Industry News

Our recent ebook “Console Tech 2021” explores how the physical and virtual surfaces that radio stations and online audio creators use are evolving.

Johan Boqvist is senior product manager, radio on-air at Lawo.

Radio World: Name a specific feature or option of your surface or GUI that you wish to highlight.

Johan Boqvist: Modern radio consoles are no longer standalone physical devices, but are steadily becoming a combination of physical and on-screen interfaces that complement and mirror each other. Lawo has led the way in this area with a software GUI called VisTool, which comes with every Lawo radio mixer, runs on Windows PCs and supports touchscreen controls. 

Lawo was one of the first companies to augment physical controls with virtual controls, which makes VisTool the most mature console GUI on the market.

RW: What makes it notable?

Boqvist: While every Lawo console comes with a basic version of VisTool, there’s an Unlimited version that allows users to completely customize the look, feel and layout of the control GUI with their own

layouts and graphics.

They can literally build a virtual console with it, complete with on-screen, touch-sensitive faders, rotary controls, meters, pushbuttons and more. VisTool can even integrate controls for studio peripherals, including playout systems, phones, codecs, video feeds and social media platforms, etc.

[Related: “How to Choose Your Next Radio Console”]

What makes this notable is that broadcasters have begun to use VisTool not only to control their consoles, but their entire studios. They’re building remote-control solutions with it, where a remote operator connected via IP has complete access to all studio equipment and can run it as if they were physically present in the studio. 

In these days of social distancing, this has proven to be a very in-demand solution, both for stations seeking to be prepared for emergency operation, and for remote talent working from home studios or other locations.

RW: What are other notable features available now in surfaces that may not have been a few years ago?

Boqvist: We’re seeing more and more automation features appearing in radio consoles.

Lawo has pioneered this, with things like AutoMix automatic group mixing and Autogain mic gain features, and also with the ability to set, save and recall settings, customized to individual talent, through the use of snapshots and motorized faders. Built-in touch-sensitive GUIs beginning to appear in radio consoles as well, a feature that was previously available only in large live-sound audio consoles like Lawo’s mc2 series.

RW: For someone who hasn’t bought a console recently, describe the level of “customization” available.

Boqvist: All Lawo radio products are customizable to meet every customer’s unique requirements and workflows. This means console configurations from two to 60 faders, with IP and/or baseband audio interfaces, redundant and non-redundant DSP cores, power distribution, network interfaces and protocols, and a number of DSP licenses and software add-ons to choose from, depending on the application.

The behavior, logic, functions and labels in the console and virtual extension are fully user configurable with the help of intuitive, use-to-use graphical editors and software. 

But if the customer doesn’t require custom configuration, Lawo radio consoles can be delivered with a standard configuration and pre-configured plug-and-play applications.

These standard configurations are frequently updated by our configuration experts based on user feedback and market requirements, to meet the requirements for the majority of radio installations. These standard configurations can also be used as baselines for Lawo’s engineering team to use when collaborating with clients to develop custom solutions.

RW: How many surfaces can an “engine” accommodate?

Boqvist: Great question! But there’s no set answer for every engine and every manufacturer; it depends upon the hardware used. Obviously, hardware with greater power and resources is better.

In Lawo’s case, we have been receiving more and more requests for shared and distributed DSP resources, and for good reason — this approach not only saves money, rack space and power (an environmentally friendly alternative), it makes possible many new options for sharing audio and logic between “logical consoles” and studios without external connections. Our solution is Power Core MAX, a license option for our Power Core DSP mixing engine, which is a 1RU device that’s one of the most powerful DSP devices ever made for broadcast. 

MAX is short for “Multiple Access,” and this license enables the Power Core device to host up to four consoles, either physical, virtual or any combination of the two. The current generation of hardware supports up to 60 faders and 96 parallel DSP channels. That’s more audio resources than a typical single radio application requires, but ideal for sharing those resources among multiple smaller control interfaces. 

Our clients tell us this is a perfect option for multiple consoles in a single studio, or for co-located studios in close proximity, since physical I/O can also be easily shared as well as control. 

