Super Moon/Blood Moon

What's So Super?

There's no cape. It doesn't really have any super powers, but it is a really rare occasion when a Super Moon meets a full eclipse. We haven't had one since 1982. We've got one this Sunday night! There won't be another for over 15 years.

Not the Apocalypse

Some observers are viewing the date with fear -- calling the eclipse a "blood moon." According to some Christians fixated on end times, this eclipse is the final in a series of four at the end of  the Lunar Tetrad.

 For astronomers and stargazers, the event is to be welcomed with celebration. It should be quite a sight.

Celebrating the Moon

We celebrate the moon in art, fiction and music.  I started pondering music and the moon earlier today after hearing numerous reports about the celestial event Sunday night. Here's what I came up with...

If you believe this is the end...what about Bad Moon Rising by Credence Clearwater Revival ? One of the garage bands I played with performed this.

The Beatles recorded Mister Moonlight. Mister Moonlight is a cover of the tune written by Roy Lee Johnson, and like a lot of tunes about moonlight it's about finding romance. Here's the version by Dr. Feelgood.

I first heard Pink Moon in a Volkswagen commercial. The music made it seem like owning a VW convertible might be a lot of fun. Given the trouble they're having with falsified emissions data, VW might want to bring back Nick Drake's tune. I first heard Nick Drake at Ripon College. Walking through the union one afternoon, there he was playing his guitar and singing. It was a great way to spend 45 minutes between classes.

We used Steve Fobert's "Moon Man - I'm Waiting on You" for pledge. There's a line in a song about a real good contact high and a chorus, "call, fax, email. I'm waiting on you."

Moon Man Link

Van Morrison's Moondance is especially relevant with it's autumnal reference. We danced to Moondance at our October Wedding 28 years ago.

Cat Stevens called Moon Shadow the ultimate optimist song. Indeed!

A tangential connection is Werewolves of London. I used to hear this a lot at Hooligan's on Milwaukee's East Side. Bar patrons would sing along with the howling part of the song. I used to go there after studying to have a Guinness and a cigar while taking in the atmosphere of Hooligan's. If it is the Apocalypse...a Guinness and a good cigar might be a good way to greet the end.

Put these tunes together and a few others and you have a lunar music special on any AAA station. Listening to the music may be an alternative to witnessing the event. It is supposed to be mostly cloudy Sunday night.

All of these songs have a personal connection, but that's what makes music so important.

Podcast Fans - Lovers of Audio

But the headline said...

The headline posted on Inside Radio made me pause. Were people who love podcasts really listening to podcasts six hours a day?  After I read the article I was reassured because if this was true, there would be no future for public radio.

Podcast Fans Love Audio—Six Hours Daily

What the data from Edison Research’s quarterly “Share of Ear” report shows is that podcast lovers listen to a lot of audio. Edison uses a broad definition of audio including radio, satellite, streaming, music videos on YouTube and a consumer’s personal music. 

These are younger, well educated listeners using mobile devices. They spend most of their time listening to podcasts...about  33%. Radio is second with 20% of their time.  They spend over six hours a week listening to audio. The average American spends about fours a week.

Sound Familiar?

Public Radio's audience also consumes a lot of audio. The benchmark in the early 2000's was over six hours a week. The core audience at a station with strong audience appeal was around 12 hours a week.

Other findings, reported by Inside Radio on Friday, include: The shorter the podcast, the more likely listeners will listen to the full podcast. Half of all podcast time spent occurs on mobile devices, followed by computers. And middays and nights are podcasting “primetime.”

What's In It For Public Radio?

A reality check. According tot he research, 5% of all Americans are into podcasts. 95% are not!

 Most of Public Radio's resources need to be centered on drivetime. The content that continues to appeal in drivetime is the news and information public radio produces.  Drivetime is still radio's most important day part. Drivetime should continue to appeal to public radio's biggest audience.

The podcast crowd listens to public radio. We need to make sure we're on the platforms used by this audience. Podcasting is the best way for our content to reach these highly educated consumers of audio. Podcast lovers choose middays and nights to listen to content on their favorite platform. The top ten chart published by iTunes testifies to the appeal of public radio's content to this market segment.

