Broadcasters have long known that we have an obligation to give back to our communities. This service has its roots in the original Communications Act of 1934. It directed that we operate in the public interest, convenience and necessity. Since that time, broadcasters have taken that obligation seriously, supporting our local communities during good times as well as responding to national and local crises as diverse as 9-11, the War in Iraq, hurricanes, tornados and the vast array of civil emergencies that arise.
It truly does not matter what the regular format of a station is, when emergencies occur, all hands turn to the immediate challenge of helping preserve lives and property with information as quickly as possible. Within the radio industry, we can cite numerous stories of staff members, both on-air and technical, who have made incredible personal sacrifices to make sure that the station stays on the air and the information is broadcast.
With the evolution of technology over time, nothing has proven as reliable as radio in any form of emergency, especially when weather or man-made disasters disrupt the electrical grid. It is only common sense that, when the TV and the lights go out, you grab a flashlight and the battery-powered radio to find out what's going on. But as portable communications has migrated over the past decade to the cell phone, there should be a reliable emergency way to stay in touch with important, perhaps lifesaving information.
Radio has invested over decades in redundant and hardened systems to allow us to stay on the air in all but the most disastrous situations. Even when our broadcast towers are damaged, resourceful engineers can get a station back on the air within minutes or hours. Our staffs may not have the latest colorful doppler radar, but they have sufficient resources to keep our listeners up to date and as safe as possible.
For the past several years, radio has been advocating for the voluntary inclusion of a small, inexpensive tuner chip in cell phones sold in the United States. In other parts of the world, this is a standard feature of cell and smartphones. It is so standard that a number of the phones already sold here in the U.S. have the chip buried within them, but not activated. Numerous other features have been added to phones over their evolution, still cameras, video, games, apps by the thousands, but until now, radio has rarely been added or activated. The wireless carriers appear to have decided to hold their customers' safety hostage to their own self-interest. Jeff Smulyan of Emmis Communications has been a tireless advocate of FM chips for cell phones and has argued persuasively for their inclusion and activation. We owe him a debt of gratitude.
Now there is an opportunity for the carriers to voluntarily step up, cooperate with the radio industry, deploy tuner chips, and better serve the life-and-death interests of customers everywhere. They continue to resist, even to the point of spurning an open dialogue with radio representatives on the topic. While every carrier is looking for additional bandwidth to meet the ever-increasing demands of consumers, one small chip can be a step in that direction. In many widespread emergencies, their bandwidth is crushed under the demand and the radio chip would provide an added available channel. Our national, state and local EAS services on the cell phone would be welcome information to anyone affected.
Radio already has a robust presence on the smartphone with the deployment of many audio apps that have been created over the past 5 years. In fact, estimates show that anywhere from 3 to 5% of today's listening is done via streaming audio; radio has made sure that we are available to our listeners, wherever they are. We expect no real monetizable increase in listening through the cell phone chip. But we do want to be easily accessible to our listeners when the worst happens. We want to serve. Do you?
(5/14/2012 12:11:42 AM)
"Broadcasters have long known that we have an obligation to give back to our communities." - Peter H. Smyth
Now, fast-forward to today. How many operators don't even know the names of which towns they are, supposedly, serving. Newsies - gone. V/T'ed Programming.Even the janitor emails it in.
Give us a break.
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