The College Radio Zone

Consulting in the Digital Age

jsadsinger — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 18:01:54 +0000

Social Business Consulting Group (Sobizco) Logo (Photo credit: wendysoucie)

Radio consulting has always been an interesting paradigm. DJ’s hate it, radio station live and die by it, program directors take credit for it (or blame the results on it). Consulting does not come cheap either. If it works you’re a genius for hiring them, if it doesn’t you may be looking for a job or the station could be looking for a new format. With all of the digital advancements, opportunities and potential advantages that the social networking offers to businesses it seems fitting that a new opportunity presents itself with digital consulting. Who knows? With the knowledge college students already have with this medium, perhaps there’s opportunities waiting for you. Read More…

Radio’s Road to Technological Survival

jsadsinger — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 17:15:08 +0000

Radio Transmission Towers Atop Mt. Wilson (Photo credit: FastLizard4)

It seems strange that radio, once a technological leader, now finds itself playing catch up with Internet radio. As the Internet seems to edge ever closer to finding it’s way into your car (without the use of smart phones) terrestrial radio continues to wrestle with ways to compete for your ears. They are still scratching their heads with what to do with HD radio, a platform that was designed to compete against satellite radio but, so far, hasn’t delivered the punch they hoped it would bring. If radio is to thrive in this bold new techno world they must find a way to adapt from the “business as usual’ platform. Right now, radio is still the clear leader in your car, even with the advances we all know about. The question is what will happen to AM/FM radio when you can tune in Pandora, I Heart radio, Spotify, and millions of other choices, without the use of a smart phone? Read More

The Internet is hurting radio’s star (mysanantonio.com)
Kelly Music Research Asks ‘How Important Is FM In The Dashboard?’ (allaccess.com)
Cool In-car Technology & Electronics are in High Demand (toyota.com)
The Future Of Radio In The Car Discussion Makes It To USA Today (allaccess.com)
Clear Channel Attacks Pandora and Sirius XM (dailyfinance.com)
Jay Allen Says There’s Plenty of Reasons to Believe Radio Will Survive (herculodge.typepad.com)
Auto Manufacturers Tell Radio Stations to get it’s Shit Together (blatherwatch.blogs.com)
Goodbye, old-fashioned radio (jimromenesko.com)

College Station Of The Year Awarded to BU’s WTBU

jsadsinger — Fri, 25 Jan 2013 18:55:00 +0000

wtbu on air now! (Photo credit: baratunde)

Just like commercial radio, all college stations are run differently. Some have better equipment, some have more staff, some have bigger budgets, some are on FM, some are Internet only. But no matter what the differences are, in each case, there is a common thread. Learning the craft and smoothing out radio skills and preparing for a career that is either in the business or related, in some way, to it, a goal for most everyone. Making it all come together and getting recognition for the hard work is, of course, icing on the cake. So what does it take to get there? This years college station of the year award winner, Boston University’s WTBU, explains what they do, daily, to make it happen. As I congratulate everyone at WTBU I would like to add that, perhaps, after reading the article and getting some ideas from it, next year might be your station we are congratulating. Read More…

All Request Smart Phone App. Is This The End of D.J’s?

jsadsinger — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:46:48 +0000

Technology has always been a huge part of radio. After all that’s what radio really is. Digital audio production put manufacturers of reel to reel tape decks out of business ( for the most part) as well as the makers of recording tape. Automation systems allow stations to use technology to keep their “live DJ sound” without a DJ. Now a new app for smart phones threatens to remove DJ’s from music station - entirely. Is this where radio is heading? Read More…

Is Personalized Radio Coming Directly to Your Car Radio?

jsadsinger — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 17:13:12 +0000

Tom Conrad (Photo credit: Thomas Hawk)

Pandora has a mission. They want to get into everyone’s car radio. Is this technically possible?

If so what impact would it have on commercial radio? This article explores the possibilities and realities (along with a video interview with Pandora’s CTO Tom Conrad) Read More…

Pandora Radio integrates with Chrysler’s Uconnect Access, now partnered with 20 US automotive brands (thenextweb.com)
Pandora CTO Tom Conrad On Bringing Personalized Radio To Automobiles Everywhere (techcrunch.com)
Sometimes Goodbye is Necessary to Really Live Life (beingabeautifulmess.wordpress.com)
Online radio will start serving ads based on your web browsing (paidcontent.org)
Pandora Announces December 2012 Audience Metrics; Adds Intergration With Chrysler (allaccess.com)
Pandora Reaches More Devices, Cars, and Ears in 2012 (socialtimes.com)
#Pandora Slays! Top 5 Pandora Stations: Classic R&B Soul (kyiramonique.com)
Analysis: In battle for the car, Sirius faces fight from Pandora (scooprocket.com)
Pandora pumps up the volume on its automotive strategy with new Chrysler deal (venturebeat.com)
More On Radio’s Strengths Vs Pandora’s Weaknesses (aoprep.blogspot.com)

FM Chip on Smart Phones

jsadsinger — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 16:56:51 +0000

For a while now, broadcasters have been lobbying for smart phone manufactures to add the FM chip so that anyone with a smart phone could access their favorite radio station. It seems that the addition of the “FM chip” is now about to become a reality. Two questions come to mind for me. First…is it as important to users of smart phones as it seems to be for broadcasters? The second, and most important question for the broadcasters is will this help in the ever important ratings game? Read More…

A Good Deal For FM (audio4cast.com)
Sprint goes back to the future with FM on smartphones (bizjournals.com)
Sprint customers to enjoy local FM radio on smartphones via FM radio chip (virtual-strategy.com)
FM Radio Coming to Smartphones on Sprint (blogs.wsj.com)
Sprint plans on offering FM tuners on majority of smartphones over the next three years (pocketables.com)
Broadcom Intros Combo Radio Chip with NFC (phonescoop.com)

