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Bob Boilen (Photo via X)

After retiring from National Public Radio last year, Bob Boilen has taken on a new challenge — program director for WOWD-LP in Takoma Park, Md.

Boilen spent 35 years at NPR where he created the broadcaster’s well-received “Tiny Desk Concerts” and “All Songs Considered” programs. He also directed “All Things Considered” for 18 years.

In October 2023, speaking on “Morning Edition” after his retirement was announced, Boilen told hos Mary Louise Kelly that what he wanted to do was to make music. “I’ll have time for that. I make sort of ambient music of my own, and I make albums with my band Danger Painters, which is really fun.”

He also mentioned that he was DJing “on this little low-power FM station.”

Starting June 1, 2024, Boilen will become PD for the station, WOWD-LP Takoma Radio. Since August 2021, he has hosted “My Tiny Morning Show” Wednesday mornings on the Takoma Park, Md.-based low-power station.

“After 35 years at NPR, it’s a thrill to be a part of community radio with a spirit of commitment and imagination that this station and its volunteers offer,” Boilen stated. On X (formerly Twitter), he added “I’m thrilled to work with old and new friends, including DJs from the WGTB [Georgetown University] days and local high school hosts on this fabulous eclectic community radio station.”

Boilen succeeds Steve Hoffman, who has served as the LPFM’s program director since 2018.

“Being WOWD’s Program Director these past six and a half years has been an honor,” stated Hoffman. “This job was the culmination of my lifelong love affair with radio and my five decades DJing on community radio.”

Hoffman continues to host the weekly program “Tuesday Morning Mix.”

The post From ‘Tiny Desk’ to LPFM appeared first on Radio World.

NEW YORK — Gen Media Partners and the Ten-Minute Trainer Network are conducting a no-cost webinar designed to help stations in small and medium markets across the U.S. fully recognize their political advertising potential in the upcoming election season.

The online event is scheduled for Wednesday, April 24 at Noon Eastern.

The webinar will be hosted by Gen Media Partners’ political advertising expert Roger Rafson, SVP of Political/Issue Advocacy and Strategic Alliances; VP/Political Strategies Manager Linley Grande; and Political Broadcast Strategist Heather Karban. They will provide actionable tactics to maximize political advertising dollars while adhering to legal boundaries.

“Preparation is vital to ensure stations take full advantage of the political cycle,” said GMP Executive VP Greg Tacher. “This is a terrific opportunity for small and medium market stations to gain valuable knowledge for free that can help them generate political advertising revenue.”

“The Ten-Minute Trainer Network is excited to partner with Gen Media Partners to bring you this important and timely webinar,” said Bryan Marriott, President of Ten-Minute Trainer Network/P1 Learning. “In less than an hour, attendees will gain valuable insights from these political advertising experts.”

The Ten-Minute Trainer Network is a collaboration between P1 Learning and the Swagger Institute, providing training solutions to broadcasters nationwide.

For more information about the webinar, click here.

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The Petitioner requests the substitution of channel 33 for channel 13 at Jacksonville, Florida in the Table of TV Allotments.

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David Layer of the National Association of Broadcasters recently gave a presentation to Denver SBE Chapter 48. I had the opportunity to interact with him in some detail about the topic du jour, which was metadata. 

David introduced the concept of the “Radio Dashboard Audit” to us. He described the process and shared the results of several audits he had done.

To do an audit, David would fly into a city or market, rent a car with a connected dashboard and then drive to a parking lot where he could sit and play with the car’s entertainment system for a while. He would observe what he saw on the screen. 

Some stations would show up only as a frequency on the entertainment system’s display. Others would show up with callsign or station name. And still others displayed their station logo prominently. 

Obviously, the stations with logo would be the most attractive to a listener tapping his or her way through the channels, with the others relegated to also-ran status. 

All that is just the first phase of the dashboard audit. The next looks at the metadata. Is the station sending its slogan? Is it providing title/artist information (and is it correct/timely)? How about album art or Artist Experience? 

David put all of those factors into a spreadsheet, and depending on the outcome, assigned a color code. Green is for full functionality of the system audited (RDS or HD Radio). Yellow is for under-utilization, indicating it is using some but not all the available features. Orange is for wrong/bad execution, meaning that the station is using functions improperly. And finally, red indicates no functionality — the station isn’t using any functions.

