[BC] IBOC "secrets" and my opinions.

[Mike McCarthy]

Frank is correct to the extent we need to make lemonade with the very sour 
lemon's tossed at us by a myopic management soft shoe sold by a bunch of 
barnstormers.  So....

Get with it people...look beyond IBOC alone. This is a multi-step process 
which simply ends with IBOC going on the air should you choose to buy into 
the technology.

What can IBOC do for you NOW (and conversely what can you do for IBOC) 
without investing in the IBOC gear? Maybe the silver lining in this is that 
really crappy AM's will be modeled/rebuilt and some engineer's headache 
will go from a daily migraine to a bi-weekly mouse poop clean up once an 
owner/manager hears a broadbanded station's analog signal. They're finally 
realizing through hearing other already broadbanded stations that have 
replaced their old dying facilities with new equipment and have broadbanded 
that they can sound louder/better.  Then maybe  equate that to lost 
revenues or possible revenue gains and thus want to make their station 
sound as loud/good as the guy up the street.  Done right, a 1KW graveyarder 
can sound as good and clear even where the clear dominates in signal by a 
factor of 4.

Look at the matches, rotations, etc. and see what you can do NOW to keep 
your current station competitive with those who have done the leg work, but 
have or have not yet pulled the IBOC trigger. You may be surprised at how 
little is needed to make a HUGE difference.  Especially on 
omni's...graveyarders where the match and such is very simple to address.

As for the other wireless technology....If the RIAA has their way with the 
new streaming rates and increases the download rates, anything other than 
conventional broadcast will be too costly to develop a business plan and 
model.  The royalty structure will be simply too difficult to overcome 
and/or account. I'm not even sure how the RIAA and various rights licensors 
will handle HD+

I do see personal wireless as a threat down the road.  But not in this 
technological generation of IBOC and IPOD...IE until 2010 at the 
earliest.  Radio services 300+ million people.  IPODS maybe 5% of that 
after 5 years.  WiFi isn't even launched yet for mass deployment and is 
BILLIONS of dollars away from reaching anything close to critical mass.

So...for the moment, we need to deal with this basket of lemon's and 
squeeze as much as we can out each any every one....

MM

At 05:25 PM 3/25/2007 -0400, WFIFeng at aol.com wrote

>Now, we also throw into the mix the up-and-coming WiFi systems,
>cell-phone-based systems, and iPods. They're growing at a phenominal rate. 
>They
>'re
>relatively inexpensive and they are available in quite a few places, and 
>growin
>g
>rapidly. IBUZ is too little, too late to even have a chance of competing.
>
>Willie...
>
>
>
>
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>
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