Radio World

The spring NAB Show is approaching. Between now and then Radio World will conduct several short Q&As with manufacturers about their plans and offerings, to help you get the most out of the big annual trade show. Darrin Paley is the senior sales engineer for western U.S.A. and Canada for Wheatstone.

Radio World: How has business been for the company since last year’s NAB Show?

Darrin Paley: Last year we did our biggest project ever in terms of complexity, size, scope and innovation — WTOP. We also found ourselves putting together packages for smaller and mid-sized stations, and I think that’s because the broadcast industry is changing at such a fast pace. Everyone needs technical solutions to those changes and they’re looking to the Wheatstones of the industry to provide it. It definitely keeps us thinking of new ways to stay ahead of the curve.

[Read: 2020 NAB Show: Schedule, Exhibitor Info, Updates]

RW: What are you hearing from your customers about their business outlook this year? In what areas should we expect growth or the most interesting projects?

Paley: The trend seems to boil down to “how to do more with less.” There’s a lot of interest in how to share studios, content and resources across distances. Broadcasters tell us they’re looking for ways to reduce real estate costs and hardware upkeep. At the same time, they’re adding more services, like streaming, and, of course, all of that falls under the AoIP umbrella. The look of the studio itself has changed as well, due in large part to virtual mixers like our Glass LXE. A number of projects I worked on this year didn’t actually have a physical console in one or more studios, and that, along with AoIP appliances to bridge studios separated by distance are creating real opportunities for broadcasters to impact their bottom line.

RW: The last year has proven rather rocky for much of the radio industry with the largest group owner making a big move to chart a new business/operational model. Stepping away from your particular segment, what is your feeling for the overall health of the radio industry?

Paley: Overall, we feel the radio industry is stable for the most part. What we saw in the last year was an industry stepping back to reevaluate how it was going to remain relevant for the foreseeable future given the change in consumer habits over the past few years.

RW: You’ve been active in the radio broadcast equipment market for many years. What’s the biggest problem or challenge facing users in this segment right now?

Paley: I think the biggest challenge for all of us in this industry is to recognize that we have to be open to new ideas. We can’t continue to do what we did five years ago. We have to keep moving forward because listeners are continually moving forward. At Wheatstone, we are constantly pushing the limits of what AoIP can do because we have an R&D department that’s made up of both engineers who have been with us since the beginning and understand the business, and also systems engineers who know about enterprise and telecommunications technology. That serves us well in being able to provide a path forward for broadcasters.

RW: What new goodies will your company be showing? Why should attendees visit N3317?

Paley: Last year we introduced several appliances for our AoIP system that bridged studios separated by distance and we developed some interesting interfaces to the network that made workflows much easier. This year, we’re taking it to the cloud in some unique ways that we think will change how broadcasters operate and will solve a few of the challenges we discussed earlier. We’ll be demonstrating WheatNet-IP and our virtual solutions at booth N3317.

RW: What do you anticipate will be the most significant technology trend at the 2020 NAB Show?

Paley: Virtualization and cloud. This seems to be a part of almost every conversation I have with broadcasters today, and for good reason. We are at an unprecedented time in broadcast history where we are just beginning to tap into technologies like cloud and virtualization that can make a real difference in the future of radio and television.

RW: Will you be attending any sessions or looking forward to any events?

Paley: I am looking forward to the BEIT session “Studio Elasticity, From Hardware to Virtual to Cloud,” presented by our senior software engineer, Scott Gerenser. It’s Tuesday afternoon, and he covers a lot of ground, including important trends and how broadcasters can start planning now for virtualization. I believe it starts at 3:45 p.m. in room N258, Tuesday of the show.

RW: You’re a show veteran, how has the show changed since your first visit?

Paley: My first NAB Show was in 1995 and I have been to the NAB in Las Vegas every year since, as an attendee and an exhibitor. The NAB Show has changed dramatically since 1995 in many ways, the biggest being the actual attendees. With the internet, consolidation, and the workload put on the engineers, not to mention the tighter budgets, there doesn’t seem to be as many attending. I remember how many local engineers, from small to large markets and from all over the world attended, and now it’s generally the group DOEs and the occasional local engineer who is researching equipment for an upcoming project.

 

The post NAB Exhibitor Viewpoint: Darrin Paley, Senior Sales Engineer, Western U.S.A. and Canada, Wheatstone appeared first on Radio World.

Chris Tarr

Radio engineers and technologists worry about whether their networks are adequately prepared to defend against cybersecurity incursions. We talked to Chris Tarr, CSRE, AMD, DRB, CBNE, director of technical operations for Wisconsin at Entercom, which was one of several radio groups in the United States that have suffered recent ransomware attacks. Opinions are his own and not necessarily those of Entercom.

Radio World: How well prepared is the radio industry?

Chris Tarr:  There’s still a mentality that you can protect yourself and make yourself completely invulnerable. It’s never a matter of whether it’s going to happen to you; it’s a matter of when. 

Do what you can to fortify your systems, [but] you can put up the best fortress in the world, and once they’re behind that wall, everything is fair game. A lot of companies do a good job of preventing people from getting in from the outside but not doing anything about people who actually get inside. The theme that I’ve seen [in other attacks] is nobody had a plan. Always assume someone is going to get in.

Always assume someone is going to get in.

Everybody says, “Oh well we have backup so we’re okay.” A lot of people who have backups never check them. They never validate them, they never make sure they’re working; and they don’t realize how long it takes to restore that stuff. A lot of people get by with, “We’ve got antivirus, we’ve take backups of everything. We’ve got a firewall, we’re good. Worst case is we just restore from our backups.” 

If backups are part of your plan, do you have a plan to check those every day, every two days? What’s your plan for how many times a week you backup? Do you backup [only] certain files? Even if you’re on the cloud, are you able to roll back if something gets attacked? 

We haven’t even gotten to the network part yet.

RW: Once a manager knows they need a plan, what’s the next step? 

Tarr: A plan is only as good as how you execute it. So what are the vital components of your operation? Once you’ve identified those, what happens if those were all to fail? How would you restore those? Even better, is there a way to really harden the network?

For example, by now everybody should be segregating their automation networks from their office networks. However, you can’t do that 100%, you have to be realistic. Short of sneaker netting, and using thumb drives and stuff that can kill the infection, how can you get files from Point A to Point B? 

Something as simple as “How many file shares do you have, and how many do you really need?” Does everybody need to have access to everything? Really take a serious look at the roles of each individual in the organization. What do they truly need access to?

Then how can we isolate things? We know that an automation system isn’t going to get the ransomware on its own, so look at what kinds of actions people could take to infect the network. 

What if the program directors want access to the computers on that automation network? In the old days we’d just throw on another network card, put their computer on there and they’re good to go. You can’t do that anymore. So you look at maybe a thin client on your desktop, where there really isn’t any services other than sharing a video feed between the two machines. 

Where do you keep your financials? Where do you keep HR stuff? How do you segregate that? Again, most of that is going to have to live on a network somewhere; what do you do to keep those files safe?

That’s step number one, getting things locked down, network segregated, backup plans. You can’t do just a single backup and hope for the best; you need to rotate backups, take backups offline so they can’t ever touch the network. That’s saved me more than once, where my backup was a disconnected drive so it never got touched. I was able to restore cleanly without any problems. 

You want to validate those backups to make sure. There’s nothing worse than putting a backup up, and realizing that it hasn’t run for three months because of not paying attention.

How will you communicate [after an attack]? Most of the time your email is going to be down, everybody’s computers are going to be off; so how do you communicate what’s going on? How do you communicate to your advertisers so that everything is okay? Because the word will get out. How do you put logs together? 

Assume that everything involved in your operation is off and there’s nothing you can do right now about that. How do you manage that? Do you set up a Twitter account for employees? Do you prepare a list of their personal email accounts so that you can do a mass email with “Here’s what’s going on” status updates on what’s functioning and what’s not functioning?

