Hi there folks. Back on June 30th, my second cousin who lives in the Mount Washington valley told me that WMWV 93.5 in Conway was streaming their audio. Naturally I was really delighted to hear this, because I was looking forward to being able to hear the local news of the area, and also hear the Morning Weather Show again as well. The last time I had heard this station live they were still WBNC FM, and the Morning Weather show was on their sister station WBNC 1050 AM.
On July first I checked out the audio stream and was kind of disappointed that public service announcements were inserted into the commercial breaks and at a much higher volume than the station's programming itself. Personally I like audio streams that are not interrupted at all, so that when you record them, people aren't given a dead give away that "this was recorded from the net." Inocuous music breaks and louder public service announcements just interrupt the flow of the station, and makes the audio stream sound unnatural to me. Anyway, on the July first audio stream there were many PSAs substituted for the commercial breaks, and when the station was rejoined again, the timing was almost always wrong. Obviously the company that streams their audio doesn't realize that WMWV's commercial load is not like that of a major market station so they insert too many public service announcements into the station's commercial break, thus always returning to the station's local programming too late. For example, after the Morning Weather Show was announced, Briggs Bunker's valley forecast was joined late and so was the segment from the Mount Washington observatory with the summit forecast.
But if I thought the audio stream of July first was bad, two weeks later the audio stream was even WORSE. I tuned into the stream of July 15 around 6:26 AM and the news was announced around 6:28, and then when the station went into a commercial break, instead of any PSAs to fill up the time, there was dead air for two and a half minutes followed by one single PSA. When the station's audio was rejoined they were doing the sports and weather and the newscast had been completely eliminated from the audio stream. Now, I can see eliminating spots from an audio stream, but eliminating the local newscast? That's why many people tune into a radio station's audio stream in the first place. If they have moved out of the area, they want to be able to hear the local news of the area. At 7:30 AM, I did get to hear the news, but when the announcer said "We'll be back with sports and weather" there was about thirty seconds of silence and then suddenly Stray Cat Strut by the Stray Cats was played, but not by the station. This time during the morning weather show, Briggs Bunker's valley report was completely eliminated and there was well over five minutes of dead air. Now, I realize that this may not actually be the station's fault, it may be the fault of the company that is streaming their audio. But as it stands now, with so much dead air and local content being missed on their audio stream, like local newscasts and half of the Morning Weather Show, as far as I'm concerned, the stream is a real joke. They've just got to get it together and provide a better, more coherent and reliable stream than they are doing now, because folks won't continue to listen to an audio stream that is going to be riddled with five minutes of dead air that's for sure. It's really a shame because I was really looking forward to enjoying that audio stream, but my experiences thus far with the WMWV audio stream have been anything but enjoyable.
I also understand that the other FM station in the valley, Magic 104.5 WVMJ is just about to begin streaming as well. I certainly hope their streaming runs more smoothly than that of their competitor.
Sam Ward in Ontario Canada
On July first I checked out the audio stream and was kind of disappointed that public service announcements were inserted into the commercial breaks and at a much higher volume than the station's programming itself. Personally I like audio streams that are not interrupted at all, so that when you record them, people aren't given a dead give away that "this was recorded from the net." Inocuous music breaks and louder public service announcements just interrupt the flow of the station, and makes the audio stream sound unnatural to me. Anyway, on the July first audio stream there were many PSAs substituted for the commercial breaks, and when the station was rejoined again, the timing was almost always wrong. Obviously the company that streams their audio doesn't realize that WMWV's commercial load is not like that of a major market station so they insert too many public service announcements into the station's commercial break, thus always returning to the station's local programming too late. For example, after the Morning Weather Show was announced, Briggs Bunker's valley forecast was joined late and so was the segment from the Mount Washington observatory with the summit forecast.
But if I thought the audio stream of July first was bad, two weeks later the audio stream was even WORSE. I tuned into the stream of July 15 around 6:26 AM and the news was announced around 6:28, and then when the station went into a commercial break, instead of any PSAs to fill up the time, there was dead air for two and a half minutes followed by one single PSA. When the station's audio was rejoined they were doing the sports and weather and the newscast had been completely eliminated from the audio stream. Now, I can see eliminating spots from an audio stream, but eliminating the local newscast? That's why many people tune into a radio station's audio stream in the first place. If they have moved out of the area, they want to be able to hear the local news of the area. At 7:30 AM, I did get to hear the news, but when the announcer said "We'll be back with sports and weather" there was about thirty seconds of silence and then suddenly Stray Cat Strut by the Stray Cats was played, but not by the station. This time during the morning weather show, Briggs Bunker's valley report was completely eliminated and there was well over five minutes of dead air. Now, I realize that this may not actually be the station's fault, it may be the fault of the company that is streaming their audio. But as it stands now, with so much dead air and local content being missed on their audio stream, like local newscasts and half of the Morning Weather Show, as far as I'm concerned, the stream is a real joke. They've just got to get it together and provide a better, more coherent and reliable stream than they are doing now, because folks won't continue to listen to an audio stream that is going to be riddled with five minutes of dead air that's for sure. It's really a shame because I was really looking forward to enjoying that audio stream, but my experiences thus far with the WMWV audio stream have been anything but enjoyable.
I also understand that the other FM station in the valley, Magic 104.5 WVMJ is just about to begin streaming as well. I certainly hope their streaming runs more smoothly than that of their competitor.
Sam Ward in Ontario Canada