Industry News

The author is senior vice president for product development at Marketron.

Is there any doubt that radio is the best and most cost-effective reach medium ever created? For many decades, radio broadcasters have made a can’t-miss pitch to advertisers: although they are focused on one primary tactic (the linear broadcast), it is a highly differentiated, high-value product with great reach in a given geography. Most radio stations can point to a long and proven track record of highly successful results, with close ties to the communities and loyal audiences they serve.

But the radio business is facing significant and pressing challenges. As consumer behavior has evolved, today’s advertisers have had to adopt new strategies for reaching potential buyers. That means interacting with consumers wherever, whenever, and however they consume media, from traditional broadcasting to the full range of digital platforms. In order to offer a competitive advertising product in this highly complex market, radio organizations of all sizes are under pressure to augment their traditional broadcast advertising programs with a healthy mix of digital advertising product (both O&O and third-party).

[Read: Marketron Makes Broadcast Business Software Ebook Available]

If managed well, this digital transformation offers a powerful growth opportunity for broadcasters. By some estimates, the digital advertising marketplace is at least seven times larger than the traditional radio market. As a company with a large installed base in the radio community, Marketron has seen even smaller broadcasters who aggressively pursue digital advertising add at least 10% to the top line of their businesses within the first year. And some of them have added 20–30% in additional revenues.

The Changing Market

There’s no question that COVID-19 has had a significant impact on the radio business. We hope and expect the market to begin recovering in the second half of 2020, but radio revenues were already flat or even in slight decline prior to the pandemic. Two big reasons are the growth of the digital advertising market and the strong competition now posed by ad agencies.

In past decades, agencies were complementary partners to broadcasters — aggregating advertising across radio, television, and print and offering another market channel and services radio stations weren’t able to provide, such as creative. Fast forward to today, when agencies can now create highly integrated campaigns, targeted to specific objectives and employing a blizzard of different tactics: radio/TV/cable, print, OTT/CTV, internet display ads, video, search engine marketing, social media, outdoor advertising. Not only are these campaigns more measurable and targeted than traditional radio ads, but agencies can also offer creative development and metrics reporting.

The good news is that an effective digital transformation can enable radio stations to become effective competitors to agencies by maintaining ownership and control of client relationships, pricing, differentiation and targeting.

Making the Digital Transformation: Key Steps

Given those challenges and emerging new opportunities, growing numbers of radio broadcasters are taking the plunge and expanding into the digital advertising realm. But what are the best approaches, and how do you begin?

Most broadcasters already have a baseline of digital products in their mix, which they can use as the starting point to evolve their operation and develop new digital opportunities while continuing to maintain on-air products. That balancing act requires a carefully thought-out gameplan that addresses the following steps:

1. Vision. Create a vision and prepare for change in order to engage employees effectively and set the company up for success and future growth. As we’ve said, this requires a full organizational commitment from the top levels of leadership down through each level of the organization. Everyone must be fully committed to embedding digital advertising into the fabric of the business.
2. Design. Create your digital product suite. Although many radio stations are currently selling digital advertising on their O&O properties (e.g. display ads on the station’s website or social media channels), the ideal digital inventory should be a mix of O&O product and third-party advertising. These are ad products that appear on third-party platforms; e.g. paid social media ads, video pre-, post-, and mid-roll ads on OTT and CTV platforms.
3. Opportunity. Build an internal organization designed for success. This includes an incentive and compensation structure that takes into account the expanded world of digital advertising, as well as the appropriate new hires and skill sets.
4. Services. Create a business infrastructure with a consolidated set of technical services for creating a proposal, generating an order, invoicing, generating campaign reports, and facilitating renewals. All of these services should integrate seamlessly with your back-office system.

Looking Forward

For many broadcasters, expanding into the digital advertising realm might seem like a daunting task, and of course there are some significant challenges involved. However, the digital transformation reward is worth the journey, paying off in the powerful new growth opportunities that a carefully crafted mix of radio and digital inventory will deliver.

Not so far into the future, we see a world in which many radio broadcasters have made a successful leap to digital — so successful, in fact, that they can position themselves as specialty agencies with a highly differentiated product. A radio station can offer something the agency down the street can’t: a highly successful linear channel, offering a powerful public service to listeners with well-established relationships in the community.

With a sophisticated product offering and thoughtfully structured internal operations, stations will be able to charge a premium for a multichannel campaign that uniquely meets the key objectives of the campaign. The net-net: local broadcasters will be able to position themselves as a single source for highly integrated and effective campaigns that meet and exceed all of their advertisers’ objectives.

The post Transforming to Win With Digital Ads appeared first on Radio World.

