Visiting WGMU Radio at George Mason University
While my family slept, I snuck out of our Washington, D.C. hotel room early in the morning on (Good) Friday, April 3rd, 2015 in order to feed my desire to see more college radio stations. After carefully mapping out the journey on public transit, I headed for the Metro station and grabbed the Orange line […]
Herbert Hoover’s four warnings about radio
Hoover was a staunch believer in public control of the airwaves. He wrote that when he arrived at the Harding Administration in 1920, radio broadcasting developers wanted regulation to prevent interference with each other, but “many of them were insisting on a right of permanent preemption of the channels through the air as private property […]
College Radio Watch: College Radio’s Part in Local Music Scenes, Controversies over Non-Students in College Radio, and More
I was just reading about the loss of some music clubs in Boston and within the same article there’s discussion about how the independent music scene is supported and fostered by not only an active live music culture, but also by the presence of college radio. In a piece for WBUR’s Radio Boston, Musician Peter […]
Southwestern College Turns Back Class D FM license as it moves to LPFM
Class D FM radio licenses are a dying breed. Low power and subject to getting shuffled around the dial in order to make way for bigger broadcasters, it can be tough for many non-commercial educational FM class D stations (mostly college and high school stations) to be heard. In recent years we’ve seen a number […]
Can WFMU’s Audience Engine Shake Up Non-Profit Journalism?
Related: Matthew Lasar takes a look under the hood of Audience Engine. Does America’s maverick freeform music station have what it takes to shake up non-profit journalism? It’s no secret non-commercial news online is facing hardships. Funding and engagement remain persistent needs, with no guaranteed formulas for staying afloat in a competitive journalism field. The […]
Keeping your listeners with you: inside WFMU’s Audience Engine
Community radio station WFMU-FM in New Jersey has won another grant from the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation to further its brainchild-in-the-works: Audience Engine. This additional $100k brings the Dodge Foundation’s support for the project up to half a million dollars. WMFU has partnered with Boston software developer Bocoup to create the system, and will distribute […]
LPFM Watch: Pirate Roots, Expiring Construction Permits, and a Proposal to Change LPFM Rules
It’s fascinating to learn more about the roots of low power FM and earlier this week, Brian Fauteux published his interview with author Christina Dunbar-Hester, whose book, Low Power to the People: Pirates, Protest, and Politics in FM Radio Activism, looks into the history of low power radio. Dunbar-Hester recounts the important role that activists […]
Digital Watch: AT&T Android Phones Get FM in 2016
On Tuesday AT&T, the nation’s second largest wireless carrier, announced that it is activating the FM radio chips on Android smartphones subscribed to its service. Beginning in 2016, subscribers buying new compatible phones will be able to use the free NextRadio app to listen to both terrestrial broadcasts and those stations’ internet streams. Sprint, the […]
Alternative to What? Finding a Better Definition for Community Radio
We’re always interested in hearing from our readers and recently received an email from Myke Atkinson, the Station Manager of University of Calgary-based community radio station CJSW-FM in Calgary, Canada. He had written a piece about community radio for the National Campus/Community Radio Association’s email list and thought that it would be of interest to […]
Funky SX! UK gives deejay school community radio license
The United Kingdom’s broadcast regulator has awarded four more community radio licenses, and one of them goes to the Funky Academy, aka Funky SX. Ofcom says that the school will (government-speak alert) “provide a rhythmic-based music service to young people,” defined as under 35, in the Southend-on-Sea borough. That’s basically the northern half of the entrance […]