Industry News

The author of this commentary is media solutions account manager of ENCO Systems Inc.

Artificial intelligence and radio have a long and fruitful road ahead.

We all know AI is used to detect faces in photos and videos — and it’s really excellent at understanding natural language too. Not just the words being said — but who’s saying them, and so much more.

An area we’ve seen dramatic improvements in from AI is Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR), with real-time accuracies now higher than ever attainable before. With products like ENCO’s enCaption (tailored for the radio industry), true speaker independence is achieved, with an on-premises solution that’s fast and reliable.

ENCO’s been crafting ASR products since 2006, and radio automation software for even longer — the marriage of the two is a powerful tool radio stations can use to mine their voice content (live and recorded), to better monetize, repurpose and create.

We even offer solutions whereby you can navigate audio recordings by viewing their captioned words on a screen, enabling you to click on them to navigate through the recording. Say goodbye to laborious and inefficient audio scrubbing!

Indeed, ASR is the key entry point to so many additional methods of analyzing, reporting and even understanding the spoken word.

ENCO’s enCaption-based ASR and radio tools allow you to deliver the spoken word to your listeners as live text to websites, searchable logs and transcripts, video captions (open and closed), and even captions delivered to car radio head units and streaming endpoints.

The same ASR text can help your producers and writers gain a treasure trove of additional data to work with, to help find nuggets of information hidden deep within their interviews.

Smart AI can help indicate who’s talking and for how long, or even the meaning of what’s being discussed, and where the topic is going.

Interesting things start to happen when you have such voluminous amounts of data. For your ad sales or underwriting teams, an AI can automatically determine where the Live Reads took place, and dump that to an audio clip (and text copy) for later review and sharing.

How about a computer-generated summary of an entire interview, in a single paragraph? AI can help with that, too.

The intimacy of radio suggests AI can never replace humans on the air, since the power of radio and voice needs far more than simple intelligence to be compelling.

But AI’s not just for autonomous vehicles and facial recognition — because when combined with well-designed software focused on the specific workflows of news and talk radio, it becomes an essential tool to aid your creative teams in making sense of your growing content, and gain greater value from it.

This is just the beginning.

The post ASR Is a Key Entry Point for AI appeared first on Radio World.

Congratulations to our colleague Mark Persons for receiving the John H. Battison Award for Lifetime Achievement from the Society of Broadcast Engineers! His latest article is about lightning damage and is featured on page 8.

Also: Best of Show at IBC winners … Laurence Harrison of the World DAB UX Group on the growing role of metadata … Benjamin Lardinoit of On-Hertz on advantages of software-defined infrastructure … and a look at technical gear behind KDKA’s famous first broadcast.

Read it online here.

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

Connected Car

Audi AG Launches Hybrid Radio in U.S. and Canada

Christian Winter wrote his master thesis in 2012 about hybrid radio, so he knows a little about the topic. He explains and updates what we need to know about it as its uptake is spreading.

Audio Gear

TZ Audio Stellar X2 Microphone Shines

This petite cardioid condenser retails for $199.99. Frank Verderosa found its performance remarkable.

Also in this issue:

• Zoom as a Research and Promo Tool
• Metadata: Keeping Radio Strong in the Car
• The Advantages of Software-Defined Infrastructure

The post Inside the October 14 Issue of Radio World appeared first on Radio World.

The FCC is expecting a rush next year when it opens a window for applications for new FM stations on the lower end of the U.S. radio band. So it is planning to cap the number of applications per entity and is asking for comment.

The commission confirmed it will open a filing window for new FM reserved band applications in 2021. Dates will be announced later. The reserved band is 88.1 to 91.9 MHz. Individuals cannot apply for NCEs.