Broadcast contract engineer Tim Walker wrote in to say how much he enjoyed reading solutions to problems from engineers in the field in past Workbench columns. It’s reassuring to see the display of engineering talent visible in the pages of Workbench.

Tim shares an experience with a Collins/Continental “Power Rock” 5 kW AM transmitter. This is a pulse-width-modulated transmitter that, in Tim’s case, was intermittently losing modulation of the RF envelope.

The culprit turned out to be a broken connection to the grid of the triode switch modulator tube (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1: With power off and circuits discharged, test the security of connections.

The soldered connection appears solid but was in fact broken, making intermittent contact with the grid ring as the temperature fluctuated and it vibrated from the high volume of cooling air through the tube compartment.

When Tim finally identified the problem, he was reminded of the welder’s adage:  “A good-looking weld is not always a good weld, but a good weld always looks good.” The same applies to electrical connections, so take nothing for granted when tracking down intermittent problems.

Early in my career, I was working with a consulting engineer, brought in by the station to try to determine why the transmitter would occasionally shut down, while the directional parameters went nuts.

The consultant and I walked to every tower. Using a long wooden broomstick, he rapped components in the base antenna tuning units, followed by a good rap to the coiled copper tube feedline to each tower. The station chief monitored operation and communicated the status over a two-way.

On the third tower, when the consultant whacked the copper feed tube, it broke right off the tower! The weld “looked” OK, but a good-looking weld is not always a good weld.

Connections need to be secure. This is especially true in older AM arrays.

Tip: Don’t Touch!

Projects engineer Dan Slentz and I were remembering the days of the big 50 kW transmitters, and the way the coils would “sing” with the modulating signal. You could actually hear the demodulated signal singing inside the transmitter, as well as in the tuning units at the tower base.

Dan found a memorable video on Reddit to share these memories with Workbench readers.

 

Fig. 2: Check out this video on Reddit, titled “Never touch an AM radio tower.”

This would be a good video to post for your entire staff to watch. Hearing the advertisement’s phone number as the battery cable is arcing across the tower base is nothing short of amazing to someone who hasn’t experienced it.

The fact that you “work” on this stuff as a broadcast engineer should amaze your staff as well. Show it to them! Just another day in the life of a broadcast engineer.

Tip: UV sterilizer

Griffin Communications’ Radio Engineering Director Brett Gilbert, researching a simple way to decontaminate surfaces, found an interesting product from CureUV.

The company specializes in ultraviolet light sources that sterilize surfaces. One particular model that looks promising is the GermAwayUV Premier 35 Watt Handheld UVC Surface Sterilizer.

This handheld device is about the size of a cigar box and is supplied with a 6-foot AC cord. It is smaller than CureUV’s other industrial sterilizers and is priced at under $400 list. The device will effectively decontaminate surfaces from viruses, bacteria and molds.

Fig. 3: This is one way to make sure your surfaces are clean.

It provides a quick and easy way of sanitizing surfaces, as you plug it in and slowly pass the lamp over the surface to be sanitized.  The bulb lasts up to 10,000 hours (about 1 year). In addition to the UV-C emitting bulb, brightened reflectors enhance the accuracy by up to 30%.

UV-C light is ultraviolet, in the C spectrum, and is especially efficient at destroying harmful microorganisms. In addition to being effective against a range of viruses, the UV-C light can be used to remediate mold, quickly killing mold spores.

UV-C light has a range of applications both residential and industrial. It’s used in food preparation settings to reduce contamination, as well as in hospitals, clinics and veterinarian offices to sanitize surfaces. The company offers a caution that Ultraviolet UV-C light is harmful to your eyes and skin, and users should never look directly at the bulb. The company recommends the use of safety glasses that can be ordered with the device.

But how do you know it’s working? As I read the description, that was my first question; I wondered whether this was snake oil.

The company acknowledges that this is a natural question, since disinfection is happening at a microscopic level. It includes a set of UV-C Visualizer Strips along with all GermAwayUV Surface Disinfection products. You place the UV-C Visualizer card on the surface you wish to disinfect and run the handheld sterilizer over it. The yellow strip on the card will change from a bright yellow to a light green.

Exposing the surface to the UV-C light until the strip turns green will ensure the surface has been treated properly, the company says. If there is no color change, you have to slow the rate at which you move the handheld sanitizer across the surface, or move the sanitizer closer to the surface.

The website was citing a shipping delay of eight to nine weeks at this writing. If you or your station invests in this device, please drop me a line to tell readers how it works out.

John Bisset has spent over 50 years in the broadcasting industry and is still learning. He handles western U.S. radio sales for the Telos Alliance. He holds CPBE certification with the Society of Broadcast Engineers and is a past recipient of the SBE’s Educator of the Year Award.

