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Media Bureau adopts a Memorandum Opinion and Order adopting consent decree with civil penalty for $5,000 for violations of section 301 of the Act and sections 73.189 and 73.1680 of the Rules

It’s part art, part science and a lot of mystery.

It’s Search Engine Optimization, commonly known as SEO. And no matter what anyone tells you, there isn’t a person on the planet who knows precisely how to manipulate it. Even former Google employees who specialized in SEO offer conflicting advice to clients.

What is a radio station wanting to improve their SEO to do? Let’s start by addressing a key concern: How to fund it.

Unless you have an employee with a background in SEO and time on their hands to work extensively with your website and YouTube channel (see my last two columns), you’re going to need a specialized agency.

FIND A PARTNER

I am not advocating a big expenditure for an SEO agency.

Many towns  — whether large or small  — have SEO consultants who would like exposure to a greater pool of potential clients for their SEO services. You guessed it, I am suggesting you seek a full or partial trade of radio advertising in exchange for help with your radio station’s digital properties.

You’ll want to trade for the value of a monthly retainer, plus a specified number of hours. Partner with an SEO agency (or ad agency that also does quality SEO) that has already licensed a keyword search tool such as Brightedge.

While there are free keyword search tools, I recommend you select a company large enough to actually have a license with a well-known entity. A legitimate keyword search tool will enable your new agency to prioritize the most relevant keywords for you; categorize keywords to maximize the performance of your content; look for opportunities for keywords that you can “own,” and provide insight into the competitive landscape.

Why is SEO so important? Entire books have been written to answer this question but they all have the same punchline: Organic search. That is, when a user types a query into Google or another search engine, you will achieve the best possible outcome for your website.

This is because the intent of the user determines the success of your metrics. And if someone easily finds what you offer, they will stay on your website or YouTube channel longer because you’re giving them what they want.

When users don’t get what they’re looking for, the opposite occurs, with the traffic “bouncing” off the site with no continued interaction. This is why bounce rates are always so much higher for search engine marketing, when users click on an ad or paid keyword result only to find something that doesn’t match their expectations.

Regarding YouTube, it is difficult to obtain great search ranking, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try. Maybe you’ve got a few unique in-studio music performances that will surface in search. Make sure they are tagged appropriately and that descriptions are unique, very specific, and totally accurate.

FIVE TIPS

There are several other basic but important ingredients in SEO that I’ve personally seen make a difference:

1) Getting more inbound links from authoritative websites to your website. He who gives also receives, so perhaps there are several large websites in your market with which you can create a linking agreement. Local newspaper websites, official local government sites (maybe you can get a link for aggregated school closings, or some other service you offer), local television websites, local sports team sites and any other sites that do well in your city. Tied to this idea is linking from your branded platforms like your YouTube channel and all of your other social channels.

2) Greater internal linking to your own content pieces. Although time-consuming this is easy and can be done gradually.

3) The depth of your website in terms of the number of pages matters, so don’t delete pages unless they can’t be updated. Over many years, sites grow substantially without your even realizing it.

4) Talk to your SEO company about building and submitting a site map. There is substantial disagreement about whether to submit a site map, or just wait for Google to crawl your site. Unless your SEO company is prepared to fix issues uncovered when constructing the site map, it’s probably not worth it to you. However, if your agency specializes in this, it could be effective.

5) Finally, you gotta have patience! SEO is not for short-term thinkers who want results tomorrow. This can be a challenge for radio station managers who demand immediate ratings results on a near-monthly basis. SEO takes time to work. I’ve seen results in three months, better results in six months, substantial results in a year.

Fair warning: There are no guarantees with SEO, but like so many creative endeavors, those who are willing to experiment and take chances often win the game.

Mark Lapidus is a multi-platform media, content and marketing executive, and longtime Radio World contributor. Email mark.lapidus1@gmail.com.

The post Let’s Untangle the Knotty Mystery of SEO appeared first on Radio World.