Other applications are virtual remote studios with a shared core and DSP engine deployed in a datacenter, with audio connectivity over Ravenna/AES67. Power Core units already in the field can be easily upgraded to MAX functionality with a simple license upgrade.

RW: How will the role of physical surfaces change in the next five years?

Boqvist: Like the rest of the industry, Lawo clearly sees a trend towards more and more virtual consoles and interfaces. As pioneers in virtualization, first with the development of our VisTool graphical control interface, and then with our RƎLAY virtual mixing and routing software, we support this trend and have plenty of experience, having helped customers around the world to deploying virtual user interfaces for production and live broadcasting.

At the same time, customers still want modular physical consoles, very often in combination with virtual interfaces. While we believe that a virtual interface can’t completely replace a physical surface in every application, we think that modular and hybrid console combinations, with open APIs for software integration, are the future. 

This enables flexible deployments and solutions designed for a common and unified workflow across a number of different application scenarios. Lawo Product Management and R&D are working with our UX team and with our clients to develop some exciting products in this vein, which are scheduled for next year, with interfaces that bring modern design and consistent workflow patterns together to unify the overall user experience — whether clients choose physical consoles, virtual consoles or a mixture of both.

The post Console GUIs Get More Powerful appeared first on Radio World.

From our Who’s Buying What page: antenna maker Dielectric said consultant Hal Kneller specified DCR-T antennas for FM translators for AM stations WSRQ(AM) in Sarasota, Fla., and WMDD in Fajardo, P.R.

“WSRQ’s translator for 106.9 FM (W295BH) is part of a blended SFN and simulcasting network that synchronizes programming across four stations in the Sarasota/Bradenton market,” the company stated.

[Related: “Hybrid Synchronization in the Sunshine State”]

“In an effort to improve coverage the 250 W translator, previously located in Bradenton, was moved to Sarasota following FCC approval. While the move would establish a stronger signal with better building penetration, the existing ‘budget antenna’ had suffered recent water damage and would not suit the signal’s new directional pattern,” Dielectric wrote in a project summary.

“Kneller kept the station on the air with a backup system while the one-bay DCR-T antenna was installed on its new tower, which he described as ‘very busy and loaded.’ The compact DCR-T design was top-mounted on the 475-foot tower, using a tower pipe initially intended for cellular antennas. The top-mounted position, combined with the directional pattern designed for the translator, has substantially improved the translator’s effectiveness in the all-important Sarasota area.”

Kneller is using two Dielectric FM filters for the Sarasota transmitter building, with one feeding 106.9 MHz and the other feeding a system on 99.1 FM.

The WMDD system in Puerto Rico simulcasts the main AM signal on 106.5 MHz. The translator is 30 miles outside of San Juan; the translator is on the AM station’s 400-foot tower.

Send news for Who’s Buying What to radioworld@futurenet.com.

The post Kneller Chooses Dielectric DCT-Ts appeared first on Radio World.

Xperi has officially announced the renaming of its DTS Connected Radio hybrid radio platform as DTS AutoStage.

Radio World recently reported the change after the company did a “soft rollout” of the new name during the online CES show in January.

[Related: “Summit to Explore Hybrid Radio, Android Automotive”]

In a press release the company expanded on the reasons. Xperi said the move reflects “the broad application of the platform within automotive infotainment systems.”

DTS AutoStage recently launched in the Daimler MBUX infotainment system, so it is showing up in vehicles like the Mercedes-Benz S-Class. Xperi said the platform also won a 2021 Business Intelligence Group (BIG) Innovation Award.

“The rebrand to DTS AutoStage was in part driven by the opportunities resulting from Xperi’s merger with TiVo in June 2020, which enabled the integration of TiVo’s world-class music metadata and personalized content discovery engine,” according to a press release.

It said the branding represents the entertainment “stages” the platform offers as well as how it can “amplify those stages as in-cabin technology continues to evolve.”

Recently announced features include lyrics, content metadata and personalization capabilities.

Xperi said its partners now include Entercom, Beasley, Cox Radio, Bauer Media and Global Radio, as well as regional platforms FM World, Quu Interactive, Radio.com and RadioApp.