The idea of the audit is to provide an idea of how well a station is represented on the dashboard of a vehicle with a connected entertainment system. Radio World’s Paul McLane wrote about this NAB effort in his column in the March 1 issue.

Putting it into practice

After the presentation and discussion with David, I spent some time thinking through how our stations at Crawford Broadcasting would likely do in such an audit.

Other than our two analog-only AMs, I was pleased to note that none would have scored red or orange. We transmit title/artist metadata and station slogan on all our HD and RDS stations, and we do Artist Experience on a couple of stations (and are looking at adding to that number). 

I got to thinking about those stations displaying their logos on car radio screens. How did those get there? They are not, to my knowledge, transmitted with station metadata. David cleared that up for me: They are transmitted over the internet using DTS AutoStage or another connected car platform.

Shortly after that presentation, I signed us up for DTS AutoStage and linked all our station logos, so those with AutoStage-equipped vehicles should be seeing our logos. We may also join up with RadioDNS at some point, which would provide an improved dashboard presence on still more vehicles.

For most of my life, there was no such thing as metadata on radio. The title and artist were provided by the DJ in the intro or back-sell, and if you missed it, you’d have to wait for the next time that song came up and listen for it again. 

A portion of our DTS Autostage dashboard where we provide station information and logos.

But over the past couple of decades, RDS has become common, almost ubiquitous, and it’s no big chore for a broadcaster to export song title and artist or even advertiser information over the RDS.

The problem with RDS is that there appears to be no industry standard for the way that automobile radio displays use the data. 

There are basically two fields available to broadcasters for metadata: Radio Text (RT) and Dynamic Program Service (DPS). Radio Text is apparently the field designed to display title/artist information, but some radios display the DPS field instead of or in addition to the RT field. My Ford Explorer displays RT in one place and DPS in another. In talking with David, I concluded that the only safe thing to do is to stuff both fields with metadata, and that’s what we are doing across the company.

The engineer’s responsibility

So, is metadata important? I don’t think so — I know so. 

Listeners, myself included, have become accustomed to seeing metadata displayed on their radio screens, and when it is absent, frozen or wrong, it is at best an irritation and at worst a tune-out factor. 

By way of example, there are two classic rock format stations in the Denver market, both owned by big groups whose names you would recognize. Chief Engineer Amanda Hopp and I often listen to one or the other when in the car together. For a good while, the metadata of one of the stations was not working.

In my unconnected car’s entertainment system display, RT is displayed in the center. DPS info is displayed at the top right above the frequency and it scrolls, and it is also displayed on an aux screen in the instrument cluster.

The default, which amounted to the station slogan, was scrolling continually. We both found that to be a tune-out factor. The other classic rock station’s metadata was working. 

If that was our reaction to bad or missing metadata, my assumption is that others would react the same way.

The point is that we have got to make sure our metadata is being transmitted and that it is correct. This applies to FM/RDS and both AM and FM PSD for our digital stations. 

How do we know it’s being transmitted and that it’s right? That’s our engineers’ job. Sure, we would expect program directors, hosts, managers, AEs and other staffers to speak up if they see something wrong; but it’s primarily the job of the engineers to spot check the metadata daily if not more often.

Going forward, we may well develop commercial uses for Crawford metadata, and when that happens there will be revenue tied to metadata, so it will be even more important to monitor it closely.

This article appeared in the Local Oscillator, the corporate engineering newsletter of Crawford Media Group. Find past issues at https://crawfordmediagroup.net/crawford-engineering/.

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Broadcasting solutions provider ENCO and captioning company VITAC, a Verbit company, announced an alliance to expand broadcasters’ options for hardware encoders and cloud captioning.

According to the companies, the alliance combines VITAC’s experience with captioning solutions, ENCO’s encoder technologies, and Verbit’s expertise in AI-driven speech-recognition solutions to provide innovative solutions for caption encoding and delivery.

“We are excited to join forces with VITAC in this strategic partnership,” stated ENCO President Ken Frommert. “By leveraging our respective strengths, we aim to offer broadcasters a broader range of options for caption encoding and delivery, ultimately enhancing their ability to deliver accessible content to viewers.”

Doug Karlovits, VITAC general manager, noted that the alliance will allow for the integration of Verbit Captivate automated speech recognition technology into ENCO’s suite of encoder solutions to improve their captioning workflow.

The post Alliance Looks to Improve Captioning Workflow appeared first on Radio World.