The post Workbench: A Good-Looking Weld Is Not Always a Good Weld appeared first on Radio World.

An image from the story “Why WWV and WWVH Still Matter.” The WWVH building seen at night.

While I agree with most of the points raised by the author of “Why WWV and WWVH Still Matter,” as an engineer I’ve long abandoned zero beating WWV to calibrate local frequency references.

In fact I owned a WWVB comparator, basically a loop antenna and TRS receiver tuned to 60 kHz that permitted fairly precise calibration but took many minutes to center the reading due to the typical path instability of radio waves, even using the ground wave, which is only useful in daylight hours.

At night WWVB is unusable for frequency/phase measurements due to skywave propagation but is the best time for those so called atomic clocks to calibrate to the slow time code repeated once a minute on a daily basis.

So, how do I calibrate the frequency references of my frequency counters and spectrum analyzer used for broadcast engineering? The answer is GPS.

The line-of-sight microwave band signals provide much less jitter, especially when more than one SV is used for a timing solution. You can buy GPS timing receivers on eBay and elsewhere for under $100.  Add  a cheap patch antenna or a quality outdoor antenna and you’re good to go.

You’ll get both data for time of day and a precision 10 MHz reference signal you can lock to a synthesized RF signal generator to dial in any frequency precisely. And just in case a GPS signal is for some reason not available I have an old Rubidium Atomic Oscillator on hand, also quite inexpensive second or third hand.

So, ultimately as nice as WWV is to have around, except for WWVB there really isn’t a great need for HF time signals anymore.

The author is chief engineer of Monadnock Broadcasting Group in Keene, N.H.

The post Letter: WWV Is Nice But Not All That Critical appeared first on Radio World.

Dan Sessler, who owned and led RF Specialties of Texas, has died. He was 74.

News of his passing was circulated by the broadcast equipment supplier and by the Texas Association of Broadcasters.

The RF Specialties Group is an alliance of independent broadcast suppliers. RF Specialties of Texas serves a six-state region, according to the group’s website.

Dan Sessler studied electrical engineering at Mountain State University; and his first radio engineering job was in West Virginia. He went into station ownership and helped build a local public TV station in Beckley, W.Va.

He was a district sales manager for Harris Corp.’s broadcast division from 1988 to 2010, according to his LinkedIn page.

Sessler acquired the Texas operation from Don Jones in 2010, as RW reported at the time.

“TAB named Sessler Associate of the Year in 2017 for his many years of service to Texas Radio and TV stations, as well as his vital contributions to the TAB Convention & Trade Show,” the Texas association wrote on its website.

“Dan Sessler was a mentor and friend to hundreds of Texas broadcasters,” said TAB President Oscar Rodriguez. “His standards of service were a model to all.  And his passion for the industry was reflected in his personal commitment to organizations like TAB where he helped us build the annual TAB Show into the great success it is.

SBE Chapter 56 Chairman Don Dobbs also noted Sessler’s passing. “I have know Dan for many years having purchased transmitters and microwave equipment,” he wrote to Radio World. “He was always supportive of the local SBE chapters, buying ads on our website and taking us out for annual holiday dinners.”

 

The post Dan Sessler Dies, Was Well-Known RF Supplier appeared first on Radio World.

Natalie Githinji

Radio is Africa’s most accessible, influential and used information outlet, according to a recent survey by United Nations Education Scientific and Cultural Organization. Several radio stations in Africa have more than a million listeners each. An even more interesting phenomenon that is becoming a part of editorial policy for many radio stations is to engage young people as presenters, content creators and other important aspects of programming.

Radio is a wonderful way to interact, learn and communicate. There is a need to keep radio vibrant and active. Most importantly, it is important to engage young producers, presenters and reporters.

As the world celebrates International Youth Day, Aug. 12, with calls for youth engagement for global action, it is important to look at some of the young Africans who have taken radio industry by a storm.

[Read: How Africa’s Vernacular Radio Stations Are Helping Right Now]

Natalie Githinji is a presenter at NRG Radio, a youth-targeted station in Kenya. At only 23, Natalie, who is also an actress and content creator, hosts one of the most popular breakfast shows in Kenya — “NRG Breakfast Club.” It has a large audience among the youth.

“Young people love listening to the show because they see me as one of their own and they are able to express themselves on touchy subjects which affect them, while feeling protected” Natalie said

“I always share my stories on air, and many of them are able to relate, get inspired and open up,” she added.

According to Natalie, radio stations in Africa need to engage more youth to give them a platform to showcase their talent and connect with young people who really need representatives and people they can relate with at stations.