 Have you thought about how you’re going to play back audio if your playback machines, heaven forbid, get hit? How are you going to bill clients? Spots, how are you going to bill them? A file server backup could take hours to days to restore. What do you do? 

That’s the holistic approach people are missing. 

RW: I do have the sense that more organizations are trying to raise awareness on this.

Tarr: Unfortunately, there hasn’t really been a lot of discussion, because companies are afraid to talk about it. Companies that have gotten hit are afraid to talk about it; they don’t want to talk about where they went wrong for fear of somebody thinking that they’re weak or incompetent. 

That public station [KQED] that got hit a year or two ago, they really were upfront about the challenges that they ran into. But nobody has really taken the time to talk about from a broadcasting point of view, what the best practices should be. 

When this happens to you, be clear and say, “Yes, it’s a very common thing. Yes, we got hit by ransomware and everything’s okay, data is secure, we have a plan and we’re implementing it.” 

Getting hit with ransomware is not unusual. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. The success stories are in how you limited how you were affected, and how quickly and efficiently you restored your systems. How quickly did you get your traffic system back up? We were scheduling spots on Monday following the weekend. That’s where planning comes in. There will be things that’ll be out of order for a week or two because they’re low priority. [But] how quickly can you get your critical functions back up?

There’s not enough dialogue about that in broadcasting.

RW: Ransomware catches people’s attention. Should a broadcaster ever pay a ransom?

Tarr: No, you shouldn’t. There’s no guarantee that it’s going to work. 

There’s a school of thought that the person who wrote ransomware is going to unlock it if you pay them, because it’s their — for lack of a better word — reputation; but you just don’t know. And payment encourages them; there’s a potential to make yourself a bigger target. 

That’s why it’s so important to focus not only on prevention but on response. If you can respond properly and you have a good plan, you don’t need to pay the ransom, you will have all of the things you need to rebuild. 

The only thing that I would completely harden in this environment would be your automation system, your bread and butter. That’s easy enough to do because you don’t have to have that on a public network

The problem that exists these days is that security is inconvenient. Unfortunately a lot of the people on the other side of the building, the creative people, the sales people — they understand inconvenience, they don’t understand security. When you say, “No you can’t move those files around, and no, you can’t connect to that automation system,” it’s inconvenient, and they put up a fight. There has to be education there. 

As long as your automation network is segregated physically, you can at least stay on the air. That is the number one. You can always hand-write logs, you can hand-write billing, but if you’re not on the air, you’ve got a problem. 

As long as your automation network is segregated physically, you can at least stay on the air.

That’s how you have to approach it: Different levels of importance. Being on the air is most important. Second, would be billing, how do we get the billings on, how do we reconcile? Then everything else. It’s trivial to backup office computers and restore them. Nine times out of 10 there is nothing so critical on them that if you’ve got a three-day-old backup, it’s not the end of the world. We had computers that were offline for a week or two. When we got to it, we got to it.

RW: You mentioned automation but there are other vulnerable mission-critical systems, right? Remote control transmitter, interfaces, EAS. 

Tarr: Those need to be firewalled and password protected. They’re not going to get affected by ransomware, but you need to be smart about them. What a lot of people are turning to now are firewalls and virtual LANs so these devices are kept onto a separate subnet and you’re only opening ports that are necessary to access them, changing default passwords. 

I used to be able to love to get to my stuff from the outside world when I’m driving around or wherever I’m at, being able to log in and do stuff. Those days are over because if I can do it, anybody can do it. So now we’re doing VPNs and virtual LANs to separate them from the office networks.

A lot of the stories you see, EAS boxes getting hacked and those Barix boxes getting hacked, was just because of sloppiness. We have a lot of engineers who are not IT guys, and a lot of IT guys who aren’t engineers. It’s one of the bigger problems in our industry, speaking of firewalls: We’ve built this firewall between IT and engineering. They don’t understand each other’s goals.

I’m lucky that I have a background in both, but in a lot of places, either engineering runs everything and you’ve got firewalls open and ports open, or IT is in charge and the engineer can’t do anything.

A lot of IT guys don’t understand broadcast stuff. For example, PSD or RDS data. Before point-to-point firewalls were common, you’d have a DSL connection at a translator site or whatever, you’d send that data over the public internet. More than once I’ve had an IT guy say, “Oh, you can’t do that.” Actually you can and you have to. And they just don’t understand that. 

Make sure that engineers and IT guys understand each other’s goals. The IT guy has to know that there are going to be some things that have to get done that may require special consideration on the engineering side. Engineers are going to have to understand you can’t throw a bunch of ports open so you can get to your Burk. VPN or something else is going to be required. 

A lot of security rides on that relationship.

RW: But when the head of a radio group reads a headline about a competitor being hit by a ransomware attack, calls the engineer in and says “How do we make sure this never happens to us,” the answer can’t just be, “We need a better relationship between engineering and IT,” right? What does the engineer say to the CEO?

Tarr: You need to get stakeholders together and come up with a plan. It’s hard to act as one cohesive unit if you’ve got these varied departments with their own priorities. You can’t even set up a security plan if you’ve got the program directors insisting they must have access to this or that. 

Let’s be honest, in a broadcast situation, a lot of times the engineers don’t carry a lot of power, so they can’t tell the program directors, “No, you can’t do that.” You need to get buy-in from the CEO all the way down to the part-time guys. Get everybody together in a room and say, “First of all, let’s talk about how this could happen,” or bring in a security consultant to talk about those things. The second part is to know that if this happens, we know what we’re going to do, we know what the expectations are. To be able to say, “Yeah, we if we get hit, we’ll be down for a day, but here’s what we’re going to do and here’s the steps that we’re taking to make sure that that plan can be executed.” That makes you more confident: “We could get hit and you know what? We’ll be okay.”

[Ebook: Cybersecurity and Studio Disaster Recovery]

RW: People reading this will be well aware of the attack on Entercom. Knowing you can’t talk about every aspect, what can you share about what the company did or learned? 

Tarr: Well, unfortunately I still can’t. There’s really not much I can divulge. The only thing I can say personally is that I was very proud of how we responded internally. We were back up and running very quickly. We had a solid plan. We worked over the weekend, we implemented the plan and it was a success. 

We didn’t look at this as a failure by any means. That’s the mindset people have to have. It wasn’t a failure that we got hit with ransomware; it’s going to happen, it happens to everyone. Had we not been able to respond to it and had it crippled our business for a month, that would have been a failure. 

The biggest thing I can say is, “Don’t think for a minute it’s not going to happen, or that just the basics are going to help you.” This is a rapidly changing environment. A good security consultant is worth their weight in gold. Hire one and have them look at what you’re doing, talk about what your job function is and what you want to achieve as a company. Get that advice.

RW: Other specific best practices to mention? 

Tarr: I’ll probably get in trouble with my boss for saying this, but I’m not a big fan of password changing. Once your password’s out, your password’s out. Password complexity is good, but the 90 days rule may not be very effective. It’s not like a password gets leaked and then they sit on it for six month.

Obviously, education. Make sure that people understand: If somebody sends you a link to something, verify with them, call and say, “Did you send this to me?” Today’s viruses and nastyware always look like they came from somebody you know. Unless somebody says specifically “I’m going to send you this,” don’t open it til you verify that they actually did. 

We talked about hardening your automation network. Do not plug it in to the office network at all. And if you do, make sure that it’s firewall blocked and that you’re only opening the ports you need to open. Make sure they don’t touch each other, other than what you absolutely need. 

Third, physical security. My server room is locked up because who knows what could happen, sabotage wise or information security wise? Even just curious part-timers can get in and wreak havoc. 

Backups. Take lots of backups and verify them regularly. Preferably have a backup offsite. At the very least make sure you rotate and what I call “air gap” backups. Have a backup that’s not connected to anything. Rotate them off. If the infection spreads, you’ve got a good clean backup to the restore from. 

