Posted on 07/03/2004 6:11:22 PM PDT by ovrtaxt
| Broadcast Lobby Fighting Satellite Radio | ||||
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Friday, July 02, 2004
By Radley Balko
I haven't listened to FM radio in years. With a few exceptions, the artists I enjoy don't get airplay. If your taste in music runs deeper than Fred Durst, Kid Rock, or Jessica Simpson, you've probably experienced the same thing.
Last Christmas, someone bought me a receiver and a subscription to XM satellite radio. I now listen to radio again.
XM offers about a hundred stations, covering every genre of music you can imagine. There's a station called "Hank's Place," which plays only authentic 1950s-era country music. There's also "Frank's Place," which plays only Sinatra-ish standards. There are several jazz channels, a live channel, an acoustic channel, and a channel for unsigned bands. There are two channels of soul, three channels of Christian rock, two channels of thrash-speed metal, and nearly everything in between.
There's a comedy channel that plays stand-up snippets from Lenny Bruce, George Carlin and Richard Pryor; and another that plays more family-friendly bits. There are news, family and talk channels, and audio feeds from about a dozen cable television networks, including Fox News.
In short, XM is everything FM radio could be, but isn't. And so, predictably, FM radio interests are doing everything they can to keep XM at bay.
Traditional (sometimes called "terrestrial") FM radio stations are represented in Washington, D.C. by the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), one of the oldest, most powerful, most entrenched lobbying organizations around. NAB has wielded that power at the expense of technology, innovation, and — ultimately — consumers.
NAB fought cable television through every stage of its development, meaning that if the NAB had its way, you'd have no FOX News, no Comedy Central, and no HBO. Just the big three networks. NAB failed there. But as Jesse Walker has documented in Reason magazine and in his book Rebels on the Air, the organization has for decades fought and succeeded in snuffing out similar efforts in radio. It's most notable victory came over the licensing of low-fi radio stations, which would have given thousands of amateurs, low-budget operators and undiscovered talent access to the airwaves.
More recently, traditional broadcasters were given huge swaths of spectrum (the invisible grid over which radio, TV, and cellular signals travel) for the development of High Definition TV — for free. Most everyone else who wants a slice of spectrum is required to pay for it. Yet broadcasters got theirs for free, leaving those interests pursuing similar technology (wi-fi and cellular providers, to name two) to fight for the scraps. It's hard to say exactly what innovations and technology that grant may have quashed. We'll never know because they were never given the chance to develop.
Which brings us to the NAB's latest fight — against satellite radio. About a decade ago, XM and Sirius approached the FCC to bid on satellite spectrum. Wary of the NAB and its Washington chest-thumping prowess, XM agreed that in exchange for a slice of spectrum, it would not offer the kind of localized programming that would put it in direct competition with terrestrial broadcasters.
Put another way, XM subscribers in Los Angeles would hear the same stuff as XM subscribers in Portland, Dallas, or Poughkeepsie. With a titan like NAB standing in the door, this gentleman's agreement was really the only way an upstart like XM could have gotten into the game.
Fast forward 10 years. Today, XM and Sirius have finally caught fire. Both have subscribers that number well into the millions, most of them disaffected refugees from FM radio. And both companies now want to offer localized content. XM wants to give customers in major metropolitan areas instant traffic and weather reports. Sirius is offering audio feeds of NFL games, and may delve into traffic and weather as well.
As you might guess, the National Association of Broadcasters will have none of it.
NAB's position is a precarious one. Satellite radio has taken off because traditional broadcast radio is so darned dreadful. That means the NAB is forced to argue that the government must prevent satellite providers from offering localized programming because allowing them to do so might drive local broadcasters out of business. But at the same time, NAB must argue that the service local broadcasters currently provide is of high enough quality to merit that kind of protection in the first place. It's an absurd case on its face. If FM and AM radio broadcasters were really giving consumers worthwhile local content, they wouldn't need government protection from XM and Sirius.
Even odder, just as NAB is fighting XM and Sirius over local content, many of the stations NAB represents are turning away from localized programming, running cheaper, syndicated content from parent companies like ClearChannel and Infinity.
I've asked representatives of NAB how using the power of the FCC to keep out competitors could possibly benefit radio consumers. They always respond the same way. "That's not the issue," they say, "the issue is that XM is backing down from its agreement." Perhaps. But it's awfully telling that they won't even address the real question.
The fight is a classic case of what economists call "regulatory capture" — when an industry that's regulated by a government agency attempts to use that very agency and those regulations to keep upstarts and competitors at bay. And it's almost always to the detriment of consumers.
The good news is that it looks likes NAB is going to lose this time. XM has already begun offering traffic and weather, pending action by Congress and/or the FCC. And more local programming may be on the way. That may drive a few traditional radio stations out of business. But it will also ensure that those that survive will do a better job of giving you the kind of programming you want.
Which is sort of the whole point of a free market.
Radley Balko publishes a weblog at: www.TheAgitator.com. |
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
And in case you haven't seen this, check it out:
http://www.live365.com/index.live
I can remember when cable TV came out. No commercials, or very few if any. Now? It's non-stop, endless commercials.
We all got duped and hoodwinked into paying for TV.
Sounds like we are in the same boat. I like different types of music but it's out of the main stream. Even the rock and roll that is played on the 60's, 70's and 80's stations isn't the playlist that I care for and does not test well in the listener focus groups that advertisers use to carry the commercial load on radio stations (and that's what it comes down to).
