Of course it was Sun Ra who declared that “Space is the Place,” though I don’t think his music is heard on the online Third Rock Radio. Instead this self-declared “space station” says that it

features updates on NASA’s newest missions and discoveries, as well as a healthy dose of great New Rock music of all kinds, along with some that you already know and love.

It certainly seems that NASA is happy with the only month-old station. The agency recently added a player for Third Rock Radio to its own iPhone and iPad apps. Though shouldn’t space radio be on satellite? At only 22,000 miles above the Earth geostationary orbit might not be outer space, but it’s closer than the internet, I reckon.

Anyway, I listened for about an hour Tuesday night and didn’t hear anything in the way of NASA or space-themed content. I just heard a steady stream of alternative and modern rock that was fine, but not terrifically different from any other modern rock station, on satellite, on broadcast or online. All indications are that Third Rock is automated with no live DJs, which makes it all the more mysterious to me why there wouldn’t be some NASA content mixed in all the time. Maybe I just need to listen earlier than 8:30 PM Central time.

It’s an interesting concept. But a new listener like me isn’t going to be enticed to tune in again if we don’t get the space stuff during our first time tuning in.

On page three of the IPO, Facebook mentions its radio interface with Pandora as a key way that the application creates value for developers:

Personalized and Social Experiences. We enable Platform developers to create better products that are personalized and social and that offer new ways for our users to engage with friends and share experiences across the web and on mobile devices. For example, a Facebook user can visit the Pandora website and immediately begin listening to a personalized radio station that is customized based on the bands the user Likes on Facebook.

On page 78 Facebook predicts that companies that traditionally advertise with radio will gravitate to the social networking app:

Television, print, and radio accounted for $363 billion, or 62% of the total advertising market in 2010 according to an industry source. Historically, advertisers interested in generating awareness of and demand for their brands have heavily relied on these offline media to reach their audiences at scale. We believe that these brand advertisers will increasingly dedicate a portion of their advertising dollars to Facebook because the broad audiences they are trying to reach are active on Facebook on a daily basis, because we can reach their desired audiences with precision, and because they can spark word of mouth marketing through Facebook. In December 2011, an advertiser could reach an estimated audience of more than 65 million U.S. users in a typical day on Facebook. By comparison, the 2011 season finale of American Idol was viewed by an estimated U.S. audience of 29 million people.

It’s evident that Facebook sees itself as a provider of every possible kind of media, and an attractor of every possible kind of media advertiser. Radio is part of the equation. With 845 million active users, how could it be otherwise?

USF Students Protesting at January 18, 2012 Protest at Entercom (Photo: Steve Rhodes)

January 18, 2012 marked the one year anniversary of the sudden shutdown of University of San Francisco’s (USF) college radio station KUSF.

Back in 2011, the hopeful buyers (Classical Public Radio Network aka CPRN) probably didn’t anticipate that 12 months later the sale would still be awaiting FCC approval.

Save KUSF volunteers continue to fight the proposed sale and were out in force on January 18 at a protest outside the headquarters for commercial radio conglomerate Entercom.

Upstairs, the formerly commercial KDFC was still broadcasting from Entercom’s studios, although under different ownership (CPRN) and on the non-commercial side of the dial using rented airspace from KUSF 90.3 FM and utilizing the one CPRN-owned station: KDFC 89.9 FM (which had the call letters KNDL before it was purchased by CPRN in 2011). KDFC was also marking its own one year anniversary of becoming listener-supported by facilitating the move of the KUSF transmitter from USF to Sausalito and by kicking off its first on-air fundraiser.

Behind the scenes, USF and CPRN were also quietly updating their asset purchase agreement in order to extend the official “Closing Date” for the KUSF sale for another six months from January 12, 2012 to July 12, 2012. Additionally, owing to the length of time that has elapsed since the original agreement, this recent amendment also contains a provision that “in consideration of the extension of the time for Closing under the Agreement,” CPRN was to pay USF $100,000 by January 31, 2012.

