That would have to be WGCU. Amateur (or worse) in every way.
-
Get involved.
We want your input!
Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.
After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.
After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/
Thanks in advance and have fun!
RadioDiscussions Administrators
Nominees for worst public radio station ever.
- Thread starter HadYourPhil
- Start date
F
FredLeonard
Guest
This should really be on the public radio board where everyone can weigh in; not a local board.
Although more responses may be realized by placing this topic in the Public Radio forum, depending on if the desired target for discussion is public radio across the board, or public radio in a particular market, this topic fits fine here since WGCU-FM 90.1 Fort Myers is specifically discussed which falls under the Tampa boards.
So how big a discussion will this end up being? How many candidates are there to nominate? How many public radio stations exist in the Tampa/StPete market?
Goat Rodeo Cowboy said:
Let's count all the NCE-FMs (a/k/a Public Radio) that are within the general Tampa Bay operational area.
1) WGCU 90.1
2) WSMR 89.1
3) WUSF 89.7
4) WMNF 88.5
5) WYFE 88.9
6) WBVM 90.5
7) WKES 91.1
8 ) WCIE 91.5
9) WFTI 91.7
10) WYFO 91.9
11) WJIS 88.1
12) WBUY 88.3
13) WNPS 88.7
14) WAYJ 89.5
15) WSOR 90.9
16) WSEB 91.3
17) WJYO 91.5
18) WMYE 91.9
19) WAQV 90.9
20) WHGN 91.9
21) WJUF 90.1
22) WFLJ 89.3
23) WREH 90.5
24) WJFH 91.5 (CP 91.7)
There you go with 24 NCE "Public Radio" Stations that all operate within the general Tampa Bay operational area.
That is an impressive list! Thanks for assembling it.
Maybe I should post in the public radio forum (which I admit I didn't know was here), but I am regularly appalled at how poorly WGCU seems to be run. Their TV station wouldn't win any awards either.
(end of rant)
WNPS has to be one of the best classical stations I've heard.
Maybe I should post in the public radio forum (which I admit I didn't know was here), but I am regularly appalled at how poorly WGCU seems to be run. Their TV station wouldn't win any awards either.
(end of rant)
WNPS has to be one of the best classical stations I've heard.
HadYourPhil said:
Phil, it may get more traction in the Public Radio forum; however, at the same time, it's fine here since WGCU-FM is licensed to Fort Myers and falls within the Tampa-Saint Petersburg forum. I interpreted your question and comment to be more local rather than mass general, so here is fine.
S
SarasotaJim
Guest
jmtillery said:
And that list doesn't include all of the NCEs operating in the commercial band like LP WSLR on 96.5 in Sarasota.
SarasotaJim said:
I intentionally left out the LPFMs and translators since the list would have been TOO long, so I condensed it to those stations operating in the reserved band. However, feel free to add the LPFMs to the list since they are non-coms and technically public radio as well.
I was there when it was "Dream 98.5" and when it was all news as WNRW. They're still in mono? Thought they had flipped the stereo pilot on, although if they are all talk, mono is fine. WGUF in Naples has always been mono as a talk station.
Back to WGCU. It is as if no one there has a clue as to how a radio station is to be run. Among other things, they have mastered the art of being undermodulated and distorted at the same time. In my car, I have to turn my radio all the way up to hear their apparently unprocessed audio.
Enough for today.
Back to WGCU. It is as if no one there has a clue as to how a radio station is to be run. Among other things, they have mastered the art of being undermodulated and distorted at the same time. In my car, I have to turn my radio all the way up to hear their apparently unprocessed audio.
Enough for today.
Any of you who read my posts in various forum topics know I don't live in Southwest Florida. But through the years I made a LOT of business trips there, and sometime this weekend I will checking in with my son who lives down there and get his evaluation of the broadcast signal being discussed here.
In the "chuckle, chuckle" mode... a few years back when I was a student pilot, I acquired some of my training at PGD (the airport at Punta Gorda). And it could well be the tower at the radio station we are discussing is the one that I played "wing-tip-tag" with one night. I needed some night flying instruction and while on a business trip I had nothing better to do at night so we climbed into a little 4-seat Piper and went skimming along toward Fort Myers where I could accomplish two things: night landings and doing traffic patterns in a tower-controlled field. My instructor was a bit under the weather and asked me to fly low because if we went up to a more normal altitude for a short flight like this, it would make his ears ache when we came down to land. That big tall tower straight ahead looked like a good landmark to steer by, and I could see from the lights that the airport at Ft. Myers was straight behind it. From the right seat came this deadpan instruction: "Don't hit the tower!" O. K. Hoss. But the top light is well below the horizon so we will go over it nicely. After a thoughtful pause came the deadpan expression of a question: "What if the top light is out?" Bank steeply to the right and Get Out of Dodge!!! was my next action.
Is there no one else reading this thread who lives in the area? I would expect some one, maybe two or three to chime in and say: "Yeah! That is ONE CRUMMY STATION!"
But that hasn't happened. Nor has anyone disputed the report on their sound. So I guess after while I need to get on the phone and have my own personal "private detective" check it out for me.
Let me tell you what I expect to get as a report: I went to their web site and it sparkles. Looks like the web people at the station know what they are doing. Then I listed to them on line. I am amazed that a station that sounds as bad on the air as you report could sound so GOOD on line. Then I noticed that have a HD-1 channel and it, too, is on line. That seems to sound good, too. Just for kicks I decided to listen to their stream of the Reading Service (for the sight impaired) and guess what: It sounds really good.
