|
and radio stations may be FORCED OFF THE AIR!! Your radios ...
|
WHY LOW POWER FM IS THE BEST THING TO EVER HAPPEN TO THE RADIO INDUSTRY
Opposing
Low Power FM (LPFM)
is a really really bad idea for broadcasters:
By Christopher Maxwell
Ex-Employee of the radio industry
Ex-volunteer for "mainstreamed" so-called "public" radio
stations
Disgruntled and talented consumer of audio programming.
The simple reason broadcasters should not oppose LPFM:
Blandness will kill the radio dial.
30% of CD sales are in music genres rarely heard on the FM dial. 20% of radio listenership is of noncommercial radio stations that are literally not counted, are deleted by the Arbitron ratings database. Talk and news radio research shows that there are more moderate and liberal listeners of news/talk ... yet most talk hosts are conservative. The current spreadsheet-driven market in radio programming severely overserves some audiences and almost totally ignores other substantial groups in America.
Technology is helping the wealthier members
of a more diverse America avoid "settling" for unsatisfying
programming choices on the FM dial:
- "Bitcasters" on the Internet such as Webactive, Palmsradio, Working Assets Radio, ZPG Radio, TheWomb, NPR and Pacifica feeds.
- Satellite Radio for cars such as Sirius and XM.
- Music Choice and DSS dish audio channels.
- Subcarrier-based subscription services that download your chosen programs to your car's radio that are stored digitally until you call them up to listen. Examples of such services are Command Audio and a variation on Cue Corporation's SCA voice-mail beepers.
- There are also now car radios that are MP3 players with a memory sufficient to store a substantial library of digital programming.
Duncan American Radio research shows that the "historically
huge" decrease of 12% in listenership over the last decade is due to "lack
of programming innovation."
If the radio industry opposes LPFM, people will continue buying the gadgets and subscriptions necessary to bypass the FM dial altogether to find that "programming innovation".
But if LPFM revives the FM dial by serving that third of America... then people will not spend the hundred$ of dollar$ to buy gadget$ that require a monthly $ub$cription.
------------------------------------------------------------
And besides, since the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) supported the continued transmission by "Grandfathered Short Spaced" stations in 1996, and since the FCC agreed; if the industry succeeds in shooting down LPFM, then the FCC will be open to a lawsuit based on unequal protection under the law and regulation.
Currently the LPFM is a weak, watered down compromise. If that is shot down, and a lawsuit then opens third and EVEN SECOND adjacent broadcasting under "equal treatment under the law" ...
Then the NAB will be faced with a dilemma they don't want:
- Shut down hundreds of their own "short spaced" stations.
- Or allow thousands upon thousands of applications for FULL POWER 30,000 and 50,000 watt third and second adjacent radio stations that will make the competition provided by LPFM look like a Mr. Microphone in the parking lot of your radio station!
Don't forget that the LPFM restricts ownership meaning that they
are NOT A THREAT TO THE FISCAL VALUE OF CURRENT FM STATION STOCK.
But a lawsuit opened set of FULL POWER second and third adjacent stations would NOT have ownership restrictions and thus would completely destroy the investment of existing FM broadcasters..
Considering what that would mean for a frustrated listener (lots of powerful competition), I almost hope that the a mislead Congress foolishly succeed with HR3439 and SB2068 that would kill the LPFM compromise offered by the FCC.
------------------------------------------------------------
Sincerely, Christopher Maxwell
Secretary/Treasurer Virginia Center for the Public Press
Radio Free Richmond Project
http://members.aol.com/wrfr
http://wrfr.pibc.com/dab/
Wrfr@aol.com
804-649-WRFR
If you want
to keep updated
SUBSCRIBE TO DAB4US-E-ZINE
(FREE)
| THANK-YOU for
contacting your Senator/Congressperson. THANK-YOU for
Thank-you for reading all this
|
| Contact
Information
for Congress HERE |
Virginia Center for the Public Press 1621 W Broad St. Richmond, Va. 23220 804-649-9737 |
 FREE
DAB4US eZine |
This site is designed to address efforts by a powerful minority to bend public policy to their aide and benefit at our expense and loss of liberty and access to the many voices of a healthy Democratic Republic.
Their Basic Plan: Force a new standard for Digital Audio
Broadcasting (IBOC-DAB) * that destroys the remaining
stations that have resisted consolidation including any new LPFM stations
that are started.
Please call your Congressmen and Senators ... make sure they know you know that you want to hear your favorite station on the radios you already own!
Lookup
Your Congressmen
and Senators
by ZIP Code HERE
Ask your Federal Representatives and Senators to send a letter to the FCC Commissioners that we must:
1) Keep the FM dial FM
(no "mandatory sunsetting" [prohibition] of affordable
analog FM broadcasting)
2) We want access to more choices in program values
and sources [stations], not less.
Tell them to tell the FCC not to force a new standard
for the FM dial for Digital Audio that will block your ability to hear
the LPFM and smaller stations.
3) Help Digital Audio find a third separate "Digital Band" just as we moved FM to a different band from AM in the 1950s.
* What is "IBOC-DAB"? ("In Band On Channel--Digital
Audio Broadcasting")
| Digital Audio Broadcasting sends the sound out coded
the same way a fax machine codes a picture, as little blocks that are "on"
or "off" (the binary language of computers and other digital devices).
In Band On Channel describes where that digital signal is placed, in this case IN the FM BAND and centered ON their original signal center location "CHANNEL" on the FM dial. If you drive up toward Washington DC and tune your radio to 106.5, then get within 20 miles of the test IBOC-DAB station, WJFK 106.7 in Alexandria, Va., you will hear a "buzz saw " sound, that is the digital carrier of the on-off-on encoded signal. |
1) Better sound (actually, less noise)
2) More robust signal (like your PCS cellphone)
3) The ability to put banner ads and weather maps or traffic wreck warning maps on a display on the radio faceplate.
Don't stare too long while driving or you're the next car wreck mapped!
There are those
who claim that your favorite station is threatened by the NEW Low Power
FM service stations
... what about that?
UPDATES:
|
|
| FREE
DAB4US eZine
Subscribe for updates or |
A
stable society
is
an inclusive
and
just
society.
Community radio is designed to encourage
a diversity of cultures represented on the airwaves
by encouraging a diversity of ownership/control.
A diversity of people and organizations
with different values and priorities
will create a more inclusive media
(and therefore government policy)
because they will have different definitions
of what is “newsworthy” and “viable”
for sharing on the public's airwaves.
Index of documents
on this web site as
well as the hundreds
of links to the outside
world.
A healthy democracy hears from everyone, not
just
the beautiful or profitable people.
WHY
doesn't the
"Almighty
Market"
Serve
Everyone?
Media is the
lifeblood
of
a
Free Society",
 
 |
"Information is the currency of democracy.",
Thomas Jefferson
You have a right in a Democratic Republic for your story to be heard
by those whose decisions affect your life ...
 |
ACTION:
What you can do to
solve the problem of
unrepresentative radio.
(Critiques)
