How much is too much?

[bobdavcav]

Some people have issues with CC limiting IHeart Radio to within the United States, and there are some other internet-related issues related to terestrial radio out there. How long is it going to take before these companies realize that we have choices and we will go elsewhere if they are not willing to spend the money to give their product to us? http://radioinsight.com/blog/blogs/82103/no-longer-streaming-worldwide/ I do not mind about KKGO because I'm not a huge country fan. However, Saga runs one of the best rhythmics in the country. So, you're going to block my access to it just because I don't live in the listening area? If companies are going to impose such limitations, then why stream at all? I don't know about anyone else on this board, but when I want local radio, with little exception, I will actually turn on the radio. I have only streamed a handfull of stations from within the Seattle market. Why? Because if I want to hear them, I can just turn on the radio. How long will it take them to realize that we won't put up with it?

 

[fybush]

How long will it take them to realize that we won't put up with it?

And Saga (or Mount Wilson) should care...why, exactly?

Or to put it a different way: what's your business relationship with Saga in another market?

As a listener to a commercial station, you're not a customer of that station. Rather, your ears and your listening time are the product that station sells to its actual customers, which are its advertising clients. If the station can find a way to monetize your listening time from a distant market, then presumably it will keep streaming to you. If it can't find a way to make money from your out-of-market listening, what obligation do you propose a station has to continue to provide streaming to you, often at considerable expense to the station itself?

 

[bobdavcav]

Ok that's a good point, but 2 questions,
1. How much does the station save in bandwidth? Are a large number of listeners outside of the station's actual market?
2. This one may seem a little farfetched, but if this catches on with Saga and other broadcasters, could it go to the big companies? If CC did it, why should I download IHeart Radio, which you claim has 1500 live radio stations from around the country if I can only listen to about 10 of them which either I am not interested in or I can get on local radio? Even if CC were to restrict it to states like Mount Willson does, why should I download the app? Maybe I would considder it if I was into classic rock and wanted to hear KKZX or if CC hadn't fired all the jocks at KISC and replaced them with Premium Choice. Then if other companies do the same, what would happen to radio? I doubt this would ever happen, but what if just about every broadcaster did this? Let's say then that I moved to Huntsville AL. I think WZYP is the worst excuse for a CHR I have ever heard, and although CC's Kiss FM is a bit better, what if I wanted to listen to the stations from my original hometown of Seattle?
3. If they are going to do this, then why have streams at all? Is there an advantage to spending the money for a stream to only reach the local market as opposed to not streaming at all?

 

[fybush]

Ok that's a good point, but 2 questions,
1. How much does the station save in bandwidth? Are a large number of listeners outside of the station's actual market?

The bandwidth isn't all that expensive. The rights fees are. Any radio station that's streaming music is paying a per-listener, per-minute rate. It's only a fraction of a cent...but those fractions of cents do add up, and if you can't find a way to make it pay for itself, it's an obvious place to cut expenses.

2. This one may seem a little farfetched, but if this catches on with Saga and other broadcasters, could it go to the big companies? If CC did it, why should I download IHeart Radio, which you claim has 1500 live radio stations from around the country if I can only listen to about 10 of them which either I am not interested in or I can get on local radio?

Because CC has a national platform of that size, it can monetize that audience. The ads that you're served in Washington State may or may not be the same ads I'm being served in upstate New York, and in either case, CC is actually making money from an advertiser based on our listening.

Saga doesn't have a platform like that, and neither does Mount Wilson, and neither seems interested in whatever kind of deal iHeart might offer them to be on their platform.

3. If they are going to do this, then why have streams at all? Is there an advantage to spending the money for a stream to only reach the local market as opposed to not streaming at all?

A growing percentage of the potential audience doesn't have a radio everywhere they might want to listen. So you reach them on the device they do have, which is a smartphone or a tablet...or an office computer somewhere deep inside a steel building where even a good FM signal may not reach.

And even at that, at least a few big stations have decided streaming's not worth it at all, most notably WBEB in Philadelphia.

 

[bobdavcav]

Yep, WBEB is another one that really annoys me. I've been pressuring a friend of mine from that area to either record it or most recently get a node up on globaltuners.com. If more areas had nodes at that site, this may not be as big of an issue, at least for me. I have been able to listen to a few stations from Eugene that I ordinarily wouldn't be able to listen to without globaltuners.com.

 

[xmusicmatt]

Because CC has a national platform of that size, it can monetize that audience. The ads that you're served in Washington State may or may not be the same ads I'm being served in upstate New York, and in either case, CC is actually making money from an advertiser based on our listening.

Before iHeart came along -- You would be hard pressed to find a lot of smaller market Clear Channel stations streaming because at that point it came out of the local stations budgets 100% (and when your a small market you don't have much wiggle room) -- now that they have iHeart web platform things are looked at from a more national level in some cases (back in the day each market managed their own web presence including the look of their websites before Clear Channel went to a template platform and now to the iHeart focus) and I know of smaller market stations now streaming especially with the iHeart platform and the ability to recover some of the licensing fees from NTR sold by the Account Execs specifically for the web sites and iHeart internet streams.

In fact -- some stations overnight air "different" programming on their iHeart web streams from Clear Channel national "Premium Choice" formats instead of what the local station has running overnights on it's FM transmitter...