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This year, World Radio Day is dedicated to diversity — diversity behind the mic and in the newsroom, diversity in the airwaves’ music and ideas. This focus comes at just the right time. Radio and radio-like audio are poised for growth, so long as they can woo younger listeners by reaching them where they are, via digital products like streams and podcasts.

Radio knows how to create value for listeners and sponsors. Radio is great for discovery, as trusted voices introduce us to new sounds, new artists and new thoughts on cultural or political developments.

New digital platforms and media are inspired by radio’s time-tested formats. Efforts on the part of streaming services to grow their user base, for example, draw on radio’s ideas, linking music, engaging talk, friendly conversation and other elements into personalized radio-like channels. 

PODCASTING

The podcast boom shows that the human element outweighs the algorithm in creating this value for listeners. The majority of broadcasters see podcasting as a good opportunity, one way or another.

We at BMAT see this as one of the largest global monitors of broadcasting for reporting purposes, carrying out 24/7 tracking of around 8,000 channels across 134 countries.

Podcasts offer potential listeners a chance to catch a beloved on-air personality whenever convenient for the listener. Podcasting lets broadcasters expand their offerings, curate experiences for specific audience segments and, importantly, experiment with new sounds, approaches and perspectives. Podcasts are a great springboard for diversity, allowing new voices to find and build an audience. 

We need to nurture these new voices in order to keep radio’s audiences youthful. For music radio in Spain, where BMAT is based, the average age of listeners is 40, which means there aren’t a lot of teens tuning in. Especially in first-world countries where there are so many other options, Gen Z and millennials are elsewhere. They’re still tuning in, still listening, but not as much. Broadcasters need to think about how to engage with these audiences. This doesn’t mean we should abandon terrestrial broadcasts, but instead, we could let new formats cross-pollinate with tried-and-true approaches. 

We need to nurture these new voices in order to keep radio’s audiences youthful.

These approaches endure and can flourish in the future, I believe, because they involve real human connection. Radio is the most widespread medium on the planet, and worldwide, its penetration is still higher than the internet. For many listeners, radio is still the best, if not the only, way depending on their location, to hear new sounds or catch up on news or important issues. 

For me and for billions of other people out there, there’s this feeling when you turn on the radio. You find your favorite station, and you come to trust the person’s taste you’re listening to. It’s a relationship between you and the presenter, a relationship that means something in this era of on-demand audio content. It’s a relationship that’s still going strong.

Jose Torrabadella is VP of broadcast at Barcelona-based BMAT. He works with the monitoring and reporting of song information, duration, audience and context for broadcasts on TV and radio channels across 134 countries.

The post Relationships Are Why Radio’s Future Promises to Be Strong appeared first on Radio World.

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It is the age-old question: What came first, the chicken or the egg? Arguments can be made for both, so the question remains unanswered, at least in the philosophical sense. But what does that have to do with broadcast radio? In that regard, I suppose we could ask whether the transmitter or receiver came first, and the answer would be that they both came at the same time.

In the early months of this year, we are faced with a similar question: What has to come first for all-digital AM to succeed: a critical mass of HD-Radio capable receivers, or a significant number of stations transmitting in the all-digital mode?

As the FCC considers allowing AM stations to convert to the MA-3 all-digital mode on a voluntary basis, broadcasters are faced with a choice as to which stations it makes sense to convert.

In some situations, the choice would seem to be fairly clear. If an AM station’s programming is 100% duplicated in the coverage area by an FM signal, whether from a sister full-power station or a translator with good market coverage, chances are that the majority (if not all) of the listeners are tuning into the FM signal anyway, and there is no downside to converting the AM to the all-digital mode, at least in terms of audience impact. The all-digital signal will give listeners another high-fidelity means of getting the station’s programming.

But in other situations, there may be some FM duplication of coverage and programming, but is it enough that no listeners are disenfranchised if the analog AM signal goes away? That is a decision that each licensee will have to make; only those who are intimately familiar with the market, their radio stations and audiences have sufficient information to make that determination.

I suspect that this is where the vast majority of AM stations are — in a situation that is anything but clear-cut one way or the other.

WHERE TO START?

