Most commercials-meter readings

[radiostuwright]

Its early and only half way through the first cup of coffee...but how many remember the 18 minutes an hour rule for commercials. There were exceptions, Christmas and election time. Most places I worked ignored it (and I don't think ever got caught.)...but what is the most you've ever run
during a given hour? "Heaviest" log etc...a n d remember the meter readings every half hour,
does anyone recall having to fake 3 hours worth real quick when you heard from one of the other stations in town or the area (back in the day when we competed but would also do things for one
another) the FCC was in town.
The most I think, was in the late 60's early 70's, 24 minutes at WSIB, Beaufort, SC.
Thanks. This should be fun.
Of course now with digital technology and the capability of speeding things up,
one could run 61 minutes of spots an hour...

 

[K6JHU]

Didn't Gordon McGlendon run KADS for a while. All ads, all the time. But these were classifides and not spots. And we have to exclude "Tradio" as well

 

[jh]

I can remember 20-22 minutes on a fairly regular basis, maybe that was after the "18-minute rule" was done away with. I remember one hour before an election that was around 25 minutes. The candidates all wanted the noon "prime" time, which was normally 12-1pm, but was actually on the rate card as 11am-1:30pm, and if there were a lot of political spots we could jam them in from 11-1:30 at the higher prime time rate.

I think with the 18-minute rule you could have a certain percentage of hours above the limit. I remember a guy who worked at a major farm station told me they had it figured out to the second. There are certain times of the year, such as before planting season when farmers are buying seed, when farm advertisers want on the air. A former owner of our station once said years ago he got into serious trouble with the FCC because certain hours were way over the limit. He said it was due to the large number of farm auctions being advertised at certain seasons.

When I started, the meter readings every half-hour was no longer in effect, but the station had never reprinted the logs, so there were still blanks for each half-hour. So we took readings every so often and just filled in those readings in the blanks on the log. We had one announcer who NEVER took readings. When he signed on, his "readings" were always exactly what they were supposed to be. When he followed another announcer, his readings were always the same as the previous announcer.

 

[bossbill]

Each Christmas season I manage to tune in to WLNG on Long Island to listen to wall-to-wall commercials interrupted by an occasional jingle, and the rare playing of an actual song. At the moment, they're running "Swap n Shop".

 

[davideduardo]

Its early and only half way through the first cup of coffee...but how many remember the 18 minutes an hour rule for commercials.

There was no "rule" but, rather, a level of commercialization under which there would be a degree of expectation of license renewal if it was not exceeded.

The "18 minute" rule is from the time when licenses were renewed every 3 years, and part of that was pulling and tabulating logs from a composite week made up of 7 random days... a Monday, a Tuesday... from the prior license period. The FCC would demand explanation if any period exceeded the 18-minute level. And, of course if you put down something like "Mother's Day in Puerto Rico exceeds the gift giving level of Christmas and Three Kings day, and thus listeners and businesses depend on commercials at this time" (a real case) and the FCC would generally accept a day or two above 18 minutes in that composite week.

The fact that 18-plus minute hours raised flags discouraged the practice. So it was a de facto rule and most of us observed it.

 

[TheBigA]

I doubt very much that the FCC cares at all about the level of commercialization, or if meter readings are accurate. Their main interest is selling spectrum space. And expanding broadband service.

 

[bossbill]

Who monitors the restroom logs at Burger King? They still have to do them. Are those faked like the transmitter logs were?

 

[borderblaster]

Much more likely a health inspector would show up at BK than an FCC inspector at a radio station

 

[TomZ]

I doubt very much that the FCC cares at all about the level of commercialization, or if meter readings are accurate. Their main interest is selling spectrum space. And expanding broadband service.

I tried to impress upon the college students that accurate readings were needed by the station's Engineer so he could see trends .. but I should have simply sent a text.

 

[TheBigA]

I tried to impress upon the college students that accurate readings were needed by the station's Engineer so he could see trends .. but I should have simply sent a text.

Transmitter readings have been done by computers for over 35 years. They're more accurate and more dependable than human ones. And the computers will make simple adjustments, or alert the appropriate people that there is a potential problem.

 

[bossbill]

We had automated transmitter logs 45 years ago at KOL. Richard Smart (who came before me) had a rather clever system of dot codes on a thermal paper roll. It logged every parameter every 12 minutes as I recall. No way to fake them...

 

[Radiopronouncer]

This was in the late 80s, or 90s, I think. One morning, during election season on a small-town radio station, I had an hour (6-7 AM) when I ran solid commercials, except for top of the hour news for 4 minutes, weather, a couple of community calendar items, bottom of the hour news for about 4 minutes, a 3 or 4 minute program and one song lasting about 2 minutes. So, the entire hour was mostly spots.

 

[fmradio1]

It wasn't hard to do if you had a full service radio station back in the day. Run weather, a couple of 30's, a feature, then a stopset, a song, a "bulletin board" then more spots, etc. The audience was used to this type of format. All news stations can still sneak spots between elements and make it work. It's much harder to do in a music format without getting out of hand. I remember running 20 minutes/hour on a Hot AC once (two ten minute stopsets separated by one song) so we could still use the "more music" positioning. Yeah, RIGHT!