I read an article here on FR that said current US radio programs play as many as 25 minutes of ads in a 1 hour show. LOTS of interruptions. Europe, so I have heard, places its commericals at half hour intervals, not breaking up the programs as much. How many minutes of ads in 1 hour, though, I don't know.
Why would you expect people to spend their time, energy, and hard-earned dollars, and not get paid for their investment.
I went to lunch at McDonalds yesterday, and ate one of their $1 double cheeseburgers. I bought one for my dog, but got it without cheese.
I went to dinner last night at the Outback Steakhouse. With tip, for two of us (not the dog) to have dinner, was just under a hundred bucks, and included a blttle of over-priced wine. I wanted it.
They spend all day cooking ribs at Outback, but don't open until 5pm. I probably paid extra for time when the store wasn't open, but they were making my dinner... and damn they were good ribs! Both cost me $$$, but I rather enjoyed the more expensive meal. I just filled my empty belly with the other one!!!
When I was in France in October 1999, I remember FM radio sounding EXACTLY like American FM (except for the language, of course).
I'll always associate "Mambo Number Five" with that trip, because I heard it so d**m many times.
So, you're telling me we have *influenced* another country? ;)
If you have Dish TV you can sample Sirius radio. They just added it to the audio channels. I really do like the variety they offer. I live in an area where the only stations are country, urban, pop, classic rock and stuck in the 80's.
I think I created a monster :-)
I KNOW you did down here in North Carolina. :-)
Yeowza! At 11:27 it's 71 degrees with a mild pacific breeze, and unlimited visibility. The Pacific salmon and 1/2 hadenuf burgers are being prepared for the BBQ. Margarita mix is almost ready...
I went to lunch at McDonalds yesterday, and ate one of their $1 double cheeseburgers. I bought one for my dog, but got it without cheese.
A friend once time threw down a half eaten big mac, my German Shepard walked over and sniffed and and walked away. That's garbage food, you ought to stay away from it.
I went to dinner last night at the Outback Steakhouse. With tip, for two of us (not the dog) to have dinner, was just under a hundred bucks, and included a blttle of over-priced wine. I wanted it.
We stay away from restaurants, to expensive, and the food is generally weak. To many coodies, and loud brats at restaurants.
They spend all day cooking ribs at Outback, but don't open until 5pm. I probably paid extra for time when the store wasn't open, but they were making my dinner... and damn they were good ribs! Both cost me $$$, but I rather enjoyed the more expensive meal. I just filled my empty belly with the other one!!!
Restaurant ribs are nasty. None come close to the ribs we BBQ and the Margaritas only cost us about 50 cents each, and are *MUCH* better!
Our neighbors are making home made enchilades for this evening. *Nothing* comes close to those things.
Oh, there commercials suck to. That place is an over priced, more like tourist trap.
But hey, different strokes.......
It's still there. It comes and goes. Alex Jones, "Christian Media"(survivalist marketing), gold bugs, Bill whatshisname of
"Behold a Pale Horse(Rider?)" reruns on occasion. And the looney left as well.
But there's a lot of other stuff too. People who like producing their own shows. Obscure (covers, flipsides,
novelty, celebs, etc) music from the 60s and 70s, 80-100 year old recordings, current novelty, avant-garde,
vanity performances, stories, 30s/40s/50s stuff, various talk shows (some even have 800#s).
If you're interested, ilgradio.com offers a slightly behind quarterly db of shortwave station times free to non radio
professionals.
And Michael Moore? Much louder laughing on the way to the bank than the Alex Jones/"Profit" Stair/Dr. Scotts of the world, I should think.
$120 isn't such a big investment, plus $10 per month. I have had XM for about 3 months and love it. The talk channels alone are worth it, along with the 70's hits station (no commercials on music channels). You can move the radio from vehicle to vehicle with little difficulty (I can't wait to take mine on our van drive from NC to St. Louis). You never have to change stations. No stations fade out. It is really a great thing to have. I even listen for 30-60 snippets to Air America, when I want to get my blood pressure up. I recommend it highlyl.
Yeah all 4 channels if you count PBS. Well at least channel surfing was quick.
We had cable in NE PA back in the mid's 60's, it's purpose was pull in the fringe broadcast stations from NY, Philly, Baltimore and DC. Just regular stations commercials and all and usually off the air by 1 AM. Later in the early 70's we got HBO, Wilkes-Barre is where it started, that was commercial free but it only had 6 hours of daily programming 6PM to midnight which was repeated the following day noon to 6PM. It cost about the same as today accounting inflation.
As for pay radio if the content is crap it ain't worth a dime but XM (no commercials) has their act together and I hear music that would cost thousands of dollars to collect, even at old 60's record prices, if you could even find the songs anymore. Now back to Harry James, Dinah Shore, Perry Como, Sinatra and Jolson, they are only in 1947 in their "HIT" countdown of the last 70 years which started Thursday afternoon.
Sirius is what Hertz carries. Pretty darned good.
But heads up on this stuff. The frequencies in use don't penetrate walls. A portable satellite radio won't work indoors.
The reason we can't get Rush is that his agreements are with local stations, who would be undercut by a national signal.
I just took my little XM antenna off the windowsill and brought it in the room and put in front of my amp, about 4 feet into the room and I still have full lock, if I turn it away from the window I start to lose but still get programming, about 6 feet into the room I get the skips, in the hall it's gone.
I think the answer will be a little repeater. Antenna on the roof hooked to a little rebroadcaster in your house.
Reception is no problem when hooked up my home audio equipment. With a portable it may be more of a concern but with the antenna being smaller than a pack of cards it's not much different than positioning a radio for good FM. XM sells a boombox for just that purpose.
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