Standalone AM stations would seem to be poor candidates for all-digital conversion. If you believe the HD Radio penetration data, that means as soon as the all-digital switch is flipped, at least 50% of the station’s listeners will get nothing but white noise. And while the statistics on receiver proliferation are undoubtedly correct on the whole, I imagine that the real numbers vary widely depending on region, demographics, the local or regional economy and other factors. All this is part of what amounts to a very local decision as to whether all-digital conversion is right for a particular AM station.

And then there is the elephant in the room: cost of conversion. Since the MA-3 mode primary digital carriers fit within the spectrum occupied by the analog signal, it is likely that most stations have sufficient antenna bandwidth to handle the all-digital spectrum.

This is in contrast to the demands of the digital hybrid mode that is authorized at present. A lot of stations that got on that bandwagon had to do a significant amount of work to get their antenna systems in shape to pass the digital sidebands. I did a bunch of those myself some 15 years ago, and it wasn’t easy.

So assuming few or limited antenna issues, all-digital conversion costs are primarily the Xperi licensing, and the signal generation equipment, which can run into the tens of thousands of dollars. Figure in some needed infrastructure changes for many stations and the costs will be even higher. That may not be a huge thing for a fully-duplicated AM in a profitable local cluster, but for the ma-and-pa AM with a translator in a small market, it may be a deal killer.

And that brings us back to the “what comes first” question.

SO MUCH NOISE

As Ben Downs so eloquently argued in his petition for rulemaking that eventually resulted in the all-digital AM NPRM, the AM broadcast medium is in trouble. In decades past, the issue was interference. In the here and now, it is man-made noise. The interference issue remains, but in many cases it is eclipsed by the noise problem.

The interference issue is, if you will pardon the pun, static (the adjective, not the noun). By and large, other than as a result of normal ionospheric variations, interference for a particular station’s signal is what it is … and what it was. The FCC’s rules and international treaties tend to keep interference from increasing significantly beyond current levels.

Many modern transmitters are all-digital ready.

But the noise problem, now that’s anything but static. It is ever increasing. I encountered an excellent example of this at my home a few months ago.

I began experiencing a lot of new noise on the AM band as well as on the lower HF bands. The noise produced such a roar that I could not listen to any AM signals at home without at least some underlying noise. The big 50 kW signals were at least listenable, but they weren’t clean. Lower-powered signals were completely unlistenable.

I tried everything I could think of to track down the noise source without success, walking around the house with a battery-operated portable radio, listening for an increase or decrease in the roar as I moved from room to room. The noise seemed to be ubiquitous. I eventually concluded that it must be coming from my neighbor’s solar charge controller or inverter.

Then one day, I happened to have a radio on when I turned off the switch for the front exterior lights. We normally leave those lights on all the time, but for some reason I turned them off that day … and instantly the noise disappeared! AM reception was clear and clean, and the S-9 noise floor on the 80, 60 and 40 meter bands dropped to S-2! I turned the exterior lights back on, but the noise remained gone.

I left the lights on, thinking that the noise would eventually come back and I could investigate further, but it never did. And then later that day, as I was backing the car out of the garage, I noted that one of the front exterior lights was out. I opened the fixture and looked at the LED bulb, and I found it discolored. Clearly it had been hot. Most likely it had been arcing internally, and when I turned off the switch, the arc extinguished, and the spacing was sufficient that it did not return when I turned the circuit back on. I replaced that bulb with a new GE LED bulb, and all was well. Still no noise.

The point here is that what happened at my house with one noisy LED bulb (in a house that has 100% LED bulbs) happens all the time in other homes and businesses. It may not be an LED bulb. It may be the motor controller in a high-efficiency HVAC unit. It may be the microprocessor in a washing machine or refrigerator. Or it may be solar charge controllers and inverters. Each noise source adds to the RSS interference level at every receive location, and as more and more devices are added, the noise floor goes up and up and up. Each device is okay by itself, but each one adds to the total.

LET’S GET MOVING

At this late date, I daresay that there is nothing that can be done about the noise issue. That train left the station a long time ago, and there is a lot of momentum. In my opinion, this noise issue spells doom for most of the AM broadcast medium. Only the strongest stations that produce a field of 10 mV/m or more throughout the coverage area have a chance at survival.

This is where all-digital comes in. It has a demonstrated immunity to noise. It’s not a panacea, but it does perform well in our 21st century noisy environment.