• 1Hidden Brain
• 2This American Life
• 3TED Radio Hour
• 4Serial
• 5Radiolab
• 6Stuff You Should Know
• 7Undisclosed: The State Vs. Adnan Syed
• 8Fresh Air
• 9Guys We F****d
• 10Freakonomics Radio

Is it a question of resources? Local stations need to look at partnerships that will get them into the podcasting game.

Classical Music Moving in Houston

KUHA 91.7 FM Moving To HD Radio

Houston Public Media (HPM) announced that classical programming is moving to HD2. The announcement says the programming will be moving from KUHA 91.7 to 88.7 HD 2. Classical Music will also be available at HPM's website, iHeartRadio, TuneIn, and TV 8.5...a digital TV channel.

Digging Further

All Access and Houston Public Media is reporting that KUHA is for sale. Houston Public Media bought KUHA from Rice University in 2010 for over $9 million. Economic trouble became evident when HPM laid off eight full time staff at the station in 2013. The move cuts expenses further and will unload some debt for HPM.

American Public Media recently cut its losses by selling off the three stations that made up Classical South Florida. In these instances, classical music was unable to sustain itself. The debt load was to heavy to be carried through voluntary support.

Classical music is losing ground. In both cases the music will be available digitally, but free over the air broadcasts are going away. The move to HD 2 and TV 8.5 in Houston is free. They will be hard to find. HD Radio has not reached deep market penetration. Finding HDTV 8.5 is viable for at home listening...not in the car.

Sesame Street - We've Strayed A Long Way

New episodes of Sesame Street will be aired on HBO first. 

I guess it's good news for the Sesame Street Workshop. They're getting an infusion of revenue to double the new episodes per season. The new episodes will eventually air on Public Television.

The Workshop has been running deficits for a while. It seems voluntary public support wasn't enough to sustain the program.

After the five year deal, will public television still be in the loop? Will HBO still fund Sesame Street or cut it loose?

After reading the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967...it seems we've strayed a long way. Are we headed in the direction of those who can pay will have access to quality programming? What about the rest of us? Has the marketplace decided educational programming for our young only goes to those 'who can afford it?

The Congress hereby finds and declares that —

1. it is in the public interest to encourage the growth and development of public radio and television broadcasting, including the use of such media for instructional, educational, and cultural purposes;
2. it is in the public interest to encourage the growth and development of nonbroadcast telecommunications technologies for the delivery of public telecommunications services;
3. expansion and development of public telecommunications and of diversity of its programming depend on freedom, imagination, and initiative on both local and national levels;
4. the encouragement and support of public telecommunications, while matters of importance for private and local development, are also of appropriate and important concern to the Federal Government;
5. it furthers the general welfare to encourage public telecommunications services which will be responsive to the interests of people both in particular localities and throughout the United States, which will constitute an expression of diversity and excellence, and which will constitute a source of alternative telecommunications services for all the citizens of the Nation;
6. it is in the public interest to encourage the development of programming that involves creative risks and that addresses the needs of unserved and underserved audiences, particularly children and minorities;
7. it is necessary and appropriate for the Federal Government to complement, assist, and support a national policy that will most effectively make public telecommunications services available to all citizens of the United States;
8. public television and radio stations and public telecommunications services constitute valuable local community resources for utilizing electronic media to address national concerns and solve local problems through community programs and outreach programs;
9. it is in the public interest for the Federal Government to ensure that all citizens of the United States have access to public telecommunications services through all appropriate available telecommunications distribution technologies; and
10. a private corporation should be created to facilitate the development of public telecommunications and to afford maximum protection from extraneous interference and control.

At Wits End

All Things Millennial?

I don't have much to say about the cancelling of Wits. It was touted as A Prairie Home Companion for a younger crowd.

I listened...sometimes. It was on Saturday night. That's not exactly prime listening time for radio. Even in its heyday, A Prairie Home Companion lost over half its audience in the last half hour on the stations where I worked.