In his one year anniversary update on KDFC.com, KDFC’s President Bill Lueth shared the news of the transmitter move, saying,

“The signal for 90.3 has been moved from the University of San Francisco campus (the current license holder of the signal) to a hill above Sausalito. The signal is in a testing phase. This will improve coverage from Northern Marin to SFO, and along the same latitudes in the East Bay on the west side of the hills from El Cerrito to Oakland, and possibly further south. Line of site constraints and building penetration issues may cause continued reception problems in some areas, but generally this new antenna location should be a vast improvement for many in the coverage area of this signal. We continue to look for solutions for improved coverage for areas still not covered by our current signals. Thanks for your patience and support.”

According to CPRN’s Managing Director Brenda Barnes, since they’ve been busy with the fundraiser, they haven’t yet had an opportunity to fully assess how the transmitter move has affected coverage. She also explained to me that the January 19th-27th on-air pledge drive was only occurring over CPRN-owned 89.9 FM, saying, “We are fundraising only on KDFC and the webstream, not on the stations we do not yet own (KUSF and the Los Gatos translator).” With increased FCC scrutiny of the deal to purchase KUSF, CPRN/KDFC is clearly taking care to comply with FCC regulations related to third-party fundraising. When I spoke with Barnes last week it was in the middle of the fundraiser and Barnes was enthusiastic about how it was going, saying, “The first membership drive on KDFC is going very well and we remain determined to preserve classical radio for the Bay Area.”

The week prior, at the Save KUSF protest at Entercom, Barnes actually spent nearly an hour chatting with KUSF supporters. She explained, “I was not at the protest but a few members of the Friends of KUSF came up to the station and we talked there for awhile, then building security came and asked us to leave.  We then went outside and talked more.  We talked for about an hour and I found it very helpful.  I offered to talk again anytime and to help them with fundraising.”

Audio from that conversation between Barnes and various Save KUSF representatives can be heard on the San Francisco Bay Independent Media Center website. During the discussion Barnes says repeatedly that she supports community and college radio. Early on she tells Save KUSF’s Irwin Swirnoff, “I believe in what you’re doing and I’m not an enemy by any stretch of the imagination.” She acknowledged that University of Southern California (USC, which is 90% owner of CPRN) was providing funding for the purchase of KUSF and pointed out that USC is interested in having a a “tangible presence” in the San Francisco Bay Area in order to connect with alumni and potential students.

Old KUSF Studio. January 2012

Swirnoff grilled Barnes about the details surrounding USF’s alleged “premature” transfer of control of KUSF, pointing out that the studio was destroyed and that KUSF’s chief operator Michael Bloch seemed to not understand where KUSF was broadcasting from.

Swirnoff also said that Bloch had “stepped down” and Barnes added that, “Michael is going on sabbatical.” Sources at USF tell me that the new Chief Operator of KUSF-FM, as of January 23, is USF Associate Dean for Sciences Chris Brooks. Unlike Bloch, Brooks has some radio experience, having been a DJ and Production Director at college radio station WCBN while he was a graduate student at University of Michigan. I tried to reach both Bloch and Brooks and had not received a response at press time.

During her conversation with Swirnoff and other Save KUSF supporters, Barnes also pointed out that she knew that there would be protests against the KUSF sale and that she’d been upfront with USF about that. She repeated that she wished that they didn’t have to compete for the airwaves, but was also clear that CPRN had the right to purchase a station that was for sale, saying, “USF owns the station. It’s their station…and they had a right to sell it…”

In probably the most revealing part of the conversation, Barnes shared some information about CPRN’s attempt to purchase KUSF several years ago. She explained that she had encouraged KUSF General Manager Steve Runyon to work on KUSF’s relationship with USF in order to prevent the station from being sold in the future. According to Barnes, “There was a process before this…5 years ago…we were the ones that tried to buy it…I sat down myself with the university and said…this is a long-standing service…this is not going to be an easy endeavor to sell the station and you’ve got to really…be sure that this is what you want to do.”