In this latest series of articles on the FCC’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on EEO rules, the National Association of Broadcasters takes a stance that is shared by other broadcasters who have publicly commented in the ECFS database — that there is no evidence of discrimination in broadcasting that justifies additional regulation or that more EEO rules will actually increase employment diversity.

The NAB filed their reply comments as part of the FCC’s request for reply comments on the commission’s Equal Employment Opportunity Compliance and Enforcement Notice of Proposed Rulemaking.

“Instead of imposing more top-down, unproductive obligations, the commission should focus its efforts on practical measures that will directly impact diversity,” the NAB said, such as increasing public awareness of EEO opportunities and industry education.

[Read: 50 Broadcast Groups to FCC: Remove Obsolete EEO Rules]

The NAB also took a stand against a proposal suggested by a group of EEO supporters that called for more frequent EEO audits. Rather, the NAB said, the FCC should minimize the unjustified burdens of EEO audits by eliminating audits for small broadcasters.

“The record does not contain a shred of evidence of discrimination in broadcasting,” the NAB said in their comment filing. The NAB said that the group relies on conjecture to argue that intentional discrimination is a widespread problem in broadcasting and that it demands additional regulation.

“Moreover, to our knowledge, the commission has conducted tens of thousands of reviews of broadcasters’ EEO programs since the rules became effective in 2003, without one finding of discrimination,” the NAB said.

As other broadcast groups have done in this proceeding, the NAB also raised the question of constitutionality. “The existing rules already push the boundaries of constitutionality. No previous version of the commission’s EEO rule has survived judicial scrutiny, and the current rules persist in part because they have never been challenged,” the NAB said.

“[I]mposing more rules, especially the collection of data about the racial and gender composition of a station’s workforce on Form 395-B, could threaten their sustainability,” the NAB said. Thus, the commission should be extremely wary of imposing additional EEO requirements.

Comments on the FCC’s EEO proposed rulemaking can be seen in the commissions’ ECFS database using Media Bureau Docket Number 19-177.

 

The post Additional EEO Rules Are Unjustified and Unnecessary, According to NAB appeared first on Radio World.

Seeing the handwriting on the wall, the C-Band Alliance reworked plans for splitting the coveted midband spectrum by offering 300 MHz of bandwidth to the cellular industry for 5G expansion into U.S. markets.

Meanwhile on Capitol Hill, a new bill was introduced late last week that would force the FCC to conduct a public C-band auction in the major markets, with profits earmarked for rural broadband expansion, and not satellite operators.

[Read: C-Band Contention Ramps Up]

The proposed bill muddies the waters, since the C-Band Alliance was feeling fairly confident that, by reorganizing the midband spectrum one more time, they could deliver a solution that works for satellite operators and broadband.

Previously the CBA had offered 200 MHz to 5G, but the FCC has made it well known that more spectrum for 5G was required. The increase includes a 20 MHz guard band, leaving 5G with 280 MHz of usable space.

How Would The Proposed CBA Split Work?

I know what you’re thinking: How can a mere 200 MHz for C-Band’s incumbent users now be adequate, when earlier this year CBA’s “line in the sand” was 200 MHz for 5G/300 MHz for C-band users? According to the CBA, it’s a perfect storm scenario which includes:

• Migrating more non-CONUS clients to lower frequencies;
• A number of customers choosing not to renew their space segment contracts (the CBA noted the natural migration of customers to SD multiplexes, terrestrial, etc.);
• Efficiency gains at the uplink level via encoders and modulators.

Why Congress And Why Now?

Don’t doubt for a second that broadband (and their lobbyists) have been quite active on Capitol Hill.

This being said, at least a few members are concerned that their “vision” of a 5G America may be stymied by the FCC. In a joint statement, Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J), Energy & Commerce Committee chairman, and Rep. Mike Doyle (D-Pa.), chairman of the Communications & Technology Subcommittee, stated they believe legislation may be the only way to “reduce uncertainty and benefit Americans.’’

In a nutshell, the Clearing Broad Airwaves for New Deployment (C-BAND) Act:

• Requires the FCC to hold a public auction of C-band spectrum;
• Allow for no less than 200 megahertz and no more than 300 megahertz of C-band spectrum [with 20 MHz set aside for guard bands];
• Ensures that incumbent C-band users will be protected by mandating that they get as good or better service than before.

