Long gone are days when people would gather around the small family radio to hear the latest of what was going on in their country and outside. Radio was a precious possession. Fast forward to 2020 and today everyone could be a ‘radio or TV station.’ When the Ministry of Health wants to release the latest update on COVID-19 they do not have to call journalists to converge in one place, instead they post it on social media where we all have access. We are at the point where even journalists will sit tight waiting for the post as opposed to keeping fingers crossed for the scoop. Government departments and private entities no longer operate like that. In the US there was a time few would know of a white house media conference until the story filed by a certain media house was running. Today President Trump tells you way ahead that he is going to have a press conference, and when the time comes, you can watch this live on White House social media pages, then later maybe tune to TV to catch an analyst or better yet follow the social media page of your favourite analyst. The dissemination and consumption of news and information totally changed. Thanks to technology news reporters do not sit there and wait to go back to the office to file a story, we all keep each other updated per second. That is a great thing but a huge challenge for mainstream media and any traditional form of doing business. Musicians used to visit radio stations and plead with presenters to play their music, but present times dictate for a super presence on social media because once you drop your latest hit and your followers spot it, the radios have no choice but to find the song wherever it is. Such revolution prompts us to constantly look for ways to evolve. The reality of how things have transitioned leaves many competing with the new trends, during the partial lockdown many used home delivery services, while we emerge from it, business is going to be hard for he that wants to sit in a mall and sip juice; there is a likelihood of customers not going back. The many days of goods being delivered to them conveniently have gotten them used to it. Salon owners might lose out too because now their employees know it is possible to plait one from their home and there will be no turning back because I mean, if one can work on someone’s hair and keep all the money, why go to a job where for every head they work on the money will be distributed among many? Times have changed, the signs could have been there but we ignored them and continued to do things as we were used to them, as the saying goes ‘if it is not broken why fix it?’. Well, if you don’t change then change will change you the hard headed one!