Is This HD Radio’s Break Out Year?

jsadsinger — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 21:16:16 +0000

The HD radio story is really Déjà vu all over again. Depending on who you talk to within the radio industry HD radio will either finally become more of a standard in car and home radios or it’s doomed to crash and burn. Looking back at the evolution of FM radio and comparing HD radio with it there are many similarities that connect the 2 mediums. FM receivers were expensive, in limited supply, and most people didn’t know about the rock movement that was happening on FM. People simply didn’t know what they were missing. Slowly, at first, some became aware of the better signal and the quality (and quantity) of music that FM offered but there was still the cost factor. Enter the FM tuner. While it did not allow listeners a better sound quality than AM, it did provide a better listening experience with FM programming. Less commercials, less repetition, low cost, and so the transformation to FM began. The migration to FM took about 4 years or more but ultimately FM became the standard we all know an love. If history is to repeat itself then this could be the year for HD radio to take it’s rightful place in broadcast history. According to the most recent article I found on the Internet this should be a big year for HD radio but will FM eventually be replaced by HD the way FM replaced AM as the signal of choice? Read More…

Lexus and Toyota First In Industry To Launch Integrated HD Radio™ Technology For Audio Entertainment and Traffic & Data Delivery (virtual-strategy.com)
Emmis Preparing NextRadioT For Smartphone Introduction In 2013 (allaccess.com)

The Radio Ratings Game

jsadsinger — Wed, 02 Jan 2013 19:59:40 +0000

Can I just tell Arbitron I’m on Pandora & my iPhone? Radio ratings diary (Photo credit: thinkjose)

Back in the day radio stations would get information on how many listeners they had based on what was known as “The Arbitron Diary” or The Book. It was a booklet that a select number of area listeners were sent (randomly chosen) and asked to log their daily/hourly listening habits. For their effort they were paid a couple of dollars to do this…that’s right one to two bucks…to help a multi million dollar company count “who” was listening to “what” based on a couple of thousand listeners listening habits. The reason this was so very important is that “ratings” or who has the most listeners (in specific gender & age groups) get the lions share of advertising dollars for the privilege to advertise on that stations airwaves.

The problem with this system is that, while it started out to be fun for the diary holder, it got boring-quickly, time consuming, tedious and, let’s not forget the 1-2 dollars for the effort… hardly motivational money. So accuracy was difficult to determine. What would you do if you were chosen? Probably what many typically did. Listeners with diarys would, in cases, simply fill them out at the end of the time period they were asked to participate in the survey (useually 2 weeks- a month) and what they would fill in may not be an accurate account of what they actually listened to so some stations may not have received the representation in “the diary” they deserved. Often the diary would be filled in at the last possible moment with the listeners favorite station (even if they hadn’t actually listened to it) or, if they didn’t have a favorite station, they would put in the last “top of mind” station call letters they remembered. Everyone associated with radio knows this was the way this game was played and though no one liked it…it was the accepted way of doing business. While technology has helped to change the way listeners are now measured there are still some bugs that need to be worked out. The question still being asked within the indusrty is “has technology resolved unfair ratings? “ Read More

Improved listener measurements change the game in St. Louis radio market (stltoday.com)
Media Decoder Blog: Arbitron Deal Extends Nielsen’s Reach Into Consumer Habits (mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com)
Nielsen buys Arbitron for $1 billion (hotair.com)

College Broadcasting Inc. Convention Addresses College Radio Concerns

jsadsinger — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 20:28:38 +0000

Broadcasting students work in control room (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Whether you’re passion is directed toward radio, television, web casting or other related media, College Broadcasting Inc. is a name you should be familiar with. Attend a CBI Convention and prepare to walk away with more than enough information to empower your station to thrive. From networking with media professionals to sharing ideas with peers, who, like you, have fallin in love with media, the convention is excitiing and rewarding on so many levels that it’s impossible to cover all the opportunities in this article. If you have not yet attended a CBI convention you really should find a way to make it next time. This years convention topics are discussed within the following Radio World article. Read More

LPFM Opportunities…Finally A Reality

jsadsinger — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 17:28:15 +0000

If you have been following the L.P.F.M. (Low Power FM) story you will have noticed a long, uphill battle, to give more radio control to local communities has been achieved. This was a monumental fight filled with politics, frustration and lots of passion. Last week The FCC cleared the way for many stations (perhaps even yours) to apply for an L.P.F.M. license. The date to apply f is still pending (stay tuned) but none of this would have been possible without the hard work and dedication of a company called Prometheus These grass roots, local radio heroes are dedicated and driven to help bring community radio into more communities and we, who are interested in pursuing this for our Internet only stations owe them a debt of gratitude! Three cheers for the Prometheus Radio

Read More

Logo for KZFR Community Radio 90.1 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Rep. Mike Doyle: Big Changes on the FM Dial: FCC Okays More Community Radio Stations (huffingtonpost.com)
FCC Meeting Today On Translator/LPFM Changes (allaccess.com)
Radio, Not the Internet, Might Be The Future of Local News (theatlanticcities.com)
FCC order enables creation of thousands of new non-commercial local radio stations (theverge.com)
Local Radio Should Be Local! by UCC OC, Inc. (socialactions.net)
FCC Approves Translator/LPFM Changes (allaccess.com)
FCC Opens FM Stations to Community Groups (theroot.com)

The College Radio Zone

Consulting in the Digital Age

Radio’s Road to Technological Survival

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College Station Of The Year Awarded to BU’s WTBU

All Request Smart Phone App. Is This The End of D.J’s?

Is Personalized Radio Coming Directly to Your Car Radio?

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FM Chip on Smart Phones

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