Hybrid radio systems combine over-the-air reception with an internet connection that delivers metadata and can allow “service following” in which a receiver switches automatically to a station’s stream when the car is out of the range of the broadcast signal.

The post Xperi Spotlights DTS AutoStage appeared first on Radio World.

UNESCO had set up a resource page for radio stations enhancing its World Radio Day, Feb. 13.

Available are videos, suggested supplemental activities for stations along with advertising materials. All the materials are copyright-free.

[Read: WRHU to Go Worldwide on February 12–14]

UNESCO has declared the 2021 World Radio Day theme to be “Evolution, Innovation, Connection.”

It also the 10th anniversary of WRD. UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azouley issued a statement: “More than ever, we need this universal humanist medium, vector of freedom. Without radio, the right to information and freedom of expression and, with them, fundamental freedoms would be weakened, as would cultural diversity, since community radio stations are the voices of the voiceless.”

The post World Radio Day Resource Page Available appeared first on Radio World.

The audio media company’s shares have enjoyed a slow, steady rebound since sinking to $3.35 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic some 11 months ago.

Now, Cumulus Media will reveal its fourth quarter and full-year 2020 results in exactly two weeks.

The company led by CEO Mary Berner will host a conference call on Tuesday, February 23 at 8:30am Eastern to discuss those results.

But, there won’t be much time for analysts and investors to digest the results prior to the call. That’s because a press release containing a summary of the Cumulus results will be issued approximately 30 minutes before the call starts.

What can those who own CMLS or wish to buy it anticipate? Berner on the Cumulus Q3 earnings call said that as the company moved into the fourth quarter, “positive momentum in bookings, driven largely by political,” was being seen.

Still, overall improvement across all categories was a factor — even though pacing was down in the mid-teens on a year-to-year basis.

“While we hope for continued improvement, our performance will remain highly sensitive to the shape and pace of external events,” Berner said.

CMLS finished Tuesday’s trading at $10.34, up 2.8% from Monday. That pushes Cumulus shares ever-closer to the all-important $11 mark – last seen nearly one year ago.

Diverse representation matters.

That’s been the mantra across the advertising industry and all facets of Corporate America for the last 8 to 10 months, and rightfully so, says Louis Maldonado, partner and Managing Director of multicultural advertising agency d expósito & Partners.

“The challenges and atrocities that we’ve collectively experienced in that timeframe have led to a social awakening,” he says.

Why, then, were the Super Bowl LV spots such a letdown?

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Travel an hour south of Norfolk via U.S. Highway 17 and you’ll end up in Hertford, N.C. — a major agricultural town in the Elizabeth City region.

Here, you can listen to “The Bull” if you don’t see one, thanks to its presence at 99.3 MHz on a Class A based in Gatesville.

At least, that’s the case today. The FM has just been sold.

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BOCA RATON, FLA. — In 1972, West Palm Beach saw the arrival of its own NPR Member station. On May 25, 2011, West Palm Beach lost its own NPR Member station, as Barry University sold what was then WXEL-FM 90.7 to Classical South Florida.

Today, that signal is WFLV, the home of Educational Media Foundation‘s “K-LOVE” and, on its HD4 signal, a unique feed from the NPR Member station based in Miami is rebroadcast on an FM translator EMF owns, filling the void left by WXEL’s demise.

Soon, this NPR station will own the translator outright. And, it will be shifting its originating digital multicast station to an iHeartMedia property in the market.

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He’s no stranger to Wedel Software, as he had a hand in several company projects over the last few years.

Perhaps that made him a top candidate for the role of Director of North American Sales, a position that he’s now accepted.

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The author is chairman of Digital Radio Mondiale.

Radio is more than 110 years old; the World Radio Day, which was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly as an international day in 2012, will be 10 years old on Feb. 13 (while the life-changing pandemic is only one though it feels like a hundred).

While we read about the excellent results of Spotify in Q4, the spread of podcasting, are we celebrating or commemorating radio? It all depends on whether we look back at the past or try to reinvent radio for the current times and the future.

