Radio broadcasting in the United States
The radio in the United States is divided into a diverse radio landscape with over 14,000 licensed radio stations.
Radio landscape
Broadcasting in the US is very different from the radio landscape on other continents. In the metropolitan areas , many different stations broadcast on the FM frequency band , with each program mostly being broadcast on just one frequency. The programs differ greatly in the " format ", i. H. their predominantly broadcasted music genre or in the programming. Most radio stations in the United States are commercial and sponsored by advertising . At many stations with music format, advertising takes up to 15 minutes, and at talk stations even more than 20 minutes per hour of broadcast time.
Parallel to commercial radio, there are many more different non-commercial stations broadcasting in the USA than is the case, for example, in Austria, Germany and Switzerland. These public radios have a history of their own in the United States, and most of these stations exchange broadcasts under the umbrella of National Public Radio .
Licensing
In the US radio landscape, the origin of radio is still clearly visible today; Radio stations are treated as radio stations with an assigned, fixed frequency. A call sign is issued for this frequency, to which the transmission conditions such as the maximum transmission power, day and night regulations, radiation characteristics and others are bound. The same applies to TV stations. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is only marginally interested in which program the stations broadcast .
The Federal Communications Commission licenses broadcasting stations in the United States. It not only regulates the frequency allocation and monitors the conditions of the broadcast, but also intervenes in the event of violations of US regulations within the program. In the USA, for example, the use of the so-called seven F-words , i.e. vulgar expressions, is prohibited and carefully monitored. The FCC is repeatedly criticized for exercising a kind of censorship through its licensing and regulations .
The FCC divided the VHF and medium wave frequency bands into areas for specific stations. At the beginning of the medium wave spectrum, the Traffic Information Radio transmits at 530 kHz along highways with very little power. There are also areas for clear channel stations with windows for regional radio stations. Stations east of the Mississippi receive callsigns beginning with W; to the west of it K-callsigns are given. This clear regulation is meanwhile put into perspective by the common practice of using digital HD radio channels and stations far away can be received as simulcasts of regional stations on VHF.
Media groups
Private media companies have played an important role since broadcasting began in the United States. Today they dominate large parts of the radio market and are controversial because of their political and economic influence. The privately organized "networks" are mostly represented in several media, such as radio, television, sometimes in daily newspapers and magazines as well as online offers. In 1992, the US Congress eased the rules for owning radio stations slightly, allowing companies to acquire more than two stations per market. The media companies took up this change in antitrust law and acquired additional positions. Long-standing networks like the Mutual Broadcasting System and NBC Radio disappeared from the market in the 1980s; the stations were taken over by the remaining corporations.
In particular, the strong clear channel stations, which can always be received on medium wave in several states and mostly broadcast a talk radio and news format, are now almost without exception owned by one of the media companies.
The largest and most powerful company is IHeartMedia of San Antonio , Texas . Founded in 1972 by Lowry Mays , it has had a huge impact not only on radio and television broadcasts , but also on concert events and music promotions, and outdoor advertising . The radio subsidiary Clear Channel owns over 850 radio stations and over 30 television stations ; it is listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol CCU . The company is still run by the company's founder, Lowry Mays, and his two sons, Mark and Randall. iHeart Media now owns a number of powerful medium wave transmitters and other old US radio stations . These include WGY New York , WLW Cincinnati , WLAC Nashville, WLIT -FM Chicago, KWTX Waco , KFAB Ohama, KOA Denver , KEX Portland and others. a.
A major competitor is Cumulus Media from Atlanta , Georgia . According to iHeartMedia, Cumulus is the second largest operator of VHF and medium wave stations in the USA. The company owns around 570 radio stations of various sizes in 150 markets (as of 2011). WABC New York is Cumulus Media's flagship station. The company also owns WJR Detroit and a number of other stations.
In February 2017, the CBS Group sold its radio division. Entercom and CBS Radio merged.
| Companies | annual sales
(in million US dollars) |
Alignment | Radio stations | Radio markets | Television stations |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| iHeartMedia | 6,318 (2014) | neutral to conservative | 850 | 10 | |
| Cumulus Media | 1,026 (2013) | neutral | 570 | 150 | |
| Entercom (including the former CBS radio ) | 114.7 (2015) | 125 | 27 | ||
| Salem Media Group | 64.6 (2016) | evangelical-conservative | 117 | 38 | |
| Cox Media Group | 15900 | conservative | 86 | 10 | 15th |
| Sun Broadcast Group |
National Public Radio
The Public Radio has a long tradition in the United States; even if the beginning of the radio age was determined by the commercial networks. US public radio is only partially comparable to public broadcasting in Germany.
