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From Radio Mag: Proposed CPB De-funding Would Hurt HD Radio

K

KB1OKL

Politics aside, we all know that ibiquity somehow brainwashed the CPB into investing heavily in IBOC which in turn has shoveled money to NPR labs for IBOC conversions kind of like giving slop to hogs. ibiquity is still teetering despite this mostly unknown to the taxpayers public largess and this could very well topple it although calling it's demise toppling would be a huge overstatement. Do you think this would be the last nail in ibiquitie's coffin or does anyone think Strubie Doobie would again save the day?

From Radio World:

"By now, nearly everyone has heard about the conservative congressional initiative to de-fund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). In fact, as this article is being submitted for publication, a house rules committee is conducting a hearing over a proposed bill to achieve that objective, even as a similar bill is in preparation for introduction in the Senate."

"The contribution NPR Labs has made -- and continues to make -- in terms of IBOC-related R&D cannot be overstated. And NPR Labs relies directly on the CPB grant engine for many of its projects."

"All of this comes at a time when radio's private sector has nearly flat-lined on fresh capital investment in IBOC-related projects."

read more at:

http://radiomagonline.com/digital_radio/cpb-defunding-hd-radio-0316/
 
The House FY 2011 budget proposal of February 11 was to cut $86 MM from CPB as compared to FY 2010 appropriations. However, $50 MM of that cut had been previously proposed by the President in his FY 2011 budget. They also proposed to abolish the Public Telecom Facilities Construction program, which is administered by NTIA. That would go from $20 MM in FY 2010 to zero, though in fairness, that was in the President's FY 2011 budget proposal too.

Since February 11, of course, there has been jockeying back and forth on all proposed cuts.

- Jonathan
 
All the minority listening (classical, jazz, blues) formats have gone to non-comercial radio. Unless you live in a major metropolitan area (e.g. LA) or an area where NPR is a strong player with several signals (e.g. Minneapolis) you are out of luck if you want to listen to one of those formats. The answer for NPR has been HD. You can carry those formats on the HD sub-channel and still leave the main channel for "All Things Consdiered" and " Morning Edition". HD looks like the solution to NPR's prblem.
 
K6JHU said:
All the minority listening (classical, jazz, blues) formats have gone to non-comercial radio. Unless you live in a major metropolitan area (e.g. LA) or an area where NPR is a strong player with several signals (e.g. Minneapolis) you are out of luck if you want to listen to one of those formats. The answer for NPR has been HD. You can carry those formats on the HD sub-channel and still leave the main channel for "All Things Consdiered" and " Morning Edition". HD looks like the solution to NPR's prblem.
Click to expand...

Yes there was a big howl in Boston when WBGH (a 100 KW NPR station) put their classical programming on their barely receivable HD2 and a low wattage FM effectively killing it for the majority of listeners. IBOC is loved by the masses and they don't even know it.
 
The only HD station in the Watertown, NY market is a translator for WCNY, not so much an NPR affiliate as it is an FM station run by a PBS affiliate which is the same funding. Although they do take advantage of HD with 2 extra audio streams but with 3 total HD streams compression artifacts are noticeable. It reminds me of a low quality web stream.

I think NPR and PBS could easily become profitable since they get quite a bit of money already from donations. If they lose public funding they could run their stations similar to how religious stations are run.
 
Keep in mind that the CPB money came from a special allocation from Congress in 2004 designed to assist in the transition to digital. Back then, Congress didn't like Michael Powell, but they liked digital broadcasting. So they came up with a special appropriation to CPB to cover the puchase of new transmitters and other equipment. I suspect all of that transition work is done, and the money has been spent. I doubt there's any additional funding for these kinds of projects now. Radio Magazine didn't mention any in the artist you linked. I don't know of any new "advances" in IBOC taking place. So this is an article built around a lot of maybes, not known facts.
 
TheBigA said:
Keep in mind that the CPB money came from a special allocation from Congress in 2004 designed to assist in the transition to digital. Back then, Congress didn't like Michael Powell, but they liked digital broadcasting. So they came up with a special appropriation to CPB to cover the puchase of new transmitters and other equipment. I suspect all of that transition work is done, and the money has been spent. I doubt there's any additional funding for these kinds of projects now. Radio Magazine didn't mention any in the artist you linked. I don't know of any new "advances" in IBOC taking place. So this is an article built around a lot of maybes, not known facts.
Click to expand...

I think the problem for public radio & IBOC will be in paying for the programming. If the stations have been using federal grants to pay NPR and APM for programming to run on HD2 and HD3, with that money no longer usable for that purpose, it's going to be more difficult to make these subchannels economically viable.

I suppose, if those subchannels really are bringing in enough revenue to support themselves, the answer will be to spend the money on classical/jazz music libraries & a local automation system.

_________________________________________________
On an almost completely unrelated subject, I was rather surprised to see Gov. Scott Walker has proposed more than $1.7 million in hardware capital investment in Wisconsin Public Radio.

http://www.northpine.com/broadcast/index.html (scroll down)
 
w9wi said:
If the stations have been using federal grants to pay NPR and APM for programming to run on HD2 and HD3, with that money no longer usable for that purpose, it's going to be more difficult to make these subchannels economically viable.
Click to expand...

Depends. The House version of the law (which is probably DOA) says that stations can't use federal funds to buy national programming. But they can use federal funds for locally produced programming. Bottom line though is this law probably won't make it to the Senate.
 
KB1OKL said:
WBGH...put their classical programming on...a low wattage FM.
Click to expand...
A few miles outside of town, but still a full class B.
 
If iBiquity would DROP all fees for the HD2 & HD3 channels beyond the initial fee, HD radio would actually have a chance to grow. All NPR's could run calssical music on HD2 and Prairie Home Companion 24/7 on HD3 and call it a day!
 
And if SoundExchange would eliminate digital royalties, or at least cut them down to 4% of revenue, internet radio would have a chance to grow. The RIAA is the biggest impediment to the growth of new media. Lots of greedy, short-sighted people.
 
TheBigA said:
And if SoundExchange would eliminate digital royalties, or at least cut them down to 4% of revenue, internet radio would have a chance to grow. The RIAA is the biggest impediment to the growth of new media. Lots of greedy, short-sighted people.
Click to expand...

Greedy yes. Short-sighted? Maybe not. The recording industry is funny. They claim radio does nothing to promote them these days while buying spots regularly on my CHR to promote music we either don't play or have in very light rotations. They very well know that radio is the vehicle that drives new music awareness.

By keeping a lid on internet radio, they keep their virtual monopoly on new music discovery via radio. If internet radio were to take off, that just might open some doors for new record labels to emerge, and we just can't have that can we?

On the original topic - go ahead and de-fund all public broadcasting. We're beyond broke, and can't afford it. If they can't get the funds for their HD efforts from pledge drives, turn the transmitters off. If they can't get the funds for their main transmitters, turn them off too. I would be in favor of allowing public broadcasters to use further enhanced underwriting or flat out sell advertising to make ends meet.

The country is facing a financial crisis of epic proportion. There's going to be so much bellyaching soon about how we're cruelly cutting off all the welfare queens and making old people eat dog food that we'll be longing for the good ol' days when we were just talking about defunding public broadcasting.
 
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