FM translator ID's

[Sean Smyth]

I'd like to think WILD would still be a thriving station under local
ownership if it could've landed an FM translator 20 years ago. Perhaps
I'm naive.

On Thu, Aug 17, 2017 at 4:31 AM, Kevin Vahey <kvahey@gmail.com> wrote:
> Bob Bittner will do everything by the book.
>
> The average listener in either Boston or Maine really does not need to be
> subjected to hearing the calls of every transmitter tied in.
>
> I am assuming that today WJTO is the 'master control' of the Bob Bittner
> network and very little if any programming originates in Cambridge like it
> did years ago with the VHS tapes.
>
> By comparison look at 'NBC Boston' on TV. Viewers at home never see any
> legal ID if watching on cable as Comcast sends the master control input
> from Denver by fiber to the cable company's head end before it is sent to
> the transmitter. If you watch OTA around Boston you do see a legal ID for
> WBTS and WMFP and viewers in NH see WNEU.
>
> I can report that Bob's 103,1 is now coming in clear around Fenway Park.
> Big City's owners are savvy enough to know that once Bob went on the air it
> was a fight they could not win. They will keep looking for a landing spot
> but their options are limited. Big City was popular with many cab drivers
> in Cambridge/Somerville and a couple of them became angry when I said the
> station was illegal.
>
> I think most of us will agree that commercial radio has ignored vast
> portions of Boston for decades. WILD-AM 1090 for years did a yeoman's job
> in trying but as a daytime only station it was limited. The station could
> have gotten very low power authorization to transmit 24 hours but the
> signal would never make it to their core listening area. They did wind up
> buying a Brockton FM station and moved the transmitter to Milton but that
> in turn made the station more valuable to the suburban market and Entercom
> bought 97,7 and it became a simulcast of WAAF.
>
> I envy at times how Canada's CRTC has a major say in what a station can
> program but I also know that would never be workable in the US.
>
> I think the FCC dropped the ball decades ago with FM rimshotters that would
> then lay claim to the larger adjacent market. The FCC could have allowed
> low power stations in Boston on signals such as 93.7, 99.5, 105.7 and 107.3
> but didn't. The one exception was 104,9 where WRBB was created to destroy a
> major payday to Simon Geller who owned WVCA in Gloucester..
>
> There is no easy answer to this.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Thu, Aug 17, 2017 at 12:58 AM, A Joseph Ross <joe@attorneyross.com>
> wrote:
>
>> But Sean Smith just mentioned listening to a WJTO translator.  So why
>> wouldn't you have a liner for its FM frequency?
>>
>>
>>