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Doyle's disappointed

K

KB1OKL

FCC's Doyle: Response To HD Power Boost 'Disappointing'

October 6, 2010: FCC Media Bureau Audio Division Chief Peter Doyle said at the Future of Music Coalition's Policy Summit this week in Washington, DC, that only "about 150 stations" have notified the FCC of their interest in increasing power for their HD Radio signals.


Doyle said he was disappointed by the slow response but hoped the number would increase over time.

more depressing IBOC news at:

http://www.radioink.com/Article.asp?id=1977296
 
I'm dissappointed more stations haven't ditched IBOC yet. Make 'em shut it all down so all my existing radios can sound great again!
 
I'm surprised it's even on the FCC's radar. I'd be interested to know how it came up at an FMC event. Did someone ask about it? The FMC is usually very critical of everything broadcasters do.
 
If you factor in all the people who rushed out to buy HD Radios (not including station owners, general managers and chief engineers) I would bet only the diehard gadget person is pretty much the main audience for it. I had an HD radio and recently returned it.

It's almost in parallel with cable television, hundreds of channels and nothing decent to listen to! I actually disconnected my pay television service for almost the same reason.

When people have a radio that appears to work fine for them there is little motivation to go out and buy yet another radio. Personally I think they should just pull the plug on the dying patient.
 
Zach said:
Even if HD were more popular, I couldn't see corporations spending money on upgrades in this economy.
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I believe for most groups who were the 'pioneers' of HD radio, this is indeed the issue. After dropping probably several million in the new technology and transmission upgrades back when cashflow was....flowing, and groups were looking for the tech magic bullet with capital to spend, there were resources and reasons to spend on HD radio. The power increase wheels were started in motion just at the head of the economic crash.

One of my consulting engineer friends tells me that many of the original HD radio stations will have to essentially completely replace or rebuild everything already installed in the first version, to increase the HD radio power.

Okay one can argue whether the investment has or will pay out, but I know of not one of the original pioneering groups willing to spend all that money again.
 
An engineer for CBS I know said that they were initially going to boost the HD power for WXRK 92.3, but then another station somewhere else in the country had a transmitter failure, so they took the new transmitter for WXRK. I guess they needed the HD transmitter that could put out 500 HD watts if it was a 50000 watt station in HD. There's no money for HD upgrades at CBS New York.

HD has shown zero return on investment since it started except for the few stations who got lucky enough to land an analog FM translator to translate their HD, or the few stations who suckered ethnic broadcasters to lease their HD2 to broadcast to 2 people. There's an HD2 station with a 60,000 monthly cume --- on its web stream.
 
Doyle's disappointed? I'm disappointed. Tom Ray is disappointed.

A LOT of people are disappointed. Disappointment is a frequent side-effect of fraud, manipulation, dumb greed and deceit - the frequently-appearing hallmarks of HD Radio.

It's as true today as it was 2000 years ago: "As ye sow, so also shall ye reap." Looks like the harvest is coming in for IBOC and all its furry friends.
 
What do you expect? Stations are still cutting talent to save money! Budgets? what budgets!
Advertising revenues are slow, and not even close to the glory days of ad sales. So Doyle is sad that stations aren't chomping at the bit to spend more money on a project that loses money! Welcome to reality guys. Maybe if someone called when HD clicks off, management might be encouraged, but nobody calls and advertisers don't care, they've got their own problems.
 
If Peter Doyle wants to support an initiative that broadcasters and listeners would actually appreciate, he should break the logjam of MX-ed translator applications filed in 2003, allow AMs to acquire translators authorized after June 2009, and open a new filing window which would give local AMs preference for the remaining translator opportunities.
 
mmnassour said:
What's Peter Doyle's background? Does he have ANY experience in the real world of commercial radio?
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Don't know about Mr. Doyle's commercial radio background, but according to this bio sketch (page 2), he was awarded a BA in Philosophy by the University of Rochester before earning his law degree at Georgetown:

http://www.easternpublicradio.org/fallmeetings/2008Archive/BioSketches.pdf

So if he ever goes back to Rochester for UR alumni events, WYSL might extend an invitation to him to stop by, say hello, and take a drive after sunset -- to listen to WBZ's interference on 1040.
 
TheBigA said:
Degrees in Philosophy and Law, and HE'S running the FCC's Audio Division? Need we say more?
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These are generally the kinds of credentials you will find at the FCC; except that you need to add economists to the list. The only area of the Commission with significant technical expertise is the Office of Engineering and Technology.
 
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