So I’m going to go out on a limb here and agree with proponents that if AM is to survive for the long term, it has to make the jump to all-digital.

But what comes first? Do we wait for a critical mass of receivers before making that jump, or do we go now? Do we drive the demand for digital receivers by going all-digital now, or is that a pipe dream? Or … is it way too late for any of this, making this a pointless discussion?

I don’t have a Magic 8-Ball that I can shake and get answers, but I do believe that the AM broadcast medium has both value and a future — if we get moving now, in at least a limited way, with conversion to the noise-immune all-digital MA-3 mode. Receiver proliferation will independently continue, driven by the auto industry and FM. AM can ride that wave. But if the AM medium dies while we wait … well … it won’t much matter if there are plenty of digital AM capable receivers out there.

It’s certainly something to think about.

Watch a Radio World webcast about all-digital on the U.S. AM band on Feb. 19. Info is at https://tinyurl.com/rw-sunrise.

Cris Alexander, CPBE, AMD, DRB, is director of engineering of Crawford Broadcasting Co. and technical editor of RW Engineering Extra. Email him at rweetech@gmail.com.

The post Is the Time Right for All-Digital AM? appeared first on Radio World.

Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU) Director of Technology & Innovation, Ahmed Nadeem, said in a statement that, despite the Coronavirus outbreak, the organization plans to go ahead with DBS 2020.

Nadeem reassured industry professionals the union is “monitoring the situation and following guidelines from local authorities and agencies.” He added that it is “taking all necessary safety precautions to create a safe environment for all concerned.”

SPECIFIC MEASURES

A few of the actions the organization is applying include working closely with Hotel Istana Kuala Lumpur to ensure specific safety measures; increased disinfection across all high-volume touch points (e.g. catering areas, surfaces, handrails, WCs, entrances/exits, public touch-screens); availability of hand sanitizer around the event and main entry-exit points; and signage onsite reminding attendees of hygiene recommendations.

In addition, he emphasized that organizers would implement a “microphone disinfecting and change protocol” for all speakers. They are also encouraging a “no-handshake policy” for attendees and will provide advice to exhibitors on effective cleaning and disinfection of surfaces within their stands as a means of prevention.

Nadeem also pointed out that the hotel has devised a special protocol for anyone feeling unwell and that the hotel’s chief safety officer will be on hand to provide assistance to anyone who needs medical attention.

“We will continue to monitor the situation following the guidelines from local authorities and take the necessary precautions for the safety of everyone involved,” he said. “While we note that a few exhibitors and participants have informed us that they will not be able to join due to travel restrictions and advisories, we highly appreciate their support and continued partnership.”

According to the ABU, the following sponsors/exhibitors have withdrawn from the event for health and safety reasons: DVB, Elevate Broadcast, Eutelsat, Sony, LS telcom and Rohde & Schwarz.

The post Coronavirus: ABU Takes “Necessary Precautions” for DBS 2020 appeared first on Radio World.

A new Raspberry Pi project, six basic audio measurements and Ben Dawson on collocating your AM with a cell tower. All those stories and more are among the technical topics ready for your perusal in the latest edition of Engineering Extra.

Read it online here.

Prefer to do your reading offline? No problem! Simply click on the Issuu link, go to the left corner and choose the download button to get a PDF version.

DIGITAL RADIO
Is the Time Right for All-Digital AM?

Cris Alexander, our technical editor and one of the industry’s most respected engineers, weighs in on this timely question.

BAKING WITH PI
Get Email Alerts From an RFEngineers Watch Dog Receiver

Ain’t projects like this fun?

ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:

• Collocating AM Transmitter Facilities With Cellular Monopole Towers
• Introduction to the Six Basic Audio Measurements
• Be Smart When Thinking About UPS

The post Inside the Feb. 12 Issue of RW Engineering Extra appeared first on Radio World.

In this document, the Commission adopts changes to its rules and procedures to select and license competing applications for new noncommercial educational (NCE) broadcast stations and low power FM (LPFM) stations. The changes are designed to improve the comparative selection procedures, reduce confusion among future applicants, expedite the initiation of new service to the public, and eliminate unnecessary applicant burdens.

