WFMU
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| Radio station | |
| reception | analog terrestrial , web radio |
| Reception area |
New York City Hudson Valley , NY Lower Catskills , NY Western New Jersey Eastern Pennsylvania |
| Start of transmission | April 24, 1958 |
| owner | Auricle Communications |
| executive Director | Ken Freedman |
| List of radio stations | |
WFMU is a non-commercial radio broadcaster based in Jersey City , New Jersey , which can be received locally on the VHF 91.1 MHz (FM) and worldwide via the Internet . The station received several awards for its experimental programs. It is often called FMU , without the initial W of the callsign , which simply means that the radio station is east of the Mississippi River. The terrestrial reception area includes large parts of the city of New York City . WFMU has been operating the Free Music Archive , one of the best-known platforms for audio content under a free license , since 2009 .
WFMU sends in FreeForm - format , after which the presenters and DJs have complete control over the content of their broadcasts. There is no editorial department that prescribes or approves content. The only form requirement is for organizational reasons and is hourly: The DJs change every hour. WFMU is the oldest surviving radio station in the United States using this format.
history
WFMU first went on air on April 24, 1958. At that time, WFMU was still part of Upsala College in East Orange, New Jersey . Just before Upsala College closed on May 31, 1995, WFMU bought the college's broadcast license and has been independent since then. In August 1998, the station moved into a newly purchased building in Jersey City. The current owner of WFMU's broadcast license is Auricle Communications , a not-for-profit organization comprised of current and former employees and listeners of WFMU.
WFMU also has another station, WXHD , which is used as a relay station in Mount Hope , New York and broadcasts the program on 90.1 MHz FM in the Hudson Valley , NY, the lower Catskills , western New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania .
Since 2005, WFMU has also offered its program via the Internet. Streams are available in MP3 , RealAudio , ASX , Ogg Vorbis and AAC + formats, after which the shows will be made available for two weeks in MP3 format and unlimited in RealAudio format via the WFMU website. Over a dozen programs are also broadcast as podcasts .
The end of 2006 was WFMU 400,000 US dollars from the so-called New York State Music Fund , which the Office of the New York State Attorney General during the tenure of Eliot Spitzer (since 1 January 2007 the governor of New York) at the non-profit organization Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors was set up to promote public access to and appreciation of contemporary music in New York State. The money (totaling $ 19 million) comes from out-of-court settlements the Office of the New York State Attorney General negotiated with various record labels charged with violating laws that prohibit Payola . To use the money awarded to the broadcaster, WFMU planned on the one hand to organize several free concerts with several musicians and bands, the first of which took place on April 28, 2007, and on the other hand to set up the Free Music Archive , a website for uploading and downloading music that is completely under free and non-commercial Creative Commons licenses.
Free Music Archive
The Free Music Archive has been operated by WFMU since 2009. Even before the start of the project, WFMU endeavored to persuade musicians and record companies to publish their works under free licenses , including in order to meet the massive increases in fees to be paid to the RIAA for playing music pieces that are planned by the Copyright Royalty Board by Internet radio stations to get around. The archive provides music and word recordings of all genres for streaming and downloading in mp3 format .
After there had been rumors in autumn 2018 that the Free Music Archive would be completely discontinued, the project was taken over by the Dutch provider Tribe of Noise in September 2019 . The service says of itself that it wants to create "fair and viable business ideas for talented artists".
concept
In principle, WFMU rejects any support from the government, companies, private foundations and other public institutions that would be subject to conditions that run counter to the principles of the broadcaster. The station is fully financed by its listeners, which is achieved in particular once a year in a two-week fundraising marathon (during which, among other things, Yo La Tengo traditionally perform) and through a record exchange that is also held once a year. All DJs and presenters are unpaid volunteers, some of whom have been with the station since the 1970s and 1980s. This type of independence is intended to ensure that the freeform format can continue to exist and that the DJs do not have to adhere to certain playlists and heavy rotation concepts or have the content of the programs determined by possible advertising partners, marketing agencies and focus groups (see Payola ).
Program and cultural impact
The Rolling Stone magazine gave WFMU fourth consecutive year (1991-1994) entitled "Best radio station in the country." WFMU was also named the best radio station in the United States and New York City by Village Voice magazines , New York Press and College Music Journal . The New York Times described WFMU in a 1999 article as a broadcaster "whose name has become a kind of secret handshake among a certain group of taste-building experts" and mentions Lou Reed , Matt Groening , Jim Jarmusch and Eric Bogosian as explained in the same article Fans of the station. Other prominent WFMU fans include a. the Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant , Sonic Youth guitarist Thurston Moore , Cars musician Ric Ocasek , television presenter Conan O'Brien and actor Crispin Glover .
The attempt by WFMU DJ Glen Jones to break the Guinness World Record for the longest ongoing radio broadcast received a lot of attention from the international media . On May 29, 2001, the attempt to record officially ended successfully with a transmission time of 100 hours and 41 seconds.
The program content and formats of the individual programs are very different. Most play music from all possible epochs, genres and language and cultural areas, there are also many experimental programs, documentaries, phone calls, and once a week a so-called listener hour, in which one listener plays the music of his choice at the station can.
Although WFMU traditionally avoids news broadcasts, the broadcaster offered Democracy Now! (with a changed title: Democracy Now! In Exile ) by journalist Amy Goodman for a transitional period of asylum after the program was canceled due to a change in management at the station WBAI and the Pacifica Radio network.
A similar example was the short-term takeover of the webcast program of the jazz radio station WWOZ in New Orleans after its studio and transmission system were destroyed by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005.
Web links
- Official website of WFMU (English)
- Free Music Archive
- WFMU Exposé / Interview with Ken Freedman and WFMU Program Director Brian Turner in: Perfect Sound Forever (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors: " $ 19 Million in Music Grants Awarded by Fund Created by“ Payola ”Settlement ( Memento of the original from May 17, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and Archive link according to instructions and then remove this note. ", December 19, 2006
- ↑ WFMU Special Events Director Mike Lupica on the WFMU blog: " WFMU Free Music Series Kickoff in Brooklyn! ", April 4, 2007
- ↑ Free Music Archive: WFMU. Retrieved June 19, 2017 .
- ↑ Free Music Archive: About Us. Retrieved November 7, 2017 .
- ^ Station Manager Ken Freedman, 2007 Mid-marathon State of the Station Address , March 10, 2007
- ^ Bijan Stephen: The Free Music Archive is closing this month. In: The Verge. November 7, 2018, accessed November 8, 2018 .
- ↑ Global Music Community Tribe of Noise Acquires Free Music Archive. In: PR-Web. September 18, 2019, accessed on September 28, 2019 .
- ↑ New York Times , April 11, 1999 issue, link to article .
