LP-FM & commercials
Dave Boland
but funding is always an issue. I suggested instead of doing like NPR
with its thanks to this foundation and that foundation for their
support, that they just do commercials. However, I'm told that
commercials are illegal on LPFM! Is that true, and if so, how does a
LPFM have an income to support itself? I know that they must be
non-profit, but does that mean non-income as well?
Thanks,
Dave
geek
Some do, some don't. You'll have to check with the Societies Act for your
state. That's where you'll find that info.
Cheers!
Brenda Ann
"Dave Boland" <dbol...@fastmail.fm> wrote in message
news:g89rb2$8tq$1...@registered.motzarella.org...
IIRC, LPFM licenses are given only to entities that can support the station
with no additional station related income. It's part of the rules for the
service.
On the other hand, who couldn't afford to keep one running? Max of 100 watts
plus required studio gear.. could be kept going for the cost of running a
few table lamps. Biggest outlay is buying the FCC approved transmitter and
antenna setup.
Dave Boland
I guess the operating cost depends on what they want to do. For
example, if they want to produce a quality news cast every hour, do
high school sports remotes, and produce quality call-in discussion
programs, they will need to pay for something. While I don't know
much about LPFM, I know that on the commercial side this all costs
money. Volunteers are a nice theory, but I have found that you don't
get the professional quality or the reliability of a paid
professional, so that brings salary costs into the equation.
Bottom line seems (to me) that any broadcaster will need income to
produce good programs, keep up with regulations, replace equipment,
etc. Other than donations that can be unreliable in bad times, I
don't see an income stream that is reliable. I'm all in favor of
non-profit and local only ownership, but bills have to be paid, and
that takes money.
Dave,
Brenda Ann
> Brenda,
>
> I guess the operating cost depends on what they want to do. For example,
> if they want to produce a quality news cast every hour, do high school
> sports remotes, and produce quality call-in discussion programs, they will
> need to pay for something. While I don't know much about LPFM, I know
> that on the commercial side this all costs money. Volunteers are a nice
> theory, but I have found that you don't get the professional quality or
> the reliability of a paid professional, so that brings salary costs into
> the equation.
>
> Bottom line seems (to me) that any broadcaster will need income to produce
> good programs, keep up with regulations, replace equipment, etc. Other
> than donations that can be unreliable in bad times, I don't see an income
> stream that is reliable. I'm all in favor of non-profit and local only
> ownership, but bills have to be paid, and that takes money.
>
> Dave,
Dave,
To call an LPFM station "local" is to give it way too much credit. These
stations are (theoretically) limited to approximately a 3 mile radius from
the antenna. And that is the 100 watt class. The 10 watt class is less than
a mile, reliably, and there is no protection whatsoever for them. They were
never meant to make money. Any "news" or sports anyone would run would be
strictly neighborhood stuff, not even city-wide.
Apart from this, if you check the FCC website, you'll find that nearly all
the LPFM licenses are held by church groups. Out of the ones that are not
held by church groups, most are owned by local municipalities and are used
for things like traffic info and local interest items on a loop tape.
I know that the service was SUPPOSED to have been an outlet for would-be
pirates to do local origination programming. That's not how it turned out.
The restrictions put on the service by CONgress took away most meaningful
use of the service. I have nothing against there being religious stations,
but church groups started out by buying up almost every open local frequency
for satellators (bird-fed translators). Then, they filed for every single
frequency that came available for LPFM, to the point that there were often
more than one local church vieing for the same frequency. They were given
preference according the rules, and ended up with most of the licenses.
man...@iphouse.com
This section pertains to LPFM stations.
Hope that helps, MATT