In Franklin D. Roosevelt's era , in the 1930s, it became clear that the radio networks mainly broadcast entertainment programs, long commercials, lots of sports, crime stories and social gossip. This should be supplemented by education, culture and knowledge, demanded an increasingly broad, educated middle class. The emerging civil rights movement also took advantage of the new, inexpensive, ubiquitous opportunities offered by radio.
Initially, college radios and local micro-stations emerged as public radios. To this day, they form the core of what was only given a secure legal form in 1967 with the Public Broadcasting Act . The 36th US President Lyndon B. Johnson initiated the legislation on the basis of which today's National Public Radio works. Christoph Leusch wrote on Friday "The US radio and television landscape only became a little bit public law afterwards and hesitantly."
National Public Radio came into being with the Public Broadcasting Act and has been the US public broadcaster ever since. It reaches at least 35 million US citizens every week through its network of stations. Young and educated Americans in particular make intensive use of the public broadcasting offer. Chronically underfunded, NPR receives $ 180 million annually in government grants. Since its inception, public radio has been criticized by the private media industry and by conservative politicians.
There were approximately 300 NPR-affiliated radio stations in the US in the late 1970s. That number doubled by the late 1980s. However, for a long time NPR did not serve local, small VHF stations as too marginal for national coverage. Many small stations were forced to set up a “community-based” program with volunteer staff.
Public radio stations usually belong to the “National Public Radio” network. Some of them are run by universities. Anyone who employs at least five full-time employees and offers a program for 18 hours a day can become a voting member of the NPR family. The FCC keeps the frequency range from 88.1 to 91.9 MHz open to public radio stations on VHF; most of these stations broadcast there.
In almost all states there are public radio networks which, in addition to radio, usually also produce TV and online services.
As one of the first broadcasters in the USA, WHA went on air in 1922 as a station at the University of Wisconsin in Madison , Wisconsin. The Wisconsin Public Radio station has been broadcasting ever since. WNYC started operations two years later in New York City on July 8, 1924 and is still one of the most famous broadcasters in the country. WNYC started broadcasting on ultra-short wave (VHF) as early as 1943 using its WNYC-FM station.
Forming political opinions on US radio
The journalist Mara Birbach sees the origin of some right-wing populist reporting in the USA not on television, but on the radio. Until 1987, American radio stations were obliged to offer balanced political coverage. For example, if the moderator of a program advocated a conservative point of view, a progressive point of view had to be taken in the same or a subsequent program. This was laid down in the "Fairness Doctrine", a regulation from 1949. It was abolished under President Reagan .
This established programs such as " The Rush Limbaugh Show " , for example . It was one of the first programs of its kind to be broadcast nationwide and a surprise success for the format. Many imitators followed. One of the most successful is Sean Hannity . He has been a permanent member of the conservative TV broadcaster Fox News since 1996 .
Since the corresponding changes in the law in the mid-1990s, increasingly small, local broadcasters have disappeared and large media groups have been strengthened. The largest American distribution service Premiere Networks (a founding of iHeartMedia ) is now the radio home of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.
Several attempts to establish left-wing talk radio as a political counterweight were unsuccessful in the long term. They mostly failed due to a low number of listeners and thus low advertising income. Air America was the most successful liberal radio network in the United States and was founded in the run-up to the 2004 presidential election. Until its dissolution in 2010, Air America set a counterpoint to the many conservative talk shows and served over 100 stations across the country.
Extremely conservative, conspiracy-theoretical and right-wing extremist program producers also manage to reach listeners across the US through syndication. The most successful here is the Genesis Communications Network of the conservative activist Ted Anderson. There is also the Republican Radio Network (RBN) from Texas, which calls itself the "truth radio station", and a number of other program producers.
history
As the Golden Age of Radio ( Golden Age of Radio ) is often referred to in the United States, the period between the first radio broadcasts in the 1920s to the 1950s, when television replaced radio as the main medium. According to a 1947 study by CE Hooper, 82 out of 100 Americans were active radio listeners.
The beginnings of radio in the USA are closely linked to the inventor and radio pioneer Edwin Howard Armstrong . Astrong served in a communications unit during World War I and studied electrical engineering at Columbia University in New York after the war . In 1919 he developed the superposition receiver and in 1920 the pendulum feedback . These inventions gave a boost to the growing community of shortwave radio amateurs, and in the years that followed, radio traffic in the United States increased significantly.
In the 1920s, many technical developments were implemented in concrete broadcasts. The transition from broadcasts from radio amateurs to broadcasting was fluid in many places. The radio pioneer Frank Conrad (1874–1941) played an important role in setting up the first station with the KDKA radio service.
KDKA - the first radio station in the world
“This is KDKA, of the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company, in East Pittsburgh , Pennsylvania . We shall now broadcast the election returns. "
On November 2, 1920, KDKA, the first registered radio station in the USA, went on air. Licensed in Pittsburgh , Pennsylvania, the station was the world's first regular commercial broadcaster. KDKA was the first to broadcast the results of the presidential election in the United States in 1920, in which the Republican Warren G. Harding was elected President of the United States . This was also the first election to use women's suffrage .
