These Ocean County Teens Could be the Future of Radio [Audio]

This story started simply enough - a young fan on our Facebook page sent us a message telling us how much he loves radio, wants to be on the air someday, and that he's written to other stations before and nobody has ever bothered to respond. Honestly, that bothered me. What does it take, a minute just to write back? So I wrote a quick response basically saying thanks for the email, keep up the hard work and good luck.

I think the reason that it really caught my attention was the fact that I was this kid 20 years ago. I was enchanted by radio and I used to call up the local station and bug the DJ. When I was in middle school, I had to do a report on a career and I chose radio. The DJ that I always called was nice enough to chat with me and help me out with my report.

We've actually kept in touch over the years, and she's seen me go from a kid who used to tape his favorite songs through his mom's stereo system and talk about them with a Radio Shack microphone, to an on-air talent, programmer, and voiceover artist.

So I didn't think twice about responding to our young fan, Mark Anthony from Bayville. In fact I kind of saw it as paying it forward.

Mark and I chit chatted a bit over email and he told me about his online broadcasting and how he loves the business. I saw a great opportunity, not only to help fire up his interest, but also to get his story out there to Ocean County. So I invited Mark and his broadcast partner Matt Ehrhardt for a tour of our Toms River studios.

They stopped by yesterday, I gave them a tour of our brand new facility, and we chatted a bit about what they're doing and their hopes for the future. Take a listen to our conversation: