Industry News

By Rob Dumke

The Alliance for Women in Media Foundation is the latest organization to institute a “COVID Change” for an upcoming in-person gathering.

The 46th Annual Gracie Awards will now be a virtual affair.

The online event is scheduled for October 5.

This year’s awards coincide with AWM’s 70th anniversary. Since its inception in 1951, AWM has been committed to inspiring, educating, celebrating accomplishments and expanding networks of women across all segments of media.

The event will be hosted by actress and comedian Lauren Ash and feature performances by Jewel and Gospel and R&B performing artist Cece Winans.

The AllWomenInMedia page on Facebook will serve as the principal viewing point for the now-virtual affair.

By Rob Dumke

A new study, authored by Ph.D. Economist Hal Singer and Ted Tatos, has examined whether large technology companies should start contributing to the agency’s $9 billion a year program that supports efforts to bridge the digital divide.

It comes following a May 2021 suggestion by one FCC Commissioner that Big Tech should start paying its fair share toward the Universal Service Fund.

Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)

Nielsen says people who only listen to podcasts every week or two are an increasingly important part of the growth of podcasting.

“Today, almost half (49%) of U.S. podcast listeners are light users who are presumably new to the medium: people who listen anywhere from one to three times a month,” the company says in highlighting results of its latest Podcasting Today report.

“That’s a notable contrast to a typical podcast listener five or 10 years ago when most listening came from people who were more likely to listen to each and every episode from their favorite titles — episodes that are oftentimes released once a week.”

Nielsen says this finding “highlights two important storylines.”

It says consumer interest in “new, engaging content” from all forms of media continues to grow, and that podcast content “has proven to be an attractive option” during the pandemic.

It also says the pandemic “paused the growth of heavy podcast listeners,” because of changes in lifestyles and schedules. “Yet while the percentage of heavy listeners declined slightly last year, we’re now seeing it increase, rising from 25% earlier this year to just under 30% as of May.”

[Read: Podcast Listeners By the Numbers]

Nielsen believes the pandemic has not had a negative impact on overall podcast engagement.

“While listener growth  flattened somewhat during the second half of last year, it has ramped up notably in 2021, largely due to an increase in at-home listening, which is attributable to light listeners checking out the medium. The rise in at-home listening is also somewhat counter to historical podcast engagement, and again, speaks to the transformation of industry to a broader audience.”

The company asserts that brands and agencies need to be tracking engagement with podcasting and putting the platform to use.

The post Podcasting Gets Boost From Casual Listeners appeared first on Radio World.

The NAB Show may have been cancelled, but industry manufacturers still have an opportunity to highlight their new products this season.

The Best in Market Awards offer a platform for the many products and solutions in the marketplace that could not be seen at major trade shows this year. The program will serve in place of the “Best of Show” Awards that would have run at the convention.

The program is open to all manufacturers of professional radio, TV and AV products and solutions, regardless of exhibitor status at major events.

The Best in Market awards will be judged and presented by Future brands Radio World, TV Technology, TVBEurope, Next, Mix, Broadcasting & Cable and Sound & Video Contractor.

These awards are intended to honor and help companies promote outstanding products launching in 2021.

The deadline for nominations also has been extended to Oct. 7. 

The post The Awards Are Still On appeared first on Radio World.

From our Who’s Buying What page: FM station WAWE in the Chicago market is using a GeoBroadcast Solutions MaxxCasting System.

The station, based in Oakbrook Terrace, Ill., is owned by Educational Media Foundation and is part of its Air1 Radio Network. GBS said management wanted to improve WAWE’s signal quality and audience.

The equipment for this synchronized-node booster system was purchased through Doug Tharp at SCMS, U.S. distributor of GatesAir/PR&E systems.

“The recently deployed enhancement improves the reach into the lower west side of Chicago in an area quite problematic for its broadcast signal troubles at the convergence of the city’s three major expressways,” GBS said in its announcement.

“The signal improvement … was strategically implemented through a four-node network using the MaxxCasting system. The coverage now reaches the University of Chicago, Rush Medical Center and the historic Pilsen community.”