Former KUSF Space in Phelan Hall. January 2012

Ultimately USF decided to not sell KUSF at the time and news of the thwarted sale was leaked to local press. According to a December, 2006 article in the SF Weekly, “The story was first reported back in October by Radio Alice personality Hooman, who claimed on the air that he had heard from a reliable source that University of San Francisco President Rev. Stephen Privett was angling to sell the station to a public radio interest.” After the sale fell through Barnes said,

“I sat down with [KUSF General Manager] Steve Runyon… and I said you have an opportunity here to do something different and to forge a different relationship with the university so that this doesn’t happen again, but you’ve got to do something different…obviously they’re not feeling solid about the station…It’s their station. They own it. You don’t own it…you have an opportunity…So I sat down with Steve and I tried really hard to talk to him and say you really have to do something different here. You dodged a bullet. This station’s important. You’ve been here a long time. You need to do something different. So I just want you to know, that I really tried and I did have that conversation with him. And I really encouraged him to try to lobby, pull everyone together and forge a different relationship with the university so it wouldn’t happen again.”

When I spoke with Runyon today, he told me that when Barnes stopped by KUSF five years ago she’d been impressed with the station. He added, “She told me that we were a treasure that the university should support.” Runyon said that Barnes told him that she’d passed along that advice to Father Privett as well. Additionally, Runyon explained that they did “take to heart” improving the station’s relationship with the college and pointed out that Barnes doesn’t know the details of what they did and didn’t do to forge those ties. He said, “I’ve always been really proud of the stuff we did [at KUSF].” He cited the station’s commitment to “social justice programming,” its range of shows in different languages, and its connection to the city of San Francisco. He went on to explain that both students and faculty were active participants at the station over the years. He did add, however, that “morale was never the same” after the rumored sale five years ago.

Barnes said that after several years elapsed, KUSF was back on the market. She said, “Then when the station came on the market again a year ago, a year and half ago or whatever…the university had decided this time…they were done, that other relationship hadn’t been forged…and so, what do you do…it’s not like I haven’t tried…haven’t respected it…when push comes to shove, the university has the right to sell it…it’s now in the FCC’s hands…we’ll have to see how it turns out.”

As has been the case at other stations, the ins and outs of preventing a station sale are complex. As we can see with KUSF, the fight to save the station has been years in the making and in many ways this serves as a cautionary tale to other stations that have seen warning signs like KUSF did.

USF Media Studies Professor Dorothy Kidd has been a vocal opponent of the KUSF sale and in reflecting back on 2011 she said, “What I learned this year is how valuable KUSF had been for students, the San Francisco community and especially for musicians, music-lovers and artists of all kinds. Even more so, it renewed my love and support for radio, a commons resource that is still really needed by local communities, students, educators and citizens across the U.S.”

While USF officials await news from the FCC about the KUSF sale, the future of the promised-for online-only student radio station remains in limbo. The old KUSF studios were dismantled months ago and Phelan Hall construction is proceeding to make way for student housing. A few weeks back an old piece of KUSF equipment even showed up on eBay. The two remaining KUSF.org staff members have been moved across campus to a small office and a proper broadcasting studio has yet to be built.

USF students interested in volunteering and gaining experience at a campus radio station are left with few options other than shuttling across town to KUSF in Exile, which is being operated by former KUSF volunteers. Kidd said, “There is no operating KUSF right now. Many students are disappointed as are faculty and staff. I continue to hope that we can learn from this crisis and build a better service for students, the university and the city.”

Swirnoff said that he remains energized about the fight to save the frequency. He said, “I feel really excited about the continued commitment from the community.” Swirnoff also said that the combination of both legal efforts and public protests have been effective methods to raise awareness about the situation at KUSF. He is optimistic about the future actions of the FCC, saying, “I have hope that public hearings could happen.”