Obviously antivirus, those sorts of things. There’s new software specifically for detection of malware or ransomware; they detect the moment that the malware tries to change a file, it throws out a couple of honeypot files and as soon as it touches one of those files and attempts to change it or lock it, it shuts everything down. 

Antivirus is great but it’s not a firewall and it doesn’t really do anything for ransomware. It’s kind of one of those “inch deep mile wide” pieces of software. You really want to get specific and look into smart firewall appliances that will stop it at the door. Short of having a security consultant, that’s the next best thing: Have a firewall that inspects the packets coming in, and get something with a subscription to a database that keeps that up to date. If you could stop this stuff from getting in the door, that’s 90% of the issue.

We all think we’re the smartest guys in the room. Engineers are notorious for that. There’s someone out there smarter than us working on what they’re going to do next. Don’t assume that because you’ve read the latest books and read the latest information that you’re safe, because there’s always somebody smarter and they’re always out there trying to wreck your stuff. Part of a complete plan is assuming that it’s going to happen. And if it doesn’t, that’s great. If it never happens to you bless you, but assume that it will and know what you’re going to do, know how you’re going to respond and make it automatic. Write the plan down, make sure everybody knows what the plan is, and then you ready to execute it when it’s necessary.

 

[Get more tips and insider information about cybersecurity best practices in this ebook.]

The post Most People Don’t Have a Cybersecurity Plan, Tarr Warns appeared first on Radio World.

Brazilian Minister of Science and Technology Marcos Pontes opened the second National Forum of Brazilian Broadcasters on March 5. In Portuguese, the event is known as the Fórum Nacional de Radiodifusão MCTIC.

Pontes is an Air Force pilot, engineer, astronaut and author. He became the first South American to travel to space in 2006.

Digital Radio Mondiale Chair Ruxandra Obreja traveled to Brasilia for the event and had the opportunity to interview Marcos Pontes on behalf of Radio World. Obreja is a frequent contributor to Radio World International, and she also shared a clip of the interview. Watch it now.

http://www.radioworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/videoplayback.mp4

 

In the video, Pontes explains the purpose and importance of this forum for the Brazilian radio broadcast industry. He said hopes the forum will be an opportunity for broadcasters to share their ideas for how the government can improve, as well as what the Ministry of Science and Technology is getting right. For example, Pontes said he is seeking feedback on what broadcast technologies the country should standardize on and what types of regulation radio broadcasters believe is necessary for their success.

Pontes also provides an update on the country’s near-term plans for the sector. In his address, Pontes said that the time has come for digital radio in Brazil. Obreja pressed him on the question of timing. Pontes demurred to provide a specific timeline, but said he hopes for a “short term” solution to emerge and said they “are getting there.”

Pontes also noted that many Brazilian stations are still in the process of converting from AM to FM. Obreja added that she hopes digital will be the next step for these stations. Pontes appeared to agree, but emphasized the need to choose the right technology to make that happen.

The post Brazil’s Marcos Pontes on Radio’s Future appeared first on Radio World.

Radio broadcasters have long feared that self-driving cars would threaten their dashboard dominance. A new optional infotainment system upgrade from carmaker Tesla proves that these concerns are well founded.

Some older Tesla Model S and Model X owners are now able to purchase a $2,500 update that the company says improves user experience, enables video streaming and supplies an expanded Tesla Arcade but will remove broadcast AM/FM radio and Sirius/XM reception. (Broadcasters will likely wince when they see “Removes AM, FM and Sirius XM radio” under the “Improvements” heading of its software breakdown.) 

Currently, the offer is available by emailed invitation only, according to Tesla Service. U.S. vehicles with Autopilot Computer 2.5 featuring Full Self-Driving Capability will be first in line, while those running Autopilot Computer 2.0 should be contacted later this month.

In response to this news, Strategy Analytics Global Automotive Associate Director Roger Lanctot wrote a LinkedIn article titled “Technology Tyranny and the End of Radio.” 

According to Lanctot, “Once again, Silicon Valley is asking us to surrender one thing in exchange for another. Yesterday it was our privacy. Today it is the radio. Tomorrow it will be our freedom.” Perhaps this conclusion is a bit hyperbolic, but Lanctot concedes that the strategy has a logical side. He writes, “it is quite possible that Tesla has leveraged user data from its own vehicles to determine that radio listening in its vehicles was sufficiently minimal to be worth risking some minor resistance.”

Additionally, it may be “a market research project” to determine customer demand for OTA radio. Why? Tesla is an international company dealing with a variety of broadcast standards while also preparing for 5G rollout; an attempt to simplify its technology offerings makes sense for the manufacturer, if not for the consumer, Lanctot reasons. Nonetheless, it’s clear that he believes radio should remain prominent in the car dash.

This isn’t the first time radio has worried about Tesla’s in-dash plans. As far back as 2017, rumors have circulated that Elon Musk’s tech-car company would remove radio. That fear proved to be overblown for the Tesla 3, but this time, it appears Tesla is indeed moving in a radio-less direction. The 2020 Tesla Model 3, for example, does not offer AM radio, according to Car and Driver. Note that Tesla isn’t the only car company experimenting with removing broadcast radio. In 2014, BMW removed AM reception from its electric i3 models, to the chagrin of organizations like the National Association of Broadcasters and AM enthusiasts.

RW has requested comment from Tesla and will report any reply.

 

The post Tesla Offers Infotainment Upgrade That Removes Radio appeared first on Radio World.

The FCC says it will be limiting access to the FCC as a preventative measure in the face of the coronavirus (COVID-19), and will be suspending FCC participation in any large gatherings.

According to the commission, anyone who has been in any country in the previous 14 days that is subject to CDC level-three travel warnings will not be allowed to enter FCC facilities. Currently that would exclude recent visitors to China, Iran, Italy and South Korea.

[Read: What Radio Exhibitors at NAB Show Are Saying About Coronavirus]

That includes FCC employees and contractors as well as visitors.

The FCC has suspended all noncritical FCC domestic and international travel and for the near term is “suspending until further notice any FCC involvement in noncritical large gatherings that involve participants from across the country and/or around the world.”

An FCC spokesperson was checking at press time on whether that means the chairman won’t make it for his Q&A at the NAB Show next month or whether that is considered a “critical” gathering. That is still six weeks away, so there could also be a change in the virus status by then.

It is certainly a large gathering, drawing close to 100,000 people from home and abroad.

 

The post FCC Suspends Travel to “Large Gatherings” in Coronavirus-Related Move appeared first on Radio World.

The author is chairman of Digital Radio Mondiale.

Analog shortwave will celebrate about 100 years of existence in 2028 when many hope 5G will have been properly defined, tested and applied, though broadcasting is low on its long list of perceived advantages.

A screenshot of Dream software showing the technical evaluation of a DRM signal (BBC transmission) received from a transmitter located in Singapore. Photo courtesy of Dr. TK Rao.

It’s true that shortwave was typically a medium of the Cold War that peaked in 1989 and that afterward its listenership dwindled. Many international broadcasters gave up on it as the post-war transmitters got rustier and the energy bills kept mounting.

After all, when budget cuts are needed, no transmitter will go on strike or write to the press, as happened when the BBC World Service tried to unsuccessfully close its Hindi shortwave transmissions in 2011. In 2020 these broadcasts stopped, when committed BBC Indian listeners, writers and thinkers who opposed it in 2011 did not protest too much.

The slow death of shortwave has been blamed on the internet and satellite. As technology and content are inextricably linked, shortwave created its type of content that is no longer favored by the savvy FM listener, internet user and cellphone obsessed.

WHAT HAPPENED?

First, came the great partnership of international broadcasters with local FM stations. International programs could be suddenly heard in big cities in very good sound quality. The drawback was that the programs were often very short, often scheduled at unreasonable hours.

“Radio should address each and every one in cities and far away rural communities, whether to inform, entertain or alert to emergency situations.”

Branding was also an issue for the big international broadcasters now piggybacking on a local station with its own identity. There was also the danger that the local station could object to this partnership for political or content reasons and drop the international program at very short notice.

