FM chip in iPhone: What's wrong with THIS picture?

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

That's a mighty big "if," don't you think?

Think of it in the context in which I wrote it, rather than as a stand alone statement.

IF music as we hear it on the radio today, and IF nationally syndicated talk radio as we hear it on the radio today is what the listeners want- THEN when radio finds it's audience via cell-phone broadband or via some super wifi network,
THEN Big business will eat the lunch of of what has been the broadcast industry. It might be Bill Gates, It might be Rupert Murdock, it might be the venture capitalists that today own Clear Channel. What need is there for the local entrepreneur in this scenario.

IF personality has a place in the providing of an audio content, and by that I am thinking of a personality who talks about your town, your mayor, your high school football team, your county fair now in progress...

and IF news... as in: The old stockyards building south of town burned last night. or: The city council has adopted the new lawn watering restrictions recommended by the state of Georgia and here is when you are allowed to water your lawn, your flowers, etc.

Then there is a place for some kind of business activity to looks a lot like what we in the past called a radio station.

There is a lot of discussion on these boards about what gathers audience today, and here we are talking about what we project will gather audience in the future. If it is "grinding records" as one broadcaster I worked for called it, and "angry white men arguing politics at the national level" then forget about anything that acts like, smells like, is staffed like anything we ever called a "radio station". Just pipe it in from India to the WiFi or the broadband network.

My "big IF" is premised on the idea that there might be some fools... even in the younger generation... who are parochial enough to want some audio seasoned-to-taste for their locale.

My current thinking is there may be some kind of a hybrid creature in our future. Warren Buffett or someone will invest in some big mechanism that fills 60 to 90% of the time with homogenized content that is identical nationwide, and like McDonalds sell franchises for restaurants, local franchises will be available to fill in the remaining 10 to 40% of the time with local chit-chat and local advertising. This model might be more manageable under a WiFi kind of concept where listeners to the national (or worldwide) major content then get handed off by the WiFi network to their local franchisee for a few minutes now and then. Kind of reminds you of radio, circa 1948 doesn't it. ;D

 

[TheBigA]

My "big IF" is premised on the idea that there might be some fools... even in the younger generation... who are parochial enough to want some audio seasoned-to-taste for their locale.

I'm sure there WILL be. Diffient strokes for different folks.

BUT the size of the sandbox you play in makes a difference.

Local radio competes against other local media.

When you put it on the web, it competes against THE WORLD.

I was just reading a story at R&R about the most popular podcasts. Most of them are national shows from NPR or local shows from large markets like LA or Philly. So to have any impact on that playing field, you need a to reach a lot of people. Unless you're not interested in having your content supported by advertising.

Back to the phones for a minute: Local radio is getting hit by competition from lots of things, and it's driving down spot rates. The only way to compete is to be omni-present. Local radio is a brand. If you're doing your job, people in the community know who you are, and that gets you in the door. But local radio leaves a lot of money on the table by not leveraging its brand in all the potential areas, including mobile, direct advertising, and local event promotion. Radio stations should use their brand identity to broaden their reach to all these other things. But they have to know if they're going to play in the big sandbox of the internet, the big national companies aren't going to be able to do much with it, because the reach is strictly local. That's why Clear Channel and other large owners haven't been able to profit (in a consolidated way) from all of their local stations.

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

I'm sure there WILL be. Diffient strokes for different folks.

BUT the size of the sandbox you play in makes a difference.

Local radio competes against other local media.

When you put it on the web, it competes against THE WORLD.

//***** S N I P *****//​

Local radio is getting hit by competition from lots of things, and it's driving down spot rates. The only way to compete is to be omni-present. Local radio is a brand. If you're doing your job, people in the community know who you are, and that gets you in the door. But local radio leaves a lot of money on the table by not leveraging its brand in all the potential areas, including mobile, direct advertising, and local event promotion. Radio stations should use their brand identity to broaden their reach to all these other things. But they have to know if they're going to play in the big sandbox of the internet, the big national companies aren't going to be able to do much with it, because the reach is strictly local.

