UMass Radio

["Bill O'Neill" <billo@erols.com>]

>Personally, I hope that WUMB will keep the daytime (5 A.M.-8 P.M.) folk
> block alive.  But I fear that they won't. And I think they may end up
airing going
> news/info, broadcasting much the same programming as WBUR <snip>

As a product of the state college system, (yes, that explains it), it still
surprises me that UMass, as a whole, has not come up with a way to link its
signals in some way.   Among the list 91.9 WUMB Boston (UMass Boston), 91.5
WJUL Lowell (UMass Lowell, formerly Univ. of Lowell), 91.3 WMUA Amherst
(UMass Amherst), <the UMass Dartmouth station??>, plus Salem State's 91.7
WMWM Salem.  (Perhaps you could add to that list.)

I would not want to mess with the autonomy of the student run operations,
(as a former WJUL PD in the early 80s), but there are many examples of how
they could synergistically link on spec. projects, concert network stuff,
esp. with economical T1 line avail. only dreamed of 15 years ago.  One show
that comes to mind is WJUL's 20+ yrs. running Old Tyme Radio Theatre hosted
by Wayne Braverman (Sun. 6-10 p.m.) as a show that could easily fit on other
stations. If a particular UMass team has a hot match-up, the host station
could feed to sister stations, etc.  The learning curve of college radio
management is out of sync with the four (or five) short years undergrads
spend there.  As a result, only the stations with active (but non overly
interfering) alumni make any progress.  Perhaps the other system stations'
joint efforts could bring some listenable results.  Based upon my
experience, it could only work if all stations went willingly, not by
administration charge.
Bill O'Neill

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