In some European cities, international broadcasters have also become local ones as they have gone on DAB multiplexes, more of a prestige move than an audience growing measure.

Photo courtesy of Encompass Digital Media.

Most of these international broadcasters are streaming and throwing their lot with another 30,000 or more stations that listeners have to choose from but only if they have electricity, a laptop, an internet connection and sometimes the patience to cope with buffering.

So, shortwave and its long-range advantage were replaced mainly by the one-to-one sophisticated internet and the cheaper, clearer but very local FM or the DAB+ option in band III, in this way undermining the very essence of their wide coverage and appeal.

At first, it might seem that these are cheaper and more modern options. But, in reality, energy-hungry FM and the multiplexed DAB+ are not that cheap either. Streaming uses an expensive digital electronics setup for something that broadcasting, as one-to-many, can do more cheaply, preserving the anonymity of the user, an advantage that is becoming increasingly relevant in many societies.

NEW REALITY

The greater danger of replacing wide-range coverage with local broadcasting is a different one, though: Radio that should address each and every one in cities and far away rural communities, whether to inform, entertain or alert to emergency situations, becomes patchy and leaves those, who need it most, out of range.

Some international and powerful public and state broadcasters still opt for wide-range coverage, however. One example is China, which might be still pursuing its local digital broadcasting version but to give full coverage on the roads and in the areas between large cities, it has opted for DRM shortwave.

China National Radio broadcasts 80 hours a day from five existing and upgraded sites with seven or eight transmitters sending shortwave DRM to most areas of North China, East China, South China and Southwest China. Russia is also airing DRM in shortwave over huge areas of Siberia.

India has three DRM shortwave transmitters and is looking at increasing this number for national and international reach. There is also interest in Indonesia and renewed questions are coming from Brazil that has been using analog shortwave to cover mainly its Amazonian region.

Vanuatu, a small country in the Pacific, has recently gone for DRM shortwave to save lives in disaster situations by using its integrated emergency warning capability. And a site in the United States has recently started broadcasting in DRM the popular Radio Marti programs toward central and Latin America.

It thus appears as if a few big up and coming countries are rediscovering the value of shortwave radio, unlike much of the Western international broadcasters who dropped it 10 or 20 years ago.

TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE?

DRM was the big hope for shortwave when the excellent engineers with vision first invented it. In its digital variant, DRM, shortwave becomes a new modern platform using up-to-the minute coding, which produces a very clear sound. In effect, DRM shortwave is like FM over very large areas. More than one good audio channel is available and can be accompanied by data and other digital services.

In digital shortwave the energy bill is cut drastically as compared to the analog invoice, and the new transmitters are very efficient. Even the not so old transmitters can be upgraded. Some broadcasters saw these opportunities and went this route while patiently waiting for receivers to become available and affordable.

Now together with the extra shortwave DRM transmission services we are seeing the rise of DRM receiver solutions (with shortwave support as well) from countries like China, India, Germany, the United Kingdom and France.

Some of these solutions are inexpensive and energy-efficient designed to serve a whole community by using a digital shortwave station receiver disseminating the broadcast via Wi-Fi.

[Read: The Power of Digital Radio in Emergencies]

Therefore, today shortwave is positioned differently. While the interest of most Western countries has waned, other parts of the world have stuck with the platform and are adapting it for their own use.

In fact, we are at a point where shortwave may just be ready to turn the corner, especially if digital shortwave can be made available in cars. Surprisingly, electric cars might be better suited to receiving the digital signal than the current cars on the road.

Questions remain though: Is it too little, too late for shortwave? Or is this a new digital platform that we should simply call “digital radio” and that we can confidently and courageously embrace and use?

The post What Is Replacing Shortwave? appeared first on Radio World.

Jeff Welton

Jeff Welton is on a roll: At this spring’s NAB Show, the Nautel regional sales manager will receive the 2020 NAB Radio Engineering Achievement Award.

The National Association of Broadcasters created the the Engineering Achievement Awards in 1959. The program highlights peer-nominated radio and television professionals who have helped to advance broadcast engineering.

This is the third major industry award Welton will receive in as many years. In 2019, the Association of Public Radio Engineers chose Welton as the APRE Engineering Achievement Award honoree. In 2018, the Society of Broadcast Engineers named Welton as the James C. Wulliman  Educator of the Year.

At Nautel, Welton is in charge of transmitter sales and customer support for the central U.S. He has been with the company for three decades, first joining as customer service technician. 

Welton is also known for his internal and external educational efforts. He has developed training materials and webinars and also writes and speaks about digital radio and broadcast engineering. His byline has appeared in the 11th edition of the NAB Engineering Handbook (he wrote the “Facility Grounding Practice and Lightning Protection” chapter) as well as in Radio World and its ebooks, including our latest on transmitter trends.

Additionally, NAB will recognize Jim Stenberg with the 2020 NAB Television Engineering Achievement Award. (Learn about Stenberg on TVTechnology.com.) Both will receive their awards during NAB Show at Tuesday’s We Are Broadcasters Celebration.

Last year’s Radio Engineering Achievement Award honoree was Garrison Cavell, who was recognized alongside his wife Cindy, who took home the TV version of the award.

The post 2020 NAB Radio Engineering Achievement Award Goes to Jeff Welton appeared first on Radio World.

EEO debate, cybersecurity precautions, Italy’s digital radio, tips in AoIP, Promo Power and lots more.

Read it online here.

Prefer to do your reading offline? No problem! Simply click on the Issuu link, go to the left corner and choose the download button to get a PDF version.

FUTURE OF AM RADIO “Digital Sunrise” Webcast Available on Demand

This issue of RW includes a sampling of what we covered in our recent webcast (which you can also watch at any time).

 

PRODUCT EVALUATION AKG K275 and K371 Headphones

Rob Tavaglione slips on two new closed-back models and tells us what he heard.

 

Also in This Issue:

• Cybersecurity: Most People Don’t Have a Plan
• A Look Inside Italy’s Digital Radio Rollout
• How to Transition to AoIP in Five Steps

The post Inside the March 4 Issue of Radio World appeared first on Radio World.

With the 2020 Radiodays Europe just about four weeks away, organizers have announced that the conference will go ahead as planned in Lisbon, Portugal, even with concerns regarding the spread of coronavirus. The conference plans to institute a number of actions to ensure its attendees’ safety.

Radiodays Europe is working with the Portuguese Health Authorities Direção Geral de Saúde, the Lisbon Congress Centre and host venues to meet the guidelines set by the World Health Organization for COVD-19.

It also has provided key practices to try and prevent the spread of COVID-19, which include:

• Keeping a social distance, avoiding handshaking and kissing, etc.;
• Avoid touching eyes, nose and mouth;
• Wash hands regularly, well and for at least 20 seconds;
• Practice respiratory hygiene; and
• Seek medical care immediately if you have a fever, cough and difficulty breathing

To date, there are no travel restrictions for entering the Portugal. Authorities are asking that people with fever or symptoms check their health status before leaving their countries.

2020 Radiodays Europe is schedule for March 29–31.

The post Radiodays Europe Moving Ahead Amid Coronavirus Concern appeared first on Radio World.

Given world headlines about COVID-19, it’s not surprising that there is plenty of online chatter in the broadcast technology community, wondering about any impact on the NAB Show next month.

As we’ve reported, the show organizers have said the event is proceeding as planned; and they’ve laid out resources for planning and safety precautions.

[Read: LVCC Takes Precautions Against Coronavirus]

In response to subsequent questions from readers and vendors, Radio World has reached out to a sampling of radio industry exhibitors, specifically, to ask whether the coronavirus situation has affected their own planning for the Las Vegas event. And while video company AJA publicly has said it would withdraw, radio exhibitors that have replied to RW so far have said, on or off the record, some variation of “We plan to be there while monitoring the situation for further developments.”

RW will post the public responses below and add more as we receive them.