You may have trouble accepting what I am about to say about my participation in these threads, but if you have doubts, go to my profile and click on "Read Recent Messages" and dig through 50 or 100 of my posts and then evaluate this:

I don't come here to argue and win fights. I come here to learn, and when I challenge what some one has said, it is for the purpose of drawing them out with a fuller picture of their concept. That's a technique I used in Talk Radio DECADES ago.

One of my mentors is prominent in Radio History. I worked for Jerrell Shepherd in Moberly, MO back when he was ramping up his local operation to the point that was invited to speak to the NAB Convention in Chicago years ago. He was billing unbelievable amounts of revenue in a town of 13,000 people.... actually a nice town... but at first glance it was a grimy, sooty, scary little town in the Missouri hills. Being in the middle of a triangle formed by Chicago, Kansas City and St. Louis, it at one time was a town where mobsters in those citiies who needed to lay low for awhile would come and disappear. Jerrell wrote the book on small town radio... and I was his pupil.

My dream in recent years has been to return to the business and not necessarily make a fortune, but to demonstrate to an industry that seeming has lost it's way that there IS a way to do small market radio. I would be very proud to have it engraved on lMY tombstone: He re-wrote the book on Small Town Radio.

I really don't care what makes metropolitan radio work for the consolidator.... other than how knowing what THEY do helps me understand what I must NOT do.

Cut me a little slack in these discussions once in a while. I am not interested in telling the boys down in San Antonio how to be a success with 1,100 radio stations. The problem with maybe 3 out of 4 small market operators is that they think they are supposed to be miniature mirror images of metropolitan radio. I left the business because I was too impatient to work for "small thinkers" who insisted on drinking the big city Cool-Aid while running a small market station.

 

[TheBigA]

OK...so I missed your point. Hit me with it again, in a different way, so maybe I'll understand.

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

OK...so I missed your point. Hit me with it again, in a different way, so maybe I'll understand.

To do this right, and not end up with a lot of egg on my face, I need to spend some time and read back through a number of your postings and quote from them. I don't think this conversation is so critical that it demands that level of research.

I picture you as a person with a number of years experience. At one time I thought that you, like I, had left the business. But the longer I read I see you quoting ratings and saying other things that indicate you are active in the business today. And I think that I read into what you say, that whether it is what YOU personally would want to listen to on the radio, you KNOW what is necessary in rated markets today to reach the advertisers who work through agencies, or have the same buying sophistication of an agency. You know much better than do I what creates NUMBERS in the RATING BOOKS and what age groups the ad buyers value. You know that it is a numbers based process. And if one is to hope to be a success in larger market radio, one must have the analytical abilities that you and David Eduardo both seem to possess.

I make it no secret that my interest is in a different kind of radio. Small Market Radio. Maybe a niche format radio if in a larger market. This is a kind of radio that will typically be purchased by advertisers who do not have a sophisticated style of buying. They may be retailers who are on the floor of their establishment and they pay attention to old farts like me who walk through the door asking: "Where is that lawn trimmer you were talking about on the radio?"

Call it bottom feeder radio if you like. It's where I grew up. When there was to practical way for me to do that kind of radio and send my babies to school, I got out and found other ways to make a living. Now I have the luxury of playing with "transaction based radio" if I like. The point I was trying to make was that even when discussing THAT KIND of radio, you are sometimes quick to point out "That won't work." And you may be right. But we CAN talk about it.

IF.... IF we indeed move into an age of FM chips in the iPhone and audio-based-content on the Internet, I see a high probability of that delivery system being dominated by people who make Clear Channel look like a small time, small scale operation. That means people who still own facilities with tower stick up out of the dirt will have to find some other content to work with.... and it will sound a lot like the content that I think I know a little bit about. And if the gigantic corporations that dominate iPhone and Internet based audio do decide to franchise out localization of a few Stop-Sets in their content, even though he/she may not own a tower stuck in the dirt, they will be doing content that a bit "bottom feeder" in style.

