KBME 790AM Sports/Talk changes starting July 9th

[BamaTX]

The point is the chip is there. People in other countries can access it. So the FCC telling Apple to stop it's discrimination isn't useless.

I believe the chip is useless either way because there is no antenna connected to it. Most Android phones used the headphone jack as an antenna source (provided you plugged in your headphones).

Apple didn't make that physical connection. And why would they? They gain nothing by a feature that is rarely used by people on android today. Cloud based music services are the future.

 

[TheBigA]

Apple didn't make that physical connection. And why would they? They gain nothing by a feature that is rarely used by people on android today. Cloud based music services are the future.

There are a lot of features on an iPhone that gain them nothing. That's hardly an excuse.

FM Radio is not a music service. Yes it plays music but that's not its primary function.

 

[TheBigA]

Sorry, but I find it hard to believe that many people still listen to the radio outside of their cars. And an even harder time believing that most sit through a bunch of ads without touching the dial on their car.

I find it hard to believe that people eat sushi. The idea of eating raw fish disgusts me. But some people like sushi.

I'm not asking you to believe anything. I'm just telling you that the facts are that people listen to radio in all kinds of places.

I'm just not buying all those stats that come from groups that have a horse in the race.

In point of fact, Nielsen has no horse in the race. The ratings they provide is primarily for the use of advertisers, not radio stations. And their studies are certified by an outside board.

 

[DavidEduardo]

Apple didn't make that physical connection. And why would they? They gain nothing by a feature that is rarely used by people on android today. Cloud based music services are the future.

I hope you are not totally reliant on the cloud when a tornado, hurricane, earthquake, flood, blizzard or other disaster strikes... terrestrial radio is a far mor robust link in emergencies than the cloud and your smartphone.

 

[The Rimshot]

In point of fact, Nielsen has no horse in the race. The ratings they provide is primarily for the use of advertisers, not radio stations. And their studies are certified by an outside board.

Nielsen is absolutely connected to radio stations. Without advertisers dumping money into radio, radio would cease to exist.

Without Nielsen exhibiting a reason for advertisers to spend revenue on ads, advertising on locally owned or nationally syndicated shows would cease to exist.

If advertisers knew for a fact eight out of ten homes listen to radio on a terrestrial basis, Nielsen would cease to exist.

It's the ugliest, dirtiest love triangle in all of media.

 

[TheBigA]

Nielsen is absolutely connected to radio stations. Without advertisers dumping money into radio, radio would cease to exist.

But the advertisers pay more for this service than radio. Without advertisers, Nielsen would cease to exist. The ONLY reason radio stations use it is because the advertisers insisted on it. Those advertisers also spend millions of dollars on their own in-house research to check the information they get from Nielsen.

And as I said, there's an independent ratings council that certifies all the Nielsen information. They have no reason to lie.

Believe whatever you want to believe, but there's more to the story than what you say.

 

[stan]

There are a lot of features on an iPhone that gain them nothing. That's hardly an excuse.

FM Radio is not a music service. Yes it plays music but that's not its primary function.

I stand by the facts as presented. If there is no physical connection then you cannot program around it.

It would be like saying, I don’t have a motherboard in the computer, but I expect Microsoft to turn on features in the computer that cannot be accessed without the motherboard present.

You may know radio, but you don’t know phones or their technology.

 

[BamaTX]

I hope you are not totally reliant on the cloud when a tornado, hurricane, earthquake, flood, blizzard or other disaster strikes... terrestrial radio is a far mor robust link in emergencies than the cloud and your smartphone.

Emergencies? People around Houston we're passing information to each other via Facebook and Twitter faster than any radio station could during Harvey. Most TV stations spent hours either interviewing people or reading comments off of Twitter. That's not to say FM radio is totally useless. I can see it being a good backup for emergencies. But that's it. Radio's golden age is behind us.

I alao stand by my statement. FM radio is not a feature that benefits Apple in any way. It actually competes with their Apple Music service.

 

[TheBigA]

I stand by the facts as presented. If there is no physical connection then you cannot program around it.

I never said there was. You didn't respond to anything I said.

FM radio is not a feature that benefits Apple in any way. It actually competes with their Apple Music service.

Which would be a reason for FM radio companies to sue Apple for monopoly practices. Thanks for pointing that out. Apple Radio is only available by subscription. So their using their monopoly to force consumers to subscribe to Apple Music.

