June 5, 2007
Your Band Can Be on the Radio in D.C.
Most unsigned bands are lucky to have a few dozen fans at their concerts. Now there’s a chance for local artists to bring their music to a much larger audience—the greater D.C. metropolitan area.
WTOP radio is now broadcasting iChannel, an Internet radio station that features unsigned artists, on its HD Radio channel, 103.5-2. Bands can submit their music to iChannel, which will evaluate it for “playability” (read: they want radio-friendly tunes). Those that make the cut can set up an artist profile and will be able to track how many times their songs have been played and downloaded, how many people have visited their profile, and where they rank in listener ratings.
Because iChannel is on WTOP’s HD Radio channel, you must have a special HD Radio receiver to tune in. Incidentally, HD Radio doesn't actually mean high definition; HD in this case is just a brand name that's seemingly intended to confuse people.
Photo by ohad*
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"HD Radio" is just a branding mechanism, but it is in fact different from regular radio. For starters, it's a digital signal, which means regular ol' radio tuners can't pick it up (a new in-dashboard HD tuner will only run around $150, though). Second, because it is digital, each channel takes up less bandwidth, allowing for additional channels (this works the same way HDTV works, as anyone who checks the weather on channel 7-2 can attest to). Finally, and possibly most significantly, the signal is broadcast as a 96 kbps or 128 kbps compressed data streams, bringing it to "near-CD quality," much to the RIAA's chagrin.
What the hell does "playability" mean?
I think playability means that you have to sound like Hootie and the Blowfish.
JM,
That's what I thought. Thank you.
JM,
That's what I thought. Thank you.
Consumers have little interest in HD Radio:
“Sirius, XM, and HD: Consumer interest reality check”
“While interest in satellite radio is diminishing, interest in HD shows no signs of a pulse.”
hear2.com/2007/02/sirius_xm_and_h.html
“U.S. automakers not jumping into HD Radio”
reuters.com/article/ousiv/idUSN2632750220070427?pageNumber=1
“Bridge Ratings: Sweat the cell phone and don’t count on HD”
“In other words, Bridge says interest in HD radio is decreasing even as your station works hard to increase awareness. What can I possibly add to this honest and bleak picture that I haven’t said before? My well-intended warnings about HD’s “premature death” seem to be rearing their ugly heads almost two years later.”
hear2.com/2007/04/bridge_ratings_.html
“But is ‘availability’ of HD radios the problem?”
“And one broadcaster reported to me that he asked an iBiquity rep how many HD radios had actually been sold as of the most recent accounting. And this was his answer: 150,000.”
hear2.com/2007/04/but_is_availabi.html
“HD Radio on the Offense”
“But after an investigation of HD Radio units, the stations playing HD, and the company that owns the technology; and some interviews with the wonks in DC, it looks like HD Radio is a high-level corporate scam, a huge carny shill.”
eastbayexpress.com/2007-03-07/music/hd-radio-on-the-offense
You can also get Towson University radio on WAMU's HD broadcast, which is less Hootie-esque and also plays artist from the region.
Hey! That's my photo
Audio weenies are saying that HD does not sound as good as it should for 2 reasons: broadcasters over-compress their content, and tuner/receiver manufacturers use cheesy preamps.
This does not bode well for the conversion of other bands to digital audio.