The first concert broadcast took place in April 1920 in San Francisco . A one-hour concert by the California Theater Orchestra was broadcast from the theater there . That same year, on August 20, 1920, the 8MK radio station in Detroit , Michigan broadcast the first radio news. They consisted of agency reports and were provided by the Detroit News newspaper .
On September 1, 1922, the first radio station of the Soviet Union called " Comintern " started on the old continent . On the same day, the business broadcasting service was broadcast as the first regular and chargeable radio service in Germany via the long-wave transmitter in Königs Wusterhausen . In the German Reich , the consignment was only allowed to be received by those who owned a sealed rental device belonging to the Reichspost . Only in 1923 was in Germany receiving ban lifted for individuals. Such regulations were unknown in the USA.
From 1922 the radio market in the USA was booming - a number of radio stations were licensed. Only the medium wave range was broadcast in amplitude modulation (AM). The number of radio receivers produced rose from 100,000 to over 500,000 between 1922 and 1923. The number of radio stations was 30 in 1922 and 556 a year later.
The first radio advertisement was broadcast on WEAF New York on August 28, 1922 , and lasted ten minutes. The client was the Queensboro Corporation, which advertised an apartment block in Jackson Heights (NY).
Ted Husing of Columbia Broadcasting System Inc. (CBS) in New York reported on June 27, 1932 what the Democratic delegates said at their convention and who they wanted to nominate for the presidential nomination. This report on Franklin D. Roosevelt's nomination prospects as a presidential candidate is considered the first public opinion poll on radio .
Regulation of radio
In 1927 the first international radio conference was held in Washington. Many regulations from the USA were adopted by members worldwide. At the conference, the 6 radio bands were determined on shortwave : 14 m, 17 m, 19 m, 25 m, 31 m, 49 m. In the USA, a more restrictive spectrum policy than in Europe was followed from the start. The basis for today's frequency allocation was created in 1928.
In 1928, the services of the transmitters were coordinated so that the broadest possible range of all transmitters could be guaranteed. As early as 1933, the FCC set a power limit of 50 kW on medium wave, which is still valid today. De facto, the performance of many stations is pushed with complex directional antennas. However, efforts were made in 1933 to lift this limit and 13 stations made technical preparations for broadcasts using higher services. It is known that the stations WLW “Nation's Station” in Cincinnati (1934 to 1939) and KDKA (then under W8XAR) in Pittsburg (1936 to 1938) actually transmitted with 500 kW. Since this transmission power led to considerable interference from weaker stations on the adjacent channels, the 50 kW limit has remained until today.
The medium wave frequency band was last extended to the upper limit of 1600 kHz in 1940, and in 1997 the medium wave band was extended to 1700 kHz. This rule only applies in North America (USA, Canada and Mexico ).
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Radio Networks
With the start of regular radio broadcasts, networks were formed like the ones that existed with daily newspapers. The networks had their wedding until the advent of television. The most important networks were or are:
- the National Broadcasting Company (NBC), established by the Radio Corporation of America (RCA), since 1926 until today
- Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS), 1927
- Mutual Broadcasting System , was set up by four stations in 1934
- American Broadcasting Company (ABC) resulted from an "anti-monopoly" forced sale of the NBC Blue Network Division in 1945
Development of VHF broadcasting
On November 5, 1935, Armstrong presented his work in front of the Institute of Radio Engineers in New York: A Method of Reducing Disturbances in Radio Signaling by a System of Frequency Modulation . Although the presentation with the help of the amateur station W2AG in Yonkers was successful, the skepticism persisted among many technicians and the FCC considered the FM system to be technically too complex and unrealizable. Nonetheless, at the beginning of 1936 the FCC granted the first 12 stations an Apex license. They were allowed to broadcast programs in AM on frequencies above 25 MHz on an experimental basis. The aim was to create transmission options for local stations in a frequency band that is less susceptible to interference .
It was not until the late 1940s that numerous VHF radio stations were actually built that offered significantly better reception quality thanks to frequency modulation (FM). With the VHF transmitters, stereophonic transmission was also possible. They were introduced in 1961. In 1963, around 250 stations were broadcasting their programs in full or in part in stereo. However, the traditional and popular radio stations have remained in the medium wave range to this day. For this reason, too, it was not until the 1970s that FM radio prevailed over AM radio. Some stations started broadcasting the same program on AM and FM with two callsigns .
Today around two thirds of all US radio stations broadcast in the VHF range and thus reach around 80% of the total audience.
