Inventebrities

Henirich Hertz (1857-1894)
– German physciatrist who determined how electronic waves could be transmitted and received wirelessly.
– Built first transmitter, antenna, and receiver apparatus. Foundation of radio and frequency measurements named off him.
– FF: Died of blood poisoning at just 37 years old.

Nikola Tesla (1856-1943)
– Serbian-American immigrant who invented the foundation for most alternating-current devices.
– Arguably the inventor of early radio.
– Created “Tesla Coil” which is commonly used in radio.

Guglielmo Marconi (1874-1937)
– “Father of Radio”
– Italian who made first successful distance wireless voice transmissions.
– English channel 1899 and the Atlantic in 1906
– FF: observed to be reason for survivors in Titanic.
– FFB: Looks identical to Anderson Cooper.

Ernst Alexanderson (1878-1975)
– Swedish inventor of alternator, allowing speech transmission to be possible.

Reginald Fessenden (1866-1932)
– Canadian inventor of the Liquid Barretter in 1903
o First audio device permitting reception of wireless voice transmissions
o 1906 – Christmas eve broadcast in BrantRock- First public broadcast of voices as well as music.

Edwin Armstrong (1890–1954)
– American Army officer who created FM and invented the regenative circuit
o First amplifying receiver and efficient continuous-wave transmitter

Lee Deforest (1873-1961)
– American business man and inventor of Audion Tube in 1906
o Vacuum that improved and amplified wireless signals

Dieter Seitzer (1933-Present)
– German inventor of audio compression and layering, otherwise known as the MP3

Radio Emerges from Merger

Conceptualized desire originated in 1916 by David Sarnoff (Russian employee of Marconi) in his document known as the “Radio Music Box Memo.” Before the public radio was established however, the government used the transmission capabilities for broadcasts covering the war effort to be received by the American families. When WWII ended the government forcibly merged top competing companies: American Marconi, General Electric, American Telephone, and Westinghouse creating the Radio Corporation of America (RCA).

Frank Conrad, a Westinghouse engineer, sparked enough listener attention to receive a license to broadcast from the Dept. of Commerce. On Nov. 2, 1920 his station in Pittsburg, KDKA made its first broadcast.

Out of the 14,952 radio stations in the U.S. today: 4,766 are AM, 6,542 are FM, and 3,644 are noncommercial.

FM- Frequency Modulation

Wider signal allows for better fidelty of broadcasts (sound quality)
Focus: Music
Non commercial stations are sans advertising. They were established in the Communications Act of 1934 to make programming for religious, children, world news, and education. FCC deemed stations: 88.1 – 91.9 noncommercial and today are host to local, community and national informational programming such as WXPN for philadelphia and NPR for the nation.
Low Power FM are 10- to 100 watt nonprofit community stations that have a range distance of only a few miles

AM – Amplitude Modulation

Narrower signal means a harsher quality of broadcast
Focus: News, sports, traffic
Signals reach a farther distance
Rural listeners but locations are less populated therefore still fewer listeners then FM

The New Age of Radio

After television brought the music industry out of its slump in the 1980s (MTV) traditional radio had to catch up with technology. The union of radio and satellite bridged this gap. Through this joining, one station or network can deliver varied programming to a diverse range of affiliates. Therefore services can be bought and molded on a market-to-market basis, otherwise known as syndication.

Fewer commercials receive air time.
Specialized programming for niche audiences.
More freedom with artist selection and playlists.
Able to introduce and develop new formats.

o Digital Music Express (DMX) is at home audio services that are accessible through cable.

o Digital Audio Radio Service (DARS) is at home or in car services that are accessible through satellite transmission.

One major example of DARS is the company Sirius XM Radio. Two competing satellite radio networks that eventually merged into one. This company provides: a huge range of different stations covering all genres and topics, commercial free subscriptions, special portable radio machines, and subscription plans for sharing. The company is incredibly successful across the nation with over 22 million subscribers and listeners.

Internet and Radio: Hurting & Helping

Though the birth of P2P, Peer to Peer, sharing of MP3s was an enormous blow to the radio and music industry the internet hasn’t been all bad for radio. Internet, E-Radio or Web radio is the delivery of radio directly to listeners and subscribers across the internet. In society today everything must be accessible through the internet to survive. Many radio providers will post simulcasts, transmission of one signal at one time across many sites with the same frequency, which are the customary over-the-air broadcasts. Some of these simulcasts will try to recreate the broadcast to be identical others will include extra information about the programming, events, or artists. The more extreme internet stations are called bitcasters and are only available online. The most successful of the bitcaster sites are the online streaming services such as Pandora and Spotify, allowing public access to music catalogs and personalized stations for free legally. Even better, these sites are platform agnostic, meaning they are offered on essentially all types of digital devices.

Podcasts have also been a critical shift for the era of personalized radio. Podcasting is the recording and downloading of audio file on servers. They are posted in complete data bundles online and therefore do not require streaming. When the phenomena started the posters were typically techies, community organizations, at home DJs, and outspoken bloggers. Now the practice is widespread and common for all internet users from the average joe with recording equipment to large companies, stations, and brands. Now there are over 27,000 recognized podcast programs online.