The New York Times will receive $45 million in the deal with $33.5 million coming from Univison and $11.5 million from WNYC. Comments on the RadioInsight blog estimate that WNYC’s acquisition price is about 1/4 of what a similar NYC FM radio stations would normally fetch.

In a challenging economic climate for newspapers and commercial radio, Spanish and public radio appear are thriving and expanding. The New York Times described the deal: “Faced with losses brought on by a deep advertising slump, the Times Company has been cutting costs across all of its operations, including the flagship Times newspaper. This year it negotiated union concessions on wages and benefits at The Boston Globe, and closed a wholesale newspaper and magazine distribution subsidiary.”

WNYC says they plan to continue WQXR’s two most listened-to live programs – Saturday Afternoon at the Opera and The Philharmonic This Week.

“[WNYC] has been trending away from the standard presentation of classical music or concert music, ” says the New York City Eye blog. Comments on RadioInsight speculate that WNYC will change to a 24/7 NewsTalk format with music programming moving to WQXR.

The DownWithTyranny blog notes the NYT has owned WQXR since 1943 and that ironically, the dwindling classical music format was once the dominate programming on FM radio. The Times sold WQXR-AM to Disney in 2006.

Sources: RadioInsight, NYT, WNYC, New York City Eye,  DownWithTyranny

This article also appears on the NyackNewsAndViews.com community news site.

• The US will be the third country in the world to dismiss analog and go digital following the lead of The Netherlands and Finland. Apparently, China doesn’t count (they have already switched, but will continue to simulcast in analog until 2015)
• “How could the Republicans not be worried about this? A disproportionate number of the endangered TV viewers are senior citizens. Bill O’Reilly’s entire audience is in danger!”Good point, Gail. But apparently you failed to notice that Bill appears on the Fox News Channel which is only available on cable and satellite. So that the rabbit ears crowd, although possibly sharing values with Bill probably doesn’t share bandwidth.
• “…the issue at hand is every American’s God-given right to television reception.” This statement was clearly made tounge-in-check. But Ms. Collins missed the point that alot of people REALLY DO THINK that TV is privilege,  guaranteed in the Bill of Rights (Did those founding fathers had forsight or what?)TV isn’t in the constitiution. Nor is in the any of the amendments, approved by Congress and 2/3 of the states. I don’t even think that it’s even codified in any FCC regulations. As a society, we have required people to acquire their own sets. And in some cases antennas. And in extreme cases, pay a monthly fee for cable or satellite service. (Note to self:Is this an example of “freedom has its costs?”).

Stations, who for the most part have done their homework on the transition, will have to spend millions to keep analog signals on the air if the Feb date is extended until June. It costs alot to lease and power those transmitters. Which is a significant unbudgeted expense during the economic downturn. Some stations have already announced that regardless of what Congress says, they are pulling the plug on Feb 17 .

We have invested $1.5 billion in the digital transition between coupons and marketing communications. Despite years of PSAs bombarding the soon-to-be-disconnected, they haven’t acquired coupons, conencted to cable or bought a new television. And law makers are blaming the government for bungling the transition and begging for a four month delay. Which will cost station owners millions more in extended leases for analog transmitters.

Two questions come to mind:

• If they haven’t gotten the message up until now, what makes lawmakers think these analog homes will suddenly “get it?”
• TV stations support themselves with advertising. Advertisers are most interested in audiences which are receptive to messages. If  they haven’t been influenced by the multi-media barrage over the past several years, they can’t possibly be good advertsing targets. Who needs ‘em?

Cold me cold and uncaring, but “Let them eat…Digital.”

See Also: NY Times, MediaNewsAndViews, Popular Mechanics, MichaelsInsights, DelSquacho.com

Well, it’s not *exactly* an endorsement.

Outgoing FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has written to COMCAST asking why they are degrading rival service Internet phone services, like Vonage and Verizon’s Voicewing. The cable MSO’s network management policy says any user who consumes 70% of their allocated bandwidth for a 15 minute period during peak hours are likely to have “choppy” phone service. Unless they subscribe to COMCAST’s VOIP which is exempted from that policy.

