[intro music]
Welcome to World Ocean Radio…
I’m Peter Neill, Founder of the World Ocean Observatory.
This marks the 750th edition of World Ocean Radio – 15 years of broadcast of this short audio feature purposed to share with a global audience technology, policy, examples of best practice, personal reflections, and solutions for how the ocean connects, sustains, inspires, and engages us in common history, traditions, sustenance, communication, community, and well-being.
750 editions. At the beginning it seemed such a simple thing – a series of bright ideas that could be succinctly shared through the magic of radio. The manager of the local community station, WERU, in Blue Hill, Maine, embraced my proposal without hesitation. My bluff was called; the concept had to become real, aural beyond the oscillation inside my brain, reformed into oscillation in the ether that every week was broadcast and heard, at the kitchen table, in the car, by my friends and neighbors.
In some ways, production was easy…because there was just SO much to be presented and discussed. But the discipline required made easy hard: each edition had to be researched, shaped, and distilled into five minutes that demanded accuracy, clarity, and thoughtfulness. What seemed simple became complicated, based on the science, the policy, the governance, and the geography of a natural system that was at once similar and distinct worldwide. It was, and remains, intimidating and humbling.
Slowly, World Ocean Radio found other broadcast stations with common perspective and interest. Through the Public Radio Exchange, the feature was added to now some 70 stations in the United States, where the audience, while strangers, share with me a fascination with how the ocean works, how it flows into all aspects our lives wherever we live.
Social media, and then the emergence of a podcast audience, followed. Suddenly, there was no limit to who might attend on platforms, that exploded into the potential of global outreach. Suddenly, World Ocean Radio could be heard in Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, New Zealand, and Hong Kong; could be available almost anywhere at any time as an astonishing, free connection to a potential audience of millions. In addition, the arrival of podcast subscription and networks amplified the audience further still until what I wrote and recorded here alongshore in Maine seemed to have no limit of connection.
750 editions. The Facebook audience grew to one million followers. The feature was heard in 118 countries, 220 cities, and every connection was received as if every word, every idea, had drifted through time and space as a message in a bottle, the thoughts of a disembodied voice, from somewhere, trying to capture the dynamic range of something at once as real, ephemeral, wide, deep, and dynamic as the ocean itself.
750 editions. One man’s musings presumptively shared with unknown millions. It’s a responsibility I had no inkling of when it all began 15 years ago. And so, today, I need to acknowledge and thank each of you, in each and every format, in each and every place; thank you for your reception, once, or weekly; and for your continuing interest; and for your commitment as a member of a growing global community of “citizens of the ocean” convened by our host organization, the World Ocean Observatory since 2010.
With regard to the future, we have the science; we have the policy; but we have not yet made manifest the national and international political will to protect the ocean for decades to come. That is the goal. World Ocean Radio is but one element in a progress of education, communication, and engagement of each one you as a member of the ocean commons, that will transform a few of us into millions, and then into millions more. Together, through the power of connection, we can succeed as a movement forward and through to an ocean recognized and engaged as a force for civilization and survival.
The sea connects all things. Thanks for listening.
We will discuss these issues, and more, in future editions of World Ocean Radio.
WORLD OCEAN RADIO IS DISTRIBUTED BY THE PUBLIC RADIO EXCHANGE AND THE PACIFICA NETWORK, FOR USE BY COLLEGE AND COMMUNITY RADIO STATIONS WORLDWIDE. FIND US WHEREVER YOU LISTEN TO PODCASTS, AND AT WORLD OCEAN OBSERVATORY DOT ORG.
[outro music]
