This is part one of a series identifying ways community radio stations can adapt and ultimately embrace digital disruption as a tool to empower communities through media. A lot of the pushback I get from community radio stations – and yes, well-resourced NPR affiliates – is that there aren’t enough people to work on digital. […]
My final radio station visit while in the Philadelphia-area this April was to see the station where it all began for me, WHRC at Haverford College. I was actually able to visit the station twice this spring, once while school was still in session on April 9 and then again during my college reunion in […]
“Some people hear radio as it is and ask why. I seek radio as it is not but as it damn well ought to be.” So begins filmmaker Tim K. Smith’s marvelous documentary Sex and Broadcasting; a film about WFMU. The doc’s IMDB page describes the film as a 76 minute exploration of “the world’s […]
The FCC released its quarterly list of the total number of licensed broadcast stations this week and once again the number of radio stations has increased since last quarter. As of September 30, there were 15,433 licensed full power radio stations in the United States. The only category that decreased was the number of AM […]
Right now I’m making all of my final plans for next week’s College Broadcasters Inc. (CBI) conference in Seattle (October 23-25). I’ll be speaking on two panels and am also in the midst of scheduling visits to a bunch of radio stations in the area for my radio station field trip series. This will be […]
It was a big week for LPFM grants, with the total number of issued construction permits for the 2013 filing window passing 1400. More than 40 permits were granted in the past week to a wide range of non-profits, including cultural groups, public access television stations, religious groups, schools, arts-oriented non-profits, as well as to […]
When I first attended the National Federation of Community Broadcasters conference in 2002, I was struck by stations who considered our station – KFAI Radio in Minneapolis – a leader because we had a full time News Director (which happened to be me). It’s a goal for many stations to have the financial stability to […]
We reported on a bunch of college radio news throughout the week, including the College Broadcasters Inc. (CBI) settlement with SoundExchange over royalty rates and reporting requirements for college radio stations that webcast. After digging into the SoundExchange-CBI Joint Motion, I have a few more details to report on this agreement for 2016-2020. (more…)
The count of new LPFMs inched forward this week with ten more, bringing the total to 1350. Several of these are in major metroplexes, including Sacramento, Denver, Los Angeles and Seattle. The Open Media Foundation received the construction permit in Denver. That group is a media and technology nonprofit that helps socially conscious organizations use […]
College Broadcasters Inc. (CBI) has announced that it has reached a settlement with SoundExchange in regards to the fees paid by student webcasters. According to a press release from CBI, this tentative settlement will “freeze royalty payments for the next five years. It would also continue to allow student webcasters to continue to file proxy […]