House Energy & Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers. To her left is Ranking Member Frank Pallone. (Photo courtesy House Energy & Commerce Committee)

The House of Representatives Energy & Commerce Committee is hearing about AM radio on April 30. Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) and Ranking Member Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) announced that the Subcommittee on Innovation, Data, & Commerce will hold a legislative hearing that day titled “Draft Legislation to Preserve Americans’ Access to AM Radio.”

The hearing will focus on draft legislative language for the AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act of 2024.

“Communities across the country, especially rural communities, rely on AM radio service for critical information. It plays an essential role during public emergencies when other alert systems that rely on the electric grid and cellphone networks don’t work, which is why it’s so alarming that some auto manufacturers are considering not installing AM radios in new cars,” stated Rodgers and Pallone in the announcement. “We look forward to working together to preserve Americans’ access to this vital source of information.”

NAB President and CEO Curtis LeGeyt welcomed the announcement and thanked the lawmakers for their leadership in protecting access to AM radio.

“With 82 million monthly listeners, AM radio is the backbone of the Emergency Alert System and serves as a trusted source of factual news and diverse programming in communities across the country,” stated LeGeyt. “Local broadcasters look forward to continue working with Chairwoman McMorris Rodgers, Ranking Member Pallone and all committee members to ensure this critical communications medium remains accessible to listeners across the country.”

The draft language largely mirrors the language of the AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act of 2023 (S. 1669/H.R. 3413), which passed out of the Senate Commerce Committee last year. In December 2023, an attempt to pass the bill through unanimous consent failed in the Senate. That bill currently has 48 cosponsors in the Senate and 245 in the House of Representatives.

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Orban will offer APTmpX in its line of FM processors including the Optimod 5950, 5750 and Trio-FM products. 

The codec technology is licensed from WorldCast Systems, which made the announcement.

“WorldCast has rolled out the APTmpX technology on their APT Codec range and also incorporated the algorithm directly on a decoder built into their award-winning Ecreso FM AiO Series Transmitter range,” WorldCast noted.

It said APTmpX is used in hundreds of MPX STL links. It cites the “absolute transparent nature of the codec, being rooted in ADPCM as opposed to a psychoacoustic code base.

“This gives the immediate benefit of maintaining perfect sonic fidelity and precise peak control of the high-end processor from which the MPX signal has been derived.”

WorldCast Systems highlights the performance of the APTmpX reduced-bandwidth codec.

WorldCast said that APTmpX will not degrade Nielsen’s PPM watermarking technology used in the United States. 

The announcement about Orban was made by Hartmut Foerster, product manager at WorldCast Systems, and David Day, president of Orban Labs. 

Day called APTmpX “the only reduced bandwidth codec technology for distributing analog FM composite today that doesn’t negatively impact watermark encoding.” He said Orban will offer APTmpX as an option in all Orban FM processors starting later this year.

NAB Show Booths: Orban W3443 and WorldCast Systems W3449.

[For More News on the NAB Show See Our NAB Show News Page]

The post Orban Signs Up for APTmpX appeared first on Radio World.

The SPECai ad service will be available to vCreative customers.

ENCO Systems, Benztown, Compass Media Networks and vCreative announced a partnership, integrating SPECai into vCreative’s workflow platforms. 

“For stations affiliated with both vCreative and SPECai, the integration will streamline the process of requesting a spec spot, as well as save time,” they said in their announcement.

“Account executives can prepare for client meetings ahead of time, or be ready to create on the spot, by utilizing the integration to select the SPECai option from within the vPPO or vProMedia order form to create compelling spec spots to present to their clients.”

SPECai lets sales reps create spec commercials in moments using AI as they sit with clients. It blends AI scripts and AI voices with Benztown music beds to create produced spec commercials.

The creation of spec spots is an area of radio business operations where AI is finding quick uptake.

ENCO President Ken Frommert said in the announcement, “AI development has accelerated at a swift pace since we first previewed SPECai late last year.”

The user, typically the account executive, answers a few questions to determine spot length, writing style (casual, humorous, uplifting), and sponsor details, using a web browser or mobile device. SPECai generates three scripts to choose from, which the users can edit or re-generate through phonetics to perfect the copy. 

The user then selects a preferred sound of the AI voice and music bed before downloading the final audio file. 

NAB Show Booth: W1743

[For More News on the NAB Show See Our NAB Show News Page]

The post vCreative Adds SPECai Ad Service appeared first on Radio World.

Audacy’s use of tools from Super Hi-Fi is taking a higher profile at the NAB Show.

