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Rusty on Radio

Rusty Hodge, General Manager of SomaFM discusses the issues that affect internet radio.


I got an HD radio for ChristmasDecember 28 2008

I got an HD radio for Xmas... the Sony XDR-F1HD.  Here are some observations based on some substantial time spent using the radio and listening to HD radio:

  1. Not used to a radio taking 5-7 seconds to "boot" when you turn it on.
  2. HD2/HD3 channels take 5+ seconds to "Link" whenever you change channels. Doesn't really encourage channel surfing.
  3. The radio runs very hot; I've heard those Ibiquity chips suck power and that's why you're not seeing a walkman HD radio yet. (And that's also why you'll probably never see HD radio in a cell phone.)
  4. In Bernal Heights (where I live), I can only pick up 15 HD2 channels.
  5. Public radio, such as KQED, KCSM, KALW all have no HD2
  6. I'm not really impressed with any of the current HD2 formats here in San Francisco. There is a lot of hiphop, but don't you think most of the audience for that's going to just be downloading MP3 "mixtapes" to their iPods?
  7. I'm not impressed with the HD2 audio quality; and when more stations add a HD3 that means the main channel will sound the same as the HD2/3 channels - 32kb streams. They sound good for 32kb but there are some strange artifacts that crop up from time to time.

Bottom line: the user experience for me is the worse issue, largely the time it takes to switch channels.  The whole tuning scheme is pretty wacky too, you can't just tune across the HD2 channels directly.

If you're only listening to the main channel pro

Listener email: Why do we expand our channels?December 13 2008

An anonymous listener from Germany writes:

i really enjoy the music you play at your station. Drone Zone, Groove Salad, Space Station, Cliphop and Doomed is the best mix for people FAR AWAY FROM MAINSTREAM. i think that was your original idea to launch this project, and i think many people will thank you for that great idea. BUT if you're not able to meet your budget why do you expand your channels? Is "getting bigger and bigger" the goal of a "underground station"? Does any one of the listeners from the beginning need christmas music? Please think about it and go back to the roots.

First, to set the record straight, Xmas in Frisko has been around longer than Doomed or Space Station Soma. I think it's unlike any other holiday broadcast out there, and very fitting for SomaFM. Christmas Lounge was an offshoot of holiday programming we did on Groove Salad - many people asked that we not play any holiday music on Groove Salad and instead start a dedicated channel for it, so we did.

Our mission has been to provide music programming that's "outside the mainstream"; music that you won't hear on FM radio. That doesn't mean every song we play hast to be unknown, it just means we're trying to play songs that you are far less likely to hear anywhere else. So yes, there are a few Christmas songs on Christmas Lounge that are by artists many people have heard of... but they're the songs that fit the theme, and they're less than

SoundExchange Royalty UpdateDecember 11 2008
A lot of people have asked if we've gotten everything settled with SoundExchange yet. Unfortunately, the answer is no. Basically, SoundExchange is in negotiations with some of the larger webcasters represented by DiMA. Once those negotiations have concluded, SoundExchange will then be negotiations with the small webcasters. I'm expecting that it won't be until Feb 2009 when the agreement is finalized.
Holiday Channel Traffic!December 7 2008
The large number of listeners to our holiday channels has boosted our "listener hours" to about 6.7 million in December. We're pushing over 600mbit/sec of bandwidth just on the holiday channels. Who knew holiday music would be so popular... and we're not even the most popular holiday music station out there!
Fundraising UpdateNovember 12 2008
Based on our current level of donations, it still looks like we're going to be behind $18-20,000 by the end of the year. While this is an improvemement from last month where we were projected to be $35,000 in debt, we still need your help to pay our bills this year. If you're not already a supporter, please donate to SomaFM today!

If everyone who listened regularly (there are about 150,000 of you who tune in once or more a week and have been doing that for over a year) donated just $10 we would have enough money to operate SomaFM for a couple years!

By the way, here's a breakdown with our monthly subscribers, which in October we had 1700 monthly subscribers:

$1.00/month 16.5%$2.99/mo24%$4.20/mo27%$7.99/mo18%$12.99/mo10.5%$25.00/mo3.5%

We bring in about $9000 a month (net, after credit card merchant fees) from our monthly subsribers, so this is a very important source of revenue for us!