[Read: WRHU to Go Worldwide on February 12–14]

The international, not-for-profit DRM Consortium feels totally in tune with the three 2021 WRD themes: evolution, innovation and connection. They are wide and lofty enough so that any new technology or platform could subscribe to them. But we are demonstrating practically how radio can evolve and invent what is needed now.

The compression delivered in digital enables up to three audio DRM programs and one data channel on one AM or FM current analog frequency. DRM has been mainly tested, and rolled out for its excellent audio qualities, even in the less forgiving shortwave and medium-wave analog bands DRM delivers combined information like audio and data (i.e., text, pictures, maps etc.) that can enable vital services like the Emergency Warning Functionality to be received on digital radio sets.

It is the pandemic that has forced us to look at the DRM audio and data combination in another context, as an innovative learning platform for all. We looked more closely at the data carriage channel. Data means files, and files represent anything from pop song titles and singers’ pictures to stock market prices or maps and the RSS feeds made available through the universal medium of radio. At least this was the kind of illustration we used to give before 2019. In 2020 we realised that this unique combination of audio and multimedia services, available on a standard digital radio set delivered via terrestrial broadcasts (i.e., one to many, and as many as needed), can offer a real solution for distance learning where the internet is patchy, non-existent or the modern gadgets are rare and unaffordable.

For most, e-learning means nowadays something done via the internet. But internet penetration varies between about 95% in the United States (where 73% own a personal computer), to slightly above 50% in Asia and under 40% in Africa. And this has created yet another information and education gap, as amply documented elsewhere.

Can DRM Be the New Teacher?

DRM can deliver typical classroom education, as well as lessons for personal self-study. Instead of giving the same FM content, or similar, on one of the two extra digital channels, a broadcaster might choose to use one of the available DRM digital channels to broadcast lectures or lessons at certain times of the day. In parallel, complementary lesson notes, full textbooks including graphics and formulas, illustrative images, quizzes etc. can be displayed and cached after being loaded and made available through the Journaline application. As the data is repeated on carousel, they can also be used as notes to the lesson to be referenced during the class or be accessed for self-study at any time and as many times as needed afterwards. The Journaline application helps with the structuring of the information by language, class level, subject, and chapters, for easy navigation by students and teachers, too. The idea has certainly got a lot of attention in India and some African countries.

DRM School Demo

If a DRM receiver is not available or too expensive for individual students, DRM radio sets that are optimized for the radio schooling use-case may provide a built-in Wi-Fi hotspot feature, allowing anybody nearby to access the full DRM audio and textbook content. This means a single DRM receiver can be used for communities, households, or classrooms, still giving every student or user full control over navigating the content at their own pace.

Digital Radio Distance Education

In this instance the digital receiver functions as a “mini-station” that feeds cheap Wi-Fi devices or a larger screen placed in a community center where, if allowed, many students can enjoy informative, modern lectures.

DRM digital radio cannot mirror the richness of internet when this is available, affordable and working. DRM or digital radio e-learning is a more compact offer. It needs a highly structured presentation of the essential content with only the key notes, images and notes available. The information is presented in a logical and structured way. Maybe this is the essence of good and intelligent teaching and learning. Synchronization of audio and visual material broadcast terrestrially is a challenge and has its own limitations, so less is more as quality always trumps quantity.

On Feb. 13, the World Radio Day, we are highlighting DRM as a distance learning platform by launching our education DRM ebook, DRM for Education.

Being a “one-to-many” platform, digital radio can deliver audio and text over vast areas and, therefore, to all the schools and students in villages far away or in busy cities, with the same content and quality and without any discrimination.

On Feb. 13 we are also launching in parallel with our ebook, DRM Delivers Education for All Initiative, which is a project you may want to learn about, get involved in, support and implement. If so, please contact us at projectoffice@drm.org.

World Radio Day is a celebration. And what better way to support evolution, use innovation, and enhance connection than through DRM, a sure way to bring a 100-year-old friend to the new generation in the guise of a knowledgeable and encouraging teacher!

The post World Radio Day – A Commemoration or a Celebration? appeared first on Radio World.