Re: HD
musichead1029 said:
Nick said:
Since no one listens to HD, it's not worth wasting $10000 to downgrade the backup to HD. In fact, if the HD transmitter fails, stations won't replace it. Radio One used to have 100.3 and 107.9 in HD, but the transmitters failed years ago and they haven't fixed it.
That's because Radio 1 isn't doing anything profitable with their HD. I don't know why they're even running HD on 103.9 without any subchannels. You can be sure if WPRB's HD goes off, they'll fix it as fast as possible since they have a lease riding on it. And there's gotta be a bar or two pulling in Phillies 24-7 via WOGL HD4 that would complain if the HD went off there. Feeding translators or a network is the current HD killer app. Savvy broadcasters will likely find other ones to justify the infrastructure they already have, unless they're merely broke like Radio 1.
And we all understand that nobody listens to HD other than hobbyists like us who have the radios and listen out of curiosity. The same applies to DXers.
WPPZ is the only Radio One station in HD, when that fails, we will hear WMGM and B104 in Philly again.
You can hear WMGM and WAEB-FM any time on a web radio, or just a computer even. Garden variety commercial radio.
HD radio is a money pit, a negative sum game. There is currently no profit with HD radio as a whole. Sure, some people are profiting like the stations that lease it to ethnic broadcasters, but the ethnic broadcasters are being screwed because no one's listening enough to sell ads (a.k.a. the cost of running HD shifts from the station to the ethnic broadcaster). Or the ethnic broadcasters are on an analog translator, and that's how they're getting their revenue.
The only beneficiaries of HD radio iBiquity which has been scamming the stations all along, the engineers forced to install and fix HD, and the transmitter manufacturers. Maybe the people who buy HD radios because they like an HD2, and would otherwise have bought a satellite radio are benefiting by not having to pay for satellite radio. Analog radio is a positive sum game as a whole because the advertising revenue exceeds expenses. HD radio does not have advertising revenue because advertisers aren't willing to pay for ads that reach maybe 5 people at most.
There are more subcarrier radios out there than HD radios, and it's cheaper for ethnic broadcasters to give away subcarrier radios than HD radios because there's no middleman (iBiquity) to bloat the costs. That money flowing to iBiquity (through HD radios bought and given away by the ethnic broadcaster, and incorporated in the cost of the lease ethnic broadcasters pay to the stations) instead of to the ethnic broadcaster is the difference between an ethnic broadcaster making a profit or taking a loss. Most cities still have ethnic broadcasters leasing subcarriers, but I rarely hear ethnic HD2s. In fact, the only ethnic HD2s I heard are HumDesi and Dhoom/Radio Asia. HumDesi is on a translator, and Dhoom wants to be on a translator and currently is on an LPFM. If it were profitable for ethnic broadcasters to lease HD2s, most HD2s and HD3s would be leased by ethnic broadcasters, instead of subcarrier leases, translators, AM station leases, and pirate stations. Yes, pirate radio does make a profit as a whole because the FCC just doesn't care about enforcement. There aren't enough $10,000 fines to discourage pirate radio, and most pirate stations air commercials.
It is so bad that stations can't even bundle ads on HD2s with analog ads because advertisers don't want to waste money on HD radio. Advertisers do want to purchase combinations of traditional radio advertising and Internet radio advertising, like Clear Channel's iHeartRadio. Internet radio is currently a negative sum game, but advertising revenue is increasing as more people get smartphones and switch to Internet radio, and within this decade, Internet radio will turn a profit as a whole.
The flaws of HD radio are keeping it from profitability. The standard itself is flawed, too much IBUZ and not enough useful service area. AM HD is not saving the AM band (a.k.a. adding revenue to AM stations) by bringing people back to the AM band, because the only way you can hear an AM station in HD is if you can see the tower and there are no thunderstorms within 100 miles. iBiquity is shooting itself in the foot by requiring receiver manufacturers to license the technology, instead of letting them have it free (iBiquity could eventually recover that revenue by charging stations a commission for HD2/HD3 advertising revenue). If the technology was free, then almost every car radio made after the mid 2000s would have HD, and HD would be in the majority of cars by now. Just like how TV manufacturers included DTV reception even before the FCC made it mandatory. But alas, HD is a novelty technology that will soon go the way of quadraphonic FM. At least the HD2s are a nice place for program directors to play around, programming formats without having to worry about ratings.