Wits had its moments, but not enough to draw me in every week. I only listened if I happened to be in the car.


Wits was an attempt to find a new hit to replace Public Radio's aging stars like Wait, Wait, Car Talk and APHC. Those programs were anomalies. Most attempts to create the new shining star have failed, especially one hour programs. It is hard for a program to gain audience...unlike programming. Listeners have trouble finding a single program. Landing on, and listening to, a program stream with a consistent appeal is much more conducive to habitual listening. Being able to listen to programming that consistently meets a listeners expectations on a regular basis can lead to greater loyalty and a large enough audiences to support the programming.

There's a difference

Morning Edition, All Things Considered, Weekend Edition and Marketplace are programs that work well together and resemble programming. Wait, Wait, Car Talk and APHC appeal to the same core audience. It just seemed like Wits, with it's out of the way scheduling, was trying to change the way people listen to radio. That's an uphill battle. We had a music director at one of the stations I worked for who vowed he was going to change the way people used radio. All he managed to do was drive the audience away.

I was at a PRPD retreat in 2002 when a network exec stopped by to give us an update on the status of public radio programming. He told us there were a handful of programs that were breaking even or better. There were over 350 programs being offered at the time. The odds of success weren't good...even when times were good.

Location Matters

All of the public radio hits mentioned above air when people use radio...except for APHC. The programs are all well produced and appeal to the lifestyle and values of the public radio audience. They also air during times when listening to radio reaches its peak. They air during morning and afternoon drive, or during the midday bulge on the weekend. A Prairie Home Companion is the exception. We aired APHC twice on WNPR. We carried the live broadcast on Saturday evening. We repeated the program Sunday at noon. It was not long before the Sunday broadcast outperformed the Saturday broadcast. The reason...The potential for an audience was greater on Sunday at noon because more people use radio at that time.

There is no shame or blame. The effort to create something new and vital should be encouraged. We should endeavor to create new audiences and, more importantly, reengage the audience we already have with new ideas and perspectives.

Eliminating Seams

Saying Goodbye Less Than Seamless

I was listening to the last minutes of Science Friday Today. At least I thought it was the last few minutes. Ira Flatow was saying goodbye. He was reading the credits. He told me to have a good weekend. The PRI button played. The show was over! Well, maybe not.

He told me to tune away.

So, I did. I got out of the car and did my errand. I got back in my car. I turned on the radio and there was the second half of Science Friday. I thought you were gone. You said goodbye. What gives?

I remember learning in my PD classes we were supposed to promote time spent listening by not creating barriers to listening. Telling listeners goodbye is a big sin. When you do this you're telling listeners to go away. You're creating seam. You're creating an excuse to tune out.

I would hope the network people would know about something as basic as the avoidance
of seams. Yet, I hear it all the time. The halfway point of Weekend Edition has a long goodbye. Garrison Keillor spends a good two minutes saying goodbye. They say goodbye every night on All Things Considered.

Why?

As a PD responsible for keeping listeners listening and engaged...you're doing your best to send them away. It is supposed to be about the listener. We're supposed to think audience. The audience tunes in and out all the time. They do not listen to programs from top to bottom. Instead of saying goodbye, how about an opportunity to forward promote?

Why is this important for public broadcasting? Building audience and promoting time spent listening creates loyalty which allows stations the opportunity to grow funding and build partnerships within the community. It's basic. It should be a part of best practices.

Gaming the Ratings?

Voltaire claims to smooth out the rating bumps.

Does it work? Is the magic box, Voltaire, junk science, or voodoo technology? Nielsen has looked into the processor. Nielsen's testing was done in a lab. Now the Media Rating Council (MRC) is looking into the technology using real world testing by working with stations that use the processor.

There are plenty of complaints in public radio circles about the wild swings in ratings under the PPM system. Part of the problem of PPM is the short sample time which will lead to volatility in the ratings. I prefer to look at ratings over periods of time to help eliminate bounce. Six month trends seem more stable.

Voltaire claims to improve sound processing to enhance PPM's ability to measure a station's encoding.

The tests by MRC will continue through August.