Broadcasting
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Local radio lives in Burlington and Graham
WBAG’s callsign stands for Burlington And Graham: two adjoining towns between Greensboro and Durham in North Carolina. I have many kinfolk in the hood, and have been living or visiting here all my life. As it happens, WBAG and I were also born the same year. So was the station’s broadcast tower, which stands in… Continue reading
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Oneday
That’s all I have to prep for a month on the road. Tomorrow is Baltimore. After that, North Carolina. After that, California. Back in Bloomington in mid-August. Right now it’s hot in all my places: Ground down Says here that Rogers Sports & Media has closed six of its radio stations. One of those, CKWX… Continue reading
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Flyagain Day
I leave shortly for fun family matters in Minneapolis. Meanwhiles, here are some worthy tabs to close: While finding this kindness by Kaliya Young (quoting a now-vanished utterance by the late and very great Craig Burton) published in 2005 on her IdentityWoman blog, I also dug her latest post there, which is about commons and… Continue reading
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Someday
Loose links Hermes Agent, and Hermes Agent. Both new to me, but look important because it’s open-source personal AI. Not clear yet on the difference. Privacy Manifesto. Wrote it years ago. Does it need an update? Reckoning with the Political Economy of AI: Avoiding Decoys in Pursuit of Accountability, by Janet Vertesi, danah boyd, Alex S… Continue reading
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Tubes
Naturally Washington Post: Human Ninja Turtles keep emerging from New York City manhole covers. Circling the drains BBC will be shutting off its Radio 4 service at 198 kHz longwave (LW) on 27 June. Being old in age and fashion, I travel with a radio and have always loved listening on the LW band, especially to… Continue reading
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Oneday
Flaming excess Big fire on Santa Rosa Island. Largest fire ever there. Success story Susie James: Three chords, the truth, and a woman behind the signal is a nice piece about good local radio in Lebanon, Tennessee. It's in the Lebanon edition of Good News Exchange, which explains itself here. Continue reading
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Leftunders
And it will probably be very bad A super El Niño is coming this year. Let’s get it in the OED I’ve been throwing away leftunders, a word I just made up and then found in the Urban Dictionary. Speaking of worse Axios says we’re scaling sin. They are correct, at least in the sense… Continue reading
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Whensday
All the way down, but not out This visit to an abandoned radio station speaks volumes about what remains of the industry. The station is WACQ/580 in Tuskegee, Alabama. I’m listening to the online stream right now, and it sounds like a working local station, with live talent and lots of ads by local sponsors.… Continue reading
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Ursday
And it still is I posted Why Music Radio is Dying almost 15 years ago, but it’s getting action now for some reason. Verily Reid Hoffman in Faith in the Possible: “It’s easy to get caught up in product releases and cycles, and forget that every technology traces this spiritual arc. You are born into… Continue reading
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Thisday
Blurp I am told that Santa Barbara’s beaches are covered with velella now. I mean a lot like the one above, See you there A couple of nights ago, a friend and reader of mine said he didn’t understand what today’s talk by Judith Donath would be about. “Signaling theory?” he said. “What’s that?” To him, signals… Continue reading
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Wonday
em… As a lifelong over-user of em dashes and F bombs—hey, I'm from New Jersey—it's fun for me to learn that AI slop generators follow my style and F bombs are a way around detection. I'd say more, but would rather point to Tom Fishburne's typically excellent cartoon and post about the whole thing. Delayed… Continue reading
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For broadcasters, digital tech isn’t a lifesaver. It’s a new land for fish with legs and lungs.
Eric Nuzum says public radio isn’t interested in saving itself. He’s actually quoting somebody else, but saying there’s a case. Specifically, When I hear public media leaders talk about the state of audience, ratings, and legacy platforms, I hear a very strong decline-centered narrative, with one station CEO infamously saying that “radio is dead.” Really? When… Continue reading
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Runday
Did he die in his sleep? "The Gambler" may be the best country song ever written. And performed. (Kenny Rogers' version is the definitive one). Alas, its author, the great Don Schlitz, has passed on. Not many details on that: Nashville hospital, sudden illness. He was from Durham, NC, one of my former homes and… Continue reading
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Operation Desert Furry
So today I went all the way with it I just realized I’ve been naming each day’s Wordland posts (such as this one) kind of the way the US military names campaigns. I’d hardly change a word Escaping the Black Holes of Centralization is getting some visits lately. I wrote it in 2014. Here is how… Continue reading
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Unday
Climbing while Rome burns FCC Chair Brendan Carr likes to climb towers. I did too, decades ago. That kind of thing runs in my family. I also salute the workers who do it. As does Carr. That’s the claimed reason why he climbed the KELO TV tower in South Dakota last summer, and WCTI TV* a few days… Continue reading
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Twos Day
One small test I wanted to know when the transmitter site for Denver radio station KHOW/630 (above), which I shot from an airplane in 2018, was built. So I asked ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, and Perplexity. Three had the answer, sourcing this report by Scott Fybush from January 2018. (Answer:1979.) The AI that found nothing was… Continue reading
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Someday
Bad Karma In August of 2024, Audacy killed off WCBS/880 in New York, handing its ratings over to sister station WINS/1010, which now identifies by its new FM signal on 92.3 (even though the AM signal is much bigger). In the process, Audacy also handed off the 880 channel to Good Karma Brands, which already… Continue reading
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Tryday
MVP thoughts I nominate Tyrese Haliburton for MVP. He hasn't played at all this year, because he's out with a hamstring injury he suffered when the Pacers (our Indiana home team) were neck-and-neck with the OKC Thunder in the final championship game. This season, without Haliburton, the Pacers are among the league's worst. Why? No… Continue reading
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From Mainstream to Allstream
David Weinberger once said, “In the future, everyone will be famous for fifteen people.” It’s the future now, and he was right, or close enough. Because today we live in a world where the power to publish and distribute no longer belongs just to institutions, but to everybody. Me included. Here are some stats for… Continue reading
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Sat a Day
Time for her own Wikipedia page I just ran across Aiyana Lee. She's good. More. Bonus link. Rutilance The FCC has green-lit Nexstar's purchase of Tenga. This will move much of local TV into the red, politically. Wrote about that here and here back in September. Pull-quote: Trump and Carr want MAGA-aligned affiliates. Simple as that. Sinclair is… Continue reading