argument235 [Spring小组第十三次作业]

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The general manager of KNOW radio station suggests to shift its program from rock-and-roll music to continuous news. To bolster the suggestion, the author several facts including the increase number of older people in their area, the decline of total number of their listeners and the decline of sales of recorded music. The author also points out that people are interested in politics by the success of neighboring cities’ continuous new station. However, these facts based on the author’s assumption undermine the article’s points for several reasons as follows.

Firstly, the author unfairly assumes that old people are not fond of rock-and-roll without given any evidence. As we all know that rock-and-roll is popular during the 50’s when today’s old people are just on their youth. It is probably that they have more crash on R&B than today’s youth since those songs can recall their days when they were still young. Hence the increase number of old people helps to improve the rate of listening to the radio program.

Secondly, the author simply attributes the decline of their listener to the R&B program. The total number of listeners is determined by all the programs provided by the KNOW station. It is likely that the R&B program is very popular among the listeners while other program is not, which results in the decline of total listeners. Or perhaps other stations supply much more interesting program that listener would rather listen to their programs. Without providing enough information the author cannot convince us that the decline is the R&B program’s fault.

Thirdly, the author also blames the R&B program for the decline sales of recorded music in local area. On one hand, common sense tells us that variety of situations would cause the decline. Especially with the development of network, most music is provided free on line and we can download it conveniently and save some money comparing with buying recorded music. On another hand, the decline sale of recorded music might means that the popularity of the R&B program since people would rather listen to the program on the air.

What’s more, the success of neighboring city’s continuous news station does not equal to the success of KNOW station if we do adopt the policy shifting from the R&B program to continuous news. It is possible that listeners are used to the continuous program provided by neighboring city’s station and the total listener number of KNOW station will decline when we put it into practice.

Finally, the survey taken before the recent election cannot convince us that people are getting more and more interested in politics because of the time of survey taken. It is not weird that people pay attention to continuous news, but after the period they probably lose their interests.

In sum, the facts provided by the author are base on author’s unfairly assumptions, which leads to undermine the author’s suggestion. To bolster the suggestion, the author should supply us with more evidence that old people do not like R&B and the program decrease the number of total listeners and the sales of recorded music. The author should also ensure us that by adopting the policy the KNOW station would increase their listeners and other study taken in other time.