MB requires licensee to pay delinquent regulatory fees or show cause why payment should be waived or deferred

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MB and OMD rescind Revocation Order and reinstate license for WCGA(AM), Woodbine, Georgia

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Media Bureau grants NCTA petition seeking clarification of the Section 621 Stay Denial Order

The Federal Communications Commission said it needs $481.59 million to conduct its operations next year, up just 0.3% from the current fiscal year and reflecting an expected boost in revenue from spectrum auction fees. Among the notable lines items in the Fiscal Year 2021 budget plan that the FCC unveiled on Monday (Feb. 10) was a $134.5 million request for spectrum auction authority, an increase of nearly $2 million (about 1.5%) from the current year.

The FCC’s 2021 budget request coinciding with the release of the White House’ $4.8 trillion proposal to Congress for next year’s spending plan. The administration’s plan includes increased funding at Commerce Department agencies to accelerate 5G and artificial intelligence.

As part of its budget proposal, the FCC listed four “strategic goals for 2021,” starting with objectives for “Closing the Digital Divide” and “Promoting Innovation.” Its goals also include “Protecting Consumers and Public Safety” and “Reforming the FCC’s Processes,” which it defines as efforts to “modernize and streamline the [agency’s] operations and programs.”

[Read: FCC Proposes Record-breaking Forfeitures to Pirate Radio Operators]

Overall, the FCC said it will conduct its business with the same staffing level (1,448 people) that it currently employs. It broke out its proposed budget levels for major bureaus and operations as follows:

As for its primary strategic goal (closing the digital divide), the FCC said it will “develop a regulatory environment to encourage the private sector to build, maintain, and upgrade next-generation networks so that the benefits of advanced communications services are available to all Americans.” It vowed to “employ effective and efficient means to facilitate deployment and access to affordable broadband” where the business case for infrastructure investment doesn’t exist.”

Counting On Auction Revenue

The commission pointed out that its to-date auction program “has generated over $117 billion for government use” at a cost of “less than $2.1 billion or 1.7% of the total auctions’ revenue.”

The budget plan cited the Trump administration’s legislative agenda items “that pertain to the FCC” and “are designed to improve spectrum management and represent sound economic policy.” In particular, it points to plans for “new authority to use other economic mechanisms, such as fees, as a spectrum management tool.”

“The FCC would be authorized to set user fees on unauctioned commercial spectrum licenses based on spectrum-management principles,” according to the 163-page FCC budget document. “Fees would be phased in over time as part of an ongoing rulemaking process to determine the appropriate application and level for fees. Fee collections are estimated to begin in 2021 and total $4 billion through 2030.”

The commission explained that it needs funding at the requested levels “to continue post-broadcast incentive auction (BIA) work related to repacking and reimbursing broadcasters and MVPDs [multichannel video programming distributors] for their relocation costs to implement the results of the BIA, as well as expand that program to include new requirements included in the Reimbursement Expansion Act.”

It also said that the funding level will “improve its auctions program infrastructure in preparation for future auctions” and thus help it to conduct additional auctions to make more spectrum available for next-generation wireless services.” It also cited the need to implement RAY BAUM’S Act (Repack Airwaves Yielding Better Access for Users of Modern Services) of 2018, which will make more spectrum available for mobile and fixed wireless broadband.

Preparing for HQ Move

The FCC confirmed that it intends to move to new headquarters at 45 L Street NE (north of Capitol Hill) in June of this year, as authorized in previous budgets. The cost of the move (about $68 million) will come from “both regulatory fees and auctions program funds.”

Separately, the Department of Commerce section of the White House budget plan singles out the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, allotting it $25 million “to modernize spectrum management systems,” and thus enable the U.S. “to more efficiently satisfy industry’s need for additional spectrum and preparing the nation to transition to 5G.”

NTIA’s sister agency within DoC, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) will be allotted $718 million “to advance U.S. innovation and technological development” as part of an “all-of government approach” to establish U.S. leadership in next generation communications (especially fifth generation 5G) wireless, artificial intelligence and advanced manufacturing. This sum doubles NIST’s prior AI funding “in order to accelerate the development and adoption of AI technologies.”

 

The post FCC 2021 Budget Plan of $482 Million Built Around Spectrum appeared first on Radio World.