Also, she believes that young people need more coaching and mentorship, and opportunities to understand, learn about radio and digital management to be prepared and become better presenters. Most important, Natalie is encouraging radio stations to appreciate and drive the content that youth relate to.

Importance

In Botswana, Yandile Nuku is proving that the airwaves are just as important now, as ever. The young radio host uses the platform to improve access to business opportunities.

Yandile Nuku

Through her weekly show, “Venture In” that airs on Duma FM in Botswana, Yandile helps young people to make sense and have better understanding of the business world. Yandile who has immense confidence in young Africans has managed to connect students to markets and different industries.

“Young people, are unchartered territory yet to be explored, diamonds in the rough yet to be discovered, the deal breakers yet to be processed and products yet to be sold,” she said.

Sub-Saharan Africa’s population is becoming more youthful — youth as a proportion of the total is estimated to be above 75%. With almost 200 million people aged between 15 and 24, Africa has the youngest population in the world. And it keeps growing rapidly. To realize a demographic dividend, there is need to invest and tap into the potential, creativity and energy of young people.

It is encouraging to see young people joining radio and demonstrating their talents.

Josephine Namakau Pumulo is the co-founder and communication lead at Agents of Change Foundation in Zambia. She uses radio to connect with and impact communities.

“As a child, I always wanted to be a journalist to share about many issues in the society, and to speak for the marginalized,” she shared.

Agents of Change uses radio as a tool to communicate issues that are relevant to young people. Currently, the organization is producing radio shows on different topics including climate change, eye health and reproductive health and rights.

Also, Pumulo is developing production guides for the agency’s young reporters and preparing them for the shows.

“We want our young people to appreciate that being on radio means a certain level of responsibility,” Pumulo said. “That is why we ensure that the content relayed to the public is verified and well researched.”

Joseph Mulekwa is one of the beneficiary of Agents of Change program. Joseph became a reporter and presenter at age 15. He was trained together with other 40 young people across Zambia in radio production and broadcasting.

Joseph Mulekwa

Now, Joseph runs the “Voice Radio Show” on Pan African Radio 96.1 FM. Young people appreciate his show because of the impact. The show has given listeners an opportunity to hold leaders accountable.

“I feel so good to be a young radio presenter and it has given me an opportunity to engage with civic leaders, policy makers and local authority … and it has helped me to act as a gatekeeper between my community and our leaders,” he said.

All his shows are live and call-in programs. This he says allows him to engage with listeners and get feedback on how best to deliver the show and discuss issues.

Questions

In the show young people do the program together with the presenter. The show is a conversation where young people raise questions, give their opinions, suggestions and demand solutions. Their conversation is always about concerns and possible solutions to issues that they care about.

“Things are changing and the world is changing too. Young people are vibrant and have more creative ideas on how to engage with other fellow young people. More radio stations should engage more young people because we understand things that affect us in our community because we are the ones on the ground,” he added.

According to Mulekwa, mentorship and support to young presenters is critical for success. He is urging more organizations to trust and support radio broadcasting for, with and by young people.

“For example here in Zambia, we only have two organizations that cater to about 70% of young people in the country … If we had more organizations that are youth-driven and speak to youth broadcast, we can have more young people becoming radio presenters,” he said.

James Smart, a renowned journalist in Africa and former Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellow at the National Endowment for Democracy, agrees on the important need for support to young people to enable them to join radio industry.

Most importantly, he advises young people interested in radio, to build their craft, learn how to present, engage audiences and connect. He urges young people not to be afraid and to try new things, create a broadcast identity.

“Create your own style and identity, copying other sounds and style is OK but please bring your personality to the job. We are suffering with radio voices because people went in and became a clone of someone they admired. Let’s inject some freshness into the business,” he said.

It’s safe to say that more young people, not less will be the new normal in the changing radio landscape — radio for youth, radio with youth and radio by youth.

Raphael Obonyo is a public policy analyst. He has served as a consultant with the United Nations and the World Bank. Also, he’s a writer and widely published in Africa and beyond. An alumnus of Duke University, he has authored and co-authored numerous books, including “Conversations about the Youth in Kenya.” Obonyo is a TEDx fellow and has won various awards.

 

The post Africa’s Youth Making Waves on Radio appeared first on Radio World.

Gordon Smith, the National Association of Broadcasters president and CEO, suffered a stroke on Wednesday, Aug. 5, and was admitted to a hospital, according to a statement from the NAB.

“He is responding well to treatment, is stable and alert, and is resting comfortably,” the NAB shared in its statement. “His prognosis is good, and he is expected to make a full recovery.”

Smith, a former two-term Senator from Oregon, has been leading the NAB since September of 2009.