[Read RW’s story this week about this planned window, “NCE Filing Window Likely in Early 2021”]

In a 2007 window, the commission capped the number of NCE FM new station applications per entity at 10. That cap was prompted in part by the massive response to a 2003 FM translator window, in which the commission got approximately 13,000 applications, many from “speculative filers.” The commission ended up getting about 3,600 in the capped 2007 window. It said the cap allowed it “to expeditiously process and grant thousands of applications to a wide range of local and diverse applicants, therefore promoting the rapid expansion of new NCE FM service throughout the country.”

Even though almost half of those 3,600 were mutually exclusive with at least one other application, it said that the cap helped restrict the number of MX applications, including “daisy chains,” situations in which proposals contain service areas that don’t directly overlap but are linked into a chain by the overlapping proposals of others.

Daisy chains are where things get really messy. “Applications for full-service stations present a prospect of ‘daisy chains’ of conflicting applications due to the size of the proposed service areas and the interference protection provided to full-service stations,” the commission wrote. “A limit on applications will reduce the number and complexity of such situations.” It wants to avoid a large number of speculative filings and the potential for “extraordinary procedural delays.”

A window in 2010 didn’t involve a cap but that was for a limited number of vacant allotments on the non-reserved band that had been reserved for NCE FM use, and generated only about 300 applications.

[Read: FCC Nixes Call to Tweak NCE Licensing Rules]

The FCC said it is expecting a lot of interest in 2021 for several reasons: There’s no application filing fee; there are no ownership limits in the reserved band; there has not been a filing window for new NCE FM applications for over a decade; and the commission recently simplified and clarified the rules and procedures including how it treats competing applications.

It invited comment on this cap, and added that its goal is to “give interested parties the opportunity to apply for local and regional NCE FM outlets.” Read the details here.

The number of FM educational stations has almost doubled in two decades, from 2,140 in the year 2000 to just under 4,200 at the most recent count. But if there is a rush of applications, they probably will be focused on smaller markets. John Garziglia, communications law attorney for Womble Bond Dickinson, told RW recently that he expects most new full-service NCE licenses will be awarded outside major urban areas.

The post FCC Plans to Cap New NCE FM Applications appeared first on Radio World.

A construction permit for an FM translator in Oregon has been rescinded due to issues of interference.

In December 2017, Bustos Media Holdings filed a construction permit for FM translator station K260DK in Portland, Ore. The Media Bureau established a deadline of Jan.10, 2018 for anyone wishing to file a petition to deny. On Feb. 1 of that year, the bureau granted the application.

[Read: FCC Addresses Reconsideration Petitions on FM Translator Interference Rules]

A month later, the Media Institute for Social Change (MISC) filed a petition for reconsideration saying it had only recently become aware of the application and said the bureau should rescind the application grant because the translator would cause interference to listeners of its station KXRW(LP) in Vancouver, Wash.

To support its claim, MISC submitted maps, studies and lists showing the issues of interference. It included maps of the 60 dBu contours of KXRW and the translator, a map showing 10 listeners of KXRW whose addresses fell within the translator’s contour, a map showing listeners outside of the 60 dBu contour who were predicted to receive interference from the translator, a map showing areas where the translator’s signal would cause interference to the signal of KXRW, a list of KXRW listeners, an engineering statement and declarations from 25 listeners of KXRW.

MISC also asserted that Section 5 of the Local Community Radio Act of 2010 requires the commission to favor LPFM service in this case.

Bustos opposed the petition, saying the petition was not properly verified.

The bureau responded to Bustos and denied its petition. The bureau found no merit to Bustos’ claim that a subsequent Application for Review filed by MISC did not concisely and plainly state important questions of law. It also dismissed Bustos’ assertion that the AFR should be outright dismissed because the AFR was signed by a nonattorney. But that in itself does not violate the rules, the bureau said.

But the full about-face came from the Media Bureau soon after. It agreed with MISC and said it erred by concluding that MISC did not give enough evidence that the translator would interfere with the reception of KXRW by listeners.