Of course, this eleventh hour grandstanding is concerning to satellite operators. If this bill passes, who picks up the tab for the new filters, repoints and — in some cases — antennas that broadcasters will need to operate with 5G sharing the spectrum? Who will finance the launch of several new satellites?

All of these expenses would be covered under the C-Band Alliance proposal, but are not even addressed by the proposed bill.

Dusting Off The Crystal Ball

Will the FCC accept the CBA proposal? We’d like to answer with a definitive “yes,” but with legislation pending, who really knows?

But what we do know is that the clock is ticking. The midband issue has been in limbo for two years, and both C-band operators and 5G advocates are hoping for a decision, and soon. If the bill fails to pass, all indications point to the FCC making their decision in December.

We believe the CBA will be a part of the transition in some fashion, since the alliance has been very vocal in their intent to implement the safe and efficient clearing and repurposing of C-band spectrum. It only makes sense that you should have the owner/operators of the orbital antennas involved, right?

Let’s hope the FCC commissioners agree.

 

The post CBA Revises Its Proposal to the FCC, Congress Says It Is Getting Involved appeared first on Radio World.

The FCC is seeking a full-court review of a three-judge panel decision vacating its broadcast media ownership deregulation decision.

The commission filed a petition for review Thursday (Nov. 7), arguing that the three-judge panel decision of appeals court imposed burdens beyond those allowed in the Administrative Procedures Act, second-guessed the FCC to the point that it undermined congressional intent, and breaks with higher-court and sister-court precedents.

[Read: Court Sends FCC Back to Drawing Board on Media Ownership]

In September, that panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit vacated most of the FCC’s deregulatory order, saying the agency “did not adequately consider the effect its sweeping rule changes will have on ownership of broadcast media by women and racial minorities.”

The court was hearing an appeal by Prometheus et al. of the FCC’s fall 2017 decision under Chairman Ajit Pai to eliminate the newspaper-broadcast and the radio-TV cross-ownership rules; allow dual station ownership in markets with fewer than eight independent voices after that duopoly created an opportunity for ownership of two of the top four stations in a market on a case-by-case basis (the FCC was not calling it a waiver); and eliminate attribution of joint sales agreements as ownership; and created a diversity incubator program.” As well as create some diversity mechanisms to address the court’s long-standing concern.

Pai signaled back in September that the FCC would challenge the decision and made it clear what he thought of the court’s persistent remands of FCC deregulatory decisions.

“For more than 20 years, Congress has instructed the Federal Communications Commission to review its media ownership regulations and revise or repeal those rules that are no longer necessary,” said Pai at the time. “But for the last 15 years, a majority of the same Third Circuit panel has taken that authority for themselves, blocking any attempt to modernize these regulations to match the obvious realities of the modern media marketplace. It’s become quite clear that there is no evidence or reasoning — newspapers going out of business, broadcast radio struggling, broadcast TV facing stiffer competition than ever — that will persuade them to change their minds. We intend to seek further review of today’s decision …”

An FCC spokesperson was echoing that Nov. 7, saying “Over the last 15 years, while the media marketplace has changed dramatically, the same Third Circuit panel has repeatedly prevented the FCC from modernizing its ownership rules, including the newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership rule that dates back to 1975. We hope that the full Third Circuit will agree to hear this case and finally allow the FCC to update these rules for the digital age.”

“It is extremely disappointing that the FCC would prefer to fight rather than do what would benefit everyone, which is to assess the impact of its actions on its goals of localism, diversity and competition,” said Andrew Jay Schwartzman, senior counselor at the Benton Institute and one of the attorneys who argued the case for those challenging the deregulation. “As a legal matter, this petition comes 15 years too late; the FCC’s challenge is really to what the same judges found in 2004, and if it had problems with the initial holding, it would have had to make this appeal at that time.”

 

The post FCC Challenges Court’s Broadcast Dereg Smackdown appeared first on Radio World.

