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WBUR Buys 92.7 WMVY

TravisWMLN said:
and if they don't reach 600K....what happens to the money?
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They are only taking pledges for donations now, not collecting the actual money.

No one's accounts are being charged for their pledges yet unless/until they reach their $600k goal in pledges, then the donors accounts will be charged.
 
After the initial $600k is raised, then what?

As a web-only entity the royalties will go WAY up. There's still all of the other infrastructure such as studios, electricity and that whole thing of paying people. Is the current staff going to stay? I don't imagine they would suddenly want to be volunteers.
 
The 600k pays for the infrastructure, then pledge drives and underwriting sustain it... at least, that's the plan. It's not impossible, it's just not very likely.

As for the staff, if they're laid off from Auritar and are collecting unemployment, why not volunteer for a while? Not everyone wants to make a living in radio anymore... it makes a nice part-time volunteer hobby. That's the whole idea behind LPFM.
 
The 600k pays for the infrastructure, then pledge drives and underwriting sustain it... at least, that's the plan. It's not impossible, it's just not very likely.

As for the staff, if they're laid off from Auritar and are collecting unemployment, why not volunteer for a while? Not everyone wants to make a living in radio anymore... it makes a nice part-time volunteer hobby. That's the whole idea behind LPFM.
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That's fine and dandy if it were located anywhere but Martha's Vineyard. There isn't exactly a lot of other media employment, or any employment going on there. And most of the folks who are there are there to make a living off radio. Why volunteer when you can get out of the black hole of MV and get a job elsewhere, unless you really really like it there and have some other odd means of generating money.

They should move it to the Cape. It would be more accessible for both staff and artists. A winter ferry ride to MV to do an interview isn't likely.
 
WNTIRadio said:
They should move it to the Cape. It would be more accessible for both staff and artists. A winter ferry ride to MV to do an interview isn't likely.
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If the station is online only, location isn't a factor. They should move it to East Boston.
 
How much technical "wiggle room" (if any)...exists to possibly move 92.7 to the mainland?

Some folks here on these boards may be old enough to remember that "Once Upon A Time"....(the 1950's)....there once existed a TV allocation for Martha's Vineyard.....VHF Channel 6.

In the early 1960's, the group of investors who were proposing to put the future WTEV/WLNE on the air successfully persuaded the FCC that it would be financially impossible to operate a television station on the island.

In the end, the Commission granted a 49 mile waiver to the 60 mile adjacent channel protection rule affecting Boston's Channel 5, and the future Channel 6 in New Bedford became a reality.

Does the possibility exist for something similar for 92.7?
 
No, because of 92.3 in Providence, 92.5 in Haverhill and 92.9 in Boston. It's pretty much hemmed in where it is.

I'm sure if it could have been moved, the previous owners would have done it.

As for moving the studios to East Boston, why pay that rent? Also, a lot of their identity is where they are from. Right up to the blue lobster on their bumper sticker. It would lose part of the "charm" if located in a major city.

But the Cape, say Woods Hole, isn't that far from MV. But way more convenient because no ferry ride is required.
 
Wish it was for a broadcast station. Maybe Dennis Jackson, Jeff Shapiro or John Garabedian will come to the rescue.
 
http://bostonherald.com/inside_track/inside_track/2013/01/beloved_wmvy_live_online

>>WMVY, the funky, eclectic, independent radio station that has provided the soundtrack to Martha’s Vineyard since 1981, is about to go off the air. But thanks to a furious fundraising effort by a non-profit group, ’MVY will survive on the Web. The Federal Communications Commission just approved the sale of 92.7 FM to WBUR, Boston’s National Public Radio outlet, and ’MVY will begin broadcasting ’BUR programming by month’s end. But thanks to fans of the station who pledged $600,000 to save it, the Vineyard institution will become a noncommercial public radio station on the Internet.
 
With all of the celebrities that live on MV and "love" the station, you would think they would have stepped up to the plate to save the over the air station instead of an internet only station.
 
DavidZ said:
With all of the celebrities that live on MV and "love" the station, you would think they would have stepped up to the plate to save the over the air station instead of an internet only station.
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The over the air station was a for-profit commercial station owned by a separate company (Aritaur), so I don't know if it could have been "saved" that way. As a commercial station, it had been unfortunately losing money for some time, and Aritaur decided to sell it. If not WBUR, someone else would have bought it. It wasn't going to stay WMVY. I know that it's legally possible to have a listener supported commercial station as Bob Bittner (WJIB) does it, but Aritaur may not have wanted to do it that way.

Mvyradio is planning to eventually seek another FM frequency for a new lower-power independently owned non-commercial (perhaps LPFM) station to serve the island, so they do have tentative plans for a new over-the-air station for MV.
 
If they were smart they would move the studios to New Bedford. The do a lot of concerts there and studio rent, utilities and bandwidth must certainly be a lot cheaper there then in Tisbury.
 
LA_Guy said:
If they were smart they would move the studios to New Bedford. The do a lot of concerts there and studio rent, utilities and bandwidth must certainly be a lot cheaper there then in Tisbury.
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Also, in order to work there on-air, you must live on the island. They were actually advertising for full-time prime-time (paid) hosts a few years ago. Applicants would have been beating their doors down if they hadn't been on the island. I know that some of their weekly specialty show producers record their shows elsewhere, such as in their own home studios, and send them in, but any real-time employees had to live on the island.

But, they may want to keep it a genuinely "island station", and their tentative future FM application, which may be an LPFM on the island, may not even cover New Bedford or any mainland areas.

By the way, the programming switchover to WBUR on 92.7 is scheduled for sometime this weekend.
 
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