Why are there no real DJs on the radio now?

[Glitterbiscuits]

I was wondering why that most of the DJs now are TV presenters and the like.
Is it to bring in ratings as they are already known?
What happened to the old route of hospital radio and local radio and working your way up to the graveyard shift on national radio and hoping to be promoted to a daytime slot.
Are there still hospital radio stations?
I think radio is a special medium and it's all getting very samey.

Modern radio presenters seldom even know anything about the music they play. They just seem to press the buttons to broadcast the songs off some pre-ordained play list that they have no influence over, that are constantly repeated on a random loop.

There are literally hundreds of chart hits that simply never get played. It's all the same, even across different radio stations (and BBC are just as bad as the commercial ones).

It's virtually impossible to find any station/presenter who'll play requests or anything different. There are even some top 10 and top 5 and even number 1 hits that never get played at all.

Our local radio station, BBC radio Lancashire have recently scrapped their last "proper" request show which was something called "unforgettables" on Sunday evenings. You could email/phone for requests which they'd play within a week or two, and the presenter would also play loads of "forgotten" songs that he found himself, often chipping in with some background information, fun facts, etc. It was a really good "sit back and chill" evening. Literally anything was played, from right back to "big band" orchestras and old musicals, through to Elvis, Beatles, Olivia Newton John, Helen Reddy, Carpenters, then Abba, Elton John, Billy Joel, ELO, and even "novelty" songs and children's TV program songs - basically anything that wasn't on the "loop" for the regular stations that wouldn't be played on radio otherwise!

Our local radio station closed and was taken over by Greatest Hits (I assume a lot of regional/local stations were). I used to love that one and Century with Ditchy & Salty.

Also loved Absolute Breakfast with Christian & Ritchie, don’t like Dave Berry but Ritchie still has an afternoon slot. I don’t think there’s many regional stations left now, apart from the BBC ones.

Although I also bemoan the loss of local stations; Ken Bruce on Greatest Hits does a section called ‘Hidden Treasure’ where you can ring/email to request a song that doesn’t get enough air play. Today’s was ‘Streets of London’ by Ralph McTell.

Absolute 80s also does a ‘Forgotten 80s’ slot on Sunday evenings (I think it’s Sunday).

Apart from Emma Bunton, Ronan Keating and Amanda Holden, I can't think of anyone else who I listen to on the radio who was a 'known name' before.

I mostly listen to Radio 1 and I only know those DJs from being DJs.

Hospital radio is still around, like my local one for Bristol hospitals. But the presenters largely seem to be older retired volunteers, rather than potential "up and coming" radio presenters of the future. https://bhbsradio.com/schedule/

For radio generally it's not like the past when if you wanted to hear music you hadn't bought yourself on disc, you had to listen to a radio station and hope something you liked came up. You can listen to whatever music you want, whenever you want, without adverts, on a streaming platform or via the internet. And if you want to listen to spoken word content there are podcasts for every niche topic, and loads with celebrities or experts of your choice. So why rely on the limited BBC provision or commercial radio full of annoying adverts.

I put Classic FM on via Alexa at home for my cats, and otherwise only resort to radio in my car because it's old and I don't even have DAB in there! So it's Radio 4 or a local Greatest Hits offering if I'm trying to dodge the bloody Archers again.

My BBC local radio station has had a major reshuffle but at least managed to escape being merged with neighbouring counties during the day. It's obvious the controllers want to get a more 'youthful' audience so the cheerful afternoon lady is now presenting the breakfast show - except it's where all the major news stories get broken, so she keeps swinging from matey banter with Ian the Traffic Guy to matey banter with someone going to the high court to get justice for child victims of knife crime, etc.

Which is a shame because the previous breakfast presenters were really good at judging the morning balancing act of informing you that the Middle East is still at boiling point but don't despair because Little Piggleton Primary has set a new world record for continuous sack racing.

I used to have local radio on 10pm - 8am and weekend mornings. It's so awful now I only have it on from 6am.