Where has the pro-IBOC contingent gone?

[Chuck]

Cable TV succeeded because it offered content you couldn't get anywhere else - like HBO and Showtime, CNN, MTV and Nickelodeon. That's not the case with satellite rado - particularly after full implementation of HD. The music will be the same.

Talk content will continue to be better on terrestrial radio than on satellite.

Offering content that you simply can't get anywhere else is the only way this thing might fly.
That is getting harder and harder to do. I have no idea how many XM channels there are, but my car radio holds 36 in its pre-set buttons. I had no problem filling them up. How far can you fragment an audience and remain profitable? It is getting harder and harder to come up with something new that is compelling enough to make people purchase $300 radios.

The idea of a gay radio channel is interesting. It is not on my personal radar screen, but I have quite a few acquaintances that might like it. That is their choice, which had nothing to do with radio. That format would be very hard to pull off in my current neighborhood. People around here used to burn Elvis records. I'd sure hate to bet my retirement on it.

 

[Chuck]

I don't think HD has the same amount of time FM had to become a success. It really depends on how you define success though. Even if HD never becomes popular to the extent AM and FM have, it can succeed on many levels. Marginalizing satellite radio is one measure of success. Staving off future broadband offerings is another.

That is more or less the way I see it too. It isn't so much about offering something better for the listening public, as it is about squashing competition. (Oh, I’m sorry, the PC word is "marginalizing.")

 

[ElCheapo]

I don't think HD has the same amount of time FM had to become a success. It really depends on how you define success though. Even if HD never becomes popular to the extent AM and FM have, it can succeed on many levels. Marginalizing satellite radio is one measure of success. Staving off future broadband offerings is another.

That is more or less the way I see it too. It isn't so much about offering something better for the listening public, as it is about squashing competition. (Oh, I’m sorry, the PC word is "marginalizing.")

Call it what you want - either way it's accurate and it applies. It's a dog eat dog world.

There's an extremely successful country station in my hometown. They've been successful for a very long time because their programming is decent and they outspend every other station in the market promotionally by a wide margin. They probably also outbill every other station in the market by a wide margin.

During every book (it's a two book market) they do a "Thousand Dollar Thursday" contest. For every remote broadcast, they give away a "crisp new $100 bill" to some lucky listener who stops by to register during the remote - they NEVER do a remote without the $100 giveaway. Their billboards are everywhere. Their TV ads are ever present.

Nobody dares challenge them in the format. They signed on in 1991, quickly disposed of the highly flawed competition and have been dominating ever since by offering a just slightly better product and buying their listeners' loyalty.

Here in the Wild West days of the internet and other new tech, I'm sure more attempts will be made to challenge radio's entrenched listener base. It's only prudent that radio should take steps to protect itself.

 

[dbdigital]

If you look at the beginnings of satellite radio going back to the early to mid-90's you will see that the subscription model was imposed on the service by the FCC at the urging of the NAB. Neither Sirius nor XM wanted it. As it is, satellite radio is forbidden from offering free, ad-supported programming nor can they broadcast local programming.

What is hurting satellite radio now, more than anything, is the profligate spending by these companies. 500 million for a jerk like Howard Stern? Give me a break. If these satcasters can keep their spending under control they will be successful even with only a few hundred thousand subscribers. Plus they have open, leasable channels on their birds which can be used for other, future, services.

The one key difference between the beginnings of FM and HD Radio is that FM, as a technology, was never imposed on the AM band making AM listening difficult on legacy radios. Far-sighted engineers and regulators put it farther up the spectrum. This is where HD Radio needs to be and why Eureka-147 has been so well received in Europe. No one over there is complaining that digital radio is killing their listening experience with noise.

As little as a year ago I could hear FM radio in L.A. (where I live, not DX'ing) practically noise-free, but now nearly all stations exhibit some degree of background white noise. Maybe they can't get the FCC to commit to a cut-off date for analog radio but Ibiquity and its investors are coming close by rendering current analog radios almost useless.

db

 

[ElCheapo]

As little as a year ago I could hear FM radio in L.A. (where I live, not DX'ing) practically noise-free, but now nearly all stations exhibit some degree of background white noise. Maybe they can't get the FCC to commit to a cut-off date for analog radio but Ibiquity and its investors are coming close by rendering current analog radios almost useless.

db

That's odd...