The Society of Broadcast Engineers has announced the creation of a new chapter, Chapter 106 Panhandle, which will serve SBE members in the Florida Panhandle, as well as southern portions of Alabama and Georgia.

SBE’s Board of Directors approved the new chapter at the SBE National Meeting in October. This brings the total number of active chapters to 115 across the country.

[Read: SBE Sets 2019–2020 Committee Chairs]

Mark Johnson, CSRE, of LinkUp Communications will serve as chair for the chapter; Cumulus Media’s Alan Lane, CSRE, AMD, DRB, will be vice chair; and Ricky Carter of Alarado Media will serve as the secretary/treasurer.

“The SBE members in the Florida Panhandle have been without a chapter for some time,” said Wayne Pecena, SBE president. “The efforts of Mark Johnson and others in the area to organize a chapter have paid off, and all the chapter leaders and organizers deserve the credit for their work in establishing the chapter to serve SBE members in the area.”

 

The post SBE Creates New Chapter In Florida Panhandle appeared first on Radio World.

Stephanie Donnell is an engineer with New Hampshire Public Radio, based in Concord, N.H., where she recently experienced an unusual problem with RFI noise appearing on the computer video screens in the studios.

The video for the affected monitors is source selected through an Avocent KVM (keyboard/video/mouse) system, shown in Fig. 1, with its central switch in the station’s technical operations center. With some toroids and snap-on ferrite beads applied to the Cat-6 cable feeding video into the Avocent converter boxes for the studio monitors, the noise was reduced to a manageable degree. However, this didn’t address the underlying source of the noise.

Fig. 1: The interference appeared to be related to the Avocent KVM.

Several theories were considered. Perhaps the noise was from cellular or wireless IP equipment shared on the rooftop directly above the studios. Another possibility was interference from one of the medical offices on the floor directly below the NHPR suite. Would rerouting the cable that fed the video monitors reduce the level of noise? A couple of attempts failed to produce any improvements.

Another thought was that the noise was somehow related to the AC power in the studios and offices. The noise problem had started following some kind of disturbance on the AC utilities across the entire city, as noted on the maintenance log. The log showed a momentary dip in the TPO of the 20 kW FM transmitter just a few miles away.

One thing that they initially tried was to isolate the entire facility from the local power grid by switching over to emergency generator power. In another test, they bypassed a fairly new central UPS, used to power several of offices. Neither of these resulted in any noticeable reduction in the noise.

In addition to the studio monitors, the noise showed up on a monitor that used one of the same KVM units in a recently vacated office. This proved to be helpful; Stephanie could work on the issue there, without worrying about disrupting operations in the studios that had the same issue.

Her troubleshooting began by trying to make sure the space was as electrically “quiet” as possible. She unplugged everything except the power to the video monitor and the KVM box; she unplugged a printer and a couple of small AC (switching) wall warts, which did not result in any changes. When she unplugged a slightly larger wall wart; the monitor screen suddenly became completely clear of the noise. When that wall wart was plugged back in, the noise returned. This larger AC power pack provided 12 volts DC for a desktop SAS intercom terminal in the office.

There were several of these intercoms around, including two in the studio where the problem was the worst. When they powered down one of the studio SAS intercoms, there was no change in the noise on the screens. But when the second SAS intercom was powered off, all of the monitor screens — not just in the studio but in all adjacent studios — became totally clear.

To determine that the actual RFI issue was due to the AC power pack, not something else with the SAS intercom terminals, Stephanie located a new power pack with identical voltage and current ratings. She connected it to the suspect SAS terminal in the studio. The results were the same as when the SAS was powered off. All of the computer monitors remained clear of noise.

Fig. 2: Very low ripple from the “good” power supply.

Digging a bit deeper, and having isolated the culprit, Stephanie decided to see what the noise level on the 12 volt output of the good and bad AC power packs looked like with the help of a scope. The “good” supply had around 40–50 mV of noise, as seen in Fig. 2. However the “bad” power pack had nearly 3 volts of some nasty looking noise, pictured in Fig. 3. Stephanie reasoned that much of that same noise was present on the Cat-6 cables going from the SAS terminals, back to the SAS mainframe, located adjacent to the TOC. The SAS cables also shared much of the same route as the Cat-6 cables connecting the different Avocent KVM boxes.