Q: What impact if any does the coronavirus situation have on your company’s plans to exhibit at the NAB Show?

GatesAir — President and Managing Director International Rich Redmond: “There are innumerable sensitivities to consider when it comes to global travel and the coronavirus, the most important of which have to do with the health and well-being of our employees, customers and colleagues. We are actively monitoring official health reports and will take the appropriate guidance and precautions outlined by the CDC and the World Health Organization. In the meantime, we anticipate that NAB will take place, and our plans and preparation for the show continue. We’re grateful that the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority has taken steps to ensure the safest possible environment inside the LVCC, confirmed through recent industry reports.” Gates Air will be in Booth N3403.

Inovonics — President/CEO Ben Barber: “Currently we are fully committed to the NAB 2020 show and have not changed our plans at all. Each year we give out ‘Swag Bags’ with different items in it like a flashlight, USB charger and an Inovonics catalog. This year we will be adding hand sanitizer to the gifts! I think people will appreciate it. Viva Las Vegas!” Inovonics will be in Booth N6525.

Logitek Electronic Systems — Sales and Support Manager John Davis, “Logitek is monitoring updates from the CDC and NAB daily and is planning to attend the NAB Show. We have purchased extra cleaning supplies and hand sanitizer beyond what we usually bring with us to Las Vegas. Based on the current guidance, as long as we follow some common sense guidelines, we feel we should be at the show.” Logitek will be in Booth C2030.

Arrakis — Sales Engineer Ben Palmer. “The coronavirus is a significant concern, and we are hopeful the situation improves quickly. We still have time before the conference, and are hopeful that the virus can be contained before then. Other conferences have shut down for various reasons, and it is easy to see the wisdom in those decisions. We at Arrakis have always enjoyed visiting with our customers and friends at NAB each year, as well as creating new relationships, but we will respect whatever decision is made by NAB. Fortunately, conferences aren’t as needed as they once were. Customers can visit our website, speak with our dealers, sales and support staff, and get all they need to help with their purchase decisions. That all said, so long as NAB is not cancelled, Arrakis Systems is planning on attending.” Arrakis will be in Booth N3012.

The NAB Show drew 91,500 attendees last year, including about 24,000 from outside the U.S., according to NAB’s post-show tally.

Related: Here’s a link to the Centers of Disease Control page of guidance to organizers of large events.

 

The post What Radio Exhibitors at NAB Show Are Saying About Coronavirus appeared first on Radio World.

The “imminent loss” of four St. Louis-area AM radio stations has the MMTC concerned — and they are asking the FCC to do something about it.

The Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council (MMTC) asked the Federal Communication Commission to provide emergency interim relief to preserve four radio stations and a construction permit by giving its subsidiary, MMTC Broadcasting, ownership and operating responsibility for the stations. The stations have been tangled up in the Bob Romanik imbroglio.

[Read: St. Louis Broadcaster Allegedly Controlled by a Felon]

Back in June 2019, four AM stations in the St. Louis market — KTFK, WQQW, KZQZ and KQQZ as well as the construction permit W275CS — had their renewal and assignment applications held up over several issues, including alleged misrepresentation issues and an alleged unauthorized transfer. When Entertainment Media Trust (EMT) applied for renewal of its licenses in 2012, a Petition to Deny was filed soon after, asserting that the stations were actually controlled by a convicted felon who was not named by the licensee in its applications. Soon after, EMT applied to assign the licenses to a newly formed trust (called EMT #2) but the same ownership concerns were raised. (An application was also filed for a new FM translator to rebroadcast WQQW.)

According to the FCC, a subsequent hearing raised key questions about an alleged undisclosed transfer of control of the stations and questioned whether EMT engaged in misrepresentation and/or lack of candor in its communications with the commission.

The hearing judge found that EMT failed to follow commission rules when addressing the questions at hand; as a result, the commission dismissed all of the applications.

But according to the MMTC, this means that unless emergency interim action is taken by the FCC by the end of March, these stations “will be irretrievably lost,” the MMTC said in response to the FCC ruling. The MMTC said it now “stand[s] ready to assist the commission in saving the stations.”

“The loss of four radio stations and a CP in the nation’s 24th radio market would be unprecedented and devastating,” the MMTC said in its letter. “Facilities such as these are entry points for new talent and entrepreneurship.” Often times stations like these serve underrepresented, minority, multilingual and religious constituencies, the group said.

The MMTC pointed to several previous court cases that have been used in the past to rescue stations such as these, but expressed concern that prior litigation routes would not work in this case, and as a result, MMTC said it is prepared to step in.

According to David Honig, who is president of MMTC as well as vice president of MMTC Broadcasting, the goal of the organization’s nonprofit subsidiary is to facilitate diverse ownership of broadcast stations. It has taken ownership of nine AM radio stations since 2008 and incubated new entrants at these stations by training them to become owners.

In this case, the MMTC Broadcasting group told the FCC that it would like to volunteer to assume ownership and operating responsibility for the stations.

“Our plan is to operate them as radio incubators, generally along the lines of the incubator plan approved by the commission in 2018,” the group said. “To execute this plan, MMTC Broadcasting would LMA the stations to Roberts Radio Broadcasting LLC, a minority-owned and family-owned company based in St. Louis,” which currently owns and operates an FM station in Jackson, Miss.

The MMTC reminded the FCC that is has broad authority to grant emergency relief to protect the interests of broadcast consumers, pointing to the operation of WLBT(TV) in Jackson, Miss., that was operated by the nonprofit Communications Improvement Inc. after the D.C. Circuit Court vacated WLBT’s license renewal. In that case, the agency turned to Communications Improvement to operate the station while conducting a hearing to select a new permanent licensee.

During Communications Improvement’s tenure at WLBT(TV), the station rose in the ratings; doubled the size of the news staff; and hired the its first African American general manager, news director and news anchors in Mississippi television, the MMTC said.

“Ultimately, in 1980, five competing applicants settled and, after 11 years of interim operation, a permanent and minority owned licensee took over,” the organization said.

While the WLBT(TV) scenario is not identical to the dilemma in St. Louis, it is close, MMTC said. “It shows how a nonprofit interim operator can heal an ailing facility to the great benefit of the general public.”

“MMTC is confident that the commission can swiftly evaluate the equities and arrive at a course of action that saves the stations by allowing MMTC Broadcasting to operate them as radio incubators on an interim basis, with an LMA to Roberts,” MMTC said. “As the D.C. Circuit observed in 1990, when service to the public should be preserved, it can be ‘reasonable, perhaps essential, therefore, that the commission grant an interim license to someone.’”

“Thus, if the commission invites it to do so, MMTC Broadcasting will file applications to serve as an interim operator,” Honig said.

Radio World will report on any response that comes from the commission.

 

The post MMTC Volunteers to Take Ownership of “Ailing” Stations appeared first on Radio World.

As the spread of the coronavirus continues around the world and has begun to spread more in the U.S., the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, which runs the Las Vegas Convention Center that will host the 2020 NAB Show, has revealed a number of efforts it is taking to help prevent the transmission of coronavirus.

To date, there have been no confirmed cases of COVID-19, the particular strand of coronavirus, in Clark County or the state of Nevada and there have been no domestic travel notices, precautions or guidance specific to travel. In addition, the LVCVA said that southern Nevada and resort properties have not been identified as being at higher risk for transmission.

Even so, LVCVA has announced that it is following CDC and Health District protocols for preventing spreading the disease, and has taken a number of steps at the Las Vegas Convention Center in that regard.

This includes:

•  Increased cleaning protocols, including more frequent wiping and disinfecting of touch points (door handles, elevator buttons, handrails, restroom stall doors and sinks) during occupied show hours;
•  Added additional hand sanitizer stations;
•  Increased the outside air intake/air change rate during occupied show hours;
•  Reinforced its standard employee health practices, including sending employees home and/or encouraging them to stay home if sick or demonstrating symptoms;
•  Reinforce its standard food safety awareness programs, including making alcohol-based hand gel/rub available at every food station and every table at food outlets; and
•  Continuing to participate in webinars and conference calls with the International Association of Venue Managers to stay up on new practices, protocols and guidance

LVCVA also shared efforts being made by authorities in southern Nevada and CDC recommended best practices for individuals.

