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Back in 1995, the hot radio technology was the Radio Data System (RDS), a digital subcarrier that can be carried by analog FM signals to provide a low-rate (but super-useful and robust) data broadcasting capability. Eager for its members to sell new radios that support RDS, the Electronic Industries Association (EIA, precursor to the Consumer Technology Association, CTA) launched a program to provide 500 radio stations across the U.S. with RDS encoders to seed the market and break the “chicken or the egg” dilemma that plagues so many new technologies. In return, EIA asked for $5,000 in advertising time per station to explain the capabilities of the new technology.

Skip Pizzi is owner and principal at Skip Pizzi Media Consultant LLC. He is a consultant to NAB and manages the 2021 BEIT Conference. The year: 1947. The place: Atlantic City, N.J. The event: The first NAB Broadcast Engineering Conference (BEC)—subsequently renamed the Broadcast Engineering and Information Technology (BEIT) Conference—held continuously on an annual [...]

NAB is a founding charter member of the Ultra HD Forum. This means that we have been a charter member ever since the creation of the Forum. If you visit their membership page, you will see the Forum has founding members and charter members, but not founding charter members. That is because I made the [...]

Metadata is defined as “a set of data that describes and gives information about other data.” When applied to radio broadcasting, the term metadata is referring to data which describes or augments an audio program. Song title and artist, an album art image, a station logo, an advertiser’s web address or a textual news story description are all examples of metadata. It has never been more important for radio broadcasters to include metadata in their broadcasts and audio streams.

In a Public Notice released June 11, 2021 the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) formally announced that it will conduct a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System (EAS) and Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) on August 11, 2021, and that the EAS Test Reporting System (ETRS) is now open for filings. The test will be held [...]

This year’s Innovation Challenge is all about giving startups an opportunity for unparalleled access to the U.S. broadcasting industry. We are blending the best parts of a traditional pitch competition with the thematic focus of the Innovation Challenge. PILOT’s 2021 Innovation Challenge will showcase emerging products or prototypes that are poised to help broadcasters rise [...]