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TORONTO — It’s a nation where political dollars weren’t a factor in quarterly earnings growth. Yet, television segment income was up despite a dip in revenue for Canadian media company Corus.

This helped Corus achieve flat earnings per share in the fiscal first quarter of 2021, as net income only slightly decreased.

The bigger issue for the company is its radio division.

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On Thursday, new House Energy and Commerce Republican Leader Cathy McMorris Rodgers shared the names of the eight GOP Members of Congress who will be seated with her on the committee that maintains oversight of the FCC.

One day later, the Democratic leadership of the House E&C Committee unveiled the Subcommittee Chairs and Democratic Roster for the 117th Congress.

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Speaking at a virtual event hosted by Vanderbilt University Law School in Nashville, U.S. Asst. Attorney General Makan Delrahim made it known that the Department of Justice does not plan to take action on the consent decrees governing the performance royalty organizations ASCAP and BMI.

Among the first to cheer is NAB President/CEO Gordon Smith.

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It already has an active Twitter feed full of general interest news.

On Monday, it will get its broadcast TV premiere as a new entrant in one of the last ultra-competitive dayparts for television and radio — morning drive.

“The National Desk” is all set and ready for launch from Sinclair Broadcast Group.

Rather than a news magazine, “The National Desk” is described by Sinclair as “an original news program,” and is being cleared for weekday morning timeslots starting January 18 — Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day — across 68 Sinclair-owned stations.

This include all of the company’s MyNetwork TV and The CW Network affiliates, and Sinclair-owned OTT platform STIRR.

“The National Desk” is being produced by Sinclair’s WJLA-7, the ABC affiliate in Washington, D.C., once owned by the Allbritton family.

The host: Jan Jeffcoat, who has been doing dry runs posted on Twitter ahead of the channel’s launch.

Jeffcoat is nationally recognized for her stints at TEGNA-owned WUSA-9 in Washington, D.C., from 2013-2018; and for her various roles at FOX’s WFLD-TV in Chicago from 2007-2012. Jeffcoat was also anchor at KRIV-TV in Houston from November 2004-June 2007.

And, much like Nexstar’s much-publicized evening news block NewsNation, Sinclair says “The National Desk” will be “commentary-free,” with news from both a local and national perspective.

Still, some may put extra scrutiny on the Sinclair offering, given its decisively conservative tone seen in some markets with its local newscasts.

“This is an opportunity to bring national conversations back to a local level,” Jeffcoat said. “We understand the soul of the stories and communities in which we operate.”

Stories will come from Sinclair’s local news reporters, packaged as a national offering that showcases its stations while, Sinclair says, leveraging its assets.

Set to join Jeffcoat is Cayle Thompson, whose resume includes a stint as a KOMO-4 in Seattle anchor, and at WINK-11 in Fort Myers-Naples, from September 2010-September 2014. He is an Ithaca College journalism school grad who has also worked in Saginaw, Mich., and in Wichita.

Both report to SVP/News Scott Livingston.

“Stories that will be national news tomorrow are emanating from smaller local communities today,” Livingston said. “’The National Desk’ will provide Americans with the news they want to hear in a timely and accurate fashion. Our coverage
highlights stories that represent the heart of America – we’re here to provide context rather than commentary.”

Travel between Rocky Mount and Wilmington, N.C., along U.S. 258, and you’ll come across the picturesque city of Kinston, in Lenoir County.

Here, a low-powered TV station is being sold by Tutt Media Group.

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Regional broadcast systems integrator Broadcast Solutions Finland Oy kicked off the new year with a new name, Broadcast Solutions Nordic Oy.

Initially focused on Finland, the company cited the change to a growth in clients in neighboring Nordic and Baltic countries. The company will remain headquartered in Helsinki.

Broadcast Solutions Nordic Oy Managing Director Antti Laurila said, “The Broadcast Solutions Group is a globally active company … And as an integral part Broadcast Solutions Nordic offers its services to broadcasters and customers in the Nordic countries, the Baltics and beyond.”

The post Broadcast Solutions Finland Changes Name appeared first on Radio World.

For more than two decades, she made her mark as a leader with a deep understanding of the media business, establishing what AMC Networks President/CEO Josh Sapan calls her “impeccable track record driving strong financial and operational results.”

This explains why AMC’s new EVP/CFO is a figure well-remembered for her years at Showtime and ViacomCBS.

Taking the role at the home of such MVPD-distributed channels as WE tv, AMC, BBC AMERICA, IFC and SundanceTV is Christina Spade.

Spade will oversee AMC Networks’ financial operations, including treasury, tax, accounting, financial planning & analysis, as well as investor relations and global technology.

She previously held the EVP/CFO role at ViacomCBS, which followed roles as the CFO for CBS Corporation and, before that, Showtime Networks.