 

[TheBigA]

OK...I see what you're saying. I'll send you a message, since it's off the topic of this thread.

 

[OKCRadioGuy]

Have any of you guys put a ATT GSM 3G phone up against an AM radio before? Captain Obvious to the rescue. GSM and AM radio could get along in an iPhone about as good as the NAB and the RIAA-Sound Exchange. Good luck on ever making AM work in a GSM phone properly. Even IF the coils and antenna situation could be made to work the signal interference would make it unlistenable. If this stupid country would adopt something worthwile like DRM in the future it MIGHT have a prayer someday of co-exisisting within a phone, but even something as robust as DRM might have hell staying locked up and working right through that hiddious bunch of poop ATT phones dish out in bursts.

 

[davideduardo]

Have any of you guys put a ATT GSM 3G phone up against an AM radio before? Captain Obvious to the rescue. GSM and AM radio could get along in an iPhone about as good as the NAB and the RIAA-Sound Exchange. Good luck on ever making AM work in a GSM phone properly. Even IF the coils and antenna situation could be made to work the signal interference would make it unlistenable. If this stupid country would adopt something worthwile like DRM in the future it MIGHT have a prayer someday of co-exisisting within a phone, but even something as robust as DRM might have hell staying locked up and working right through that hiddious bunch of poop ATT phones dish out in bursts.

DRM is pretty much dead. It's requirement for an either/or decision to go digital from analog means stations would start with zero audience. Considering the frail nature of AM, that would simply kill the band.

 

[pocket-radio]

FM radio on a cell phone is stupid. Given iphone connects to last fm and the web, or that cell phone double as an MP3 player, listening to fm radio for music would be a last choice, like when nothing else is available.

It's doubtful cell phone sales will spike because of a radio chip on board...or people will suddenly spend more time listening to radio via a cell phone.

Show me the research where people are begging for fm radio on their cell phone?
I'm sure the NAB & fumbles paid a hefty price..

Again, like HD, At&T answers the question nobody was asking..

Don't get to excited, as this to shall quietly fall off the radar screen and will JUST go away.. SORRY..

Being made available doesn't automatically make you relevant or drive consumer demand. Just Ask HD broadcasters.

 

[Holland Cooke]

Know anybody with an iPhone?

RE "Show me the research where people are begging for fm radio on their cell phone?"

Such data HAS been presented from-time-to-time.
I'm traveling and don't have anything pertinent on the laptop I'm toting, so this is from memory.
Might've been a-year-ago at the NAB in Vegas (or the year-before).

But that's not the point.

Why WOULD people be asking for more-more-more FM programming?
What's on FM now has been so cut-back, voicetracked, homogenized, syndicated, automated, and otherwise dumbed-down.

Know anybody with an iPhone?
They're already having-more-fun-with-their-phone than with their radio.

HC
www.HollandCooke.com

 

[TheBigA]

Re: Know anybody with an iPhone?

Know anybody with an iPhone?
They're already having-more-fun-with-their-phone than with their radio.

The interesting thing I'm noticing is most people I know are using the email function more than the phone. In other words, they'd rather send an email or text than actually talk using the same device.

This is starting to lead me to believe that people are making a lot of assumptions about phones, wifi, and wi-max that may not come to be. In other words, just because you have internet in your phone or in your car DOESN'T mean you're going to listen to internet radio. In fact, so far I haven't seen anyone using their iPhone that way. They're mainly using it for basic web information. Most of these web sites are far more compelling and more interactive than any form of radio: terrestrial, satellite, or internet.

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

Re: Know anybody with an iPhone?

In fact, so far I haven't seen anyone using their iPhone that way. They're mainly using it for basic web information.