The bureau found that the petition did indeed contain “convincing evidence” that the translator would cause such interference. That included a list of KXRW listeners, a map demonstrating that 10 of those listeners resided within the translator’s 60 dBu contour and proof that a future FM translator would result in interference to reception KRXW by those 10 listeners.

Thus, the bureau found that the company presented convincing evidence of predicted interference. As a result, the bureau granted the Application for Review and rescinded the grant for the construction permit for K260DK in Portland.

The post Media Bureau Changes Course, Revokes CP Grant for Oregon FM Translator appeared first on Radio World.

Mary Schnelle has joined the U.S. sales team of Broadcast Depot.

She’s well known to equipment buyers in the radio broadcast industry from her years with Harris, SCMS and Broadcasters General Store.

Broadcast Depot offers products and services for radio, television, IP, OTT and satellite transmission. It was founded in 1999 and is headquartered in Miami. Tim Jobe is national sales manager for the United States.

Schnelle began her career in accounting at Harris in 1992. She is a graduate of Culver Stockton College in Missouri and holds an MBA from Quincy University in Illinois.

Send People News announcements to radioworld@futurenet.com.

The post Schnelle Joins Broadcast Depot appeared first on Radio World.

From our Who’s Buying What page: WCR Community Radio station in Warminster in the United Kingdom is using two new Sonifex S2 broadcast mixers for its refurbished radio studios.

The manufacturer quoted Managing Director Barry Mole saying the mixer’s modularity was an important consideration. The S2 has hot-swappable input and output modules in both analog and digital, and a selection of optional modules for its main surface and meter bridge.

[See Our Who’s Buying What Page]

WCR Community Radio relies heavily on volunteers. It was founded in 1996 as a hospital radio station broadcasting from a backroom at a local theatre. It secured an FM license in 2012, broadcasting on 105.5 MHz.

The station is using an S2-M6SS 6 Way Source Select Panel to handle remote OB inputs, feeds from other studios, a recording computer and other sources.

Send news about new product installations, studio or RF builds and other projects to our Who’s Buying What feature at radioworld@futurenet.com.

The post WCR Community Radio Uses Sonifex S2 appeared first on Radio World.

The author is a consultant to Entercom and former senior VP of engineering at CBS Radio. He was a founder of HD Radio developer USA Digital Radio and was the VP of engineering for its successor iBiquity Digital.

A rule allowing AM stations to transmit in all-digital will be the most significant “AM improvement” since the allowance of FM translators.

Together they showcase the FCC’s interest in bringing AM radio into the 2000s; and it is happening as we approach the KDKA 100th anniversary of that famous Cox-Harding election coverage broadcast. I feel fortunate to have met the announcer, Leo Rosenberg, from that historic broadcast.

[Related: “The FCC Will Vote This Month on All-Digital for AM”]

From my earliest days of working in AM, I have been concerned about the quality of the AM reception process.

Following Greg Ogonowski’s research identifying AM receiver bandwidth as the choke point of quality in AM transmission systems and the subsequent introduction of pre-emphasis to overcome the limitations of the AM broadcast system, I began looking for technical solutions.

Then came household noise and egregious noise in the environment as the biggest enemy of AM radio. As I began reviewing my texts from my college textbooks, I began to see how advances in solid state that would ultimately lead to inexpensive digital chips for radios can solve both the problems of AM and FM.

The National Association of Broadcasters must also be given credit for bringing the possibilities of DAB to the United States through its interest in Eureka-147, even though U.S. broadcasters would have never been able to gain access to the required spectrum.

In the early 1990s I became a believer in digital radio as the solution for AM and FM ills. The draft report and order brings to the AM broadcaster the ability to offer what FM offers today. However, the total digitization of radio will bring to FM opportunities beyond the capabilities of all-digital AM, and once again leave AM behind — but not left out of the digital world.

The post Digital Radio as Solution to Both AM and FM Ills appeared first on Radio World.

Audio consumption in the United States is shifting from home back to the car as quarantine restrictions have lifted in some areas.

