Last month I had the pleasure of visiting WGBK-FM, a high school radio station in suburban Chicago. This was my very first trip to see a station run by teens and I was thrilled to witness young people doing radio. Not only were they working as DJs on standard music shows, but they were also […]
Far outside the view of the general public, the virtual cratediggers of the FCC’s electronic recesses like Matthew and myself are sometimes privy to the little slap-fights that go on between broadcasters. In this case things are getting a little heated over the far left end of the FM dial, with a prominent public radio […]
Four United States Senators are on the warpath over the Early Termination Fees that wireless services charge if you duck out before the completion of the contract. Their Cell Phone Early Termination Fee, Transparency and Fairness Act would bar carriers from charging ETFs that exceed the price break on the phone you get for accepting […]
Arbitron’s controversial Portable People Meter is still in hot water with the government. The device, which measures user listening habits sans a written diary, is scheduled to be the subject of a hearing by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on Wednesday, December 2.
The Texas Association of Broadcasters opposes the FCC’s proposed localism rules. Why not? Everybody else does. Two years ago this December the Federal Communications Commission proposed a quartet of new regulations to nudge radio stations to provide more local news, music, and public affairs programming. These included rules requiring a certain amount of local programming […]
It was probably only a matter of time before the FCC would catch up with San Francisco’s Pirate Cat Radio. The unlicensed broadcaster was increasingly putting itself in the public eye by operating a cafe adjacent to its studio, granting interviews with mainstream press, and even appearing on the national television show No Reservations this […]
Perhaps it was too good to be true. The overcrowded FM dial of the New York City metroplex offered no easy opportunity to bring a new cutting edge dance music station to the radio. But an opportunity was found at the far left end of the dial in the space occupied by TV channel 6 […]
A new study says that most commercial stations “do little or no local news reporting,” and public stations aren’t much better.
There’s some excellent news from the FCC today. They’ve just announced that there will be another window of opportunity for non-commercial, educational broadcasters to obtain an FM frequency. Between Friday, December 11 and Friday, December 18, 2009; aspiring stations will be able to apply for open FM frequencies. Take a look at some of the […]
The FCC just announced today that they’d levied $7,000 fines against several college radio stations. The crime wasn’t anything salacious like playing songs with bad words. In fact, it’s much more embarrassing as it was a “failure to timely file renewal application,” which in turn led to “unauthorized operation” of said stations. This is a […]
