Multiple program burst broadcast

In an on-demand radio broadcast system in which the receivers have the capability to store received programs, a communications channel is divided into a plurality of time segments. Each time segment is partitioned into a high priority program timeslice and a low priority program timeslice. High priority programs are broadcast in each high priority program timeslice. The remaining programs are broadcast during a plurality of low priority program timeslices. This overcomes a problem of the receivers being out of contact and not having current versions of the high priority programs.