The op-ed from American Cable Association Chairman Steve Friedman [“Fix the market for small-cable customers” Opinion, Feb. 22] provided Times readers with an incomplete look at the fair, market-based process that cable operators and TV broadcasters use to negotiate carriage terms.
RBR-TVBR exclusive:
With thanks to Turi Ryder, Howard B. Price, Steve Jones, Lee Harris, Alan Eisenson, Rita Rich and Jerry Bell. By way of full disclosure, Valerie says “Many who contributed to this article are also contributors to “Creating Powerful Radio – Getting, Keeping & Growing Audiences for News, Talk, Information & Personality.” (Focal Press 2007) www.creatingpowerfulradio.com
Imagine the worst. You’ve cut your news staff and most of your programming is syndicated or voice-tracked. Then an earthquake strikes, a record breaking blizzard or snowstorm hits, there’s a fast moving tornado, fire, flood, toxic spill, or a crazed gunman active at a local school, and you’re not prepared? What do you do? This has actually happened in several markets. Stations have failed the public in their time of need. And, without advance preparation, it could be your city, your station, and your listeners, next time.
RBR-TVBR exclusive: Part Two of Valerie Geller’s Series: “In Case of Emergency”:
This is the story of two small radio stations in Fargo, North Dakota. Without the benefit of a fully staffed or provisioned news department, that, during a crisis, (AM1100 “The Flag” and Eagle 106.9 FM) creatively found ways to serve their communities vital news coverage. Not only did their website win awards, the station forged corporate sponsorships during the time of crisis that have benefited them to this day. They eclipsed the established news leader in the market with their coverage. You’ll learn how, with a little ingenuity and dedication, even without a traditional news staff, these radio stations managed to find ways to fill the need for up-to-date accurate information when the lives, homes and safety of the people in their listening area was at stake.
RBR-TVBR Exclusive:
What do you need to have at your station if a disaster strikes? From bottled water to self fueled heaters to backup batteries and breakfast bars – find out what you need to pack in your emergency "kit" – I’ve turned over this entire section to expert Howard B. Price, a newsman with years of experience in both radio and television, now Director of Business continuity and Crisis Management for ABC News. Howard Price offers practical, and carefully prepared lists of what you need to know and survive at your station in Case Of Emergency. Practical. Useful and good to have on-hand around budget time.
Agency Would Permit Broadcasters To Give Up Spectrum In Exchange For Share Of The Proceeds by John Eggerton — Multichannel News, 2/24/2010
The Federal Communications Commission plans to give broadcasters a chance to turn in their spectrum in exchange for an auction pay-off.
Catherine M. Welch (2010-02-24)
WILMINGTON, NC (whqr) – Wilmington is once again the nation’s testing ground for digital television. This time it has launched a new program that puts the space between digital television channels to work for the city.
Retransmission tussle could benefit those with rabbit ears By PETER CARANICAS
As the tussle over retransmission consent fees continues to play out between broadcasters and the cable biz, one factor that’s been largely overlooked is the easy availability of free over-the-air TV via rooftop or indoor rabbit-ear antennas.
By Erwin Krasnow (EKrasnow@gsblaw.com) and John King (JKing@gsblaw.com)
Univision’s sale of KLOK-AM San Francisco; KTVC-TV in the Eugene OR DMA. If there is or possibly may be an FCC proceeding against a station, or a pending license renewal, the FCC may stall a transaction. Here, from communications attorneys Erwin Krasnow and John King of law firm Garvey Schubert Barer, are some contractual ways to proceed anyway, by agreeing to give the FCC as much time as it needs to do its thing while going ahead with the deal.
Tolling Agreements
Locally focused TheCoolTV to air on digital channels
By Michael Malone — Broadcasting & Cable, February 4, 2010
Sinclair Television Group has paired with Cool Music Network to air the music network TheCoolTV in 34 Sinclair markets representing 24 million homes.
TheCoolTV is a new 24/7 music network with a local angle to its content. "Through their partnerships with local artists, music venues, promoters and major festival events, TheCoolTV has been able to cultivate a unique aspect of localism," the network and Sinclair said in a statement, "thereby appealing to the viewers in each market."
Sinclair did not specify a start date for TheCoolTV.
CoolTV will air a mix of videos and live concerts. "We are excited to offer TheCoolTV on our multi-cast spectrum, but more importantly, feel this could be a perfect fit for the mobile television model," says Sinclair Executive V.P./CFO David Amy. "We believe their ability to customize their content based on each market’s musical tastes will make it all the more appealing to our viewers."
TheCoolTV CEO Joe Comparato says the network can reach viewers on multiple platforms. "We understand that today’s music fans want their music where and when they want it, and that’s what we deliver with strategic broadcast partnerships and unprecedented technical advancements," he said.
Kids don’t watch much TV with us parents anymore. They log onto their favorite shows. They go to YouTube. They watch content on their smartphones and their notebooks…not the TV. However, for the rest of us, we’re watching more content in general–on TV and everything else.
The Council for Research Excellence found:
• The average TV time per day for an individual was 353 minutes (nearly six hours)
• The average computer time was 142 minutes (about 2-3/4 hours)
Of course, the tight economy and need for a break in this “always-on-world” may help drive our need for the screen.
