Changes at WBZ

[Deleted User]

I was kidding that Joseph should go get a new car. I think about half the cars out there in the Boston market have HD radios now. Every day there is more. Ask your friends.

HD radio has been around for well over a decade now, people need to use it.

For music on HD1 it is great

 

[johnster]

A story from 2019: More Than Half Of New Cars Now Equipped With HD Radio.

 

[Least]

A story from 2019: More Than Half Of New Cars Now Equipped With HD Radio.

Wimmmex cited that same article. If/when that data coralates to a substantial population having access to and using HD Radio, then we'll see AM go the way of the dodo, and AM be revitalized on HD-2 and HD-3 stations. Until then, we have FMs and HD-1 being flipped to all news in New York, Los Angeles, and other places. That article was published before a pandemic and subsequent shortage in car productions; as well as, doesn't account for the number of cars estimated on the roads that are equipped with HD Radio. Anecdotally, my truck is a 2019. The trim I bought came with standard AM/FM. Therefore, not all cars bought and made at that point had HD Radio. Yet, all iPhones and Androids sold in 2019 until now have the ability to install the iHeart and Audacy apps. Therefore, I hypothesize that we still have a greater number of people using analog FM stations and apps over HD Radio, resulting in companies not observing having a format on HD-2/3 as being greater revenue stream. In fact, streaming hasn't been a greater revenue stream either. So, if they feel WBZ will bring in more money somewhere other than AM, it's either 94.5, 97.7, 101.7, or 107.9 (but FM and HD-1 for whatever frequency it would choose).

It will come down to a tipping point. Basically, you are hypothizing that we are at that point. I'm stating that moves made by radio companies show that we are not.

 

[davideduardo]

I was kidding that Joseph should go get a new car. I think about half the cars out there in the Boston market have HD radios now. Every day there is more. Ask your friends.

But a huge percentage don't know how to listen to HD channels. I've had my new car for two months, and am fine in finding the few local FMs I might listen to occasionally, but have, still, no idea how to get an HD2 or HD3 channel. And I use local OTA radio so little anyway that I'm not likely to waste time trying to figure out how to find those "stations between the stations".

 

[davideduardo]

There is a lag time of a minute or two between the terrestrial and streamed content,

You are generally exaggerating this by a lot. When I have compared... which is not often... I find the difference to be well under 30 " and usually more like 20" or less.

In cars, a lot depends on the buffering the car system puts on streams to avoid dropouts as much as possible. That itself bothers me as the buffer speeds up or slows down to fill time or catch up, and the changes in speed, even if pitch/speed adjustment is done, are annoying.

 

[spt87]

My thoughts is that it's nice they promoted a 35 year veteran of the station to the top job. That doesn't always happen.



The job of "innovation focused consultant" to me means finding new ways to monetize their content, in the way that WTOP in Washington has done it. That's the challenge for news organizations, whether it's an all-news radio station or a newspaper. Find new sources of revenue that don't involve :30 spots.

I agree - nice they promoted from within and someone who came along with the station when iHeart bought it.

For monetization - I would like to see them try a patreon type model to support shows in off hours slots where they like to ditch live/local shows and run paid programs, the computer replaying old news or syndication.

They should have done this with the Bradley Jay show as a trial before they just ditched it right before Covid. That show would have had a bigger audience during the covid years with people at home, not working and looking to talk about the pandemic. They blew an opportunity on that.

Not too hard to add some functions to the iHeart app. to support a favorite show. Worth a try - public broadcasting has done it for years in a low tech way. Bob Bittner did it with his memories stations. A Patreon type revenue stream combined with spots could make those time slots viable for some quality content rather than treated as throwaway.

If you look at WABC NYC where the morning show has had a dramatic revival in ratings - I wonder how much the live/local overnight show has contributed as a lead in audience? In Boston there was a noticeable uptick in callers to the overnight show (when it was Bradley Jay and Steve Leveille before that) between 4 and 5am as early risers got up to start their day - those people would naturally feed into morning drive. Those people may be gone to a large degree now. WBZ-AMs 12+ is looking weaker to me lately - may be a factor.

 

[dhoule]

I always listen to WBZ 107.9 HD 2

 

[Cap-n Spackle]

You are generally exaggerating this by a lot. When I have compared... which is not often... I find the difference to be well under 30 " and usually more like 20" or less.

I'm not, actually. This AM, Red Eye Radio began on WFTL via TuneIn at 1:06 (consistent with your timing), but not until 1:09 on iHeart with WBAP, the flagship station for the program. WFTL isn't available on iHeart.
Occasionally the stream pushes out ads through the entire first segment, but I can't tell if it's the station's fault, or as I suspect, the iHeart stream.
Another thing that bugs me is that if I look at something in another tab and it has content that has audio, it knocks out the iHeart stream, and even if I go back immediately to get it playing again, it reverts to pushing out the same ads that they jam in every time you change to a different stream.