Stereo on medium wave
Various manufacturers experimented with adding a stereo mode to the amplitude modeled medium wave emissions. Motorola introduced the C-QUAM process and from 1984 American automakers such as General Motors , Ford , Chrysler, and a number of import automakers built C-QUAM-AM stereo receivers into their cars. In 1985 AM stereo broadcasting officially began in Australia - in the C-QUAM standard. Two years later, Canada and Mexico adopted C-QUAM as the standard for AM stereo. Japan followed in 1992. In the USA, the introduction was slow. The technology experienced a new boost from 2006, when C-QUAM decoding was implemented with the ongoing digitization in HD radio receivers.
Today more than 80 medium wave stations broadcast in AM stereo (as of 2016).
Digitization in the 1990s
To improve the audio quality, experiments have been carried out with digital operating modes since the mid-1990s.
Since 2004, medium wave has officially been broadcast in a digital mode in the USA. In the USA, the telecommunications authority decided on the DAB-IBOC standard (Digital Audio Broadcasting-In Band On Channel), in which the digital signal is added to the existing analog AM signal in the form of extended sidebands. Due to the associated larger bandwidth of broadcasting, however, there is considerable interference in the adjacent channels, which is why the digital sidebands had to be switched off at night when they were introduced. This restriction no longer exists since 2007.
The HD Digital Radio Alliance , a consortium of radio groups ABC, CBS and iHeartMedia, has been promoting the parallel broadcast of other channels (HD2, HD3 etc.) since 2013 . The regular FM or MW program is mostly broadcast on HD1, while many broadcast other programs with other music genres on the sub-channel 2, 3 or even 4.
One stations have also started broadcasting their local AM and low-power VHF programs on their sister stations' HD channels: KMBZ-FM in Kansas City simulcasted 610 KCSP's programs on 96.5-HD2. KBCO in Boulder , Colorado uses its HD2 channel to broadcast exclusive recordings from its own recording studio. CBS Radio has plans to bring its popular flagship stations to remote markets via HD2 and HD3 ( KROQ -FM in New York City, WFAN in Florida, and KFRG and KSCF in Los Angeles ).
deregulation
From the 2000s, the broadcasting market was deregulated by the FCC. Since then, it has been possible for individual corporations to own a number of stations in a radio market. With the election of Donald Trump, the lawyer Ajit Pai moved up for the Republicans as Commissioner in the FCC Commission. In addition to a negative attitude towards FCC-Net Neutrality, Pai also represents a business-oriented view of the radio landscape.
See also
literature
- Heide Dürr: Multicultural broadcasting - a comparison between Germany and the USA . Dissertation, Law Faculty of the University of Tübingen 2004.
- Jesse Walker: Rebels on the Air: An Alternative History of Radio in America . New York University Press, New York 2001, ISBN 978-0-8147-9381-7 .
- Ralph Engelman: Public Radio and Television in America. A Political History . SAGE Publications, Thousand Oaks 1996, ISBN 978-0-8039-5407-6 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b radio in the USA. In: wabweb.net. Retrieved August 20, 2016 .
- ↑ Cumulus now owns Citadel Broadcasting - Atlanta Business Chronicle. Retrieved August 15, 2016 .
- ^ Entercom Communications Corp. Reports Third Quarter Results | Entercom.com. In: entercom.com. Retrieved September 2, 2016 .
- ↑ Press Releases. (No longer available online.) In: Salem Media Group. Archived from the original on September 21, 2016 ; accessed on September 2, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Christoph Leusch: On the air: the other USA . In: Friday . July 10, 2014, ISSN 0945-2095 ( freitag.de [accessed on August 23, 2016]).
- ^ Radio - New initiatives, 1960–1980. Retrieved September 23, 2016 .
- ^ Deutsche Welle (www.dw.com): More than Fox News: Right opinion making on American radio | America | DW.COM | September 10, 2015. In: DW.COM. Retrieved August 31, 2016 .
- ^ Jo Ann Oravec, How the Left Does Talk: A Fair and Balanced Examination of Air America Radio . In: Journal of Radio Studies . tape 12 , no. 2 , November 1, 2005, ISSN 1095-5046 , p. 190–203 , doi : 10.1207 / s15506843jrs1202_2 .
- ↑ Information and communication in the past and present. (No longer available online.) In: ib.hu-berlin.de. Archived from the original on June 20, 2016 ; accessed on August 20, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ History of FM broadcasting. In: wabweb.net. Retrieved August 20, 2016 .
- ↑ hifimuseum.de - You are in the area: FM Stereo in USA 1963. In: hifimuseum.de. Retrieved August 21, 2016 .
- ↑ Broadcasting in the USA. In: wabweb.net. Retrieved August 20, 2016 .
- ↑ AM stereo; History; Broadcast systems; Adoption in the United States; Worldwide introduction; Current status. In : haltenraum.com. Retrieved August 21, 2016 .
- ↑ techcrunch.com