 

[BamaTX]

I find it hard to believe that people eat sushi. The idea of eating raw fish disgusts me. But some people like sushi.

I'm not asking you to believe anything. I'm just telling you that the facts are that people listen to radio in all kinds of places.

Those aren't facts. They are estimates from a study by an agency that has a special interest in advertising. This would be like the tobacco industry funded studies from the 70s and 80s.

Also, comparing sushi to radio is a terrible example. You can easily go around town and gather the exact numbers of sushi dishes sold on any given night. You will never be able to see the exact numbers of people listening to terrestrial radio unless you survey all ~5 Million people at all times.

In point of fact, Nielsen has no horse in the race. The ratings they provide is primarily for the use of advertisers, not radio stations. And their studies are certified by an outside board.

Nielsen definitely has a horse in the race. If it told people and ad agencies that people weren't listening to the radio, nobody would buy their ratings.

I'd also question the methodology used to come up with such numbers. If a person drives to the grocery store and listens to the radio for just 5 minutes that entire day, is it counted as a listener? What's about someone who walks into a store that has the radio on? Do you count all those people as radio listeners even though they don't touch the AM/FM dial at home or their car?

 

[TheBigA]

Those aren't facts. They are estimates from a study by an agency that has a special interest in advertising. This would be like the tobacco industry funded studies from the 70s and 80s.

How much money do you spend to listen to FM radio? I'd guess nothing. GEICO spends hundreds of millions of dollars. They can afford to spend their money anywhere. They choose radio and TV. If I'm believing anybody, I believe them, not you. Sorry.

 

[The Rimshot]

Did you tour the entire home? Or are you basing that just in the main living area?.

I only toured the main living area.

You're probably right. There is a P1 listener in the attic.

All of my sister's horses are P1 listeners. She keeps a radio in the barn locked on KKYX.

 

[BamaTX]

Which would be a reason for FM radio companies to sue Apple for monopoly practices.

That's not a monopolistic practice. Monopoly is when you control the entire market for your perspective industry. You can always buy a portable AM/FM from Sony or JVC. Apple is not in the business of making AM/FM radios.

Thanks for pointing that out. Apple Radio is only available by subscription. So their using their monopoly to force consumers to subscribe to Apple Music.

SMH. No, just no. Through Apple's app store, you can download Spotify, Pandora, Google Music Play, Deezer, Tidal, YouTube Music, etc. and sign up for competing music services.

You can maybe make the case that Apple's App store itself is monopolistic, but that has nothing to do with our argument. So let's save ourselves the headache and avoid going down that road.

 

[BamaTX]

Everything we are telling you is going over your head.

Who do you think is selling Geico the ratings and listening demographics for radio? I'll give you a hint, it's the same folks who published the study about how we are all still listening to the radio.

 

[gr8oldies]

Geico's corporate, marketing department and ad agency is so clueless that they spend millions on radio whwn absolutely, positively no one is listening and absolutely everyone is kistening to their own personalized stream of obscure indie bands and 10,000 B-side oldies streams? They don't check Neilsen and their agency's work? Interesting. If every morning show is indeed talking to absolutely no one, someone isn't doing their homework. Furthermore, if Neilsen is out and out lying and radio oenetration is 0%, there should be some major, highly publicized lawsuits going on.

 

[TheBigA]

Through Apple's app store, you can download Spotify, Pandora, Google Music Play, Deezer, Tidal, YouTube Music, etc. and sign up for competing music services.

AM/FM radio is not in the streaming music business. As I said, they play music as part of what they do, but it's not the only thing they do. If you listen to any of those streaming services you listed, all they provide is the music.

Apple is not in the camera business. Yet my iPhone has a camera in it. Apple is not in the watch or clock business. Ye my iPhone has a clock in it. Apple is not in the weather business. Yet I can get the weather on my phone. So there are lots of things on the phone that Apple doesn't benefit from.

A monopoly isn't just when one company controls the market. A monopoly is when that company uses its size to control price and behavior. That's what this is.

Who do you think is selling Geico the ratings and listening demographics for radio? I'll give you a hint, it's the same folks who published the study about how we are all still listening to the radio.

You don't think Geico has the money to buy other opinions? How much have you spent for yours? Nothing.

