Industry News

Friday marked Day 15 of the “blackout” of all Nexstar Media Group-owned broadcast TV stations and the WGN America cable TV network across Dish lineups.

Is there an end on the horizon? Maybe. But, Nexstar has a new option for disgruntled Dish customers that want their NewsNation and other WGN America programming — and its an over-the-top platform.

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We’ve received good feedback and a couple of questions regarding Wayne Eckert’s submission on grounding wooden poles used to support STL antennas, described in the Workbench column in the Nov. 25 issue. (Like all recent issues of Radio World, you can access it online at radioworld.com/digital-editions.)

You’ll recall that Wayne is an engineer with the Rural Florida Communications Cooperative, so he’s had a bit of experience in bonding and grounding to reduce lightning damage.

Fig. 1: Wayne’s drawing of a properly grounded pole for supporting an STL antenna.

He told us last time about an AT&T document “Grounding and Bonding for Network Facilities.” It’s on the website https://ebiznet.att.com/sbcnebs/.  Much of the document is applicable to broadcast sites and studios.

Fig. 1 is Wayne’s diagram detailing the bonding of an STL antenna to a down ground. Note that the bond sweeps down from the antenna to the grounding conductor.

In answer to the first question we got, yes, the down ground wire does extend above the pole by about 6 inches to a foot. This “pigtail” conductor then is sticking up from the pole.

The down ground cable is typically #6 hard-drawn copper, solid or stranded. Yes, all pole attachments should be connected to the down ground cable using silver solder and short sections of the same #6 gauge cable.

These short grounding cables, attached to the mounted structures can be connected to the down ground using a C-Tap crimp lug (Fig. 2). If the installer doesn’t have crimping tools and dies, the connection can be made with silver solder.

Fig. 2: You can crimp connections to the down conductor using a C-Tap and lug.

Silver solder should be used for all RF and grounding connections — 60/40 tin/lead solder will melt under the heat of a lightning strike given that its melting point is only 360 degrees Fahrenheit. Silver solder’s melting point is above 1,000 degrees.

Strong adhesive

You may have gone to the dentist and received a filling made of a composite resin, a mixture of plastic and glass or quartz. It’s applied in layers, with each layer cured using an ultraviolet light.

A similar liquid plastic adhesive that uses UV light is available for consumer use. Bondic is ultra-strong and unlike super glues is not messy.

Fig. 3: An image from a promotional video for Bondic. The adhesive works on nearly everything and doesn’t “stick” until it’s cured by UV light.

Each Bondic kit includes a special dual-purpose pen. One end dispenses the liquid plastic, the other consists of a UV LED used to cure the bonding material. So this is not really a glue but rather a liquid plastic which, when activated by the UV light, welds the pieces together.

The bond is waterproof, and (should you wish to repair a coffee cup handle) it’s dishwasher safe. Another plus: Unlike glues that eventually dry out in the tube, Bondic stays wet until it is cured by the UV light.

Bondic can be used not only to bond two items but to fill in chips or cracks in metal, wood, plastic, ceramic or glass. One typical use is to repair broken insulation on a smartphone charging cable.

In addition to the starter kit, refill tubes of the Bondic liquid are available. Search Bondic on Amazon or visit getbondic.io.

Guy insulators

Professional Engineer Charles “Buc” Fitch writes that he was quite surprised to find out that Preformed Products, the folks who make all those guy wire grips and associated mounts for towers, also manufactures fiberglass guy wire insulators. Buc says they offer a full line of ceramic insulators as well as fiberglass guy strain insulators. Visit www.preformed.com.

Buc points out the importance of using isolating guy wires with these fiberglass extensions near an FM antenna, as the steel guys can cause FM signal distortion.in nearfield positions. Visit the Preformed site, you’ll be amazed at their varied products.

Classic mic repair

Dan Slentz is always finding entertaining or educational subjects on the web and often shares with Workbench readers. His latest submission is both entertaining and educational.

Fig. 4: A video on YouTube profiles Clarence Kane, a former RCA employee who is still servicing microphones.

Clarence Kane is the owner of ENAK Microphone Repair (ENAK is Kane spelled backward!). He was born in 1926 and got interested in electronics while in the service. Afterwards he attended the Radio Electronics Institute and went to work at RCA, where he worked for 33 years, mostly repairing microphones.

Radio World’s James O’Neal wrote about him in Radio World in 2010. His company continues that service, and he’s the last remaining RCA employee still servicing microphones.

Dan points us to this 12-minute mini documentary video about him on YouTube.

John Bisset has spent more than 50 years in broadcasting and recently began his 31st year writing Workbench. He handles western U.S. radio sales for the Telos Alliance. He holds CPBE certification with the Society of Broadcast Engineers. He is also a past recipient of the SBE’s Educator of the Year Award.

Workbench submissions are encouraged, qualify for SBE Recertification and can be emailed to johnpbisset@gmail.com.

The post Workbench: More on the STL Support Pole appeared first on Radio World.

