[EAS] WEA used in NYC bombings

[Dave Kline]

You make several very good points John.
The only area where I would disagree is with the weight you put upon radio stations to somehow send pictures to their listeners or even to those not currently listening. 
Let's also not party like it's 1949. I think that new fangled thing that has pictures and sound would handle this much better than any radio station.

But all in all, good stuff in general.

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Dave Kline
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On Sep 20, 2016, at 3:07 PM, John Willkie wrote:

>Let's disabuse ourselves of false notions before they become embedded.

>3.  Let's don't party like it's 1999 anymore.  There is this capability called email, and SMS.  I understand that both can carry photos.  I also understand that radio stations acquire lists of listener telephone numbers and even email addresses.  Unfortunately, if these are only used for prize validation,etc by the promo department, it would probably take weeks for the radio station to realize that they could send out the photo (moments after the WEA alert) to folks on their email lists.  Surely, some of the prize trolls in Lithuania would get the alert, since the tools don't exist to geo-fence sms and email yet.  Imagine if a broadcast station maintained and promoted an email/sms list for such alerts?

>4.  I also understand that it's not uncommon for even automated radio stations to have a twitter account.  Sometimes, the social media manager might be the only employee on duty.  Imagine if this person sent the photo out via twitter and then promoted on-air and even in sms (since not all folks have graphics in their sms) where to go for the photo.

>5.   Once again, as someone with a smartphone with an FM radio (AM is basically useless in a smartphone due to interference), unless the radio is on, its worthless for real-time alerts.  Even then, if it informed me of the name, just like everybody else, I would do a search in the browser for the photo.