The Acoustic Avenger Rides Again

It was while working on Talk Topics Thursday that a headline on a news website caught my eye. I'll not go into the sad details of the story, because I'm not looking to make light of the situation, but the story was headlined "Woman Accused Of Smashing Guitar On Aunt's Head," and the headline instantly made me think of one thing and one thing only:

El Kabong.

Okay, now, if you're a person of a certain age, and you, as I, grew up watching cartoons all day, every day, you know about El Kabong, mysterious masked avenger of the West. Actually, it was Quick Draw McGraw in a mask and cape, and he went around slamming a guitar over bad guys' heads while yelling "El Kabong!" Naturally, the 6-year-old version of me thought this was the height of sophisticated comedy. (The far older version of me still laughs at it, for what it's worth) And it left me wishing that I, too, could run around hitting people over the head with an acoustic guitar, making a comical "sproing" noise as the strings break and sending a shower of splinters all over the place.

I can't do that, however; I vaguely recall something in my Criminal Law class about "battery" or some such term, and I'm not a violent person anyway. Still, there are a lot of moments in life and in radio when I'd love to at least figuratively El Kabong someone into submission. I had a couple of those moments this week.

One of the moments came when a radio executive spoke at one of those expensive conferences where people in suits pay lots of money to sit in a room and hear other people in suits talk about the business. The CEO told everyone that he and his radio executive brethren have been lobbying heavily to get FM radio tuners into cell phones, and he called that the future of the business. He projected, using numbers apparently emanating from thin air, that it could boost listening 10 to 15 percent. Then he talked about how nobody makes money streaming and he complained about having to spend all that money on bandwidth when they can't sell ads on it and that the consumer, not the broadcaster, is going to have to pay for it.

I thought about what he said for a moment. He's complaining about bandwidth costs, and he's talking about getting FM tuners into cell phones. And the radio industry's been telling everyone that the FM thing is about access to emergency information, but that's never made sense, because there are so many other ways to get EAS information to cell phone users. So it's not about that. It's about that bandwidth. They think that if there's an FM tuner in a cell phone, "the kids" will listen to music on the tuner -- no bandwidth costs! No extra music licensing fees! -- and not via streaming.

Allow me to El Kabong the industry leaders here. Look, you can put an FM tuner in every device on Earth, but that's not how people are consuming entertainment media on their cell phones. It's not a radio, it's something far more diverse. And, as far as those who use their phones for music and news and information are concerned, they don't NEED an FM tuner. They already HAVE radio on there, but better, because it's practically any station in any style of music from anywhere in the world and some of it is even customizable. And if you make them pay extra for it, or make them access it through a radio tuner instead of a simple app, they'll just get their entertainment some other way, like Pandora or a podcast or someone else's stream. I appreciate the fact that radio companies have spent a lot of money on towers and antennae and transmitters and STLs, but getting the FCC to mandate something that's really just to rescue your business plan is rather desperate, and, ultimately, unnecessary. Those stations serve a purpose already: You reach practically all households and cars with streaming entertainment. Now you have competition. Concentrate on the content, not the delivery mechanism.

Ah, yes, content. Turns out that content is our business. It's content that people want, which leads to building audience, which leads to advertising sales or subscriptions or event marketing revenue. It may be a pain in the wallet to pay for bandwidth to stream, but you have to be available everywhere people want their entertainment and you have to serve it to them the way they want it. Put an FM tuner in every toaster, fridge, and weed whacker in America and it won't increase listenership. People want streaming so they can hear whatever content they want on their phones, on their computers, and on their Internet-enabled clock radios. That costs money, but they're accustomed to flat-rate unlimited data. They're not paying for that bandwidth. You will. So it wasn't in your business model. It is now.

And then, I had a lunch meeting, so I got in the car and drove up the coast listening to HD Radio. Yes, I've ranted about HD Radio here before. I keep reading, however, that... well, one press release this week was headlined "HD Radio Technology Poised to Boost Radio Industry Recovery." And it talked about the great revenue possibilities for HD Radio, like sellling sponsorships, iTunes tagging, leasing channels, and sports. Yes, it's always sunny in HD Radio land.

