business – Page 2 – Engineering Radio

A little story about my local newspaper

So, the other day I was in the convenience store near my house. I had not picked up a copy of the local newspaper in quite some time, so I looked around for one. I couldn’t find it anywhere so I asked the checkout clerk, who looked at me rather deadpan and said “They went under about a year ago.”

What? I hadn’t even noticed my own local paper was gone, for a year.

A quick Google search and I found a notice on their website saying that the newspaper was no longer published and a blog entry from a former reporter summing up the end of the newspaper.

Sadly, the Millbrook Round Table was just one of scores of local newspapers forced to close down, because the holding company of many of them, Journal Register Co., defaulted on loans and was de-listed from the New York Stock Exchange. However, despite the sympathy I feel for all of those reporters, editors, photographers, graphic designers, proofreaders, ad salespeople and delivery people, no one can say we didn’t see this coming. The truth is, newspapers have been an antiquated technology, and try as they might, they haven’t been able to find a new business model that would enable them to be profitable in the post-paper world of instant, online publishing.

Sound even vaguely familiar? All of the small local newspapers are bought up by a big consolidator, who then defaults and cuts costs. Caught behind the technology curve, unable to make up the lost ground, local institutions that have been in place for more than a century fold and disappear in the wink of an eye, sometimes completely unnoticed.

Sadly, I will say that the radio business seems to be on the same trajectory.

Book Review: Fighting for Air

I just finished reading Fighting for Air by Eric Klinenberg. It is a good book and a great description of what has happened to radio since the major consolidations occurred in 1999 and 2000. Depressing. Just damn depressing is what it is.

The book chronicles the evolution of the Prophet System and how that system was used to replace entire radio station air staff. It discusses the various failures that radio has produced as a result of automated programming, the complete lack of originality, public safety issues, and how major media companies have stripped the heart and soul out of radio.

Something that the book points out that I never really considered, every one of these unoriginal canned music stations diminishes all radio by some increment. For those that think the Clear Channels, Cumulus, and Citadels are only harming themselves, think again. People who get fed up with radio and buy an I-pod are excluding all radio stations from then on. That is another degree of audience lost to a competing medium.

Having worked for one of the smaller group owners since 1999, one that rarely if ever appears on anyone’s radar, I can say I have seen some minor shades of what has happened with Clear Channel in the company I work for. I think everyone who works in radio has seen some of this in one form or another no matter who they work for.

Radio has never been the most stable of employers. Even in the early days, people moved in and out of radio stations, sometimes taking a job with the competitor across town and sometimes moving across the country. It was understood that sometimes changes needed to be made, sometimes people had to be let go. It was a part of the landscape. The difference is in the post-consolidation radio environment, people are leaving radio altogether, replaced by a mindless computer programmed from afar.

During my time as a radio engineer, I have installed a few of these computer automation systems. I think the first one was in 1993 on an AM station doing all news. We used it for the overnight hours, replacing some minimum wage board operators. The general manager was shocked and a little bit in awe of how well the system worked.

This trend continued in 1994, when I installed a BE Audiovault system at an AM/FM combo. There again, the system replaced an overnight board operator on the AM station. Later, the FM station did a sort of mini-mation where the overnight news guy checked on it every 45-50 minutes. Those stations are now completely voice-tracked and or satellite syndicated.

Through the 90s, I installed first-generation computer-based automation systems mostly on AM stations. Things like Digilink, DCS, ENCO, etc.

In other markets, an automation system was used to resurrect a couple of FM stations, starting out voice-tracked, then adding live bodies to fill in day parts, usually having the 6 pm to 6 am time slot voice-tracked. Having three-day parts live is better than none I suppose.

The AM stations in my market cluster now are running some awful syndicated satellite news/talk programming. Why are these stations even on the air? They should be sold to someone who will operate them locally, or turn their licenses in.

For whatever role I have played in ruining radio, I am sorry for it.

It is a good book, I recommend anybody that works in the radio business read it.

Local Community Radio Act (HR 1147/S 592)

I sent off a letter to my Senators and Congressman this morning regarding HR 1147/S 592 AKA Local Community Radio Act. Basically, I am against this. Not that I don’t appreciate what it is trying to accomplish. I believe the technical degradation of the FM band is a higher concern. After all, if we turn the FM band into what the AM band has become, nobody will listen to the radio.