I live in a rural area that just a few years back looked like it hadn't changed much since Jed Clampitt moved to "Beverly.... Hills that is." Wife was home yesterday a bit under the weather. On the way home from church I stopped at Quiznos to pick up a sandwich. The "good ol' boy" in line in front of me was reading his order right off the screen of his phone to the sandwich maker. No human ears involved in the relay of this food order.

 

[pocket-radio]

Having easy access to Pandora in your car, I think many would listen. I also think FM/AM/HD & Pandora will all live side by side in the car, further shrinking and fracturing shares of broadcasters. Ad revenues will also hit the road and follow the net. It's a matter of time.

PC will replace radio someday. PC has already replaced announcers.

Ipod now reads the artist tracks.. jocks have been replaced.. LOL

 

[TheBigA]

Having easy access to Pandora in your car, I think many would listen. I also think FM/AM/HD & Pandora will all live side by side in the car, further shrinking and fracturing shares of broadcasters. Ad revenues will also hit the road and follow the net. It's a matter of time.

The companies that own broadcasting are moving into new technologies. CBS is leading the way. The box itself may change, but the players won't. And the next enemy will be the ISPs. They will be more powerful and more difficult to work with than broadcasters ever were. I anticipate the ISP-haters will rise up and empower the next generation of broadcasting simply to compete with the ISPs like Comcast, Verizon, and AT&T. It's a matter of time.

 

[LynnW]

It seems that the Broadcom wireless communications chip used in the current (second) generation of iPhones is capable of receiving FM transmissions. The next generation of iPhones will have a different version of the Broadcom chip which will also be able to transmit FM. While some current iPhone owners want to receive FM broadcasts, more are interested in using the FM transmitter to send music from the phone to their car radios or home audio systems. Ever more would prefer other new features or upgrades to current features such as a better camera, video recording, expanded bluetooth features, and a better speaker.

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=681601

 

[pocket-radio]

Interesting, Fm radio is dead and sounds really bad. Yet Ipod users want the ability to transmit a signal to fm?

uh????????????????????

 

[davideduardo]

Interesting, Fm radio is dead and sounds really bad. Yet Ipod users want the ability to transmit a signal to fm?

In fact, the audio quality of an FM is quite a bit better than that of the iPod compression algorithm.

 

[Holland Cooke]

But what's "quality?"

In fact, the audio quality of an FM is quite a bit better than that of the iPod compression algorithm.

TECHNICALLY correct, but...

You'll notice too that FM has better technical quality than satellite radio; yet listener research as consistently demonstrated that listeners regard satellite "quality" as better, evidently because they're happier campers (having more variety). They'll compromise for content. And given the audio environment in many listening situations (i.e., in-car or other active backgrounds), the difference between satellite or Internet-delivered audio and FM isn't so obvious.

 

[davideduardo]

Re: But what's "quality?"

In fact, the audio quality of an FM is quite a bit better than that of the iPod compression algorithm.

TECHNICALLY correct, but...

You'll notice too that FM has better technical quality than satellite radio; yet listener research as consistently demonstrated that listeners regard satellite "quality" as better, evidently because they're happier campers (having more variety). They'll compromise for content. And given the audio environment in many listening situations (i.e., in-car or other active backgrounds), the difference between satellite or Internet-delivered audio and FM isn't so obvious.

If you really dig, the reason people think such sources have better quality is that people believe anything "digital" has to sound better.

 

[Carmine5]

Interesting, Fm radio is dead and sounds really bad. Yet Ipod users want the ability to transmit a signal to fm?

uh????????????????????

It isn't just transmitting to FM that makes the iPhone (and iPod Touch) versatile but their ability to also transmit stereo audio by BlueTooth using the new Apple iPhone 3.0 OS.

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-12519_7-10213039-49.html

Interesting article on how these advances will kill satellite radio:

http://www.fmqb.com/goout.asp?u=htt...w_apple_will_kill_satellite_radio_this_summer

C5