Spade succeeds former AMC Networks CFO Sean Sullivan, who stepped down in October 2020.

“AMC Networks has built a strong portfolio of distinct brands that are synonymous with high quality,” Spade said. “I look forward to the opportunity to work with the AMC Networks team to build on the company’s long track record of innovation and success.”

Prior to joining Showtime Networks, Spade was an audit manager with PricewaterhouseCoopers in the Entertainment, Media and Communications practice.

It’s being heralded as “a significant industry breakthrough” by ViacomCBS and DISH Media.

They’ve successfully delivered the first-ever addressable impressions within a live national broadcast via MVPD set-top box.

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What is the relationship between the number of independent local television news operations in a market and the size of the market, as measured by number of television households?

That’s a question two members of the FCC’s Office of Economics and Analytics have addressed in a 28-page “Working Paper” that concludes further consolidation is likely in markets that cannot sustain a variety of competitors.

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The controversial donation-based local broadcast TV streaming service that bills itself as a “digital translator” has entered yet another market.

This time, Locast is planting stakes in Wisconsin — a timely move for Green Bay Packers fans looking forward to viewing their next National Football League playoff match.

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The author is president of V-Soft Communications and Doug Vernier Telecommunications Consultants. This is one in a series of articles about how to get the most out of various popular broadcast products.

Lost the lease on your tower? Need to find a better channel? Can you increase power?

These are the common questions posed by FMCommander users. Here is how you can make the best of V-Soft Communications’ widely respected FM channel-study program.

Need a new tower site? Start the program and enter your station’s call sign, then click the “Compile” button to create your job file. (In this case we have used KAZY.) The program will access the V-Soft FCC database, updated daily, to find all the stations that must be protected by the reference station under the rules:

Within a few seconds the program will show you the minimum separations channel study:

Well, it looks like your station already fails the minimum separation required to KCWA. The user can see the situation graphically by opening the “Separations Mapping” screen.

The big plus mark reference site must not be inside another station’s separation circle. The radius of this circle is the Sec. 73.207 required minimum distance between stations based on their class. As you can see, the site is inside the separations circle for KCWA. This can happen if one or both stations use the Sec. 73.215 short space rules. But can the station be moved to a different tower that can satisfy the rules?

To look for usable existing towers click open the “Map Information“ window and click the bullseye icon to see the default coverage of the reference station. Any new tower location must satisfy the FCC requirement for the 70 dBu to cover at least 80 percent of the principal city to which the reference station is licensed (note that is barely the case for the now existing tower).

Click on any of the towers to move the reference station to the selected tower. For this example, we will click on the tower to the west of Cheyenne. The tower I.D. number and heights are listed immediately below the tower.

Looking at the updated main screen table, we find that that besides the overlap with KCWA, we now have another problem with KMAX-FM. Notice that, on the Main screen, KMAX-FM is now colored magenta (below). This means that the site fails to meet the minimum 73.215 short space distance to apply the required (U-to-D) contour-to-contour rules. As you can see by the maps, there are no other towers that are outside KCWA circle.

This likely means that a new tower must be built at a nearby site that would properly serve the principal city and that would not make the short space contour overlap worse. The application at such a site must show that, based on the protected and interference contours of two stations, there is no overlap that would cause interference. When the lightning bolt icon is clicked from the Map Information screen, the screen will show the contour relationship of the reference station and KCWA.

As one can see, there is no contour overlap and the site meets the 73.215 short spacing requirements. It appears that the current tower’s location is the only area that meets all the requirements.

Got a suggestion for a product you’d like to see in this series? Email radioworld@futurenet.com.

The post Tips for FMCommander Power Users appeared first on Radio World.

As first reported by RBR+TVBR on August 7, 2019, the FCC said Cumulus Media violated the terms of a Consent Decree reached in 2016 to civilly resolve a violation of the commission’s sponsorship ID rules.

The matter originally involved a New Hampshire radio station. But, two Detroit-market stations; stations in the Michigan markets of Flint and Ann Arbor; and a Macon, Ga., AM were found to make similar violations of FCC regulatory policy.

This resulted in a hefty Notice of Apparent Liability for Forfeiture. Now, despite the dissent of Democratic Commissioner Geoffrey Starks, the Commission has signed off on a forfeiture order.

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Who knows why the last couple of months have seen an explosion in broadcast/podcast microphones but enjoy the bounty.

The latest is TASCAM’s TM-70, a supercardioid pattern microphone with a dynamic element “for live broadcasting, podcasting, film dialog, and audio streaming.”

[Check Out More Products at Radio World’s Products Section]

The company lists the frequency response at 30 Hz–20 kHz.

The company said, “the TM-70 was specifically engineered to capture what it is pointed at, effectively isolating sound sources such as directional dialog. The mic’s super cardioid directivity makes it resistant to ambient noise, thus enabling users to achieve a clean, clear audio signal that results in first class speech intelligibility.”