Edison Research released a summary of its latest Share of Ear report.

[Read: Removing Car Radios “Puts Consumers at Risk,” Former FEMA Head Says]

“Prior to COVID-19 restrictions in Q2 2020, 32% of all audio in the U.S. was consumed in-car,” the company stated.

“When quarantine restrictions went into place in Q2, erasing many Americans’ commutes and greatly reducing travel in general, in-car listening plummeted by 38% so that it accounted for only 20% of all listening. This caused at-home listening in Q2 to soar from 49% of all listening to 70% of all listening, an increase of 43%.”

Now its latest research, conducted in early September, shows a shift back to the car as quarantine restrictions have eased in some locations and in varying degrees.

“In-car listening grew from 20% in Q2 to 28% today, not quite equal to the pre-COVID number of 32% of all listening,” it stated.

At-home listening levels fell from 70% early in the quarantine period to 59% of all listening today. The company said at-home is still 10 points higher than pre-COVID. “With a U.S. workforce that has seen many employees transition to home office environments, future surveys will bear out whether or not this is a permanent shift.”

Meanwhile, listening at work has “slightly rebounded” over the same period.

The post Listening Is Shifting Back to the Car appeared first on Radio World.

A century after its famous election night broadcast, KDKA will now be heard on the FM dial as well as its familiar 1020 kHz AM frequency.

Entercom, owner of the station in Pittsburgh, said, “News Radio 1020 KDKA will simulcast on FM for the first time ever and be heard on 100.1 FM as ‘100.1 FM and 1020 AM KDKA,’ effective Nov. 2.”

The new frequency is an FM translator, W261AX. The hip-hop format that had occupied that slot, WAMO, moves to 107.3 MHz.

[Read: What, Exactly, Was First About KDKA?]

There is already a station licensed with a KDKA(FM) call sign and owned by Entercom, but it carries sports programming.

The announcement that the news format would expand to FM was made by Michael Spacciapolli, senior vice president and market manager of Entercom Pittsburgh. “After serving Pittsburghers on our AM dial for the last 100 years, we are thrilled to expand the reach of historic KDKA on FM,” he was quoted in the announcement.

The station famously aired presidential election results on Nov. 2, 1920, and KDKA has been celebrating the anniversary throughout this year.

The post KDKA Adds FM Signal appeared first on Radio World.

FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks addressed the Hispanic Radio Conference on Oct. 15. In a section of his talk he singled out GeoBroadcast Solutions for favorable comments.

He drew attention to the company’s localized broadcasting technology. “The use of this geo-targeted content holds promise as a way for stations to provide hyperlocalized content including alternative language news, weather, emergency alerts, and advertising periodically during the broadcast day. It could provide a way for minority-owned stations to better serve their communities, and open up opportunities for small businesses looking to more cost-effectively advertise to a targeted audience and for FM stations owned by people of color to increase advertising revenue.”

[Read: Should Translators Originate Content? FCC Is Taking Comments]

Starks noted that the FCC can do to promote this. “One proposal before the FCC holds promise to do just that.  GeoBroadcast Solutions LLC has petitioned the FCC to revise the FM booster rule to allow, on a limited basis, geo-targeted content to originate from FM booster stations.”

He added that GeoBroadcast Solutions “has developed an ad revenue sharing model that would help smaller stations install boosters and new technology necessary to use the system without having to come up with up front capital and operational expenses.”

GeoBroadcast Solutions CTO Bill Hieatt said, “We appreciate the commissioner’s remarks and note that our development of a geo-targeting solution for the broadcast radio industry was due in part to help reach underserved minority sub-markets within a station’s signal range.”

He explained, “We believe our technology will level the playing field across consumer media in ways that cannot be done today but can begin quickly to support moves the radio industry in line with today’s technology while also improving the consumer experience in the most widely-used source of news, entertainment, and information.”

The post FCC’s Starks Points to GeoBroadcast Solutions at Conference appeared first on Radio World.