 

[DavidEduardo]

Those aren't facts. They are estimates from a study by an agency that has a special interest in advertising. This would be like the tobacco industry funded studies from the 70s and 80s.

Advertisers long ago formed the Media Ratings Council to make sure that measurements of all kinds of electronic media met high standards.

http://mediaratingcouncil.org/

The MRC's job is to evaluate, via regular audits, the survey techniques and practices of companies wishing to have MRC accreditation, often called "the check mark". This is done to give advertisers a guarantee of the metrics used to buy advertising.

Since the advertisers themselves founded and funded the MRC... and pay for the operations including some very highly recognized experts in statistics... ad buyers know that the delivery of electronic media of all kinds is very precisely and accurately

Also, comparing sushi to radio is a terrible example. You can easily go around town and gather the exact numbers of sushi dishes sold on any given night. You will never be able to see the exact numbers of people listening to terrestrial radio unless you survey all ~5 Million people at all times.

What you are saying is a common statement by ignorant people who do not understand the science of statistics. Statistics, it's often said, is the only science where "error" is not a dirty word; that is because we can predict with great precision the accuracy of a poll based on a sample within a determined margin of error.

The errors in broadcast ratings are known. They are within a small percentage, as has been proven many times via replication studies. In the case of advertisers, they know that real audience delivery is within a tiny margin of the data expressed in a ratings poll. And such a margin of error is not significant to media buying decisions because it does not materially affect the results of a campaign.

Oh, and instead of making the enormous expenditure of going to every restaurant that serves sushi and every market that sells ready-made sushi in a city, you could do a random probability sample of the population and find out not just the consumption of sushi on a single day, but also learn weekly consumption, intent to consume in the future, acceptable pricing points and even what particular kinds of sushi were the most appealing. And that data would be accurate, in a well-designed survey, within very tight margins of error and would cost far less. And it would also pick up those tho neither went to restaurants nor bought ready made sushi, but also those who made their own at home from ingredients!

You might want to check out definitions for things like "replication study" and "standard error".

Nielsen definitely has a horse in the race. If it told people and ad agencies that people weren't listening to the radio, nobody would buy their ratings.

Nielsen rates radio, TV and all sorts of new media. They even do statistics about music radio play and on-demand streaming. Their research universe is not just radio, but media.

I'd also question the methodology used to come up with such numbers. If a person drives to the grocery store and listens to the radio for just 5 minutes that entire day, is it counted as a listener? What's about someone who walks into a store that has the radio on? Do you count all those people as radio listeners even though they don't touch the AM/FM dial at home or their car?

Take a look towards the bottom of:

https://www.americanradiohistory.com/Ratings_Publictations_Papers.htm

...and find DoM books (there is little year to year change) for both the diary and PPM. The Description of Methodology shows what the minimum listening in any time period is (in radio, the measurement unit is the quarter hour, and it takes listening in a minimum of 5 discreet minutes in any quarter hour to give a station credit for that quarter hour). I've also added some historical data today that includes presentations made when the PPM was being rolled out after over 6 years of "real time" testing in Philly and Houston.

There are also many editions of the "Audio Today" and other "state of radio" reports at:

https://www.americanradiohistory.com/Arbitron_Radio_Today.htm

There is also some data there about several of the publicly released replication studies Arbitron did that showed that their sample size and methodology produced data that could be precisely replicated time and time again.

 

[TheBigA]

I only toured the main living area.

I have a shower radio. It's in my ensuite. Would you have seen that if you came to my house?

BTW you don't have to own a radio to listen to the radio.

 

[The Rimshot]

I have a shower radio. It's in my ensuite. Would you have seen that if you came to my house?

BTW you don't have to own a radio to listen to the radio.

How much time to do you spend in the shower? Wait...don't answer that.

It was my understanding that you have to listen on a terrestrial basis to register in the PPM. Did Nielsen change this to accomodate internet-based listeners?

 

[TheBigA]

It was my understanding that you have to listen on a terrestrial basis to register in the PPM. Did Nielsen change this to accomodate internet-based listeners?

The PPM measures the signal regardless of what device you use. If it's encoded, the meter picks it up. The point isn't to measure device usage, but to measure exposure to content, or impressions.

If you look at the Nielsen ratings, they're now listing radio station streams. So you have AM, FM, and Stream.