Web site Twine quotes the FCC letter:

We request that Comcast explain why its omitted from its filings with the Commission the distinct effects that Comcast’s new network management technique has on Comcast’s VoIP offering versus those of its competitors. We also ask that you provide a detailed justification for Comcast’s disparate treatment of its own VoIP service as compared to that offered by other VoIP providers on its network. In particular, please explain how Comcast Digital Voice is “facilities-based,” how Comcast Digital Voice uses Comcast’s broadband facilities, and, in particular, whether (and if so, how) Comcast Digital Voice affects network congestion in a different manner than other VoIP services.

COMCAST, which seems intent on capturing cable’s Big Brother award, was fined by the FCC  last fall for interfering with peer-to-peer download sites.  The Register notes that COMCAST lawyers will want to moderate their bluster — because any claim that their IP service uses distinct transmission services makes they liable for fees paid by telecom carriers.

The Obama administration is on the record as favoring network neutrality. It will be interesting to see if the Julius Genachowski, who is rumored to be next FCC chairman, picks up the gauntlet and follows up on Martin’s letter. COMCAST is required to respond to the FCC by January 30th.

Sources: Twine,  Gigacom, The Register, Network World

Broadcasters and public interest groups are urging a delay to the February 17 deadline for TV stations to turn off their analog signals forever. They’ve been joined by the incoming Obama administration in asking Congress to push back The Big Switch to June.

Former FCC Chairman William Kennard and Michael Powell opine in the New York Times that the government has bungled the coupon program and will leave millions of sets TV-less lurch on February 17.  There’s more demand for boxes than hardware to go around and a backlog of coupon requests that can’t be fulfilled.

FCC Chairman Martin says that consumers will be ill-served by a delay, because it will create more confusion — not less.

Finally, let’s get to Marie. Historians say that it’s unlikely that Marie-Antoinette ever said “let them eat cake.” But no matter — she probably would have said it if she could. And if she was alive and able to take a cold-hearted position on the digital TV transition, I have no doubt she would agree with Kevin Martin. And me.

Watching TV is an unalienable American right. Our founding fathers embodied this belief in the Declaration of Independence, when they wrote:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness…including access to at least three over-the-air network affiliates in each DMA, with ample ratings-generating content, including sports fare on the weekends and news-lite programming at six and eleven, as well as specially titilating content during the months of November, Feburary, May, and to a lesser degree, July.

Part of this text was inserted to defy King George, and his imposition of the UK’s distasteful annual TV License fees. But I digress.

Nielsen says a little less than seven percent of TV Households in the US are unprepared. Among Spanish speaking households, that jumps to almost 12 percent. Albuquerque, Tulsa and Houston are among the most unprepared places, digitially speaking: 12-13 percent of the homes in these markets say they aren’t ready for Feb 17th.

About five percent of people 55 and older haven’t gotten the message, either.

But I have to ask: where have these people been the past year? Broadcasters have been flooding the airwaves with announcements over the last six months. Millions have been spent in the effort to get the word out. Millions more have been spent on the coupon program for digital converters. If they digitally-clueless haven’t gotten the message until now, what makes us think that a few more months will make a difference?

Yes, it’s going to be a train wreck. People will be angry and confused. And the poorest, the oldest and those who find navigating government and technology are going to be hurt the most. But where does it say that over-the-air TV is a right for everyone?

It’s going to be ugly. But it will finally get people, who haven’t been paying attention up until now, to pay attention.

I say it’s time to bring it on. It’s going to hurt sooner or later. Let’s make it sooner and get this over with ASAP.

Democratic Senator Herb Kohl is looking into why a la carte text costs have doubled at a time when operator costs have remained flat. In fact, the technology costs the operators nothing at all in terms of bandwidth.

Last September Democratic Senator Herb Kohl from Wisconsin sent a letter to the top presidents of AT&T, Sprint, Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile asking them to explain why the price they charge customers continues to rise. As chairman of the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee, Kohl wants to know why prices have doubled during a period while competition, through operator consolidation, has decreased.