So let's walk through the logic tree: They have an engineering staff that keeps the PBS TV station on the air, they have an engineering staff that has tackled HD for the FM channel, and they have a staff that maintains a rather clean looking web site.
I've been wrong a few times in my life, but my B.S. detector tells me the premise of this discussion thread might be singing off-key a bit.
Someone else jump in here and tell us what you are hearing.
In the "chuckle, chuckle" mode... a few years back when I was a student pilot, I acquired some of my training at PGD (the airport at Punta Gorda). And it could well be the tower at the radio station we are discussing is the one that I played "wing-tip-tag" with one night. I needed some night flying instruction and while on a business trip I had nothing better to do at night so we climbed into a little 4-seat Piper and went skimming along toward Fort Myers where I could accomplish two things: night landings and doing traffic patterns in a tower-controlled field. My instructor was a bit under the weather and asked me to fly low because if we went up to a more normal altitude for a short flight like this, it would make his ears ache when we came down to land. That big tall tower straight ahead looked like a good landmark to steer by, and I could see from the lights that the airport at Ft. Myers was straight behind it. From the right seat came this deadpan instruction: "Don't hit the tower!" O. K. Hoss. But the top light is well below the horizon so we will go over it nicely. After a thoughtful pause came the deadpan expression of a question: "What if the top light is out?" Bank steeply to the right and Get Out of Dodge!!! was my next action.
Is there no one else reading this thread who lives in the area? I would expect some one, maybe two or three to chime in and say: "Yeah! That is ONE CRUMMY STATION!"
But that hasn't happened. Nor has anyone disputed the report on their sound. So I guess after while I need to get on the phone and have my own personal "private detective" check it out for me.
Let me tell you what I expect to get as a report: I went to their web site and it sparkles. Looks like the web people at the station know what they are doing. Then I listed to them on line. I am amazed that a station that sounds as bad on the air as you report could sound so GOOD on line. Then I noticed that have a HD-1 channel and it, too, is on line. That seems to sound good, too. Just for kicks I decided to listen to their stream of the Reading Service (for the sight impaired) and guess what: It sounds really good.
So let's walk through the logic tree: They have an engineering staff that keeps the PBS TV station on the air, they have an engineering staff that has tackled HD for the FM channel, and they have a staff that maintains a rather clean looking web site.
I've been wrong a few times in my life, but my B.S. detector tells me the premise of this discussion thread might be singing off-key a bit.
Someone else jump in here and tell us what you are hearing.
DJ Mo said:
You're not hearing a phone conversation.....The station is apparently fed via a low-bitrate web stream. Why they keep the Stereo light on-on top of that is beyond me....I was there last month, and definitely did notice the light on then. Don't understand the point of owning an FM station when you broadcast that poor of an audio feed.
I think I mentioned this on another thread a couple of weeks ago, but whatever. Back when I was experimenting with FM pirate radio (a very long time ago), I disabled the stereo pilot on one of my transmitters to try to get stronger coverage of the neighborhood. I immediately noticed that several of my digital radios would no longer lock onto the mono signal, and the only way to listen was to tune to the frequency manually. Anyway, my guess is that almost all FM stations these days would run the stereo pilot regardless of what's being played to ensure that people with cheap digital radios will be able to find them.
Regardless of what is going on on line the FM broadcast is indeed hedious. I live in Naples and frequently, the WGCU sister satelite WMKO on 91.7 is where I head for WGCU programs as 90.1 doesn't come in well here. 91.7 is also modulated very low with much hiss in the background as is the case with 90.1. 91.7 is a ACC internet feed which on occasion drops out as well.
As to 98.5 it is obviously an internet feed but man you have to work real hard to make it sound that bad.
As to 98.5 it is obviously an internet feed but man you have to work real hard to make it sound that bad.
Not sure what WGCU's problem is, but management would be my first guess. I don't listen on line, nor do I have any desire to, so I don't care how that sounds. It's the OTA product that is far more important and that needs help. Also, WGCU-TV's audio is overmodulated by quite a bit. There's more weird about 'GCU-TV, but this is a radio discussion.
Don't know what to make of the tower light discussion. WGCU, like all the SW FL TV stations, has its tower in SR 31 in Charlotte County. WGCU's tower is the shortest of the bunch, BTW.
Don't know what to make of the tower light discussion. WGCU, like all the SW FL TV stations, has its tower in SR 31 in Charlotte County. WGCU's tower is the shortest of the bunch, BTW.
Cedric said:
That's an interesting observation Cedric. It would be fun to see how many licensed FM's are broadcasting in mono.
That's interesting stuff there. I dig it. I guess no one around here is broadcasting in mono except for the odd pirate?
When I started broadcasting in mono, I did notice a slight improvement in distance, but some radios just wouldn't stop on a mono signal when scanning. My car stereo wouldn't stop on it, and my Radio Shack digital pocket radio couldn't find it at all unless I punched the frequency in manually. Every other digital radio I had picked it up fine, but that always bothered me. So I decided to put the damn crystal back in.
When I started broadcasting in mono, I did notice a slight improvement in distance, but some radios just wouldn't stop on a mono signal when scanning. My car stereo wouldn't stop on it, and my Radio Shack digital pocket radio couldn't find it at all unless I punched the frequency in manually. Every other digital radio I had picked it up fine, but that always bothered me. So I decided to put the damn crystal back in.
- Status