Where are all the news stories on this phenomenon? Surely some of the TV stations and newspapers that aren't part of the "cartel" would have noticed this and reported on it accordingly.

That would make a GREAT, highly sensational story - or series of stories - if only it were true!

 

[SUPERCASTER]

It's the most upgradable path that uses currently allocated spectrum. The game plan is for analog to go away completely eventually. You can't do that with FMExtra. It will always be what it is right now - no way to grow or expand it in the future. With the HD platform, stations can continue to whittle away at your analog signal as HD grows in popularity. Don't need those subcarriers anymore? Kill 'em - more bandwidth for HD. Don't need to broadcast in stereo anymore? Kill 38 kHz and gain more for HD. Don't need analog anymore at all? Turn it off and use your entire bandwidth for HD.

More ElCheapo baloney.
With FMeXtra you can delete the stereo subcarriers and devote more bandwidth to digital streams. Later delete the main mono modulation and add even more digital subcarriers or higher quality bitrates thus making the entire licensed 200kHz FM channel bandwidth entirely filled with digital channels, without jamming the adjacent channels, at full FM class A, B, or C transmitter power, without a new FM transmitter or antenna.
What could be better then that?
Learn more here:
www.dreinc.com

 

[ElCheapo]

More ElCheapo baloney.
With FMeXtra you can delete the stereo subcarriers and devote more bandwidth to digital streams. Later delete the main mono modulation and add even more digital subcarriers or higher quality bitrates thus making the entire licensed 200kHz FM channel bandwidth entirely filled with digital channels, without jamming the adjacent channels, at full FM class A, B, or C transmitter power, without a new FM transmitter or antenna.
What could be better then that?
Learn more here:
www.dreinc.com

Well, I stand corrected. I hadn't taken the time to read up on that technology and was relying on what I had been told by a colleague.

Didn't see much point in studying it since it's DOA technology here in the USA.

We're living in an HD world now.

 

[SUPERCASTER]

More ElCheapo baloney.
With FMeXtra you can delete the stereo subcarriers and devote more bandwidth to digital streams. Later delete the main mono modulation and add even more digital subcarriers or higher quality bitrates thus making the entire licensed 200kHz FM channel bandwidth entirely filled with digital channels, without jamming the adjacent channels, at full FM class A, B, or C transmitter power, without a new FM transmitter or antenna.
What could be better then that?
Learn more here:
www.dreinc.com

Well, I stand corrected. I hadn't taken the time to read up on that technology and was relying on what I had been told by a colleague.

Didn't see much point in studying it since it's DOA technology here in the USA.

We're living in an HD world now.

You are really confused. I belive you are referring to DRM (Digital Radio Mondiale) which is an entirely different system.
See www.drm.org for DRM.
And
www.dreinc.com for FMeXtra, that has nothing to do with DRM.

 

[Chuck]

]
Well, I stand corrected. I hadn't taken the time to read up on that technology and was relying on what I had been told by a colleague.

Didn't see much point in studying it since it's DOA technology here in the USA.

We're living in an HD world now.

Nothing is dead yet. HD may or may not succeed. For many broadcasters, it is an answer to a question that nobody asked. Only time will tell, but most stations have no plans to convert in the foreseeable future. You’ll note that the only people who are gung-ho about this are the “Alliance” members, many of whom have a significant investment in Ibiquity.

From a small station’s point of view, assuming you think there is a real advantage to going digital, FMExtra makes a lot more sense, both in terms of cost and in terms of technical capabilities. You don't have to get permission from the Commission to use FMExtra. It works well within the rules as they stand. DRM may take off too. There is a movement to get the FCC to authorize it in the 26 MHz band. It was shown that way at last spring's NAB, and seemingly worked quite well.

There is also a movement under foot to allow existing small AM stations to have FM translators. NAB is firmly behind that. Unless the FCC allocates more spectrum, possibly by taking over TV channel 6 when the day of TV analog shut down happens, I have no idea where they plan to put them. If they try to put those translators in the existing FM band, it will turn HD's excess sidebands into a real issue. It should be interesting.

So far, the FCC has not made IBOC the US standard, and probably won't. They have a history of not dictating standards. Nothing is settled. People running IBOC are doing it on an experimental basis, and they do so at their own risk.