The post NAB’s Gordon Smith Suffers Stroke, Responding Well appeared first on Radio World.

Alan Hughes

The author comments here after reading the commentary “What Can ATSC 3.0 Teach Radio” by Dan Slentz.

Over-the-air TV, like broadcast radio, is the cheapest and fastest way to communicate to large audiences. These are one-way communication systems where the whole audience gets the same thing simultaneously.

It is possible to separate parts of the audience using the Alternate Frequency System available in DRM and DAB+ digital radio, which can specify areas as small as 7 x 7 kilometers (4.35 miles x 4.35 miles). It requires GPS to be automatic from the user’s perspective, but it won’t work indoors since the needed satellite GPS reception is blocked.

Since broadcasting and OTA are one-way systems, how and where are the data to make appropriate individualized advertising to be gathered? Smart TV’s microphones and cameras? Existing smart speakers provide data, which could be sold, which will enable control like cable TV companies have had.

Is the broadcast industry ready for the privacy issues of having microphones and cameras always on while watching TV?

Dan Slentz in “What Can ATSC 3.0 Teach Radio?” suggests using the MAC address. Consider the data requirements to send for an audience of a million TVs and sending the different content data as well as the 48-bit MAC address a million times. How long would that take? The remaining available data rate available in HD Radio once the sound data has been used is tiny for additional content such as unique addressing and its unique information.

After 20 years, ATSC 3.0 is finally an admission that COFDM modulation, which is used in all other digital TV systems outside of North America and South Korea, is much better than ATSC 1.0. COFDM can reject reflected signals (in the analog days these were called ghosts). The extensive use of outdoor TV antennas has kept broadcast TV popular as it is free to the user and the signal reliably is good.

ATSC 1.0 uses MPEG2 compression, the least efficient system; and in much of the rest of the world MPEG4 compression is used, which halves the data rate, allowing for more HD programming. Now ATSC3.0 is capable of Ultra High Definition because of the latest compression, which halves the data rate again. However, UHD requires more data for the extra sharp images.

I agree that having more channels from the same transmitter does not necessarily improve profits. In Australia all TV stations transmit two high-definition programs and three standard-definition programs. The SD programs are generally old reruns, cheap programming or advertorials that the advertisers pay the broadcaster to transmit. These programs generally get much lower ratings.

The problem with FM zoning is that the translators are located in areas where the main signal is poor, not where a particular audience type lives. DRM and DAB+ use the Alternate Frequency System which can specify the four-corner GPS co-ordinates of a rectangle as small as 7 x 7 kilometers and send the data to that area. It is not part of the HD Radio specification.

Advertising the presence of the steakhouse down the road is already being done by Google via cellphones and smart speakers.

The reason the cable companies became dominant in TV was because of the selection of “Never Twice the Same Color” (i.e., NTSC analog TV) and later ATSC 1.0, which with the use of indoor antennas shows the wrong hues, ghosts and, in ATSC, unreliable reception.

ATSC 3.0 can broadcast up to 57,000 kbps. It is difficult to have new innovations with HD Radio because the highest bitrate is only 96 kbps, and nearly all of this is required to get reasonable sound quality or for additional, poor sound-quality, subchannels. For AM HD Radio the number is either 20 or 40 kbps.

In HD Radio, you need to use the primary and secondary signals. In all-digital HD FM, the secondary digital signal is radiated at 1% of the main signal power, which makes the reliable digital coverage area much smaller than analog. By comparison DRM can have up to 186 kbps and all digital signals are of the same power which is not limited by interference to and from adjacent channel broadcasters including your own.

The author is a broadcast technical author from Australia and has spent a lifetime in training technicians. Radio World welcomes opinion and points of view on important radio broadcast industry issues. 

[Also by this author:“A Better Way to Revitalize U.S. Radio”]

 

The post More Thoughts on What ATSC 3.0 Can Teach Radio appeared first on Radio World.

“Best of Show” Up Close is a series of Q&As with participants in Radio World’s annual springtime Best of Show Awards program.

Winmedia nominated its winSales system. We asked Jesus Vazquez Miguel, international sales manager, for more information.

Radio World: What is winSales and what is its targeted application?

Jesus Vazquez Miguel: WinSales facilitates advertising management for radio, TV and advertising agencies.

Jesus Vazquez Miguel

Fully integrated with the winMedia playout system, WinSales can also easily be interfaced with most playout systems currently in the market. Therefore it is a major asset for sales and financial teams as well as a very powerful monitor tool for management, to follow the evolution of the turnover or the invoicing cycle of the different projects.