Fig.3: The AC ripple seen on the bad power supply.

Using a large bench vise she cracked open the bad AC power pack. It didn’t take long to find what she was checking for: a pair of electrolytic capacitors with bulging tops, seen in Fig. 4. This was a typical sign that they were “open” and no longer functioning as filters for the DC output.

Fig. 4: Bulging tops of the power supply electrolytics point to the problem.

It is interesting that this issue with the SAS intercoms had no noticeable effect on their operation but rather affected an an entirely different studio system. It also demonstrates that even capacitors in wall warts can be suspect.

Your contributions to Workbench help other engineers and qualify for SBE recertification credit. Send Workbench tips and high-resolution photos to johnpbisset@gmail.com.

John Bisset has spent 50 years in the broadcasting industry and is still learning. He handles western U.S. radio sales for the Telos Alliance. He holds CPBE certification with the Society of Broadcast Engineers and is a past recipient of the SBE’s Educator of the Year Award.

The post A Very Odd Case of Studio RFI appeared first on Radio World.

All Ferncast products have a new core feature, with the company announcing the launch of its Aixtream software for live audio streaming and transmission platforms.

Aixtream can be used as a software installation or virtualization as well as Ferncast’s hardware platforms and has modules for OTT streaming, audio transmission over SIP, DVB-compliant transcoding, audio capturing and more.

 

One of the first customers to using this new technology is German public broadcaster Deutschlandradio. Ferncast’s Aixstream technology will handle the OTT streams of three of the broadcaster’s programs, which eventually totals 50 streams to reach all the decoding platforms and players.

In addition, Ferncast says that the FernPipe concept is also using the aixstream software.

The post Ferncast Launches Aixtream Audio Streaming Technology appeared first on Radio World.

BRUSSELS — Countries that have approached the DAB+ digital radio standard as late adopters are deploying their networks at a much faster pace than early-riser nations, reports show. Speakers at the WorldDAB general assembly, which took place in Brussels Nov. 5–6, confirmed this fact.

WorldDAB President Patrick Hannon addresses WorldDAB general assembly delegates in Brussels. Photos: Davide Moro

LESSONS LEARNED

Consider Germany, the United Kingdom, Switzerland and other countries, which began thinking about transitioning their country’s radio industry to digital terrestrial broadcasting more than 10 years ago.

Jean-Paul Philippot is chief executive for Radio-Télévision Belge de la Communauté Française (RTBF), Belgium’s french-speaking public service broadcaster.

They were also tasked with having to picture — from scratch — the relevant ecosystem that went along with it. This included regulatory issues, spectrum availability, network planning, hard-to-find receivers and a relationship with the car industry still to kick off.

However, “late-adopter countries are speeding up their digital network deployment at a surprising pace,” explained Patrick Hannon, WorldDAB president.

“They are benefiting from the lessons learned by the pioneering countries that went before them, and they are well aware of the key actions they need to take,” he said.

“In addition,” he continued, “those countries can take full advantage of all the previous activities carried out by founding members of the WorldDAB.”

Kamel Haj Ammar is general engineer and director of commercial affairs for the Office National de la Télédiffusion (ONT), the public service broadcaster of Tunisia.

As examples Hannon mentioned the EU directive on the availability of digital receivers in new cars, the success stories of digital-only stations and the sound relationship built with major car automakers also in term of hybrid receivers and user interfaces.

Speakers from Belgium, France, Tunisia, Slovenia and Austria illustrated how their respective countries are advancing at a surprising speed on the digital path and, also thanks to a clearly-defined action plan, which has helped pave the way.

FOUND ITS WAY

According to the latest available figures, 51% of the Tunisian population is covered by DAB+ signals, and this figure increases to 61% in Austria, 73% in Slovenia and 95% in Belgium.

What’s more, it only took these newcomers a few years to move from nothing to the present point, while early adopter countries needed 10 years or more to do the same.