In any case, it is an interesting circus to watch.

 

[Tom Wells]

regarding the hiss on FM , I am also sure there is additional 2-3 db of white noise added to the analog signal in demodulation.
This is considering a locked into mono mode. Most FMs keep mod indexs so high and loathe dead air, so it's not something than can be noticed, until you look for it. WFMT 98.7 Chicago not running IBOC has a clearly quieter floor, and holds tuning better at distance
in REAL LC tuned radios at distance while commuting. The IBOC sidebands begin to sizzle in with the "capture effect" unless you carefully
retune to center again. oh, for the days when you could tunrn the AFC off!

I am glad to see more regular people back, but I still hold my head and get annoyed at what business has done to the art of radio, then
wonders why ratings shrink.

Then, a salvation is offered up from....the engi.... NO! The business people again come and tell us how to save the radio.
Only it's a modem. And a slow one, that would have been laughed out of any good radio engineering school until the 80's.
Because it is so obviously not "radio".
By then, there were enough youngsters who did not get taught the fundamentals. Until we had 10 years of engineers who
don't understand the difference because they know no analog, this could not happen.

And how it is the RF and radio engineers of america did not stop this, I can't beleive either.
It's like the younger engineers at a car company to say "let's just make the brakes electrical....it could be DIGITAL!"
There are really good reasons why there is a rigid pipe with an antiquated hydraulic impulse system between your foot and the brake discs, and it's in response to life or death reality, safety-wise.
Would that we had protected good engineering practice long before ever got to the point of "sipping the kool-aid".

"We" should have educated the public instead of letting them become stupid about all things RF.
They did understand it from wiggling rabbit ears and rods. They didn't know they were finding best SNR.
Radio should have financed a campaign to help people clean up their own RF env.
Sell truly quiet dimmers, filters, toroids, noise phase cancellation loop antennas, outside to inside -remodulators for FM troublespots
similar to tunnel leaky coaxes.....the things that could have been done were numerous. Now that the whole RF environment
in the broadcast band is filled with the spurs of millions of unfiltered discontinuous-current devices, our best response to
the noise problem seems to be:

"If ye make noise unto us, we shall change our mode unto noise also. We shall see your noise and raise ye ten."

Professional engineers, why did you say so little?
My head 'bout 'sploded when I first read the proposal, but as I'm not in the biz, I know the FCC round-files engineering comment from
the public.
Those of you who felt there might be some problems at first glance, why did you say so little?

 

[ElCheapo]

You are really confused. I belive you are referring to DRM (Digital Radio Mondiale) which is an entirely different system.
See www.drm.org for DRM.
And
www.dreinc.com for FMeXtra, that has nothing to do with DRM.

No, I'm not confused at all. With 1,000 stations installed there's no way Clear Channel, Cumulus, ABC, CBS, Greater Media, Entercom and the others are going to about face and install something else.

You don't just walk away from that kind of investment.

 

[700WLW]

You are really confused. I belive you are referring to DRM (Digital Radio Mondiale) which is an entirely different system.
See www.drm.org for DRM.
And
www.dreinc.com for FMeXtra, that has nothing to do with DRM.

No, I'm not confused at all. With 1,000 stations installed there's no way Clear Channel, Cumulus, ABC, CBS, Greater Media, Entercom and the others are going to about face and install something else.

You don't just walk away from that kind of investment.

There are still 12,500 stations that will need to be convinced to spend the outrageous sums to convert to IBOC - good luck ! The J. P. Morgan study of HD Radio stated that it would not generate sufficient revenue, so what is the incentive for the remaining 12,500 stations to convert to IBOC ? These 1,000 stations can broadcast away, but only a handful are listening !

 

[ElCheapo]

There are still 12,500 stations that will need to be convinced to spend the outrageous sums to convert to IBOC - good luck ! The J. P. Morgan study of HD Radio stated that it would not generate sufficient revenue, so what is the incentive for the remaining 12,500 stations to convert to IBOC ? These 1,000 stations can broadcast away, but only a handful are listening !

Most of the country's population is concentrated in those media markets. If the all farm news station in middle of nowhere Iowa never converts, I don't think it will really hurt the cause.