The 2020 NAB Show is scheduled to take place April 18–22 at the Las Vegas Convention Center, and as of now the show is set to continue as planned.

However, some individual companies are taking their own actions that could impact travel to the NAB Show. Amazon has said that it is restricting all nonessential employee travel in the U.S. until the end of April.

The virus is also having an industry impact beyond the NAB Show. Sony has reportedly warned investors that production of both image sensors and electronics “could be affected enormously” if the virus continues to spread.

The post LVCC Takes Precautions Against Coronavirus appeared first on Radio World.

Usher is the host. Guest stars include Lizzo, Halsey and Justin Bieber. What’s this all about? It’s the 2020 iHeartRadio Music Awards live at the Shrine in Los Angeles with a national network television simulcast on Fox. 

The list of nominees for this seventh annual event is equally star-studded: Ariana Grande, Bad Bunny, Billie Eilish, Camila Cabello, Cardi B, Daddy Yankee, Dan + Shay, Drake, Ed Sheeran, El Fantasma, Halsey, J Balvin, Jonas Brothers, Justin Bieber, Khalid, Kygo, Lil Nas X, Lizzo, Luke Combs, Maren Morris, Post Malone, Selena Gomez, SHAED, Shawn Mendes, Snow, Summer Walker and Taylor Swift. 

Music fans are encouraged to participate by voting for winners in many categories: Best Fan Army, Best Lyrics, Best Cover Song, Best Music Video, Best Remix, the Social Star, Favorite Tour Photographer and Favorite Music Video Choreography. 

Wanna attend? Considering concert prices these days, it’s priced quite reasonably, ranging from $75 to $250. 

Come on … what is this — a commercial for the show? No, but I’d like you to view this as a model for creating awards to bestow as a local radio station. 

GIVE YOUR OWN AWARDS

Why are awards important? When we show appreciation with awards, the mere fact that we’re doing so positions the medium (you) as a leader, an authority, a vital entity to the community it serves. Radio stations are certainly accustomed to receiving awards, but we don’t put enough focus on giving awards.

The music award approach we are using as a model is reasonable on a local/regional basis and makes sense in markets with an active, supportive new music scene. Perhaps there’s even a local music organization with which you can partner. 

Behold, your award program creation checklist: 

• A name that simply explains the award. 
• Credible host(s) to deliver authenticity, celebrity and audience.
• Media partners, such as a local TV station, newspaper or website. 
• A broad selection of nominees who will spread the word about their nomination. Create enough categories so you’ll have multiple winners. 
• Judges who are admired or connected and can activate their circle. 
• On-air promotion of the award that includes an audience voting element. 
• External public relations outreach, maybe hiring a local PR firm. 
• Advertising support — perhaps inexpensively on a highly targeted social media platform.
  A live awards ceremony that people can attend in person, hear on-air, comment on social media, watch streamed on television or via Facebook, YouTube or an app. 
• A wrap-up of winners on-air that runs for several days after the event. Make certain to capture pictures and video for distribution. 

Perhaps music awards don’t make sense for your format, or you’re in a relatively small market. No worries. Awards are universally appealing, and there are plenty of other ways to achieve this fun and exciting form of connection and entertainment. 

Instead, your station will want to brainstorm other themes that resonate with your local audience.

Striking an emotional chord is important. 

Visual arts such as photography or painting can generate a lot of interest. 

Teaching, coaching and mentoring are hot topics for families. 

Environmental issues loom large on the minds of many young people, so creating a local “Environmental Action Award” will resonate in certain communities. 

Awards take time to establish, so consider a multi-year approach. You’ll know when you’re on to something if your awards catch on outside your typical sphere of influence. 

There was a time when local radio stations embodied these attributes just by existing at an organic level, but this should no longer be taken for granted. Stations must intelligently and actively assert ourselves as a major arbiter of what’s important in the community. The most challenging part is that we also must earn the role by openly recognizing major talent — music or otherwise — in our communities.

The post Awards for Your Community’s Best appeared first on Radio World.

The comments here were posted to social media by readers of the Radio World ebook “Radio Engineering in Crisis.” Read it at www.radioworld.com/ebooks.

“That’s a good read. I like Gary Kline’s contribution around interviewing new engineers, specifically around site and equipment condition. As an engineer the condition of equipment is usually high on my priority list, especially if I am being called in to fix something urgently. ”

 

“The status quo is in serious danger, but radio will adapt to the engineering shortage. I can foresee entire stations moving into the cloud, and a greater reliance on manufacturers’ field service. The broadcast engineer of the future will likely become a data center technician or a frequent flier, and there will be many fewer of us. ”

 

“Ditching the high-power RF may be possible around urban areas, but rural areas will get the shaft. Due to terrain shielding, DSL is the only option with 800k download and 300k upload … using remnants of the old Ma Bell co-ax system. Executives at the top still get their big raises and perks annually, but rural areas are ignored. Cellular service … I essentially live in a cellular ‘white area’ … and the FCC doesn’t care about serving rural areas … the FCC talks loud and says and does nothing. ”

 

“This has been a serious problem for a while. It is getting worse as more technologists retire. Employers need to increase pay and incentives to turn this around. ”

 

“Broadcast engineers are an endangered species, there is no doubt. I’m grateful to have worked in a time when at least some management respected and valued their tech staff. The thought of being tied to a pager and having a dozen sites to worry over is not appealing to anyone with ‘a life.’ I loved working on transmitters (in well-cared-for sites) and designing user-friendly broadcast studios, but that was ‘back in the day’ when such settings weren’t uncommon (at least in this market). Seeing the neglected TX sites owned by venture capitalists, I’m glad to be retired. ”

 

“I learned about RF as a teenager with ham radio. That helped me with my first phone and AM/FM transmitters. After college I drifted into TV post. But I still have a love for RF. Is there a future for young RF inclined engineers? Does it take an IEEE degree and will it pay above scale? ”

 

“To attract broadcast radio engineers, the industry needs to respect the job position and compensate accordingly. Turn to the cell industry for your compensation and benefit template, then sweeten the deal a bit more. ”

 

“You can’t get engineers or engineering groups involved in changing the mindset of management. That has to come from other management groups, otherwise it looks like a self-serving exercise. It will take a change of mindset at the local, regional and corporate management levels. This is a problem that has been warned about for decades and it is currently on the cusp of crisis. In 10 years, it will be too late. ”

 

“One must continue to listen, learn and love their chosen professional calling. This requires licensing certification and continuing education to stay on top of their game. ”

“I was working for an AM/FM combo when in college and fully expected to stay in the business. Then industry came calling with a 50% premium to go with them. Never looked back and it appears things headed down hill after that day. I still have my license but that doesn’t seem to be important anymore. As industry has done, most maintenance is contracted out to manufacturers now, so if I were to be in the business, I’d look at the OEM for work. MBAs have decided it doesn’t cost as much to do that. ”

 

“There’s much more RF work in mobile networks, home/metro internet and emergency communications, automotive systems, industrial IoT, military and even space systems. In practice, it may or may not require a degree, depending on level of design or debug or deep sales activity vs just installing. ”

 

“The other challenge is senior broadcast techs who are tired and can’t really be bothered passing the baton to new engineers. I was involved in a short-term project where I saw many of the broadcast techs were 60+ years old. There’s nothing wrong with that; however … their energy levels were fading, they were no longer excited to be at the forefront … Meanwhile company management had no succession ideas because to them it wasn’t a problem. To me, it’s all about the seven traits of a good engineer, including continuous learning, serving as mentors, good tech and listening skills — these are key to empowering the next generation of people who will need to be both IT techs and broadcast engineers for a sustainable future. ”

The post “It Will Take a Change of Mindset” appeared first on Radio World.

