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what do u hear ?/How do u hear it ?

R

Radio_bored-Op

Okay, last post established - what may be on . . during the banking
hours, at business establishments in the buffalo/rochester area..

now, how does it sound?
when...say you are in toronto ( or listeners in the GTA) here some thing like this:

"...a young talent, on 98.5 broadcasting live* at the sheridan/delaware, wilson farms..."
?-Does it sound funny...like who cares.. i noticed that when driving to Toronto, flipping the
dial, and hearing the over-hype/sell of WHOOOOOA, its jammed w/ the prize wheel, the
free stuff, the people,food the fun, ooooh yea - - only to think , that store is EMPTY! and
that remote is yawn!

-The reverse never happens:
(example, on the address).... "...q107/edge 102, live at 215 queen street, and
we are Wik'd Tatto's..." // i just pictures that remote being (wow) as it also is probably
dead*


Same w/ the buffalo stations (using this hopefully its okay) - at FUCILLO's Chevy - and
since its *HUUUUGE* . . . listeners in toronto, does that *SOUND* more . . successful,
and promising if you were to take a drive out say from st. catherine's .. because they
had the concert tickets you wanted; would [that] remote seem like it should be
more difficult to find a parking spot....? just b/c of the advertising-tv dollars create
the atomsphere, that *huge* is busy 24/7 - i went to see WEDG there, and the
sales staff, and radio people, outnumbered the customers...i live here, and that
shocked me that day.

i know its how the talent sells it , (esp the night vibe/live to air's, etc)
but . . i like to pop in on remotes, and still check them out....
it is still nice to hear A LIVE *and alive*breathing body, doing some thing , some where...
..just to me, the remotes in southern ontario, seem higher priority of importance!
(ie: CIDC, sat 1-3pm, at #dealer#ship) , i can envision, i will not even be able
to get near the on-air talent, it will be a mob scene....

true or false?
 
Seems like most remotes today consist of an announcer, with or without an engineer/helper, talking on the phone or on an FTP rig back to the studio filling a minute or two a couple times an hour during the breaks between songs, sitting at a card table with some equipment and a few station logo trinkets and bumper stickers--and that's it. Basically it's a waste of time for both the station and the announcer sitting there, who spends most of the time just chatting with the assistant or an occasional store employee or passing customer.

Remotes used to be the real thing--hours of programming actually originating from the remote site, not just a minute or two on the phone back to the studio where the real action is. On music stations you'd see the jock actually spinning the tunes, talking to visitors, putting a few of them on the air in conversation. Talk stations that did remotes (and I've done my share of these) would set up in a place with high pedestrian traffic, do the show live and take not only phone calls but questions and comments from people walking by and walking up to mikes we'd set up for them to go on air. Always drew a crowd and gave the station a good promo push, increasing its visibility. I know they cost but IMHO a real remote is worth it.
 
AMEN Brothers! I've been saying remotes are a waste of time for years.

In addition to everything that was mentioned the format rules state there is to be no interaction on the air with the people at the remote. What a waste!

How about stations that are using a profanity delay 24/7 and or a delay for HD radio? I know a station that pre-record their remote breaks and sometimes does this at the station before going to the remote!

A couple of years ago one of the guys I worked with did the announcing while I ran things back at the station. The number one question he got....Where is the rest room? (rimshot).
 
The advent of HD radio was one of several factors that reshaped remotes. HD has built-in latency - typically 8 seconds or more - that makes it impossible to listen off the air while doing a remote. That means that a one-way connection - like a Marti - ain't gonna work live. That pretty much ruled out doing a show "live on location", and relegated remotes to live commercial breaks a couple of times an hour.

Shrinking promotions budgets meant less personnel, and even lamer prizes, mostly collected by "prize pigs" who came to the remote only to see what they could get for free. Most of the time, the guy on location would do his breaks over the remote unit for later playback. Local background sounds, or segments with input by the customer or listeners could even be edited if necessary since they weren't played back live. That also put an end to long-winded sponsors who tried to stretch a :60 into a :90.

So, what does the typical passer-by see at a remote? A jock, chatting with people he/she knows or wants to schmooze, maybe talking into a mic twice an hour. If there's a prize wheel, or some kind of contest to win swag, the stuff available is usually not exciting, and not easy to win. There's not nearly as much of an "event" atmosphere as there once was.

Can remotes still work? Yeah, but not as effectively as they once did. You have to have the means and personnel to create a spectacle if you want spectacular. That's much harder to come by now.
 
So the obvious question in my mind... and this is as an outsider but with my "ruthless MBA" hat on... is what would be the value add to the advertiser if that's all there is to a remote?

If you take away the curious, the radio groupies (uh, I resemble that remark!) and the "prize pigs" (I also liked "prize pigeons," forget who here used that), then what's left in the way of traffic through the door of the car dealer, the furniture store, the donut shop?

A guy with a cell phone is not exactly what I would call compelling. It just doesn't seem to be enough to bring in the potential customers.

(And then there's the hilariously gone-bad remote during WKRP's first season. Talk about a "prize pig"...)
 
Cell phone "remotes" are TOTALLY lame. Geez, take out a laptop, plug in a microphone, record the break, and e-mail back to the board-op. At least you'll get decent audio quality.
 
umtrr-author said:
Well, I wouldn't have made my radio debut if it wasn't for a remote...

http://www.irwinsjournal.com/ijonline/ijairtime.htm

But Bob is spot on with respect to most of the remotes I've bumped into in the past few years. (Which is not many.)
Click to expand...

I enjoyed your story! Thanks for sharing it.

Mine was Buffalo legend Tommy Shannon who was at the Erie County Fair working in the WGR booth many years ago. He stuck the mic in my face and asked my name and where I was from. My mind went blank for a second. The engineers were out there cueing the records and making a good show of it. It was amazing seeing the broadcast unfold before my eyes!

After that it's difficult to get excited about a guy with a mic and no one else around doing regular format and not talking to people who are watching him at the remote.
 
Thanks, Mike, coming from a pro, that is high praise. I hope I have the technical details right. It had been a while from the "actual event" to the story writing and even longer to when I typed it up (all of my writing was longhand until after college).

Incidentally, the story relates to a long time thread here on this board, and perhaps the up and coming one as well. The DJ doing the remote in the "actual event" was a former member of the group Looking Glass. Cue "Brandy, You're A Fine Girl"! Or maybe "Jimmy Loves Mary-Anne"...
 
I honestly don't care how remotes are done. I'm just happy to hear that there is a sponsor to back them up.
 
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