“It’s a real pleasure to see how the key action points from each implementation plan, which proves itself to be effective are so similar. This means we have probably found the right way forward,” Hannon concluded.

Patrick Hannon, WorldDAB president (left) presents Sergio Natucci, chief operating officer at DAB Italia, with the 2019 WorldDAB Award for Outstanding Service (Per Erik Selemark Award).

The more than 200 delegates who took part in the general assembly confirmed Patrick Hannon as WorldDAB president, Joan Warner and Jacqueline Bierhorst as vice-presidents and Ron Schiffelers as treasurer.

Also during the event, the organization awarded the 2019 WorldDAB Award for Outstanding Service (Per Erik Selemark Award) to Sergio Natucci, chief operating officer at DAB Italia.

WorldDAB gives this award annually at its general assembly to an individual member of WorldDAB in recognition of his or her exceptional efforts in carrying out the promotion and rollout of the DAB.

marks the first time this award goes to a person representing the commercial broadcasting sector.

The post Late DAB+ Adopters Benefit From Experience, Move Faster appeared first on Radio World.

Order grants a motion to extend the comment period for Pluto TV's Petition for waiver of certain closed captioning requirements

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The Media Bureau denies a Motion for Stay of the Third Report and Order in MB Docket No. 05-311 filed by the National League of Cities, et al

FCC denies the Application for Review filed by Chehalis Valley Educational Foundation seeking review of the Media Bureau's decision to dismiss the licensee's request for a change in community of license

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A group of 50 state broadcaster organizations are telling the Federal Communications Commission that it’s time to remove outdated equal employment opportunity rules.

Many of the proposals presented in the FCC’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on equal employment opportunity would increase burdens on broadcasters and be of questionable constitutionality and little practical utility in achieving the commission’s stated goals, the group said.

The broadcasters filed their comments as part of the FCC’s request for reply comments on the commission’s Equal Employment Opportunity Compliance and Enforcement Notice of Proposed Rulemaking.

[Read: A Debate Over EEO Audits]

The FCC wants to reduce the regulatory burdens associated with the EEO rule without altering the substance of the rule.

“That can be accomplished quite simply and quickly by eliminating what has now become clear are repetitive and unproductive random EEO audits,” said the state organizations. Stations’ EEO performance is already reviewed at license renewal time and during mid-term reviews, and previous audits have confirmed “that they are not needed, as they have found a very high level of EEO compliance among broadcaster,” the group said in its filing.

“Alone among all other broadcast rules, the EEO Rule is the only rule enforced by random audits,” the group said. “There is no rational basis for implementing such an unusual, repetitive, and burdensome enforcement mechanism for EEO.”

The group also pointed to the questions of constitutionality that were raised about previous EEO rules. “[T]he DC Circuit has openly and repeatedly questioned whether the FCC has any compelling governmental interest in regulating the employment practices of broadcasters at all, a matter it has never had to reach in invalidating the prior iterations of the FCC’s EEO rules.”

As a result, any modified EEO rules adopted by the FCC should be as narrowly tailored as possible, the group said.

The New Jersey Broadcasters Association, which was as part of the 50 broadcaster group comment, filed a separate set of comments to advocate again that the FCC reassess its current documentation and paperwork approach to nondiscrimination and employment diversity.

“In the absence of evidence that the current FCC’s paperwork and recordkeeping requirements prevent or reduce discrimination, or increase employment diversity, the FCC should direct its regulatory efforts to finding effective ways to achieve the important goals of nondiscrimination and employment diversity,” the NJBA said.

The FCC’s current EEO requirements are unproductive and are not serving to achieve their intended goals, the organization said. Instead, it’s time for the industry to come “together to explore more effective options that will truly reduce discrimination and increase diversity in the broadcast station workplace,” the NJBA said.

Comments on the FCC’s EEO proposed rulemaking can be seen in the commissions’ ECFS database using Media Bureau Docket Number 19-177.

 

The post 50 Broadcast Groups to FCC: Remove Obsolete EEO Rules appeared first on Radio World.