GatesAir has appointed three new members to its worldwide sales team. These latest hires are focusing respectively on the Caribbean and Latin America; Europe, Middle East and Africa; and Asia-Pacific regions.

Antonio Satta

Antonio Satta joins GatesAir’s CALA team as sales director, Brazil. Reporting to Felipe Luna, GatesAir’s managing director, CALA region, Satta brings nearly 15 years of broadcast and telecommunications experience to his new role.

Previously he was with Screen Service Broadcasting Technologies for 11 years, most of which were spent in Brazil as managing director.

GatesAir says that as well as direct-end customer relationships, Satta will work closely with Foccus Digital, GatesAir’s long-time Brazilian partner.

Matt Smith

In addition, Matt Smith joins the GatesAir’s EMEA team as regional sales director, covering a diverse geography across Western Europe, the Nordics and southern Africa. Reporting to Andy McClelland, GatesAir’s managing director, EMEA, Smith brings more than 15 years of industry experience to GatesAir.

According to the company, he held roles of increasing responsibility over his years at Envivio and Harmonic, where he most recently served as director, key accounts for the United Kingdom and Ireland.

Smith will focus on business growth and managing go-to-market initiatives across nearly 30 countries, with an added goal of strengthening GatesAir’s partner network and reseller base throughout his territory.

Oscar Hu

Finally, Oscar Hu joins GatesAir’s APAC team as regional sales manager, Southeast Asia. Reporting to Jacky Yee, GatesAir’s head of sales, APAC, Hu will focus on raising GatesAir’s visibility and market share across most of Southeast Asia (and parts of East Asia and Micronesia), including Cambodia, Indonesia, Japan, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

Hu brings nearly 15 years of broadcast industry experience to his new position, and most recently served as sales manager for Digital Broadcast Asia Pacific.

“GatesAir’s main international initiative has been to establish a stronger global presence, and that strategy included hiring experienced resources with a regional presence that would bring us closer to our customers,” said Rich Redmond, president and managing director, international, GatesAir.

“With a stronger global foundation now in place, we continue to invest in the right talent with the appropriate skillsets that will help broadcasters navigate challenging digital transitions, and develop new business opportunities for over-the-air content delivery.”

The post GatesAir Boosts Global Sales Team appeared first on Radio World.

ANTWERP, Belgium — Radio 2 Antwerpen recently inaugurated new “pop-up” studios.

Els Broekmans is a VRT Radio 2 Antwerpen presenter. Credit: mmpress 

“The basic idea was to bring our regional studios to where people live and work, increasing the station’s visibility,” said Dirk Somers, head of Radio 2’s partners and infrastructure department.

“It was also a cost-savings operation. Before, Radio 2 was housed in buildings with huge studios and space for over 30 people. Today, we have compact, cost-effective and efficient working landscapes in Leuven, Hasselt, Kortrijk and Antwerp.”

“Presenting while standing up is a bonus and results in better breathing,” said presenter Els Broekmans. Credit: Joost Joossen

Boosting the regional station’s visibility was a crucial element in the whole process, echoes Steven Cauwenberg, region-manager for Radio 2 Antwerpen. “The past 41 years, the Antwerp regional studio was located in the back part of De Singel arts center. Today, we broadcast from a glass house, located in the very cradle of the city, within walking distance from the River Scheldt and the town hall,” he said.

“Our neighbors in the Beacon (a smart community and hub that houses more than 60 startups focused on AI and IoT innovation) add value to the location. This is where digital creatives, developing smart-city applications like self-driving vehicles, or elements that could become interesting for radio are located. There’s quite some potential in future synergies or cross-pollination here.”

POP-UP RADIO STATION

Radio 2 Antwerpen’s space for news and digital content. Credit: Joost Joossen

Bearing in mind a possible future relocation, the broadcast site’s infrastructure was conceived as a pop-up studio landscape. “The Beacon building was supposed to be replaced by a new real estate project,” added Somers. “We signed a five-year rental agreement but I gather that, considering the success of the site and its total occupancy, the agreement may be extended”.

The broadcaster initiated the project for the new studio in early 2019, with parameters like visibility, open office structure and user-friendliness playing a crucial role.

The new facilities offer plenty of daylight in the open office space. Credit: Joost Joossen

“Radio 2’s regional programs run on weekdays from 6–8 a.m. and 12–13 p.m., plus three regional news inserts in Radio 2’s national programs,” explained Cauwenberg. “When we designed the studios, we calculated the maximum double use of the rooms. The main on-air studio has no specific ‘Radio 2’ branding or imaging, so other channels can use it. In addition, it’s possible to use the production studio as an on-air facility and our interview studio also serves as a meeting room.”

The 350-square-meter (app. 3,800 square feet) open office landscape with huge windows offers plenty of daylight and looks out on a lively square. The on-air studio and the two production cells are housed in Flexboxes — a 100% plug-and-play concept designed by office furniture manufacturer Ahrend.

Steven Cauwenberg (left) is region manager for Radio 2 Antwerpen. Geert Cantens is engineer with VRT Labo Radio. Credit: mmpress

The cabins are designed to offer flexible, modular and functional room-in-room operations. The acoustically insulated Flexboxes, equipped with mains, data connection, LED-lighting and air circulation, were optimized for radio use. Whereas the two production boxes were standard, the on-air studio cube was tailor-made and equipped with air conditioning.

“Alongside the three studio-boxes the work floor is split in a production section for audio production, and a news section for digital and radio content, plus two national news journalists operating from Antwerp as regional hub,” said Cauwenberg.

HEIGHT-ADJUSTABLE DESKS

A DHD 52/XC2 core powers the main on-air studio. There are two DHD 52/MX mixer frames at the presenter position and one mixer for the news host or program sidekick.

“The entire configuration is packed in three racks,” said Geert Cantens, engineer with VRT Labo Radio. Credit: mmpress

“Two presenters in one self-op studio is new — before, the presenter and news host worked in separate studios,” explained Geert Cantens, engineer with VRT Labo Radio.

Another novelty for Radio 2 Antwerpen is the integration of the Broadcast Bionics PhoneBOX SIP telephone system “Until recently, the Antwerp studio used an ISDN-based telephone system with analog lines. PhoneBOX is fully IP-based allowing recording, editing and the transfer of telephone content from a PC. On the journalists office desk, a small DHD module is used for preliminary talks and switching PhoneBOX footage/material to the main studio, boosting the news flow’s flexibility. PhoneBOX is not only the main hub to receive telephone calls, but can also receives LUCI calls from reporter smartphones.”

The transportable Flexboxes are the basis for Radio 2’s pop-up principle. Credit: mmpress

The on-air staff also works from height-adjustable desks — Radio 2 Antwerpen was the last studio with seated presenter positions. “Apart from the fact that we’re really in the middle of the action, quite a different vibe. presenting while standing up is a bonus, and results in better breathing,” said presenter Els Broekmans. “Radio 2’s former tagline, ‘Altijd dicht bij jou’ [‘Always Close to You’] has become true and this reflects in our presentation.”

Although most processing takes place within the DHD engine, an Empirical Labs Distressor was added in the equipment rack. “It has become a standard component for our on-air studios and engineers have become used to the settings,” commented Cantens. “We also use DHD’s internal automatic mic mixer feature for studio guests.”

The on-air studio is equipped with a Dalet Plus playout system, connected with VRT’s database in Brussels as well as Genelec 8240A monitors and Neumann U89 microphones. Two silent PCs are located under the presenter desk. “The whole concept had to be economical. We stepped away from the expensive and complex KVM connection to the engine room,” Cantens explained.

CROSS-TALK STUDIO

“It was crucial that the on-air and production studios had the same functionalities and layout,” continued Cauwenberg.

The production booth’s configuration is identical to the on-air studio’s setup. Credit: mmpress

“All studios are self-op — for many people with a journalistic background, this is a next step ahead. That’s why our production booth is identical to the main studio,” he said.

