[EAS] EAS message released for education

[Dave Kline]

Doesn't this send a mixed message?

It seems that we finally have gotten most everyone to a place where they wouldn't even consider running a Euro style siren for fear of alarming someone and incurring "the wrath."
Now we have sound alike alerts to explain to everyone what the September test will sound like? 

It's a freakin' EAS test for cripes sake! 
99.9% everyone knows what they sound like. 
And more importantly 99.9% of everyone doesn't give two hoots about listening to any more of it than they have to.

>From a testing standpoint, how is it helpful to start running a bunch of EAS sound alike promos?
Does that not just serve to further dull our senses to that time when a real alert happens?
We already have weekly and Monthly testing. We're adding one more test for the year. 
Nobody listening cares enough to care.
Why go to any extra trouble to ram more of this down their throats?

And from a programming standpoint, who wants to be running enough of these to actually be effective?
Especially when we have managers or PDs who complain that there is too much of this on the air as it is with real alerts. 
I'm sure a bunch of phony ones will will just make their day.

In the car, my wife won't let five words get out of the mouth of a DJ before she's changing to another station with some music.
She'd rather listen to music she doesn't like than to listen to the mindless DJ blabber.
I'd bet she'd be punching the buttons before the second phony duck fart jumps off the speaker cones.

When will the insanity stop?

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Dave Kline   UNO-TV/Mav Radio/KVNO
University of Nebraska at Omaha
6001 Dodge St. Omaha, NE  68182  CPACS 200
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On Aug 23, 2017, at 12:31 PM, Lamm, Dale wrote:

>Here's part of the announcement, taken from "Inside Radio":

>Using the Emergency Alert System tones outside of an actual test or an activation is strictly off-limits. But the government has released a special set of a "sound-alike" EAS tones for stations to use as part of the public education effort leading up to this year's national test. The Federal Emergency Management Agency says the audio file contains "non-functional sound-alike EAS data headers" which most critically won't trigger any station's EAS receivers.