Travel one hour west of Helena, Montana, and you’ll reach the small town of Deer Lodge. Here, an AM radio silent has fallen silent, as has an FM translator at 99.3 MHz and 20kw FM.

The owner passed away. He had no will. Now, the stations are being involuntary transferred to a family member.

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City United Church in recent years has been using a Massachusetts AM to provide a “Power”-ful religious-themed message to local listeners.

Then, the station fell silent. Now, this facility is being sold.

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Have you ever wondered how many ads you should be airing in a certain week in order to reach your audience effectively? The short answer is, “it depends on what your goals are.”

Cumulus Media/Westwood One and the Radio Advertising Bureau partnered to offer some specific guidelines for radio stations. The goal was to reach  a range of listeners, ranging from a 34% reach to a 78% reach of a station’s audience, with four separate campaign goals defined as very light, light, medium and heavy.

The very light and light schedules were ideal for advertisers who want a maintenance campaign with modest levels of reach and frequency. A medium schedule is a good fit for a general sales event or promotional campaign with modest levels of reach and frequency. A heavy schedule is best for a major sales event or a product launch where many listeners are reached very frequently.

Those four approaches offer stations guidance as to how much and how often an audience is reached, wrote Pierre Bouvard, chief insights officer at Cumulus Media/Westwood One, in a blog post.

The study revealed that turnover is a key factor. Turnover is calculated by dividing a radio station’s cume (the number of different people reached by a station in a week) by its average quarter-hour audience. The greater the turnover, the more ads needed to reach an audience in a typical quarter hour. Stations with high turnovers have lower time spent listening while stations with lower turnovers have higher time spent listening.

“There’s no such thing as good or bad turnover,” Bouvard wrote. “You just need to know what it is. Turnover is a helpful ratio to understand how many commercials, promos or song spins are needed to reach a station’s audience.”

To determine the ads needed for a very light schedule, for example, take half the turn over. For a medium schedule, double the turnover.

The report also offered suggestions for different radio formats. For a top 40 station, for example, a station would need to air 15 ads, promos of song spins per week to reach 34% of its audience. To reach 78% of its audience, a station would need to air 103 ads.

The study also found that although agencies and FM/AM radio sellers agree on the number of ads needed for light schedules, they typically underestimate the number of ads needed for medium or heavy campaigns.

A companion study determined what kinds of campaigns are actually being run across the country. Cumulus Media conducted a Media Monitors analysis of AM/FM radio advertising in 99 markets during a week. The report found that during the first week of August 2020, 182,425 commercials were run on 1,685 monitoring radio stations in 99 markets. The study assigned one of the four types of schedules — very light, light, medium and heavy — in those 99 markets.

The report found that the vast majority of weekly radio station campaigns (73%) are very light, meaning they are reaching only one-third of a station’s audience. Only 2% of radio campaigns were considered heavy while 4% were considered medium intensity and 66% were considered medium.

It appears that the underestimation of the number of ads needed for medium and heavy schedules is the reason why there are so few medium/heavy campaigns, Bouvard said, even though heavy campaigns are an important strategy for advertisers.

[Read: Bouvard: More People Are “Ready to Go”]

One of the best practices as recommended by the study is that radio stations run heavy schedules of AM/FM radio ads if these advertisers are looking to generate significant impact. A previous study conducted by the National Association of Broadcasters and Coleman Insights found that advertisers who run heavy schedules rate the campaigns as excellent far more often than those running different campaigns.

The bottom line: set the right expectations with your advertisers. “Don’t expect grand opening results from a light weekly campaign,” Bouvard wrote.

Instead, press your advertisers to examine their existing plan to see if the schedule intensity matches desired results. The strategy that answers an advertiser’s concern about cost of medium- and heavy-intensity ads is two-fold: run shorter ads and run ads at all day and time periods, since ad costs for nights/weekends generally run about half of prime-time hours.

Remember, Bouvard wrote: advertising is not one-size-fits-all. “Understanding the campaign goal is crucial to determining a correct AM/FM radio plan strategy and as important as the message itself,” he wrote. “While the number of occurrences/spots needed for various campaign goals might be underestimated, the use of these tools can serve as guidelines to better optimize the AM/FM radio planning and buying process.”

 

The post Determining How Many Ads a Station Needs to Run to Get Results appeared first on Radio World.

Eliminating injuries and fatalities in tower work is the aim of a new partnership of OSHA, NATE and the FCC.

 “The goal of the three-year partnership is to eliminate worker injuries and fatalities while performing wireless and telecommunications, tower erection and maintenance operations,” they said in an announcement.

“The partnership will address some of the industry’s frequently encountered hazards, including falls from height, electric, falling objects, tower collapses, and inclement weather.”

[Read: FCC, OSHA Team Up on Tower Safety]

The agreement was signed in an online ceremony involving officials of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, NATE: The Communications Infrastructure Contractors Association and the Federal Communications Commission.

