454 | nº 38, pp. 453-479 |January-June of 2024The impact of Spanish university radio stations that operate on iVoox (2011-2021): presence, number of plays...ISSN: 1696-019X / e-ISSN: 2386-3978doxa.comunicación1. IntroductionWe are currently immersed in the third phase of podcasting, which is known as “big podcasting” (Quah, 2019), or the “audication era” (Espinosa de los Monteros, 2020). is is a period in which the dissemination of sound content in the form of podcasts has reached the pinnacle of its development in terms of formats, production and, above all, its success with the audience. is has been stated by Terol et al. (2021) in their analysis of these platforms in the Spanish-speaking market, further adding that 20 years after the birth of the podcast, “we are witnessing an unrelenting expansion of audio in an ecosystem where traditional industry players, digital native projects, and technology companies with a global presence are competing” (2021:476).e rise of podcasting has caused a disruptive change that has forced a reaction by the old players, who have been forced to take immediate action in order to harness the opportunities oered by the new medium, as well as to compete with formidable newcomers in the audio content market. Among these traditional players is university radio, whose origins in Spain can be traced back to before the digital expansion at the end of the 20th century, with the launch of the rst eight ventures (Martín Pena, 2013). Over the last ten years, the university radio sector has undergone profound changes in many aspects: the production of content, the way it is disseminated, and its relationship with audiences, among others. ese global changes have been reected in a timely manner by academic thought in this area of broadcasting. For example, Marta Lazo et al. (2021) has examined the role of university radio as an educational project in the digital environment. Other researchers have explored the opportunities oered by the new media for the dissemination of science (Contreras Pulido and Parejo Cuéllar, 2013). Still others have taken a more specic approach in examining how the new formats aect programming, which has been a key focus of academic reection in the last two decades, and something that we will examine in greater depth in this study.Among other reasons, the interest in university radio programming is justied by its potential connection with the purposes of these university actors. Academic research aimed at university radio in Spain has established public service as the core of its mission (Aguaded and Contreras, 2011a:409). us, university broadcasters should not limit themselves to being closed laboratories, or simply “intramural” radio, and should aspire to reach beyond the university community. ey must have an audio content of these stations, which has led the broadcasters to meticulously maintain their presence on this platform by separating the content into various channels and programmes, adding specic descriptions, and tagging their audios. Moreover, a group of broadcasters that continually appears on the platform with a higher level of programme production has also been identied, which has a strong impact as well. Finally, it has been noted that the more topic-oriented programmes of these broadcasters, especially those focusing on cultural dissemination, have a greater impact on this channel.Keywords: University radio; podcasting; big data; iVoox; listeners; social impact; universities.sonoros de estas emisoras, que justica que la mayoría de ellas hayan cuidado su presencia en la herramienta, separando los contenidos en diferentes canales y programas, añadiendo descripciones especícas y etiquetando los audios. Además, se identica un grupo de emisoras con aparición continuada en la plataforma y mayor producción de programas, que también obtienen mayor impacto. Por último, se indi-ca que los programas de estas emisoras más centrados temáticamente, especialmente los que se jan en la divulgación cultural, tienen un ma-yor impacto en este canal.Palabras clave: Radio universitaria; podcasting; big data; iVoox; oyentes; impacto so-cial; universidades. doxa.comunicación | nº 38, pp. 453-479 January-June of 2024Ignacio de Lorenzo Rodríguez and Eva Lus GarateISSN: 1696-019X / e-ISSN: 2386-3978| 455impact. As stated by De Lorenzo as far back as 2011, we cannot forget that university radio stations are media, rst and foremost, so their main work instrument