 

[Tom Wells]

I tried to impress upon the college students that accurate readings were needed by the station's Engineer so he could see trends .. but I should have simply sent a text.

Transmitter readings have been done by computers for over 35 years. They're more accurate and more dependable than human ones. And the computers will make simple adjustments, or alert the appropriate people that there is a potential problem.

The monitoring computer is just another layer added so that no one need understand the technology at hand.
The computer has NO idea what's going on, what might be degrading or failing, or where a parasitic oscillation is suddenly coming from.
Accuracy of readings is no substitute for an engineer on duty. If every station sounded just fine, I'd agree that there is no need for
an engineer at each station or group.
Instead, there are many stations with atrocious engineering and that seems to be OK with the business people.
Radio would be better served if the FCC had eliminated general managers and administration.
Let's eliminate the requirement that hospitals have licensed MDs on staff.
We can do just as well, staffing with all nurses, aides and administrators, right?
Why would we need highly trained and experienced people on staff all the time?
It doesn't matter all that much.
After all, healthcare is first and foremost about being a profitable business, right?

I can devalue the contribution of administrators just as well as they can devalue the technology and profession I have chosen.
Administrators have the luxury of NOT having to forever contiunously add to their knowledge to be valuable.
My education must never stop if I am to remain valuable, just like a medical doctor.
And at the same time, business feels a need to devalue the understanding of technology.

Given our society's attitude toward technology, there's a big disconnect already and a dangerous future ahead.

 

[davideduardo]

The monitoring computer is just another layer added so that no one need understand the technology at hand.

In so many ways, the impartial computer is better than assigning a human being to a monotonous task. Monotonous tasks create indifference, often leading to the faking of data.

The computer has NO idea what's going on, what might be degrading or failing, or where a parasitic oscillation is suddenly coming from. Accuracy of readings is no substitute for an engineer on duty. If every station sounded just fine, I'd agree that there is no need for
an engineer at each station or group.

The FCC primarily required engineers so that equipment that was far from reliable or stable would not interfere with the operations of other stations by variance from licensed values. Once equipment was so reliable that such things could rarely occur... and if they did, they triggered corrective or protective measures... having people take readings was an absurdity.

When stations sound "bad" it's usually because of the way equipment, such as processing, was set up, not because of defects in the equipment that a transmitter operator could or would correct.

Why would we need highly trained and experienced people on staff all the time?
It doesn't matter all that much.

In radio, the FCC never defined "highly trained" or "experienced" in the operator requirements. All that was needed was a person with a license appropriate to the class of operation... often a 3rd Restricted, which took all the skill that is required to open a box of cereal to acquire. Even the 1st Phone requirements only got a very minimal proficiency level... or, as many of us have observed, just enough knowledge to be truly dangerous.

I'm reminded of a 1st ticket holder who failed to calibrate a phase monitor back in about '70, saw the reading were off, and proceeded to adjust the phaser of the 4-tower directional. After the standing wave tripped the station off the air and the Chief Engineer was raised from bed, spending a long night putting all the many interdependent adjustments back, somebody remembered to fire the totally licensed guy who did the damage.

 

[Tom Wells]

Yes, there were a lot of production-line engineers that only ever learned to a test,
and never really learned transmission line behavior and phasing of multiple elements.
The old 50s and 60s electronic magazines were full of advertisements for such schools.
I was taught in 1980 that the 1st ticket was so devalued and over-issued as to be worthless, so I never bothered.

Nothing is ever stable, and in high-rf environments few things are ever as stable as management thinks.

Lots of things are monotonous, that's why the 3rd class licensee was assigned the task.

 

[davideduardo]

Yes, there were a lot of production-line engineers that only ever learned to a test,
and never really learned transmission line behavior and phasing of multiple elements.
The old 50s and 60s electronic magazines were full of advertisements for such schools.
I was taught in 1980 that the 1st ticket was so devalued and over-issued as to be worthless, so I never bothered.

And anyone with a bit of experience and training could pass it with one eye closed. I got mine in '69 (fun, because I took the test at the old FCC on M Street) because it was useful to have; I could be Chief Operator of any station in case of an emergency or where we shared engineering with other stations.

But as to a test of ability, it was quite basic and rudimentary. I did a PE exam in another country, and it was vastly more difficult and exhausting.

Nothing is ever stable, and in high-rf environments few things are ever as stable as management thinks.

Nautel, who arguably builds the worlds best transmitters, got its start by building ultra-reliable transmitters for beacons and such; they were designed for months and months of unattended operation at nearly inaccessible locations in Canada. When they started building broadcast gear, it was designed to run at sites that were similarly in locations that might be inaccessible for weeks at a time (AM) due to snow, or months at a time (FMs on hills or mountains in winter). There was no need to have the transmitters manned at all times; just reasonable maintenance when the site could be reached.

They were as stable as rocks.

Lots of things are monotonous, that's why the 3rd class licensee was assigned the task.

The First Radiotelephone License was required for similarly monotonous jobs, like taking the readings on a directional. That's why so many jocks had to go to those 6 week schools so that they could get a job spinning tunes on a DA station. They generally had no interest in engineering and no interest in taking readings.

 

[borderblaster]

All hail 6 week wonder schools. REI in Sarasota and DC.