WinSales is intuitive. It makes it possible to respond in real time to market issues. It includes a calendar of events to anticipate and create special offers. The sales manager can organize suitable and targeted advertising offers.

RW: What sets it apart from similar offerings in its product class?

Vazquez Miguel: WinSales is the only product in its range that is able to send the content scheduled within the platform directly into the dedicated slots of the playout system.

In other words, when an advertising campaign is booked in winSales, in one click, it can be sent into the playlist of the automation system.

Lastly, winSales bridges the gap between the sales and production. The customer can provide the media corresponding to his campaign. In that case, the audio or video file will automatically be inserted in the playlist. If the media is not provided at this stage of the booking, the playout will generate a production sheet in which the audio will have to be added.

RW: What are the benefits of a “secured extranet”?

Vazquez Miguel: The WinSales offers a secured connection to the main server, an end-to-end encrypted connection, but also cloud data backup on multiple servers.

RW: In light of the pandemic, what kind of remote capabilities does it offer?

Vazquez Miguel: In these unprecedented times, we really have to work on improving the ability of our customers to go through their whole day-to-day workflows without being able to access their workspaces.

When we designed winSales years ago, we already had in mind that people’s ways of working were changing, and this is even more important when it comes to the various roles within the advertising space.

WinSales is a web-based platform; therefore, it can be used remotely from any type of device, from a computer, to a tablet or a smartphone in its responsive version, while offering the exact same capabilities as what a salesperson will get from being at his office.

For instance, he would have an extensive access to his sales catalog — advertising spots, sponsorship, events, packages, promotions, digital and social networks — and would be able to give availabilities and rates to his client in real time

RW: What does it cost?

Vazquez Miguel: The system starts from $300 (U.S.) per month.

RW: What else should we know about winSales or winMedia’s business these days?

Vazquez Miguel: In the era of uberization, winSales is fundamentaly the intermediary between the broadcasters and the advertisers, and provides a range of solutions in order to remove the stress and the admin on their daily basic workflows.

More than a website, winSales is a true market place where advertisers can simply upload the different products that are part of their catalog throughout the year, and where broadcasters can compose their campaigns as simply as by putting the different type of products they need in their baskets.

WinMedia is more than ever improving its products by transforming them to respond to the major need the world is facing at the moment: being able to work efficiently and deliver from anywhere. As a result, we offering more web-based and user-friendly interfaces, easy-to-set-up packages and a full offer of remote presentations.

[Read about all the nominees and winners in the award program guide.]

The post “Best of Show” Up Close: WinMedia WinSales appeared first on Radio World.

Founded as a teachers’ college in the 1860s, Truman State University has evolved into “Missouri’s only public liberal arts and sciences institution.” And radio and media play a role in that mission.

Radio World contacted David C. Price, Ph.D., to learn more about the vibe around the station right now, part of our ongoing coverage of issues facing college and educational media.

Price is associate professor of communication and advisor to KTRM(FM), KKTR(FM) and  TMN(TV).

Radio World: Describe the media programs and operations there.

David Price: The Department of Communication at Truman State University sponsors five media outlets, along with the digital/social media associated with these outlets: a campus newspaper, “The Index”; an online magazine, “Detours”; a television studio, TMN-TV; an NPR-affiliate station, KKTR 89.7 FM, which re-airs programming from KBIA out of the University of Missouri in Columbia; and a student-run radio station, KTRM 88.7 FM.

RW: Tell us more about that.

Price: KTRM is a student-run eclectic station. Students who want on-air experience are given one-hour shifts and are allowed to select their own formats.

We have approximately 75 to 100 students participating, with the vast majority doing on-air programs. In between shifts and when classes are not in session, the station airs Adult CHR on the Simian automation platform from BSI.

The station describes itself as playing “genre spanning alternative and underrepresented music,” emphasizing independently produced music and music from smaller record labels.

KTRM is a Class A non-commercial station running 3,500 watts. KKTR is also a Class A non-commercial station running 3,500 watts.

KTRM has one air studio with a three-microphone set up for interviews, a back-up studio production room and two editing suites equipped with Adobe Audition and Adobe Premiere Pro.

The station is entirely student run, with a support staff of faculty advisors and an engineer; a secretary is available for purchasing and bookkeeping. Only the engineer, Norm White, works full-time supporting the radio and television outlets. The faculty advisor is given one quarter released teaching load and handles the required FCC documentation. (There are two faculty advisors at this time, one for radio and television, the other for newspaper and magazine.)

The mission of the station is educational — though we have to remind students of that frequently. There is some integration with the curriculum, but it is indirect so as to maintain the editorial and management independence of the media outlets.

[Read about the history of Truman State University.]

RW: Other media facilities on campus?