The text business is a booming business. SMSing is up 32 percent since 2007 totaling 2.5 trillion worldwide messages sent each year. The Gartner Groups says that number will jump to 3.3 trillion in 2009.

Consumer advocates — who have filed more than 20 class action suits against the carriers — are incensed because sending a 160-character text costs the carriers no additional bandwidth to transmit. That’s because the message is carrier in a dedicated part of the communication called the control channel, reserved for setting up calls, ringing your phone, sending SMS texts and other overhead operations. Kohl’s case centers around why operators have doubled their fees while shrinking their operating expenses through consolidation for bandwidth they doesn’t cost them anything to use.

Sources: Engadget, Geek.com, tech.blorge.com, NYT,  HowStuffWorks , IntoMobile

Mediamark Research says hybrid car owners are 85% more likely than the average adult to have a bachelor’s or post-graduate degree. And their $100K+ household income (179 index) helps to pay the Prius premium Toyota Hybrid owners fork over to drive these high-tech gas-sippers.

MRI says this group skews young (4 of 10 are Gen Xers, born 1965-76) and are 27 percent more likely than the average adult to consider preserving the environment “very important.”

Source: Mediamark Research

New York — July 28, 2013: Google (GOOG) announced that they will acquire the assets of the bankrupt satellite radio company, Sirius-XM. That company was formed almost five years ago when the FCC approved the merger of the original companies at the end of July 2008.

Rumors of the acquisition have swirled for months, with the most recent tease being posted on the Google blog last Thursday. “Something big is in the offing. Look to the skies!”

Analysts have been predicting that Google would seek a telecomm partner to expand the reach of its Android cell phone operating system offering more bandwidth than carriers like Sprint, VerATTizon (formed by the October 2010 merger of Verizon and ATT) and Microsoft (whose acquisition of COMCAST is still pending). Google is expected to make an announcement of their Android upgrade, which will include 10 MBit speed, 100 audio and video channels and free calls within North America. The new ad supported service will show ads related to the content of each consumer’s call on the Android receivers Hi-Def 6 inch wide letterbox screen.

In their five year history, Sirius-XM was never able to dig out of the regulatory hole dug for them by the second Bush Administration’s FCC and Justice departments despite generous incentives and creative promotions. In 2009, Sirius-XM offered 10 free ad-suporrted channel to woo back subscribers who had equipment pre-installed in their cars but who had cancelled their satellite subscriptions. Despite high profile entertainment events and celebrity tie-ins, but merged service never took off. “It’s an iPod, iPhone entertainment universe,” said analysts Geoff Gadfly of Schenectady-Sasquatch Consulting. “Why would someone want to pay for satellite radio when they have all of those features on their iDevice?

See also: Orbitcast, Seeking Alpha, Engadget, FCC, Broadcasting/Cable, NAB

The analysis posits that digital signal coverage will be less than what non-cable consumers are used to from analog signals, forcing them to buy new antennas or switch to cable. Which will be a twin win for MSOs  as both cable audiences and subscriber fees increase.

Source: Light Reading

It’s the first time an Internet provider has been called out by regulators on the issue of the issue of Net Neutrality. “The commission has adopted a set of principles that protects consumers’ access to the internet,” says FCC Chairman Kevin Martin. “We found that Comcast’s actions in this instance violated our principles.”

Comcast’s Internet throttling was detailed in a November 2007 report from The Electronic Frontier Foundation analyzing Comcast’s Internet traffic interference activities suggesting that the MSO was using packet-forging to disrupt peer-to-peer (P2P) filesharing on their network.

Wired magazine reports that Comcast has also tampered with public access to officials.

Comcast faced further public outrage after it admitted to paying people off the street to sit at a public hearing at Harvard, while members of the public were prevented from attending. At the time, Comcast claimed it merely paid people to save spots at the hearing for Comcast employees, but the event’s organizer disputed that claim.

Sources: Wired Magazine, ArsTechnia, TorrentFreak, FCC Commisioner McDowell in the Washington Post