When the FCC announced the creation of an “AM Revitalization Initiative” in 2013, the proposal included a grab-bag of industry desires, such as the right for AM stations to utilize FM translators and for AM stations to move from hybrid analog/digital broadcasting to the all-digital AM-HD protocol. But to the consternation of industry lobbyists and HD-backers there’s been no movement on this initiative — so now they’re beginning to whine about it.
Case in point is a commentary published in late June by Frank Montero, an attorney at D.C. communications law powerhouse Fletcher, Heald & Hildreth, which laments that AM broadcasters are being held hostage without access to FM translators and accuses the FCC of playing political football with the future of AM itself. It’s full of questionable assertions and revisionist history. Continue reading “AM Broadcasters Still Seek Translators, Digital Authorization”
Category: Digital Radio
New HD Radio Applications Seek to Fix System Flaws
There’ve been a couple of interesting developments out of the HD Radio trenches over the last few months. Both are touted as advanced “applications” for utilizing the HD Radio system — but in reality they’re band-aids that seek to fix fundamental flaws with the technology itself.
The first involves transmitter-manufacturer Nautel and its experiments with FM-HD multiplexing. This practice is inherent to the DAB/DAB+ radio systems adopted in Europe, Asia, and elsewhere: instead of every station having its own transmission infrastructure, stations send a stream to a multiplex transmitter where it’s combined with other stations and broadcast as a unifed signal. Instead of tuning to a particular frequency, DAB/DAB+ receivers look for the data-flags of the desired station and, once found, decode only that stream. In this configuration, DAB/DAB+ multiplexes can broadcast 10 or more channels of programming on a single unified digital radio signal. Continue reading “New HD Radio Applications Seek to Fix System Flaws”
Patent Troll Gives Up on HD Radio
Good news for iBiquity et al.: a simmering fight with patent trolls seeking recompense from hundreds of broadcasters and auto manufacturers over their implementation of HD Radio has been quashed.
The trolls folded first. On April 23, Delaware Radio Technologies and Wyncomm LLC notified the Federal District Court in Delaware that they wanted to terminate their lawsuits “with prejudice,” meaning they cannot be refiled. iBiquity, who countersued the trolls last year, moved for dismissal of its case on May 6. Continue reading “Patent Troll Gives Up on HD Radio”
Comparing Progress: HD Radio vs. DAB/DAB+
The annual NAB Show in Las Vegas is now behind us, and with it a bevy of announcements regarding HD Radio, the U.S. digital radio standard:
1. More test-results were announced regarding the workings of all-digital AM-HD Radio. Not many details: additional stations have conducted field-tests, and while the digital signal does sound better than the analog and hybrid analog/digital ones, it’s not as robust as hoped, leading many in Vegas to believe that, if the FCC does authorize the use of all-digital AM-HD this year, it’ll be for the daytime only. Continue reading “Comparing Progress: HD Radio vs. DAB/DAB+”
Still Waiting for the HD Payday
There’s been a slew of news about HD Radio uptake, but as usual, not a lot of meat on the bones. Rather, it’s the continuation of a yearly practice of demonstrating signs of life. These are designed not so much for the radio industry or listening public as much as they are for investors waiting to see a return for subsidizing the system’s development and promotion. 15 years on from the founding of iBiquity Digital Corporation, they’re still waiting.
The most notable announcement is the (re)launch of an advertising camapaign to agitate listener interest in radio-via-smartphones. It’s based primarily around NextRadio, the Emmis-developed FM receiver application available on select Android devices. Until last month, the “Free Radio on My Phone” campaign generally advocated the benefits of having an FM chip enabled on mobile devices, but the new iteration directly promotes NextRadio itself, according to the campaign materials available online. Continue reading “Still Waiting for the HD Payday”
Patent Troll Suffers Setback in HD Lawsuits
A judge in Delaware’s federal District Court has put the brakes on a patent troll’s carpetbombing of the radio industry. For those just tuning in, some ambiguous firms in Delaware acquired some old AT&T patents that vaguely describe digital data transmission. Armed with these, the firms filed a slew of lawsuits in 2013 against broadcasters who’ve deployed HD Radio technology, claiminng that the system infringes on their intellectual property.
iBiquity Digital Corporation, HD’s proprietor, filed a counterclaim last year seeking the dismissal of the trolls’ crusade and the voiding of its patent claims. If the trolls want to bilk anybody, iBiquity is the logical target, as it controls all of its intellectual property with a firm hand. Furthermore, the station’s license agreement with broadcasters indemnifies stations against such claims. Continue reading “Patent Troll Suffers Setback in HD Lawsuits”
Broadcasters to SEC: Digital A Variable Priority
In its latest quarterly filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Emmis Communications, the Indianapolis-based broadcast conglomerate who developed the NextRadio/TagStation suite and is a major player in HD Radio, had some interesting things to say about both technologies.
Back in 2013, Emmis inked a deal with Sprint in which broadcasters would pay $15 million a year to Sprint through 2016, in quarterly installments, in exchange for Sprint adding FM receiver chips to some 30 million devices on its network. Emmis has been working with other broadcasters to help shoulder the burden of this deal, but it would seem that industry enthusiasm for the project is coming up a bit short. Specifically (p. 30): Continue reading “Broadcasters to SEC: Digital A Variable Priority”
HD Radio in 2015: Threads Make a Strand?
This begins HD Radio’s 13th year as the de facto U.S. digtital radio standard. With a broadcast penetration rate still hovering at around 15 percent and listener uptake at a third of that, there’s still a long road ahead before the technology reaches any semblance of marketplace criticality. That said, HD proponents have many narrative threads in play, all of which will bear watching in the coming 12 months.
The Coattails Effect. Broadcasters have demurred investing in HD transmission technology until listeners have receivers. By and large, they still don’t, but HD proponents are hanging their hopes on two primary vectors: the car and the phone. Continue reading “HD Radio in 2015: Threads Make a Strand?”
Skotdal: The Future of AM is FM
Just a couple of days after prognosticating on the policy future of all-digital AM-HD radio broadcasting, one of the key players in the industry’s testing regimen issued his own reality check: for digital radio to succeed, all over-the-air broadcasting must migrate to FM.
Andrew Skotdal is the owner of two AM stations the NAB et al. used to test all-digital AM-HD in Seattle this fall; he presented on these tests at the NAB Radio Show. In prior trade coverage, Skotdal has been upbeat about the future of digital AM broadcasting, though cognizant of its uphill climb. His latest missive shatters many illusions. Continue reading “Skotdal: The Future of AM is FM”
Next Steps for All-Digital AM-HD
Since my run-in at the NAB Radio Show with industry forces spearheading experimentation with the all-digital AM variant of HD Radio, they have been busy. Back in September, testing was underway on stations in Seattle—the eighth and ninth such stations to conduct tests in the last two years—and the NAB et al. described the preliminary results as quite positive.
When the tests concluded in October, the president of the stations hosting them in Seattle said that while the experience was good, some listeners wondered if their stations would be going all-digital anytime soon. Not for at least 10 years, replied the executive, “because regulatory efforts take time.” Continue reading “Next Steps for All-Digital AM-HD”