is radio programmes. us, the public service aspect advocated by Aguaded and Contreras is essentially achieved through the radio programmes produced: broadcasters educate and disseminate culture through them; students are trained as future professionals by producing programmes; and nally, the broadcast becomes the starting point for interacting with audiences. In any case, in order for university radio stations to full their objectives and make an impact, they must rst ensure that people listen to their programmes (Aguaded and Contreras, 2011b:6).However, until the present time the study of university radio programming has been limited by the diculty of making the transition from analysing programmes (genre, topic, duration, student participation, etc.) to examining their impact. e rst factor impeding this transition is the diculty of quantifying the impact of a university radio station’s programming. For years, research on university radio stations in Spain has been more concerned with the ways in which they have an impact than with specifying the results of their activity with gures. us, in the early stages, researchers considered the legal acknowledgement of these broadcasters as the main way for them to make an impact, or as an impediment if legal recognition did not exist. Obtaining FM broadcasting licences was seen as the most direct and clearest way out of the amateur broadcasting quagmire. e licence was the “real Gordian knot” of the future of university radio, according to Ortiz Sobrino, “which would determine its survival and, above all, its social impact” (2018:15). Who would have thought that the digital revolution, often seen as a threat to the industry, would be the Alexandrian sword that would break the licence constraint? Marta Lazo et al. make the following assessment:“e migration of university radio stations to the Internet has put an end to the problems described above [...] and it oers not only legal coverage, but also the economic and operational exibility denied to radio broadcasters by FM. Broadcasting on the Internet has a much lower cost, is more exible, and is simpler than conventional broadcasting” (Marta Lazo et al., 2021: 156).anks to podcasting, university broadcasters were no longer so dependent on the FM antenna, and could reach generations who used Spotify, iVoox, and Apple podcast on their mobile phones more than the conventional radio app (Miller, 2017: vi and vii). Spanish university radio stations had already been pioneers in experimenting with these new channels since their origins (Fidalgo, 2012), yet among all the digital tools available, iVoox became one of the main ways for university radio stations to disseminate content. Moreover, in many cases it became their main broadcasting channel. Marta Lazo et al. (2021:158) have reported that out of 32 broadcasters in their study, 20 used iVoox as a tool for storing and disseminating audio content. Since its launch in 2011, iVoox has oered broadcasters a way to play their content, not only on the iVoox platform or mobile app, but also through the iVoox widget on their own websites. Just two years after being founded, iVoox was already a major channel of dissemination by university radio stations, given that 54% of them had already had a channel on the platform, while their presence on other online sites was much lower, such as iTunes (13%), Spotify and SoundCloud, on which they were not present (Martín Pena et al., 2023:264). ese gures for the rapid expansion of podcasting contrast with the fact that it was not until 2019 that Apple started to replace iTunes with Apple podcast. Moreover, in this same year Spotify made a full commitment to this format by acquiring Gimlet Media and Anchor.iVoox, which is the true “Iberian exception” to this market, promotes itself as the leading Spanish-language podcast and radio platform. Although the Digital News Report 2023 (Amoedo et al., 2023:165) states that podcast consumption in Spain through 456 | nº 38, pp. 453-479 |January-June of 2024The impact of Spanish university radio stations that operate on iVoox (2011-2021): presence, number of plays...ISSN: 1696-019X / e-ISSN: 2386-3978doxa.comunicacióniVoox is on a downward trend (from 20% in 2021 to 16% in 2023), today it is the third platform in this country. Spotify (30%) and YouTube (29%) are the only platforms ahead of iVoox, followed by Google podcast (13%). All the others have less than 10%.e growth of these