Price: The campus public relations office has a videographer and photographer on staff and are actively producing print, social media and video productions. We do share some equipment with them when needed.

The sports information area in the athletics department has video and audio production staff and equipment, though the live game productions are done by a contracted professional radio station.

The campus library has an audio/video production room for students who wish to self-produce content.

RW: How has the pandemic affected operations of the radio station? 

Price: Our students were on spring break when we were told operations were to cease. The radio station has been playing Simian nonstop since then.

The faculty advisor kept the station running (since students were not allowed on campus) by adding an externally produced weekly public affairs program and monitoring the equipment.

When students return to campus, they will once again be responsible for the public affairs programming. Under the student station manager, some content has been created, emailed to the faculty advisor who then uploaded it to the log by the faculty advisor. Students have also updated the playlist, which was emailed to the faculty advisor, who then uploaded the new songs and added them to the log. The student station manager decided to feature only Black artists in June to support the Black Lives Matter messaging.

The student station manager and an assistant were permitted to enter the studio to create the new playlist and upload related content. That was the only time students were in the station from March 6 to the end of July.

[Related: “High School Station Stays on the Air, Minus Its Students”]

Students were allowed back into the studio beginning Aug. 3; the station manager and one staffer came in on Monday to being preparations for fall semester.

As of now, the student body is expected to return to campus Aug. 12, and the station is expecting to have student broadcasters on-air at that time to resume control of daily operations, including all the public affairs programming, content creation, uploading, modifying logs, and other management tasks.

During the last two months we have been actively discussing how to maintain a safe workspace when we have 75 to 100 students coming in and out the studio and changing personnel every hour. The student station manager has been involved in these discussions.

We struggle with developing cleaning protocols, especially with microphones and audio boards. We have requested, but not yet received, Plexiglas dividers to separate student work areas and alcohol-based cleaning supplies. We purchased microphone covers, though we are uncertain how effective they will be.

RW: For the educational year ahead, what are the priorities of the station or your broader programs?

Price: Our top priority has to be protecting the health of the students. We will repeatedly tell students that the concept of “the show must go on” is no longer true. We have the Simian backup so if a student doesn’t feel safe or doesn’t feel healthy they are not punished in any way for not being there for a show. This is true of all of our media outlets.

We are planning for students to return to the studio as in the past. However, our student station manager is encouraging and welcoming off-site productions, where students can pre-record segments or shows at home and submit them for loading into Simian. We hope this option decreases the number of bodies going in and out of the studio, but still keeps students involved.

RW: You mentioned the Simian system. Describe the rest of the air chain.

Price: The air studio has an Audioarts D75 digital audio console with Electro-Voice RE20 mics; a DaySequerra M2 HD Radio Modulation Monitor; Sage Digital Endec; Symetrix AirTools 6100 Broadcast Audio Delay; and Rane HC6S Headphone Console.

We also have three Denon DN-C635 Compact Disc/MP3 Players; a Technics SL-1200MK2 turntable; a JK Audio Broadcast Host Digital Hybrid; Samson Servo 200 Amplifier; Symetrix 581 Distribution Amplifier; and Dell Optiplex 7020 computer with two monitors. We expect students to supply their own headphones for health/sanitary reasons.

The backup/production studio has an Audioarts R55e On-Air Console with Electro-Voice RE20 mics and Dell Optiplex 7020 computer with two monitors. For field productions we’re using a Comrex Access IP codec.

The transmitter is on campus here in Kirksville, about a half-mile SSE from the studio. The STL microwave link is a Moseley SL9003Q. The RF chain at the transmitter site includes a Harris HD transmitter with an Orban audio processor; and the antenna is an ERI LPX-4E.

RW: How would you characterize the feelings of students these days about careers in radio and in media more broadly?

Price: Our campus is located in a relatively rural part of the state, and I see more interest in time-shifting audio (podcasting) than in live broadcast. We don’t have a commuting audience, for the most part, so dayparts are less significant.

In my teaching, I pitch the value of local content that print can’t and doesn’t do as well — particularly sports and weather broadcasting. We regularly broadcast Truman athletics (even though there is a professional station also broadcasting the games).

Our radio students are also big into community engagement, sponsoring live music performances on campus or in community venues, which draw large audiences.

RW: Anything else we should know?

Price: Although the pandemic has disrupted operations, the bigger threat to student media is the continuous budget cutting coming from legislators and the governor of the state. As they cut funds for higher education, the cuts are passed down to our operations also.

We fear that if a major piece of equipment were to fail we would not be able to find the money to replace it. Some of our technology is aging, and our engineer has done his best to keep it going, but there are weak links in the production chains that could be big-budget problems.