That was the view from Press Release World. The view from a Volvo headed north near LAX was a lot different. There, two nagging problems remained: One, the signals keep cutting out, and two, the content is, to say the least, not compelling, at least when it's audible. Maybe they're doing incredibly innovative programming when the signal cuts out, and go back to playing the same music you can hear everywhere else when the signal cuts back in. I don't know. All I know is that even in the primary contour of the L.A. stations, I couldn't hold an HD-2 or HD-3 signal without a dropout for longer than maybe two minutes, and the dropouts lasted long enough to make the channels unlistenable.

Let me take my HD receiver and... El Kabong!

Forget about the enhanced revenue possibilities of HD. If people can't hear it, you're not serving your advertisers. I've mentioned this before, and I'm not the only one who's proposed this (I know Walter Sabo's said it, and I'm pretty sure I've sbsequently heard it from others), but, look, if you aren't going to make money on it, how about taking a page from radio history and handing your HD channels over to high school and college students? How about letting anyone, not just students, do anything they want on there? Sure, a lot of that might be awful, but if nobody's listening, so what? Maybe someone'll come up with a great idea for a show that you can move to your analog signal. Maybe a new format will emerge. Think FM in the late 1960's. Might as well use the thing for something different. And every one of those people you hand the keys, and their families, will run out and buy an HD receiver, so there's that.

Okay, that's enough El Kabonging for radio. I have to go make time for other worthy recipients, like the college classmates who are planning a "guided sushi dinner (with an emphasis on sustainability)" (just $105!) or pretty much the entire California legislature. But that's another column for another venue.

=============================

Remember the beginning of the column, where I mentioned a story from the Talk Topics column? That's the show prep column at All Access News-Talk-Sports, and it's packed with hundreds of items you can talk about on the air or mutter about to yourself, if you're so inclined. For example, there's the one about the high schoolers suspended for throwing "green cards" at Latino students from a rival school, and the one about the driver's license with a rude phrase instead of a street address. There's the prank based on the fine Keanu Reeves epic "Speed" and the guy who sat dead on a subway train for hours while nobody noticed. There's one about the ineffectiveness of an expensive TSA program and how politicians forced to take an ethics test made sure that the test would be impossible to fail. There's a woman whose license plate got revoked by the state, a woman who nearly died from eating too much Bok Choy, and a state Attorney General who wants his anonymous Twitter critics named and shamed. There's lots more, too, including "real news" like the election aftermath, the oil spill, the economy, and several people running around without clothes. There's also "10 Questions With..." newly-minted WXKS (Rush Radio 1200)/Boston morning host Jeff Katz and the rest of All Access with industry news, ratings, job listings, and all the resources you need, all free.

More: The Talk Topics Twitter feed at twitter.com/talktopics! The All Access Net News Twitter feed at twitter.com/allaccess! My own Twitter feed at twitter.com/pmsimon! The All Access iPhone app here! More me at pmsimon.com! Occasional contributions coming to Rancho Palos Verdes Patch! Enjoy!

=============================

Hey, I have a Live Personal Appearance to plug: I'll be on a panel at a Sportscasters Broadcasting Jobs Seminar June 4th through 6th at the LAX Marriott here in Los Angeles. The event is all about sports radio, with an emphasis on finding and getting jobs in the format. There are a lot of prominent sports radio figures scheduled to speak, like Larry Gilbert of 710 ESPN in L.A., Bruce Gilbert of Red Zebra, Shelley Smith of ESPN, and, way down on the list, me. If you or someone you know is interested in working in sports radio, check the seminar out by clicking here.

=============================

And now, if you'll excuse me, I have more avenging to do. My mission is clear. All I need is a guitar.

Perry Michael Simon
Editor
All Access News-Talk-Sports
psimon@allaccess.com
www.facebook.com/pmsimon
www.twitter.com/pmsimon