tools among university radio stations, which Martín Pena et al. (2023:268) have dened by the term platformisation, has far-reaching implications for these radio producers. One is specically the direct benet resulting from an increase of research into university radio programming, which is clarifying how the impact of university radio is occurring:“Consequently, platformisation is much more than a scenario. It is a fundamental part of the strategy for getting to know the audience, because it denes their practices, reveals the dynamics of production and content circulation and, most of all, because this approach allows us to observe the digital footprints left by the audience” (López et al., 2023:2, italics added by the authors).e reason for this novel development is that previous studies of university radio programmes have faced at least three challenges in gathering impact and audience data. e rst was the diculty of recording in detail, as well as encompassing the reality of sound, which by its very nature evolves over time from day to day, and from season to season. e second impediment was the local nature of university radio stations, along with their variety and number, which meant that the data was dispersed, and in many cases ephemeral. A signicant part of previous studies gathered information on the content of university radio stations by asking their directors about their programming, which was a management challenge, or by reviewing the available websites, which were not always up to date or complete. e third obstacle, possibly as a consequence of the above, is that researchers have been faced with the diculty of obtaining quantitative impact data regarding plays, likes, and comments. As university radio stations are not included in the Estudio General de Medios (EGM) [General Media Study] they do not have demoscopic information on their listeners. Moreover, until recently the sources for evaluating their own impact were indirect, and in many cases subjective.Consequently, the embracement of iVoox by university broadcasters oers an opportunity to overcome these diculties. Firstly, iVoox oers the advantage of compiling on its platform a register of the complete programming of most Spanish university radio stations. Secondly, it oers information on the number of plays, likes, and comments on all uploaded programmes. For these reasons, iVoox allows us to access the digital footprints, as indicated by López et al.As mentioned above, this research builds upon previous attempts to analyse the programming of Spanish university radio stations, all of which are useful. Although the authors do not intend to carry out an exhaustive review of such research, they would like to establish some points in common. Most previous research has concluded that this programming either is, or should be, alternative, a term that has also been used to dene the entire university broadcasting sector. According to Marta Lazo and Martín Pena (2014:16), González Conde (2000) had already mentioned university radio stations as alternative, referring to Radio Complutense, and Gallego (2007) also used the term to describe the sector. is concept has also been used outside Spain with regard to college radio stations, yet in the United States and Canada, as two examples, it focuses specically on the music that is broadcast on these stations (see Freeman 2022:352 or Desztich and McClung, 2007:199). In Spain, Aguaded and Contreras (2011b:6) were the rst to specically emphasise that, in the struggle for impact and audience share, university radio programming must do things dierently by trying to develop content and programmes that are alternative. However, the denition of this term as applied to programming, which has had some success in research literature, does not have one unique meaning: sometimes it refers to more specialised content (Aguaded and Contreras 2011b:6); in other cases, it is dened doxa.comunicación | nº 38, pp. 453-479 January-June of 2024Ignacio de Lorenzo Rodríguez and Eva Lus GarateISSN: 1696-019X / e-ISSN: 2386-3978| 457by its opposition, or complementarity, to what is produced by commercial radio or, in other words, alternative is any content that is not being produced in that eld (Espino Narváez, 2014:32); nally, alternative has been referred to more recently as programmes that are alternative because of what they achieve, as when they “assist in developing communication that is fairer and more