6-6-2012
"The Future of Audio" hearing was the perfect outlet for Emmis CEO Jeff Smulyan to push out his message of safety and take issue with the way the wireless industry has frustrated his efforts. The wireless industry has never bought into Smulyan's safety angle but that didn't deter him yesterday. He told lawmakers a 90 character text based alert system is no comparison to local radio?s role as "a lifeline service during times of crisis" and again emphasized that broadcasters are not looking for Congress to mandate the chips into phones.
Smulyan said Americans deserve better choices and should be free to choose mobile phones with activated radio chips." He also took this hearing as an opportunity to point out that even when the chips are available cell phone salespeople and consumers really have no idea. "It is needlessly difficult for consumers to identify the few device models that do include activated radio chips. Radio is not typically featured, or even listed, as an available search option on wireless carriers? phone purchasing websites. Verizon?s website, for example, allows consumers to research phones by selecting and searching for any combination of 18 various features; however, Verizon does not include free, over-the-air radio on that long list of features. The story is the same at mobile phone retail stores, where radio is rarely indicated as an available feature on the display cards for mobile devices. In-store salespersons and telephone customer service representatives are largely unaware as to which of their own devices are radio-enabled. Indeed, while they are often surprised to learn that a particular phone is equipped to receive free, over-the-air radio, they are clearly aware of, and able to inform consumers about, streaming, data-based radio apps, like Pandora.com. Some industry experts observe that mobile phone providers would rather reap the revenue of data-intensive, fee-based streaming apps than offer consumers a free and local audio alternative."
Smulyan says the way the wireless industry is acting prevents consumers from a choice and puts them in danger. "The control of U.S. wireless carriers over the manufacture of mobile devices ultimately results in consumers being unable to access radio?s free, local news, information and entertainment programming via their mobile phones. More seriously, this lack of access could jeopardize the lives and property of Americans by restricting the availability of critical information during emergencies. Including and activating radio chips in mobile phone devices, and making them widely available to consumers, would substantially increase the accessibility of important emergency information, and keep Americans safer."
(6/7/2012 10:18:47 PM)
If radio in phones is such a great thing, why isn't this man manufacturing and selling phones with the chip? My phone does have it, and let me tell you, unless you're at the transmitter, it's useless without a headset. It needs the headset to act as an antenna.
(6/7/2012 10:13:43 AM)
I'm surprised he didn't say that all radio-people are dedicated to the premise of widespread, consistent community service. Something along the lines of: "Me an' my boys here are all onside with this."
But then he couldn't, now, could he? He would turn to look and gesture behind himself only to find he was alone.
Smulyan is such a joke an liar. This is all about getting HD Radio chipsets backdoored into cell phones. Big Group Radio and the NAB are investors in iBiquity's junk-technology.
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