I made some rough calculations based upon the typical bandwidth consumed by streaming internet stations that use MP3 to estimate that the 2 GB monthly cap would be good for 34 hours of stereo music, and the 200 GB limit would only let 200 minutes squeeze through. While 34 hours seems like quite a bit of listening on a mobile device, I could see how the hours could add up for someone using an iPhone to stream internet radio in a car during a long commute. Of course that wouldn’t account for any other data usage for activities like email, browsing and facebook.

Therefore I was surprised to read a recent interview with Pandora CFO Steve Cakebread in which he declared, “The impact of data caps for Pandora listeners is almost non-existent.” Speaking with the investment site Seeking Alpha, Cakebread explained the typical bitrate Pandora uses is 32 kilobits per second, which is one-quarter the 128kbps rate I used for my estimate.

Bitrate and fidelity are tied together, with higher bitrates typically meaning better quality sound. MP3 is a nearly 20 year-old codec, and 128kbps is generally considered the bare minimum bitrate for obtaining acceptable stereo sound for music. However, Cakebread explains that Pandora utilizes the much more modern AAC+ codec which is more efficient and delivers better fidelity at lower bitrates than MP3. He tells Seeking Alpha that the average Pandora user listens to 10 hours a month, which adds up to 140 MB. This means that even if an average user did all her listening on a mobile device using the cell network, she would come in way under her 2 GB cap.

It’s good to have this kind of data directly from a major internet broadcaster like Pandora because it does help us understand the actual constraints faced by mobile streaming. At 32 kpbs a mobile listener with a 2 GB data plan should be good for some 142 hours of Pandora a month, which would be like listening for 17 whole work days. I can definitely imagine there are folks who listen to that much terrestrial radio, and I don’t doubt there are some power subscribers who tune in to Pandora for that much. So it does also illustrate the gap between mobile internet radio and its wired broadband and terrestrial broadcast counterparts. While mobile listening may not be seriously curtailed by data caps, it is still limited in ways that wired broadband or wireless broadcast are not.

Costa Rica’s Tico Times recently published a profile of unlicensed Guatemala radio station Radio Ixchel, as part of an examination of the radio scene in that country. Guatemala has as many as 800 pirate stations, where most radio licenses are auctioned for as much as $100,000. While there are license categories for public stations, there is no regime to license community stations. The 2009 Community Media Bill would have permitted new community stations in some 300 municipalities, but the law failed to pass.

Guatemala’s radio pirates do face the threat of government raids, but the story of Radio Ixchel‘s founder sounds more like the relative toothless penalties risked by pirates in the US:

Today, pirate radio stations face the constant threat of police raids and possible imprisonment. It happened to Radio Ixchel in 2006. But unlike the warnings made in radio announcements, Xunic was not sent to jail. He went before a judge and returned home without a fine.

Not unlike many unlicensed broadcasters in the US and around the world, Guatemala’s radio pirates take to the air because the dominant media fails to serve the needs of local communities and indigenous peoples. The 1996 peace accords that ended Guatemala’s civil war guaranteed indigenous peoples the right to establish media outlets in their own languages, but this has yet to be turned into policy. In a country where even speaking an indigenous language was illegal less than twenty years ago, the fight for communication and media freedom is still vital.

You can read more about Radio Ixchel at the Columbia Journalism Review and Cultural Survival.

At this point, the modern/classic binary is still going strong. Take San Francisco/San Jose “classic rock” station KUFX. The station’s top hits list includes Queen – “Crazy Little Thing Called Love,” U2 – “Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For,” ZZ Top – “Give Me All Your Lovin,” Van Halen – “Pretty Woman,” and Bad Company – “Rock and Roll Fantasy.”

That’s all pretty classic classic rock, as far as I’m concerned. But other classic stations in the same genre are starting to integrate what I’ve always regarded as modern rock tunes into their playlists. For example, there’s the Sky.fm online station. Sky also claims the classic rock category, but brands itself as offering “a diverse and exciting selection of classic rock hits, ranging from 70′s British hard rock to 80′s progressive rock.”

Last I checked, Sky.fm hits included selections from The Cars, Peter Gabriel, and David Bowie. Are these classic rock artists? Is John Mellencamp, also featured on the station, really classic rock?