democratic, which is at the service of citizens” (López et al. 2023:2, citing Vázquez, 2012). In any case, in his approach to Canadian college radio, Fauteux (2015) had already described the diculty of dening alternativeness in this sector.To complicate matters even further, according to Álvarez Villa and Ramírez Queralt (2005), alternative does not necessarily mean experimental. us, although these authors describe university radio as alternative, they found only a slight presence of experimental formats and content in university radio programming. Moreover, they found that creativity in university radio was limited to music or ction.In short, the eort to distinguish themselves from the commercial sector would require specic content more closely linked to culture, university information, and the dissemination of science. According to Perona (2012), the programmes that were becoming more prevalent on university radio focused on social aspects (equality, solidarity, and human rights), as well as scientic research, cinema, new technology, employment, travel, and book reviews. Music and its dissemination have also played a prominent role in the programming of Spanish university radio stations. Moreover, Martín Pena and Piñeiro (2020:201) argue that the programming of university stations has a strong edu-communicational and didactic aspect, which is especially aimed at future communication professionals.Another novelty provided by university radio programming does not refer to the topics, but to the format, which is the so-called mini magazine. As pointed out by Perona (2012), this type of programme combines various sub-genres such as interviews, talk shows, news, and debates into a relatively short time space. According to this author, the mini magazine is “one of the methods for transmitting content that is most highly valued by university radio stations” (2012:44). e short time frames that comprise the mini magazines can also become independent within university radio through micro spaces, which are not exclusive to the sector. ese types of short, independent sound programmes, which are often interspersed in blocks of music, could be considered an optimal tool in the search for both quality based on original content developed with more care and its dissemination in social media, as well as for innovative teaching (De Lorenzo, 2012).us, based on these premises in relation to university radio programming, this paper explores the way in which iVoox has been embraced by these Spanish sound producers, how it is reected in their programmes, and the impact obtained in the process. With the use of big data techniques, this approach will allow us not only to acquire the necessary techniques for an analysis based on iVoox data, but also to draw conclusions that can be extrapolated outside the eld of university radio stations. iVooxoers the opportunity for the authors of this paper to conrm their ndings in relation to the previous programming aspects based on objective indicators and a comprehensive approach.2. Methodologye rst step was to dene the research questions of this study and associate them with specic indicators that could be obtained from the iVoox platform, which are as follows: 458 | nº 38, pp. 453-479 |January-June of 2024The impact of Spanish university radio stations that operate on iVoox (2011-2021): presence, number of plays...ISSN: 1696-019X / e-ISSN: 2386-3978doxa.comunicaciónTable 1. Research questions and indicators used for the analysisResearch questionIndicators used1. How has iVoox been embraced by Spanish university radio stations?1. Percentage of use of the platform among university broadcasters2. Distribution of utilisation of the dierent broadcasting formats oered by iVoox: opening a channel or using the widget integrated into the website3. Use of other alternative or complementary platfor-ms2. How is the programming uploaded to iVoox by Spanish university radio stations?1. Evolution of loaded programming: number of program-mes and hours2. Grouping of broadcasters according to programme production, hours, and evolution 3. Frequency of programme duration, especially micro spaces and mini magazines 4. Monitoring of the platform’s standard rules: a. Grouping of content into channels.b. Description of programmesc. Use of tags 3. What is the impact of university radio stations through iVoox?1. Evolution of the number of plays obtained over time by university radio stations2. Grouping