It ships with a shockmount, six-foot mic cable and a tabletop mic stand.

Info: www.tascam.com

The post TASCAM Joins the Mic Rush appeared first on Radio World.

The author is executive director of the National Federation of Community Broadcasters. NFCB commentaries are featured regularly at www.radioworld.com.

This week, ethical breaches at the New York Times’ radio offerings came to a head. The lessons of how content and errors in judgment related to it can impact a station’s visibility in the community are matters worthy of reflection.

On Jan. 11, the Public Radio Program Directors association sent a letter to the New York Times, raising concerns from nearly 30 stations about ethical failures involving many parties. One of the Times’ recognized names, Michael Barbaro, host of “The Daily,” is at the center of the scandal.

[Read: Community Broadcaster: Making Sense of Chaos]

The Times lays out the criticisms, which include Barbaro allegedly pressuring reporters around coverage and failure to disclose his romantic relationship with Lisa Tobin, the executive producer of the now discredited “Caliphate” podcast. Andy Mills, implicated in past controversies at WNYC, is also among the names raised amid these issues.

At least one station, Houston Public Media, has dropped “The Daily,” which became a syndicated radio offering last year. Tobin, Mills and Barbaro have yet to issue their own statements, though the Times has noted Barbaro regrets some of his actions.

The signatories of PRPD’s letter take a very clear position on programming that should be instructive to every station. “[M]illions of Americans rely on our news organizations every day as one of their most trusted sources of information and we are accountable for all the programming that we provide to them,” they write. “That trust, and our responsibility in upholding that trust, is the very foundation on which we operate; it is the most important and sacred bond that ties us together. When that trust is called into question, we must respond. We must make our very best decisions about the programming we deliver and ensure it meets the high standards that our listeners expect and demand from us, while also staying committed to the standards by which our newsrooms operate.”

In brief, when programming does not live up to the trust listeners put in it, such stumbles put the station in a position where its credibility and trust as a whole are put into question. In economically challenging times, no station can really afford to have audiences feel like the outlet can’t be trusted with its programming, because that cascades into every relationship including giving.

For many years, community radio stations took a laissez faire approach to programming, believing that individual statements of paid and volunteer producers on air were up to them. Sometimes this could result in creative radio, such as the freeform radio movement of the 1970s and 1980s. At other times, it could result in broadcasting random opinion and conspiracy theories. In the last 10 years or so, however, more stations realized what larger outlets did before — the listener generally believes that the medium is responsible for what it puts on the air.

Today, it is common for community radio to ensure producers get training about what language is legally and ethically permissible. Plenty of stations still adhere to an open-ended approach that relies on producers to handle the airwaves well. Yet no station is immune from weighing out the interests of an individual producer and the station’s status in the city.

Community radio has come a long way in appreciating the art of radio requires an audience to make it magical. Trust is key to such a bond.

The post Community Broadcaster: Off-Air appeared first on Radio World.

Cumulus has failed to convince the Federal Communications Commission to reduce a $233,000 fine for violating sponsorship identification rules. The FCC also scolded the company for violating terms of a consent decree.

Broadcasters are required to disclose information about sponsors of paid-for programming. The commission decided last summer that various arms of Cumulus had aired paid programming without sponsorship ID announcements 26 times, and failed to notify the FCC about 13 of them as required by a 2016 consent decree that resolved earlier violations.

[Read: Broadcaster to Pay $125,000 as Part of Civil Penalty and Consent Decree]

Cumulus didn’t contest the findings in August but wanted the penalty reduced to the base penalty of $104,000. It said that the higher fine is excessive and argued that earlier incidents should not be used to justify a higher penalty because Cumulus had subsequently been reorganized, went through a transfer of control and now had a different board.

But in this week’s order the FCC wrote, among other things: “The respondent’s implication that it is a drastically different organization post-transfer is belied by the fact that its core senior management remained unchanged by the transfer of control.” And it stated: “The commission expects parties to honor agreements made in consent decrees, and when parties fail to do so, it is a very serious matter.”

Cumulus also had argued that its overall record of rule compliance is “as good as or better than any other large broadcaster in the industry,” that it has a “stellar” reputation, that management has focused on adherence to FCC rules, and that out of approximately 135 million ads during the three-year period covered by the consent decree, there were only two occasions of sponsorship ID noncompliance.

The commission dismissed those arguments too, saying, among other things, that it doesn’t take a company’s overall size into account as a mitigating factor. “To the contrary, if a corporate entity chooses to acquire many stations, it must ensure that it scales up its compliance efforts accordingly.”

Read the order.

The post FCC Confirms Cumulus Sponsor ID Penalty appeared first on Radio World.