Hot stuff

What is the actual historical difference between classic and modern rock anyway? Some years ago I ran into a guy selling copies of The Art of Modern Rock at the Metreon in San Francisco. I asked him when he thought “modern” rock began and “classic” rock ended. He seemed sort of annoyed by the question, so I left him alone.

My guess is that Disco serves as the original historical marker between classic and modern rock. Between 1974 and 1979, Disco disrupted Rock in huge ways. It stole a sizeable chunk of Rock’s audience, causing a huge anti-Disco backlash. The story is nicely told in Alice Echols’ great book, Hot Stuff: Disco and the Remaking of American Culture.

When Rock made its comeback in the early 1980s, it did so by borrowing Disco’s thunder. “New wave” bands like The Cars, Devo, Oingo Boingo, Prince, The Talking Heads, and Blondie appropriated the hard 4/4 beat and urbane sound that bands like Chic and Rick James perfected. Artists like John Mellencamp and Bruce Springsteen didn’t go that route, obviously, but their songs about post-industrial America clearly acknowledged that the sixties were over. So did Bowie with lyrics like “Do you remember your President Nixon? Do you remember the bills you have to pay? Or even yesterday?”

So in a historical sense, “modern” and “classic” rock can really be defined as pre- and post-Disco rock. Modern rock really took off after Disco unexpectedly declined following the spectacular release of Saturday Night Fever in 1977. But in a practical sense, when surveying modern/classic rock radio stations, it’s getting more difficult to detect the clear, bright line between the two genres.

Modern = new

Now, in addition to the blurring between pre- and post-Disco rock circa 1980, there are modern rock radio stations like 99Rock that have moved way beyond that era. Their version of modern rock is Green Day, or Cake, or even Celo Green.

Thus, modern rock is now relatively new rock. Modern rock as it emerged in the 1980s is 80s nostalgia. Everything pre-1990 that still makes it to playlists has itself becomes a “classic” (even if it was once “modern”), and the historical events that actually created the modern/classic rock distinction are slowly being forgotten in the process.

This doesn’t mean that radio stations can’t still call themselves “classic” or “modern.” They can call themselves whatever they want. But the original difference between the two terms, rooted in cultural events, is fading from memory as the generations change.

But now Kroes is crowing over discussions she has been having with Hungary’s center-right government. Here’s her latest tweet on the matter:

I also just spoke to Hungarian Deputy PM Navracsics – we are working towards a solution for #media #freedom & #pluralism

All this is happening in the context of Hungary negotiating for help from the International Monetary Fund and the European Union. Observers in Brussels are upset at Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s moves to push hundreds of judges into retirement and replace them with picks favorable to the government. The government’s control over media outlets is also causing static.

“No IMF deal will be contingent on the fate of Klubrádio,” notes The Economist. “But the station’s uncertain future is certainly not helping Hungary’s cause. . . . The station, your correspondent predicts, will be saved.”

Let’s hope so.

WPSA Turns Back License to FCC

Over the winter holidays, Paul Smith’s College in The Adirondack Park in New York sent a letter to the FCC asking that its class D FM license for college radio station WPSA be cancelled.

The December 12, 2011 letter was accepted by the FCC on December 20, 2011 and the 98.3 FM license was deleted. Back in October, 2011, WPSA was granted a request for the station to go silent. This cancellation follows a series of forfeiture orders due to WPSA’s late renewal of its FCC license in 2006.

In 2007 it was issued a Notice of Apparent Liability for Forfeiture in the amount of $7,000 for failure to renew its license on time and for “unauthorized operation of the Station” after its license had expired. WPSA never ended up paying the $7,000 fine and in correspondence with the FCC in April 2011, it was instead assessed a reduced fine of $250. This reduced amount was in part due to the elapsed time since the original forfeiture order and in part due to the station’s class D status. According to the letter, “We note that the Station is a Class D station. Given the Commission’s recent precedent assessing forfeitures in the amount of $250 against a licensee of a Class D FM station for violating Section 301 of the Act, we will reduce the forfeiture amount sua sponte from $4,000 (the amount set forth in the NAL for the Section 301 violation) to $250.”