It quoted EMF Senior Broadcast Engineer Shane Toven saying the station had been coverage-challenged, especially “between the Loop and O’Hare.” He said GBS designed the system for the Chicago market and that EMF worked with GBS to launch a similar one in Boston at WKVB, including HD Radio subcarriers.

“After licensing that system, GBS helped us finish up the WAWE nodes to significantly improve our coverage in the Chicago market and reach deeper into the community,” Toven said.

GBS also said that with these MaxxCasting nodes in place, the same infrastructure could be used to diplex similarly located stations that want to improve coverage. Its Director of Infrastructure Deployment Vern Egli was quoted: “The convergence at the expressway interchange notoriously has had poor reception, due to the concentration of broadcast signals emanating from Chicago’s large towers and the amount of daily automotive traffic.”

MaxxCasting uses nodes to reduce interference between main and booster FM transmissions. It deploys a cluster of high-power, directionalized and synchronized node sites.

The post EMF Deploys MaxxCasting in Chicago appeared first on Radio World.

ViacomCBS’s BET unit has formally launched BET Studios, with a pledge of offering equity ownership for Black content creators.

The principal partners are Kenya Barris, Rashida Jones and Aaron Rahsaan Thomas.

Barris is an award-winning writer, producer, and director who created the “ish” multiseries franchise (Black-ish, Grown-ish and Mixed-ish). Jones is an actress, director, writer, and filmmaker, known for her appearances on “The Office” and in the 2010 feature film “The Social Network.”

Thomas is a television, film screenwriter and producer who has worked on numerous CBS TV series.

“The demand for premium content from Black creators has accelerated dramatically as a result of both the rapidly changing media and social landscapes. BET, with our 40-year legacy of celebrating Black culture, and the full power of the ViacomCBS ecosystem—is uniquely positioned to service this demand,” said BET President Scott Mills. “As a company with its origin in Black entrepreneurship, we are incredibly excited to create the first major studio to provide Black creators with ownership, creative freedom and the unparalleled partnership and support of BET.”

BET Studios will be headed by Aisha Summers Burke, who was recently appointed EVP/GM of the new venture.

Audacy and Cumulus Media struck a content distribution partnership.

They said Cumulus’s 413 radio stations and family of podcasts will be available on the Audacy digital platform.

The announcement was made by Larry Linietsky, senior vice president of digital operations and business development and Cumulus, and Corey Podolsky, VP of business development for Audacy.

Podolsky said the addition of Cumulus radio stations “enhances and bolsters Audacy’s position as the fastest growing digital platform for radio listeners” and that Audacy “looks forward to building on this initial partnership with Cumulus.”

The Audacy app has about 2,000 stations including Audacy’s own 230 or so, plus podcasts and other programming.

The post Cumulus Stations Join Audacy App appeared first on Radio World.

Barix introduced the first in a new set of Exstreamer products, the Exstreamer M400 IP audio decoder.

It says the existing line of Exstreamer AoIP codecs are popular for radio broadcast applications including studio-to-transmitter links, studio-to-studio links and remote contribution, and that the new hardware offers a more modern, extensible version with more support for current standards.

The announcement was made by Product Manager Davide Nossa, who said the platform provides “more processing power, enhanced security features and greater extensibility, alongside expanded support for audio formats and technology standards including Opus and AES67.”

Features include stereo, line-level, analog audio output with RCA-type connections. It can decode streams in MP3, AAC-HE, FLAC, PCM, Opus and Ogg Vorbis formats.

AES67 support enables the decoder to be configured as a dedicated AES67 receiver and decoder, enabling integration into AES67-based AoIP networks and interoperability with Dante-compatible devices.

“The Exstreamer M400 incorporates the full AES67 interoperability guidelines including RTP audio delivery, multicast addressing and PTP-based synchronization with a separate master clock device,” Barix said.