of the stations according to the number of plays obtained3. Number of plays of the programme durations4. Number of plays per station5. Number of plays by categorySource: created by the authorse rst stage of the research was to review the existing literature on the programming of university radio stations which, on the one hand, provided support for the theoretical framework presented in the introduction to this paper. On the other hand, it has allowed the authors to determine the sample of radio stations to be analysed. e lists of Marta Lazo and Segura (2012) and Perona (2012) were used as a starting point to establish as complete an overview as possible of all Spanish university radio stations, which was veried by the history of university radio stations in Martín Pena et al. (2023). Firstly, 40 stations were identied. Next, the content dissemination methods used by each radio station were studied, reviewing their websites and checking whether iVoox was among their channels, or whether it was their main channel. In addition, the use of the platform’s widget on their websites was veried, which allows university stations to oer the content of their channels on iVoox without the user having to enter ivoox.com.
doxa.comunicación | nº 38, pp. 453-479 January-June of 2024Ignacio de Lorenzo Rodríguez and Eva Lus GarateISSN: 1696-019X / e-ISSN: 2386-3978| 459Of the nal number of 30 stations identied as iVoox users, two of them (Unizar and Universidad de Vigo) were removed from the list because they were channels that oered only one programme rather than their entire radio production. us, the list of iVoox radio stations for the analysis was as follows:Table 2. Spanish university radio stations analysed with a presence on iVoox 1. Europea Radio (Europea1)2. Inforadio (Inforadio)3. iradioUCAM (UCAM)4. Ondacampus (Ondacampus)5. Radio Campus Universidad la laguna (ULL)6. Radio CEU (CEU)7. Radio de la UA (UA)8. Radio UAL (UAL)9. Radio UMH (UMH)10. Radio Universidad de Navarra (Navarra)11. Radio Universidad de Salamanca (Salamanca)12. Radio Universitaria de León (León)13. Radio UOC (UOC)14. Radio UPF (UPF)15. Radio UPV (UPV)16. Radio URJC (URJC)17. Radio US (RadiUS)18. Radio UVA (UVA)19.Ràdio VOX-UJI (UJI)20. RUAH (RUAH)21. Uburadio (UBU)22. UNEATLANTICO Radio (UNE)23. UNED (UNED)24. Uniradio Huelva (UniRadio Huelva)25. Uniradio Jaén (UniRadio Jaén)26. Universidad de Loyola (Loyola)27. Universidad de Murcia (Murcia)28. UVic Ràdio (UVIC)Source: iVoox, created by the authorse second step was to extract the necessary data from the platform in order to carry out the research, which required consideration of how content is structured in that environment.Figure 1. Structure of the content on iVooxϱ͘ZĂĚŝŽ "ĂŵƉƵƐ hŶŝǀĞƌƐŝĚĂĚ ůĂ ůĂŐƵŶĂ ;h>>Ϳ ϲ͘ZĂĚŝŽ "'h ;"'hͿ ϳ͘ZĂĚŝŽ ĚĞ ůĂ h$ ;h$Ϳ ϴ͘ZĂĚŝŽ h$> ;h$>Ϳ ϵ͘ZĂĚŝŽ hD, ;hD,Ϳ ϭϬ͘ZĂĚŝŽ hŶŝǀĞƌƐŝĚĂĚ ĚĞ EĂǀĂƌƌĂ ;EĂǀĂƌƌĂͿ ϭϭ͘ZĂĚŝŽ hŶŝǀĞƌƐŝĚĂĚ ĚĞ ^ĂůĂŵĂŶĐĂ ;^ĂůĂŵĂŶĐĂͿϭϮ͘ZĂĚŝŽ hŶŝǀĞƌƐŝƚĂƌŝĂ ĚĞ >ĞſŶ ;>ĞſŶͿ ϭϯ͘ZĂĚŝŽ hK" ;hK"Ϳϭϰ͘ZĂĚŝŽ hW& ;hW&Ϳϭϵ͘ZăĚŝŽ sKyͲh:/ ;h:/Ϳ ϮϬ͘Zh$, ;Zh$,Ϳ Ϯϭ͘hďƵƌĂĚŝŽ ;h!hͿ ϮϮ͘hE'$d>$Ed/"K ZĂĚŝŽ ;hE'Ϳ Ϯϯ͘hE'% ;hE'%Ϳ Ϯϰ͘hŶŝƌĂĚŝŽ ,ƵĞůǀĂ ;hŶŝZĂĚŝŽ ,ƵĞůǀĂͿ Ϯϱ͘hŶŝƌĂĚŝŽ :ĂĠŶ ;hŶŝZĂĚŝŽ :ĂĠŶͿ Ϯϲ͘hŶŝǀĞƌƐŝĚĂĚ ĚĞ >ŽLJŽůĂ ;>ŽLJŽůĂͿ Ϯϳ͘hŶŝǀĞƌƐŝĚĂĚ ĚĞ DƵƌĐŝĂ ;DƵƌĐŝĂͿ Ϯϴ͘hsŝĐ ZăĚŝŽ ;hs/"Ϳ Source: iVoox, created by the authors The second step was to extract the necessary data from the platform in order to carry out the research, which required consideration of how content is structured in that environment.Figure 1: Structure of the content on iVooxSource: created by the authors On iVoox, a content producer groups audio files (editions) into programmes and then assembles these programmes into channels, following the diagram in Figure 1. Therefore, to identify the impact of a broadcaster, we needed to locate all the editions of the programmes that had been included in the channels, along with the data we were interested in compiling in each case. Starting with all the university radio stations identified, together with their channels on iVoox, a Python programme was created. With the aid of software packages Selenium (version 3.141) and Beautifulsoap (version 4.12), it was possible to go down the list of all the radio stations, as indicated by the arrows in the figure, through all the programmes, and ultimately find the editions published on iVoox. The following information was obtained from each of the available editions by web scraping (extracting text by using HTML):