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Above, the D.J. Everett III Radio Room. See the end of this article for more photos of the room.

Many successful career people are grateful for mentoring they received on the way to the top. But few have honored a memory as passionately as has Beth Mann.

Ham Broadcasting is all about local. It owns five stations and markets itself as “western Kentucky’s leader in marketing and promoting all types of businesses.” It tells advertisers on its website, “We use a unique and powerful combination of radio and new media platforms to grow all types and sizes of businesses and organizations. We are 100% locally owned, 100% locally operated, 100% locally oriented and 100% locally committed to help you grow your business.”

The late D.J. Everett III

Mann, its owner and general manager, wanted to commemorate the contributions of her predecessor D.J. Everett III. She did so by creating a Radio Room named for him at the WKDZ/WHVO studios in Cadiz, Ky. It opened to the public last October during the station’s 10th annual Pink Out fundraiser for breast cancer research.

Everett worked as a broadcast journalist and TV general manager, as well as a radio owner. He was inducted into the University of Kentucky’s Journalism Hall of Fame in 2012. He died in 2015 at the age of 67. “Under his leadership, WKDZ was recognized numerous times as one of the best radio stations in the U.S. in its market size,” according to the Times Leader newspaper in Princeton, Ky.. “Everett was also known for his civic engagement and community involvement.”

This Radio Room is a gallery and meeting space also dedicated to the physical history of radio in Cadiz locally and in the United States.

Among its highlights are an extensive, beautifully staged collection of antique radio receivers behind glass walls; the Legends Room, a replica 1966 radio production studio; and a public meeting space in the center of the facility.

The D.J. Everett III Radio Room covers 1,850 square feet, entered through a pair of custom-made doors adorned with door handles styled after the RCA 77-DX microphone.

Beth Mann, WKDZ

“I started working with D.J. Everett when I was 17 years old, first in television and then in radio here at Ham Broadcasting,” said Mann. “D.J. was a father and mentor to me, and when he passed away in 2015, he left me a number of vintage radios. I took over the company at that time — it had been part of his long-term plan for me to do so — and I wanted to find a way to honor his memory and showcase his collection. The D.J. Everett III Radio Room grew out of that.”

An Inspired Radio Collection

The radios in the room cover from the earliest days of the medium up to the 1960s. Included in the displays are a 1919 Commerce Radiophone crystal set: a 1923 Atwater Kent “breadboard set,” so-called because the components are laid out on a flat piece of polished wood with no protective case; and a wonderful selection of 1930s-era “tombstone” and floor console radios from the Golden Age.

“We also have a 1943 metal-cased Echophone radio, which was used by the troops during World War II,” said Mann. “My favorite is the gorgeous dark green 1946 Bendix Caitlin, which came in a plastic case that would melt if the radio’s tubes got too hot.”

Annette Hargis contributed a diary in which her great-grandmother noted the day WKDZ went on the air. “We have a special place set aside in the D.J. Everett III Radio Room for this masterpiece,” Mann posted.

Also on display are photos, posters and other historical memorabilia. “We even have a diary donated by Annette Hargis, in which her great-grandmother Mrs. Wiley Stallons noted WKDZ’s first broadcast on April 8, 1966,” Mann said.

The Legends Room radio studio features 1966-era radio equipment that would be familiar to many broadcasting veterans, including a suspended RCA 77-DX microphone, a Gates Producer dial-type control panel, a cart tape machine for commercials and idents, a rotary dial telephone and a Revox reel-to-reel machine of a kind this author used in his own early radio days.

“The Legends Room is decorated with photos of our staff back in 1966, plus photos that trace D.J. Everett’s distinguished broadcast career,” said Mann.

Add the many tables and chairs available for community meetings, and one can see why the D.J. Everett III Radio Room has caught the imagination of Cadiz residents and radio fans in general.

“The overall reception to our project has been phenomenal,” said Beth Mann. “It is a chance for us to celebrate D.J.’s legacy, and also to show the world that local, community-centric radio is alive and well, and a career worth pursuing by young people.”

See below for photos of the radio room. For more about this impressive installation head to www.wkdzradio.com.

Annette Hargis contributed a diary in which her great-grandmother noted the day WKDZ went on the air. “We have a special place set aside in the D.J. Everett III Radio Room for this masterpiece,” Mann posted.

 

The entrance to the Radio Room with its microphone-styled door handles.

 

A display about radio during World War II includes ads from radio manufacturers explaining their work for the government making military radio equipment.

 

 

Early radio displays

 

A replica of a 1960s studio setup.

 

The post A Visit to the D.J. Everett III Radio Room  appeared first on Radio World.