They included Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Labor Loren Sweatt, NATE Chairman Jimmy Miller and FCC Chairman Ajit Pai.

Sweatt said demand for wireless communications and broadcast services has increased the need for construction, service and maintenance of towers around the country.

The effort is being done under OSHA’s Strategic Partnership Program.

 

The post NATE, OSHA and FCC in Safety Partnership appeared first on Radio World.

Entercom named Ashok Sinha to a key communications role.

As senior VP, head of corporate communications and PR, “will lead the communications strategy and execution across the company’s entire portfolio of assets.”

[Read: Entercom-Urban One Deal Shakes Up Four Markets]

That includes oversight of internal and external comms, media and press relations, corporate messaging, crisis communications and issues management, and “executive thought leadership management.”

He was formerly vice president, communications lead, technology at WarnerMedia. He has also held communications positions at Publicis Media, NBCUniversal, Viacom and Product(RED).

He reports to Chief Marketing Officer Paul Suchman, who said the appointment is part of the company’s efforts to “build the future of audio.”

In the announcement, Sinha called himself “a lifelong consumer of music and the spoken word” and said “I believe in the power of audio and its ability to engage, entertain and inform the world.”

 

The post Entercom Names Sinha to Communications Post appeared first on Radio World.

For stock watchers, one thing has become very clear over the last several weeks on Wall Street: The nation’s No. 1 audio entertainment and media company, iHeartMedia, is seeing a strong recovery from its COVID-19 pandemic-fueled low.

On the other hand, shakiness abounds for Entercom Communications shares.

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Tune to 107.9 MHz in Central New Jersey, and you may hear a wide variety of Classic Hits and an announcer using a wee bit of reverb on “WOLD.”

That’s the call sign for a LPFM that happens to share a very tight short-spacing situation with an FM translator just down the road. While this would normally create interference, the facilities share the same programming, originating from Princeton University.

Now, the school has a plan to eliminate the interference, secure a second FM signal in the process, and air paid advertisements without running afoul of low-power FM rules.

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The Federal Communications Commission’s Enforcement Bureau has begun targeting property owners and managers that tolerate pirate broadcasting on their properties.

It started today by notifying owners of three properties in Queens in New York City that there is apparent illegal broadcasting happening at their buildings.

The bureau issued an announcement that it is exercising the FCC’s new authority under the recently enacted PIRATE Act, which gave the commission a significant new hammer in its anti-pirate toolkit: “Parties that knowingly facilitate illegal broadcasting on their property are liable for fines of up to $2 million,” it stated.

Enforcement Bureau Chief Rosemary Harold said, “It is unacceptable — and plainly illegal under the new law — for landlords and property managers to simply opt to ignore pirate radio operations. Once they are aware of these unauthorized broadcasts, they must take steps to stop it from continuing in their buildings or at other sites they own or control.”

If they don’t, she said, they risk a heavy fine, followed by collection action in court. “In addition, our enforcement actions will be made public, which may create further unforeseen business risks.” She emphasized what the FCC and broadcasters have been saying for years: that pirate radio is illegal, and can interfere with licensed stations and emergency alerting.

The bureau will provide written notice to property owners and managers that it thinks “are turning a blind eye to — or even helping facilitate — illegal broadcasting.” It also has created a new “Notice of Illegal Pirate Radio Broadcasting.” The notice provides owners a period of time to remedy the problem before any enforcement action proceeds.

The first three notices were mailed — first class and certified mail — to owners of buildings in Queens that are just a few blocks apart. The bureau said it traced a signal on 105.5 MHz from 3520 97th Street, Queens; another on 91.3 MHz from 3535 95th Street; and a third on 95.9 MHz from 3512 99th Street. They were given 10 days to respond; the FCC said the bureau will “consider any response before taking further action.”

Under the prominent headline “Notice of Illegal Pirate Broadcasting,” each letter’s language should get the attention of a landlord. It reviews the possible penalties, then adds: “If you do not respond to this Notice, the FCC may nonetheless determine that, as a legal matter, you have sufficient knowledge of the above-referenced pirate radio activity to support enforcement action against you. Service of this Notice to you or your agent establishes the foundation, along with other evidence, that could lead to significant financial penalties.”

Broadcasters have pushed for decades for the FCC to be more aggressive in combating illegal broadcasting. FCC Commissioner Michael O’Rielly has been a vocal proponent of giving the commission more tools to do that, and Congress did so in the PIRATE Act.

The argument is that landlords and property managers often know of the activity, and the bureau said it has previously sent warnings to landlords and sought cooperation from national property owners’ organizations to raise awareness. “With pirate broadcasts persisting despite these efforts, Congress took action and empowered the commission to penalize property owners and managers that knowingly permit pirate broadcasters to remain operating from the landlord’s buildings or unbuilt areas,” it stated.

“Landlords and property managers also may be found liable if a pirate station ceases operation for some period of time but later resumes at the same site.”

 

 

The post FCC Starts Crackdown on Pirate Radio Landlords appeared first on Radio World.