Radio is too important to ruin. Here is what I wrote:

I strongly urge you NOT to support the bipartisan Local Community Radio Act (HR 1147/ S. 592) sponsored by Reps. Mike Doyle and Lee Terry and Sens. Maria Cantwell and John McCain.

In spite of what many have said, Low Power FM (LPFM) contributes to the technical degradation of the FM service. By adding more and more signals covering every possible spot in the FM spectrum, the noise floor is raised causing many FM receivers to “picket fence” which is annoying to most listeners.

Radio has suffered enough degradation over the last few decades. AM radio is now so fraught with interference, especially at night, most people do not even consider listening to it. Packing the FM dial with thousands of low power operators will create the same problems and cause most people to abandon radio altogether.

I am a strong proponent of 1st amendment rights. I believe the sponsors of this bill are well intentioned, however misinformed. I believe that the deregulation of commercial radio allowing one company to own 1,200 radio licenses has created most of the problems we see today.

Clear Channel, in particular, has removed almost all localism from radio, creating bland canned music channels. Their modus operandi was to buy a group of radio stations in a market, combine the stations under one roof, get rid of most of the staff, and drop the advertising rates so other local stations could not compete. Non-Clear Channel stations were then forced to make cuts in there advertising rates and or expenses to stay in business.

The answer is not to create a bigger mess. Instead:

1. Push the FCC to tighten ownership rules. In some ways the horse is already out of the barn, but it would prevent another Clear Channel from forming in the future.
2. If major radio groups go bankrupt and are broken up, allow it to happen, do not intervene. This will allow real radio broadcasters to pick up the pieces and put something together. Perhaps investigate supporting small radio owners by waiving FCC fees and limited tax breaks for a period of time.
3. Push the FCC to continue with the localism hearings they were conducting.
4. Push the FCC to update the EAS and make a workable Emergency Alert System in the US.

Radio is too important a resource to have it ruined. Of all the media outlets, radio is the most robust. During an emergency often times the utility grid is down. Many radio stations have backup power generators and can provide vital information when the internet, phone system, cable TV network, cellphone system, e-mail, etc are down.

Radio can provide local government important mass access to their constituents during elections and at other important times. Radio is free, there are no subscription fees, no service providers, etc. Almost everyone owns a radio, most people own several.

Small savvy radio owners can make a go of it, provided the deck is not stacked against them.

Please DO NOT support the Local Community Radio Act. Thank you.

If you want to get involved, you can go to the Free Press website, there you will find a link to a “Take Action” page (not sure that link will work). Again, I am not opposed to Free Press or even Free Radio. Packing the FM spectrum with LPFM, translators and the like will only create reception problems. This is just become another reason for people not to listen to radio.

More failure, please…

Sounds kind of silly, but in some cases, failure is good. Companies that are inefficient, poorly run, poorly conceived, have substandard products, do not serve their clients, and so on should be able to fail. This allows good companies, that do things right, to thrive.

Too big to fail is too big and those companies should be broken up. This holds true in the radio business as well as the banking industry, the auto industry, and so on. What is truly unfortunate is that the people most responsible for the failure, the upper management, and CEOs, often get away with millions while the people who had their back into it get to go to the unemployment office.

That being said, radio is in for some drastic changes soon.

NO BAILOUTS FOR RADIO

Enough already with the bailouts. Radio is not some precious national resource, it does not function for the betterment of society, nor does it provide vital information in the time of emergency. It stopped doing those things years ago when deregulation kicked in, deregulation which was lobbied for extensively by the NAB (National Association of Broadcasters) at the behest of radio and tv station owners, by the way.

Once deregulation took effect, station management went on a hunt for pennies, often tripping over dollars to get them. Through staff reductions and cost cutting, the product was deluded and the medium was marginalized and that is where we are today.

Not everyone followed the above narrative, there are some operators who stuck to the framework of public/customer service and kept good programming on the air. Those stations are few and far between but they are out there. Why should they not reap the benefits of their forward thinking?