The production Flexbox has a back-up on-air studio, and Cauwenberg underlined the multipurpose aspect of the studio, for use by other VRT channels or programs.

The broadcaster uses a third booth so a guest can be in the Antwerp studio and the reporter in another VRT studio, thus not having to travel between different cities. “We had this option before, but we’ve added a Sennheiser HMD26 headset, an Axis camera and a big display,” Cauwenberg said.

“This allows us to interview people in Antwerp face-to-face, offering a clean feed for any VRT channel, without them having to travel to Brussels. And the room also serves as meeting room.”

The three studios are connected with the DHD 52/XC2 core in the technical area — the signal is routed to VRT’s line center by means of a redundant fiber-optic link.

It was system integrator Amptec who won the public tender for the cabling and installation of the new studio landscape. The company also took on the integration of the studios in Leuven, Kortrijk and Hasselt.

“The main challenge was that the configuration had to be designed in view of a future relocation,” said Jasper Willems, broadcast project engineer with Amptec.

“Both the presenter desk as well as the three racks in the machine room can be disconnected — just put in place the horizontal cabling and the studio can fairly easily be relocated … plug and play!”

The post Radio 2 Antwerpen Inaugurates New Pop-up Studios appeared first on Radio World.

Stakeholders weighed in Feb. 28 after the FCC voted to proceed with a public auction of C-Band spectrum for 5G, an item that had prompted heated debate from the Hill and elsewhere.

“The U.S. must win the race to 5G,” said House Energy and Commerce Committee ranking member Rep. Greg Walden (R-Ore.) and Communications Subcommittee ranking member Rep. Bob Latta (R-Ohio) in a joint statement. “It’s simple: either we lead the way, bring along other like-minded countries, and write the rules on advanced technologies, or we have them dictated to us by China. We know that only the first option will be written with free-market principles in mind. I’m encouraged chairman Pai and the FCC share this mindset and I commend their progress on the C-Band auction order.”

“ACA Connects praises chairman Pai and the FCC on the adoption of an order today that strikes an appropriate balance between clearing a large portion of the C-Band for 5G use and protecting incumbent users of the spectrum,” said ACA President Matthew Polka. “This proceeding turned out to be one of the most challenging undertakings of any FCC chairman’s tenure, and Chairman Pai and his team proved once again they know how to get things done.”

[Read: FCC Preps Big Spectrum Moves]

The C-Band is used by satellite companies to deliver programming to broadcasters and cable operators, so the FCC is having to free up 280 MHz of the lower portion of the band, move incumbents to the upper part, and make sure that new wireless broadband users of the freed-up spectrum don’t interfere with those incumbents.

“Today’s vote is another major step toward unleashing mid-band spectrum for 5G,” said AT&T EVP Joan Marsh. “Making the C-Band available for mobile flexible use will provide a vital resource for deploying next generation wireless networks and securing U.S. 5G leadership. We look forward to reading the details of the item and continuing to work with the commission to ensure a successful auction and effective transition.”

“The FCC’s vote today is a great success for the future of 5G in America. We cannot afford to wait any longer to roll out 5G nationwide in America and the approval of a public auction of the spectrum is a great step to unleashing American innovation,” said 5G Action Chairman Mike Rogers. “China has a head start on cornering 5G, but with this vote we are one step closer to ensuring we don’t lose the race. Getting 5G right is critical to our country’s long term economic and national security and I applaud the FCC’s and Chairman Pai’s actions today.”

“While surely there will be much quibbling about various facets of the FCC’s decision, to my mind, Chairman Pai and his Republican colleagues deserve much credit for proposing a sound way forward,” said Free State Foundation President Randolph May. “Absent the willingness to consider somewhat novel approaches to address the need to repurpose this midband spectrum sooner rather than later, I suspect we’d still be stuck in neutral — and in today’s technologically dynamic and competitive marketplace environment, being stuck in neutral doesn’t advance overall consumer welfare or the national interest.”

“I applaud the commission for voting in favor of the C-Band auction rules,” said Competitive Carriers Association President Steven K. Berry. “C-Band spectrum provides incredible potential for all carriers — both large and small — to deploy next-generation technologies, and a public auction of this invaluable resource is certainly the right decision. An auction of 280 megahertz will go a long way to helping meet consumers’ insatiable demand for more. While we would have liked to have seen a limit on spectrum aggregation to further promote competition, we commend the commission for its work on this enormously complex issue and look forward to a robust auction in the near future.”

 

The post D.C. Reacts to FCC C-Band Vote appeared first on Radio World.

The Intercollegiate Broadcasting System will host its 80th High School & College Media Conference March 6–7 in New York. 

Ahead of the event, IBS President Chris Thomas and IBS NYC Co-Coordinator Shawn Novatt told Radio World that the event would feature guest speakers including iHeartMedia Division President Scott Hopeck, Z100’s Maxwell, WCBS(FM)’s Race Taylor, New 102.7FM’s morning show team, Cox Media Group Long Island’s promotions/marketing and sales team and many others.

The Hotel Pennsylvania-hosted conference will cover topics ranging from production, on-air and show preparation, podcasting, sales, production and more in order to teach attendees how to improve their student media operations. 

IBS events are for member stations only; however, all college and high school media outlets are eligible for membership. Attendance costs $110 per person or $660 for groups of six or more people. 

The post IBS to Host High School & College Media Conference for This Weekend appeared first on Radio World.

“StudioHub is back, baby!” Angry Audio founder Michael “Catfish” Dosch announced in a Monday press release. 

Radio World reported in October that Dosch’s new company planned to acquire the StudioHub line of R-J45 adapters, cables and studio accessories from Radio Systems. That has now gone through. 

“We purchased the IP to all of the products formerly manufactured by Radio Systems under the Radio Systems and StudioHub brands,” Dosch told RW Monday. “We bought the StudioHub brand and trademarks, but did not buy the Radio Systems brand. We also purchased all remaining inventory of Radio Systems.”

The terms were not disclosed. It was a three-party business transaction between Angry Audio, Radio Systems and Michael Sirkis, who owned most of the IP for the products manufactured by Radio Systems.  

Earlier, Radio Systems had announced that it would no longer manufacture its own equipment but would instead serve as Lawo’s exclusive U.S. distributor. 

Angry Audio is now offering the StudioHub products on its website at its own brand page, https://angryaudio.com/studiohub/. 

Dosch said Angry Audio is manufacturing most of the more popular Radio Systems products. Angry Audio is headquartered in Nashville, Tenn. The adapters and cables are manufactured in China; electronics products are assembled and tested in Nashville from parts sourced mostly from China. 

Angry Audio is not continuing the Millenium console line. “We will however, provide spare parts support for owners of Millenium consoles on a ‘best effort’ basis, meaning as long as we have, or can reasonably obtain, inventory,” Dosch said.

The post StudioHub Products Now Available From Angry Audio appeared first on Radio World.

From Radio World’s “Who’s Buying What” department: Canadian broadcaster Bell Media says it has signed a deal to pilot Veritone Essentials and Veritone Attribute artificial intelligence solutions at three dozen of its radio and television stations for several years. 

In the announcement, Bell Media Vice President of National Radio Sales Dean explained the Veritone deployments enable “real-time campaign optimization” in addition to “attribution and effectiveness metrics.”

Rutherford said, “We are now able to see campaigns as they air, including preproduced, live, and in-show executions. This allows us to provide up-to-the-minute analytics with a new level of transparency, enabling our local and national advertising partners and sponsors to better measure campaign effectiveness and return on investment.”

[Read more: Radio Just Got Smarter Thanks to AI]

For example, the Veritone Attribute app demonstrates correlations between advertisements and web traffic within a select time frame via “intuitive dashboards and reports.”

Bell Media has 109 licensed radio stations in 58 markets in Canada.

Send your Who’s Buying What news to radioworld@futurenet.com.

The post Bell Media Chooses Veritone for AI Ad Solutions appeared first on Radio World.