 

[SUPERCASTER]

Tom Wells said:

Professional engineers, why did you say so little?

From what I'm told it was "orders from (HD cartel) hindquarters", no input or comments allowed.
Just as the public has little input over what they are allowed to hear over the air.

 

[SUPERCASTER]

You are really confused. I belive you are referring to DRM (Digital Radio Mondiale) which is an entirely different system.
See www.drm.org for DRM.
And
www.dreinc.com for FMeXtra, that has nothing to do with DRM.

No, I'm not confused at all. With 1,000 stations installed there's no way Clear Channel, Cumulus, ABC, CBS, Greater Media, Entercom and the others are going to about face and install something else.

You don't just walk away from that kind of investment.

They may have to, and learn to like it. The public is really turning off, off and away from the Borg cartel.
"RESISTANCE IS FUTILE". "WE CONTROL THE VERTICLE AND THE HORIZONTAL", as well as collect and spend the payola.
-Borg Cartel
Professional Psychopath, Control Freak, and voraciously greedy.

 

[dumber than a box of hair]

You guys clearly don't understand retail either. This is a technology in its infancy. Big box stores don't jump onto a product until it reaches critical mass and demand is such that they can make some money at it. HD isn't at that point - yet - but neither was FM at one point.

Thanks for making my point for me. Lousy products create first impressions that stick...such as "why waste my time with this?" When FM was in its infancy, you didn't have big-box retailers. Radios were sold at electronics stores, and since FM radio's claim-to-fame was high-fidelity, the electronics stores were carrying FM radios almost immediately. In some ways, it's an apples-to-oranges comparison, because FM came with a new band free of interference from existing signals, but retail-wise it's the same salami...a new technology. By the time FM listening reached mass numbers in the mid-1970s, FM radios were small, cheap and easy to find, and the big-box stores were already selling them in huge numbers. First impressions were almost entirely positive, unlike what we're seeing with HDRadio.

Except for very small markets, outdoor antennas have always been necessary to receive all available FM signals inside concrete and steel buildings. I take care of two FM sites that are at opposite ends of my market. Both are 100,000 watt stations, but at the Best Buy store furthest from my 99.9 transmitter you don't have a prayer of receiving the analog FM signal in the building without a rooftop antenna - I've tried. You can get it just fine in the parking lot.

The other station can't be received at the Wal-Mart furthest from its transmitter site - except in the parking lot. This is nothing new.

Again, there's that "first impressions are everything" rule. A $300 radio with such lousy reception, that even a hi-fi salon can't make work right, is going to make exactly the wrong impression.

Media fragmentation is occuring already. Media fragmentation will continue to occur whether broadcasters stick their heads in the sand and try to ignore it or not. Today's big broadcasters will become content providers more than anything. Having more outlets for our content is the game plan here. The difference between now and then in terms of docket 80-90 is technology and relaxation of Commission rules. Then, to operate a station you had to staff it, you had to rent space for it, etc. Today, you put a computer in a rack and plug it into an existing transmitter site that has been enhanced with some additional gear. The ongoing costs of operating HD are minimal.

Spoken exactly like someone who's never had to plan and execute programming or pay its costs. Media fragmentation isn't the only issue, and throwing together a computer, processing and an HDRadio transmitter does not make a radio station. There are initial and ongoing programming costs associated with EVERYTHING we broadcast. Unless the radio industry wants to completely abandon its current business model, we have to sell commercials to pay for all that (even our Internet streams have commercials), and commercials are bought for the most part on the basis of audience research. With so few listeners, no one will advertise on secondary channels, so the only way to pay for the HD2 or HD3 programming will be to dilute what the main-channel commercials are worth.

 

[700WLW]

There are still 12,500 stations that will need to be convinced to spend the outrageous sums to convert to IBOC - good luck ! The J. P. Morgan study of HD Radio stated that it would not generate sufficient revenue, so what is the incentive for the remaining 12,500 stations to convert to IBOC ? These 1,000 stations can broadcast away, but only a handful are listening !

Most of the country's population is concentrated in those media markets. If the all farm news station in middle of nowhere Iowa never converts, I don't think it will really hurt the cause.