“Supported discovery methods include SAP (Session Announcement Protocol), mDNS (multicast DNS) and RTSP, enabling the decoder to automatically identify and list available streams from Dante, Ravenna and other audio over IP solutions that use these protocols. SDP (Session Description Protocol) information can also be manually inserted for interoperability with third-party solutions that do not support these standards.”

It said the Linux-based IPAM 400 audio module provides significantly higher processing power and a more programmable, software-driven architecture that allows easier expansion, prototyping and customization. “A larger buffer size and advanced buffer management technology can be configured to further bolster the Exstreamer M400’s resilience to network performance disruptions in applications where minimizing latency is not critical.”

It also cited expanded support for IT security standards, IPV6 and internal audio file storage with externally triggered playback.

The post Barix Has New Exstreamer M400 IP Audio Decoder appeared first on Radio World.

With the decision on Sept. 15 by the National Association of Broadcasters to cancel the 2021 NAB Show, RBR+TVBR welcomes vendors who planned on hosting exhibit booths to share their product announcements with us for publication in RBR.com and our Weekly Tech Roundup.

Exstreamer audio over IP codecs from Barix are widely considering for radio broadcasters’ technical infrastructures, with its applications ranging from studio-to-transmitter (STL) and studio-to-studio (SSL) links to remote contribution from the field.

Now, Barix has launched the Exstreamer M400 IP audio decoder, the first model in a new generation of Exstreamer solutions.

“Radio broadcasters large and small have long depended on the robust reliability, outstanding audio quality, and rich feature set of our previous Exstreamer products for their critical audio transport requirements,” said Davide Nossa, Product Manager at Barix. “The Exstreamer M400 delivers these benefits on a next-generation hardware platform with more processing power, enhanced security features, and greater extensibility, alongside expanded support for audio formats and technology standards including Opus and AES67.”

The Exstreamer M400 features stereo, line-level, analog audio output with RCA-type connections and can decode streams in MP3, AAC-HE, FLAC, PCM, Opus, and Ogg Vorbis formats. Newly added AES67 support enables the Exstreamer M400 to instead be configured as a dedicated AES67 receiver and decoder, enabling seamless integration into AES67-based audio-over-IP networks plus interoperability with Dante-compatible devices. The Exstreamer M400 incorporates the full AES67 interoperability guidelines including RTP audio delivery, multicast addressing, and PTP-based synchronization with a separate master clock device. Supported discovery methods include SAP (Session Announcement Protocol), mDNS (multicast DNS), and RTSP, enabling the decoder to automatically identify and list available streams from Dante, Ravenna, and other audio over IP solutions that use these protocols. SDP (Session Description Protocol) information can also be manually inserted for interoperability with third-party solutions that do not support these standards.

Powered by Barix’s high-performance, Linux-based IPAM 400 audio module, the Exstreamer M400 features significantly higher processing power than earlier Exstreamer models and a more programmable, software-driven architecture that enables easier expansion, rapid prototyping, and greater customization. A larger buffer size and advanced buffer management technology can be configured to further bolster the Exstreamer M400’s resilience to network performance disruptions in applications where minimizing latency is not critical.

Expanded support for IT security standards includes HTTPS: support for audio streams and the web-based management interface, plus secure, encrypted SIP communication links using TLS and SRTP. Other new features relative to earlier Exstreamer models include IPV6 support and internal audio file storage with externally triggered playback.

The Exstreamer M400’s Linux-based architecture enables extensive upgradability, supporting Barix’s mission of continually enhancing its products while enabling Barix engineers to quickly customize functionality to meet specific customer project requirements. A modern API is planned for future release for developers, replacing previous Exstreamer models’ older CGI control specification as part of Barix’s commitment to support the latest technology standards.

The Exstreamer M400 with AES67 support is now shipping.

Brad Smith, the Founder/CEO of Simplecast, is the new Head of Podcast Products for SiriusXM.

Simplecast was acquired by SiriusXM in 2020.

In the newly created role, Smith and his team will be responsible for SiriusXM’s podcast product strategy across all of its owned platforms – including SiriusXM, Pandora, and Stitcher — for both creators and listeners.