Back in 1999, WPSA had its license cancelled for the first time by the FCC and the call sign was deleted. Interestingly, two years later, the school filed a Petition for Reconsideration and managed to have the license reinstated in 2001.

WPSA Poster from 1993 (Source: WPSA Facebook Group/Joel Rodgers)

I couldn’t find much information about the station’s history, but alumni have shared reminiscences dating back to at least the 1970s. As a class D station operating at no more than 10 watts, it’s doubtful that WPSA had much of a presence beyond campus.

When I spoke with Jill Susice, the Coordinator for Student Activities at Paul Smith’s College, she told me that WPSA ceased its FM broadcasting at the end of the fall semester 2011. She also explained that its antenna only covered a 2 mile radius, which was “basically just the campus.” Susice added that they are working on bringing the station back as an online-only student radio station “hopefully by the end of the year or early next semester.” She explained that students were involved with the decision to give up the FM license, saying, “Students were involved in the decision and there wasn’t the interest in the radio station to continue.  No one was listening and wanting to participate in it.  The trend is that the students are on-line versus on the airways.”

AMARC is the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters and for nearly 30 years has worked for media democracy by supporting the growth of community radio. This year AMARC’s Middle East and North Africa conference will focus on “community media and the Arab Spring.” The conference will be held March 9 and 10 in Tunis and seems especially timely as tens of thousands of Egyptians continue to rally in Tahrir Square, celebrating the anniversary of Egypt’s popular revolt.

The conference’s concept statement offers the observation that the protests that started with the Arab Spring

have shared techniques of civil resistance in sustained campaigns involving strikes, demonstrations, marches and rallies, as well as the use of social media such as community radio, and web-based and mobile technologies. These means of communication allowed protesters to organize, communicate, and raise awareness in the face of state attempts at repression and Internet censorship.

Coordinating solidarity and mutual aid between broadcasters, media activists and communication rights activists is a top item on the conference’s agenda. Sessions will also focus on women’s access to community media and participatory sustainable human development. The conference concludes with work towards a “Tunisia Declaration” featuring “debate on a policy declaration and on advocacy strategies, for reinforcing the capacities and to strengthen community broadcasting social impact.”

Here in North America we are too often absorbed in our own over-mediated bubble of constant communication access. So it’s good to be reminded how radio and other community media still play a vital and revolutionary role in the struggle of people for freedom around the world.

It might also remind us that we still need to harness that potential, too.

‘Zines are like the college or community radio of the print media world. Or maybe LPFM or pirate radio are a more appropriate comparisons, since ‘zines tend to be more personal, limited in distribution, and sometimes reproduced surreptitiously on office copiers. In any event, I’ve been a fan and reader of ‘zines for, I guess, nearly some twenty years now. In fact, my first exposure to ‘zines happened in college radio, when several programs at my station pooled copy money to publish a few runs of a music ‘zine.

Over on his Arcane Radio Trivia blog, intrepid radio researcher Jose Fritz recently posted about the ‘zine Paper Radio:

Paper Radio is about the art and history of radio. Issue # 8 reads in plain language “The goal of Paper Radio is to help readers connect and reconnect with radio. Unlike other mediums, radio sparks the imagination, it paints scenes with sound…” Topics include pirate radio, shortwave (WCBQ, CHU, WWCR, WRMI), pirate shortwave, DX’ing and in the few issues I have, they cover a slew of small local radio stations WNEC, KPFA, KMUD, KENC, WRKU, and WFEA-AM.

Paper Radio is published by DJ Frederick in quantities of a hundred or so, and is on its eighth issue as of this past November. Prior to issue six it was known as Signals. Back in June DJ Frederick threatened to go on a possibly permanent hiatus, but apparently decided to hit the photocopier again after all.

At just three bucks post-paid, I’m ready to order my own copy.