The two companies announced an enhanced partnership that they say will “drive operational innovation and efficiency across Audacy’s digital ecosystem” by streamlining Audacy’s programming, production and broadcasting of digital content. The announcement was made by Sarah Foss, CTO of Audacy, and John Bolton, CBO of Super Hi-Fi.

Highlighting this, Audacy this week is using a local HD2 channel to air “Audacy Innovation Radio: Live From NAB.” It’s on KMXB-HD2 and is using Super Hi-Fi tools to program rotating formats.

Dayparts are hosted by Audacy talent using Super Hi-Fi’s Voicetrack Fusion tool, which was just introduced. The playout is cloud-based and delivered to the transmitter via Orban’s Optimod 5950: Super Hi-Fi Edition, which also is new at the convention.

The companies also announced that Audacy now is using the Super Hi-Fi Program Director Radio Operating System on five HD-2 channels of FM stations in Boston, Buffalo, Houston, Los Angeles and Portland, Ore.

in Boston, WLKK-HD2 in Buffalo, KILT-HD2 in Houston, KROQ-HD2 in Los Angeles and KNRK-HD2 in Portland, Ore.

Audacy recently adopted Super Hi-Fi’s HLS+ streaming technology on approximately 700 online stations.

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LAS VEGAS — The NAB on Tuesday announced the 10 winners of the 37th annual NAB Crystal Radio Awards.

The 2024 NAB Crystal Radio Award recipients listed below were chosen from 50 previously announced finalists.

Finalists were honored and winners were announced during the We Are Broadcasters celebration today at the  2024 NAB Show in Las Vegas.

The winners were chosen by a panel of judges representing the broadcast industry, community service organizations and public relations firms.

KFI-AM Los Angeles, Calif
KKBQ-FM Houston, Texas
KMVP-FM Phoenix, Ariz.
KNDE-FM College Station, Texas
KSL-FM Salt Lake City, Utah
WBZZ-FM Pittsburgh, Pa.
WHPT-FM Tampa Bay, Fla.
WJJY-FM Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn.
WLBC-FM Muncie, Ind.
WNRP-AM Pensacola, Fla.

The NAB also presented Hubbard Broadcasting’s KSTP-FM in Minneapolis-St. Paul with the esteemed Crystal Heritage Award during the ceremony. The Heritage Award recognizes radio stations that have won a total of five Crystal Radio Awards for exceptional year-round community service efforts. Only 11 other stations have received this honor.

Since 1987, the NAB Crystal Radio Awards have recognized radio stations for their exceptional year-round commitment to community service.

LAS VEGAS — With the NAB’s efforts to preserve AM radio access in every U.S. vehicle getting strong applause on Tuesday during association head Curtis LeGeyt‘s welcome remarks at the 2024 NAB Show, there’s a strong sense that Congress is oh-so-close to passing the AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act.

On Wednesday, the head of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and its Democratic Ranking Member shared plans for an April 30 legislative hearing that could push the effort forward in a big way.

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The Alliance for Women in Media Foundation (AWMF) will honor legendary actress and comedienne Carol Burnett with its Lifetime Achievement Award at the 49th Annual Gracie Awards Gala.

The event is scheduled for May 21 at the Beverly Wilshire in Beverly Hills, Calif.

The honor recognizes a woman whose work in media honors the legacy of Gracie Allen, a pioneering force in the industry and the award’s namesake.

Additionally, recording artist Rachel Platten, known for “Fight Song,” will perform at the gala.

AWMF President Becky Brooks commented, “Carol Burnett is a true icon of television and entertainment, whose impact spans decades and resonates with audiences of all ages. Her groundbreaking work on ‘The Carol Burnett Show’ set a standard for excellence in comedy and storytelling, earning her countless awards and accolades. We are truly privileged to recognize her outstanding contributions to the industry.”

As a highly acclaimed actress, she has been honored with Emmys, Golden Globes, People’s
Choice Awards, the Horatio Alger Award, an ACE Award, the Peabody, and a Grammy. A
Kennedy Center Honoree, the recipient of the Kennedy Center Mark Twain Prize for Humor and the Presidential Medal of Freedom; was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame, and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Currently, Burnett is in “Palm Royal,” a new series for Apple TV that premiered March 20.