SUNNYVALE. CALIF: Telegent Systems, the company introduced its third-generation analog mobile TV receiver, the TLG1121. The firm described the TLG1121 as “the first single-chip analog mobile TV receiver based on 65 nm CMOS process technology.” The single-chip configuration reduces power consumption and size relative to its predecessors. At 6-by-6 mm, the chip is 25 percent smaller than the second-generation iteration.
The TLG1121 supports NTSC, PAL and SECAM TV broadcasts on mobile devices. Analog remains the transmission format of choice for mobile TV around most of the world.
“Analog mobile TV has rapidly become the most prevalent form of broadcast mobile TV worldwide, representing more than half of 2009 broadcast TV handset shipments,” said Will Strauss, president of analyst firm Forward Concepts. “More than 88 percent of the global population will continue to receive analog broadcast TV signals in 2013, providing compelling market growth opportunities for manufacturers building devices for these regions.”
The TLG1121 is expected to become available for “customer sampling” in the second quarter of this year. — Deborah D. McAdams
RBR-TVBR Exclusive:
There’s a bit of an untold story we’re hearing that’s out there involving broadcast station finance – at the M&A level. Because of the unprecedented downturn in 1) The fortunes of ad-supported broadcast radio/TV and 2) The monumental disruption in the worldwide capital markets, we’ve got a situation where probably 90% of all broadcast station licensees that did some kind of restructuring, M&A or something similar in the last five years, are at the very least in some kind of technical default with their lenders today.
Tech Tip by Richard C Goetz of R & L Media Systems, Inc. Email: rickg@rlmediasystems.com
If you want a good, on-air product, do a nice 704 or 720 x 480 MPEG2 encode.
At our station, we encode everything at 9800 MBits because 99% of our content is converted DVD.
For instance, I just broke up a Detective show called Federal Men. The 25:57 show was 489,068 KBits, encoded at 8,000 Kbps VBR (variable bit rate) off the DVD. Since DVD video uses Dolby Ac3 audio, I have to convert it over to MPEG Layer2 audio for air.
I have Womble (edit software we use to convert and cut up shows) set for 9800 Kbps, VBR for video and audio is set for MPEG Layer 2, 48 KHz Sample rate, 192 Kbps Bit Rate. The three segments are now 217,476, 239,444 and 30,492 = 487,412 Kbit. Now, the funny thing is, in the past when I tried to save disk space by lower the bit rate to say 4000 Kbps, it took 20 times
as long, the picture was not as good, AND THE FILE WAS BIGGER then the original material. So I picked a standard that was greater then the highest rate of the material we encode, and use that across the board. Your video servers will like it as well since they are not trying to switch to all the different encode rates. Doing it this way allows us to put 20-30 weeks of Classic TV programming on a single 2 TB drive with room to spare. No crazy Raid array to fail.
If you want backup, put in a 2nd drive and copy.
We also play all of our commercials, stations ID’s promo’s and bumps off 8G Flash drives.
And that is my tech tip for today.
Tech Tip by Richard C Goetz of R & L Media Systems, Inc. Email: rickg@rlmediasystems.com
SMS and MMS usage is higher than ever, we all know that. But just how huge and far-reaching the technology has become is still impressive nonetheless, and was the focus of a recent report published by Portio Research entitled; “Mobile Messaging Future 2010-2014.”
Calls iPad a "Game Changer"
By Mike Farrell, Multichannel News — Broadcasting & Cable, 2/9/2010 7:05:07 PM
Related:
Cable, Ad Gains May Drive Big Media
Retrans…The Bloody Battle to Save Broadcast Television
The Walt Disney Co. CEO Bob Iger told analysts Tuesday that his company is willing to do battle for increased fees for its broadcast and cable networks, adding that the media giant also sees upside in affiliate fees for its ESPN network as well as new opportunities in the digital delivery of content with Apple Computer’s new iPad device.
"We run some of the best stations in the country," Iger said on the conference call. "…We think it’s time to recognize the value they provide to distributors and their importance to the local community and to our viewers in those communities. We believe it would be appropriate to seek cash for retransmission consent and we believe the same would be the case for our affiliates. I won’t say how much or describe the discussions we are having with the distribution community, but clearly there is a trend we are observing that we fully intend to participate in."
Disney has been aggressive on the retrans front with its affiliates–late last year Belo Corp., which owns several ABC affiliates said it would allow Disney to participate in its retrans haul for those stations.
Iger added that he believes that ESPN, which attracts the highest affiliate fees of any ad-supported network, still has upside potential.
"We think our position going into a new round of negotiations is actually quite solid because of the value we are generating," Iger said." Distributors do quite well with ESPN, not just because of the overall value we deliver, but the ads they sell on local basis are worth a considerable amount. ESPN generates more advertising revenue than any other channel in the cable universe."
Iger also hinted that Disney could participate in Apple Computer’s new iPad device – some have even see the product as a way to bypass cable and satellite distributors. Iger didn’t go that far, but he called the iPad a "game changer."
FCC Reboot YouTube Videos
National Association of Community Broadcasters
1. Mobile Coupons USA