Read the negative reviews on Amazon, Circuit City, Best Buy, and Radio Shack for HD Radio receivers, then look at how many people have voted over the course of six months on Amazon - not one review has received more than 75 votes. Some reviews even mention/explain the circumstances surrounding the development of IBOC, by the HD Radio Cartel. When I was at Best Buy, the Receptor could only receive a FEW AM/FM stations, with the supplied long-wire antenna, but the boom-boxes received MANY AM/FM stations with standard antennas (the FM antennas were not even extended). Lousy reception, along with having to mount external dipole antennas and no portable HD Radio receivers for the forseeable future, will surely doom HD Radio.

 

[ElCheapo]

Spoken exactly like someone who's never had to plan and execute programming or pay its costs. Media fragmentation isn't the only issue, and throwing together a computer, processing and an HDRadio transmitter does not make a radio station. There are initial and ongoing programming costs associated with EVERYTHING we broadcast. Unless the radio industry wants to completely abandon its current business model, we have to sell commercials to pay for all that (even our Internet streams have commercials), and commercials are bought for the most part on the basis of audience research. With so few listeners, no one will advertise on secondary channels, so the only way to pay for the HD2 or HD3 programming will be to dilute what the main-channel commercials are worth.

I have programmed stations quite successfully. As an example, I took a station from sign on to a 10.1 share 12+ in one book - with a class C1 transmitter 34 miles out of the metro - and grew that during subsequent books. I've been involved with the programming of several successful stations. I've worked in large, medium and small markets.

The whole point of HD Radio is providing for free what the satellite crowd is charging for. I don't know if that's the stated opinion of the "cartel" but that's my opinon.

If we don't offer it and the consumer wants it, they'll just get it elsewhere. So far, there are 10,000,000 people who want what satellite radio offers. In the big picture, that's a small number of total radio users.

Even if HD ad rates never achieve parity with analog, they provide revenue that we absolutely wouldn't have received otherwise. If you know programming, you should know what "sold out" means. I would assume most of the primary channels that are broadcasting HD remain sold out most of the time.

 

[OldGringo]

Thanks for making my point for me. Lousy products create first impressions that stick...such as "why waste my time with this?" When FM was in its infancy, you didn't have big-box retailers. Radios were sold at electronics stores, and since FM radio's claim-to-fame was high-fidelity, the electronics stores were carrying FM radios almost immediately. In some ways, it's an apples-to-oranges comparison, because FM came with a new band free of interference from existing signals, but retail-wise it's the same salami...a new technology. By the time FM listening reached mass numbers in the mid-1970s, FM radios were small, cheap and easy to find, and the big-box stores were already selling them in huge numbers. First impressions were almost entirely positive, unlike what we're seeing with HDRadio.

FM spent over 20 years in failed infancy. Born around 1940, the band was moved from 46 MHz to the current one after the war. Between 1950 and 1960, the number of FM stations declined as operators turned in hundreds of licences.

Stereo was supposed to fix this... but less than 100 stations converted in the first two years.

It was not until the "drop dead" date in 1967 that FM came to life when the FCC mandated that AM and FM simulcasts had to end. Many operators thought having the same programming in better quality would be the best use for FM. It wasn't, as the prior 27 years proved. It took a government mandate for FM to take off. Within about 5 years, the FM share had doubled, and by 1977, FM had as much listening as AM.

First impressions, for nearly 3 decades, were uniformly negative. It was hard to find receivers, and they were considerably more expensive than AM radios. I worked at an FM starting around 1960, and getting a reciever I could afford at $1.10 an hour took several months of part time work.

 

[OldGringo]

There are still 12,500 stations that will need to be convinced to spend the outrageous sums to convert to IBOC - good luck ! The J. P. Morgan study of HD Radio stated that it would not generate sufficient revenue, so what is the incentive for the remaining 12,500 stations to convert to IBOC ? These 1,000 stations can broadcast away, but only a handful are listening !

Nobody needs to be convinced of anything. First, there are 2000 stations either signed or on the air. These stations represent about 90% population coverage of the US, and probably even more ratings coverage. In other words, nearly every person will be able to hear HD, and nearly all the stations with significant audience will be in HD. Remeber, the top 10 markets alone are about 23% of the US population and nearly 33% of radio revenues... by the time you get to the 50th market, you cover 70% of America's population. And the decent signals in all those markets are HD already.