As a non-profit organization, AWMF is committed to developing educational programs,
charitable activities, and scholarship initiatives that directly benefit women in the media.
Through these investments, AWMF remains steadfast in its mission to cultivate growth,
empowerment, and leadership opportunities for women throughout the industry. Henry Dry Goods confirmed to create custom Gracies Gift Bag with included gifts.

Even as discussions around LGBTQIA+ visibility remain politically divisive, new data from Horowitz Research underscore that LGBTQIA+ representation in TV content drives viewing among not just American LGBTQIA+ audiences, but among Adults 18-34 overall.

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LAS VEGAS — The largest captioning company in the U.S. has approved a strategic partnership with ENCO that’s designed to provide broadcasters with greater choices for hardware encoders and cloud captioning.

The partnership with VITAC, a Verbit company, is designed to bring broadcasters a comprehensive suite of captioning tools and services, tailored to meet their specific needs and requirements. “The combination of VITAC’s decades-long experience in serving media clients with captioning solutions at the highest standards, ENCO’s cutting-edge encoder technology, and Verbit’s expertise in AI-driven speech recognition solutions will enable broadcasters to achieve unparalleled levels of accuracy, reliability, efficiency, and innovative solutions in caption encoding and delivery,” the companies said in a joint release distributed Monday. “This unique collaboration represents a significant advancement in addressing the evolving needs of broadcasters seeking versatile and efficient captioning solutions and reaffirms the companies’ shared dedication to driving innovation and excellence in captioning technology.”

ENCO President Ken Frommert commented, “We are excited to join forces with VITAC in this strategic partnership. By leveraging our respective strengths, we aim to offer broadcasters a broader range of options for caption encoding and delivery, ultimately enhancing their ability to deliver accessible content to viewers.”

S&P Global Ratings, on the second day of the 2024 NAB Show in Las Vegas, moved ahead with several rating actions on U.S. local TV broadcasters in 2024.

The news is not good, as the actions include two downgrades, a negative outlook revision, and just one rating affirmation.

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LAS VEGAS — Head to the West Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center, and those stopping at booth No. 4429 will be able to see for the first time at an NAB Show how a company focused on bringing advanced capabilities to traditional cloud networking environments is reinventing cloud networking through a multicasting product for broadcasters.

IEX Group Inc.’s swXtch.io will have its first presence at the National Association of Broadcasters’ annual conference and expo, and the message they are sending to the industry is that the time is ripe for broadcasters to move their live production, content delivery and playout, and media monitoring and transport workflows to the cloud.

This will see swXtch.io showcase new enhancements to its cloudSwXtch product and demonstrate how broadcasters can realize the adaptability, reliability and agility benefits of the cloud.

Specifically, live production in the cloud is a capability, as swXtch.io now supports JPEG-XS compression flows. This allows customers to move visually lossless video at very low latency into and through the cloud. As swXtch.io explains, JPEG-XS compression addresses the challenge of managing the heavy bandwidth and high costs of uncompressed video in the cloud while retaining premium broadcast-quality pictures.

The company’s cloudSwXtch also offers support for uncompressed ST-2110, providing customers with more options to manage their entire live production workflows in the cloud.

Content delivery and playout are also values that swXtch.io will demonstrate at the NAB Show, in particular how lossless UDP provides additional protection for media streams across dynamic bridging (ground-to-cloud) and multi-cloud networking applications. Lossless UDP optimizes packet delivery for high-bandwidth streams with minimal latency. cloudSwXtch also offers stream protection through SMPTE ST-2022-7 hitless merge, offering network path redundancy as parallel streams move through the cloud or across multi-cloud networks.

Lastly, swXtch.io will demonstrate Network Media Open Specifications (NMOS) workflows in cloudSwXtch networks, streamlining the management and orchestration of media workflows in the cloud and ensuring they align with on-prem systems. And, swXtch.io will also highlight how its partnership with Cinnafilm makes live, broadcast-quality standards conversions and Hollywood format conversions in the cloud a reality.

Company CEO Brent Yates said, “Broadcasters can bring missing cloud features like JPEG-XS, Precision Time Protocol (PTP) and multicast in alignment with on-prem infrastructure and create a broadcast network that is deployable, monitorable, and functional across clouds, allowing them to achieve true multi-cloud diversity. Visitors to our booth will finally see seamless cloud broadcasting for real.”

cloudSwXtch is available on all major public cloud network providers (AWS, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure and Oracle Cloud Marketplaces).

The NAB Show 2024 concludes on Wednesday, April 17, at the Las Vegas Convention Center.