K-Rock, KROQ & HD2 formats

I just listened to the audio file where 92.3 Free FM returned to New York it's beloved K-ROCK (minus Howard Stern). A rare radio moment toward the end where the General Manager jumps on air and apologises for taking K-Rock off the air. It's like the "good guys won" [comment]. If only the same could be done to bring back Channel Z here in NZ, even as an internet-only radio station. These guys managed to to do it with K-ROCK 2.

Speaking of which, the Los Angeles long standing KROQ, after implementing HD2 their broadcast, also launched a 'version' of KROQ, or simply, time delaying KROQ from the 80's. It's called ROQ of the 80s [listen live]. Choice!

A good virus

User generated content is most certainly the future. I jumped in fairly early into the blog world, but of late I've been focussed on other things. Now to take focus again, it's clear that the web is shying away from corporate flyer websites (we send you receive), into it's very appropriate new name "web 2.0", where the users generate and the users receive.

iGoogle rocks my world. Everything I want to see at a glance is on my iGoogle homepage. Yahoo was clunky when they did this 'cutom homepage' idea around 1997, today they've fallen behind the fresh thinking of Google, who's superior "Reader" product is inmeasurably invaluable. I have an inbox for all the RSS fed news I'm particuarly interested in, grouped and sourced the way I like it. Saves me oddles of time trapsing the net!

I very much like finding these news tools by Google by what could be a calculated accident, then deciding to 'opt in' and participate. Helps too that I only need 1 Google account to have all this at my disposal.

Spamming/emailing me the latest 'innovation' may serve only to piss me off. Block sender? Yep.

I'm now keen on contributing more to infonews.co.nz and Scoopit, Delicious and others I'm sure. As I say, it's a good virus - all this interesting news going around :)

Oh lookie! Blogger is introducing video!

Television is extinct

What the hell is Freeview? What the hell is TVNZ on demand? Why does Teletext still exist?

C'mon Freeview Group, you can surely co-operate a bit better than this. You seem to be only interested in keeping your existing viewers inside their analogue tomb, instead of trying to promote and open the doors to change. Where are the incentives?. It's promotion is so pathetic, minimal, and ineffective. Well, that's the impression I get by what I see - and let me say, I don't see much to begin with.

I hardly watch any television anymore anyway, and it's not a boycott or deliberate. Have you ever sat down and watched other people watch TV? Do it tonight if your household is slave to the telly, and just for fun, say something random when they're really engrossed - like "I hear a whistle".

Does NZ TV really stink as much as I still think it does? Are programmers still hooked on reality TV? I ask genuinely, as I've been away from the TV guide listings for a while now. If I want TV, really, I can get it online from overseas sources. I can't understand why "MySky" is a good thing, nor the tech underground using their modded TiVo boxes. Getting it online doesn't mean I get it from TVNZ on demand, either. Installing a Satellite to get Greek, Romanian or Indian FTA channels is just darn stupid.

I enjoy a good comedy show if I happen to align myself with the network's schedule, but this usually never happens until later at night when I'm relaxing before bed.

I caught glimpses of Shortland Street last night in a rare "in-between things" moment. I saw Angela Bloomfield and Craig Parker back on the soap. Oh dear. Is manic desperation setting in?
I don't have an opinion of Angela's four years as Director for the soap, but when I see her on screen, it's a cringe to see. I don't expect great acting anyway from a show that is on the same level as Home & Away. I happily use those 2.5 hours a weeks in better ways.

Let me get this right. You are looking for something decent to watch, right? You sit on your bum on the couch, scan the channels, and watch the screen of a box in the corner when you see something you like. Now, you either watch by free analogue broadcasts via the coathanger on the roof, or pay Sky for more or less 5 channels of news, or music, or kids, or lifestyle, or porn, or documentary, or weather, or whatever. Around 100 channels to delight you.

Television is a platform for broadcasting content. The content is delivered to you from a Television station. Let's simplify.

Content is your favourite show, or documentary, or music video. Why stay dependent on 60s colour TV, when you can try moving into the 70s and getting it on Betamax, or on VHS if you prefer the 80s. Hold on, why not move into the 90s and get a DVD - or perhaps this decade, you might just download it to your computer, or can I mutter, your iPod?

Television is an extinct platform that for so long, has tried to keep propping itself up. An advertising and copyright industry evolved from this. Truthfully, today's world is going through a technological revolution, where supply of content, wether it's music, or video, books or pictures are available - NOW. No waiting for a TV schedule. No need for an advertising or copyright industry. The industry-created rulebook is not relevant anymore.

So, Freeview will try and keep us in front of Television sets, by offering a clearer picture, which really, in the long run, doesn't matter. You and I, (the taxpayer) funded around 30% of the setup costs, yet you still have to wait for your show, watch ads, and turn the volume down in the breaks. But the quality is "so damned good" in widescreen. ugh.

Watch this website carefully, and remember - while you're watching a TV, it is watching you.

Radioscope finally returns

The news is back. Radioscope returns with a mambo-built website, and it's now free!

Originally an industry magazine, funded by subscriptions - it was a staple for the industry throughout the 90s. It went online around 2000, providing support, news and teasers of job movements within the NZ radio industry. Charts and survey fiagures were soon added and Media Sauce grew.

In 2005, they stopped publishing the glossy magazine, and went online as a subscription news business, covering the radio and music industry headlines. Perhaps this industry is just too small or whatever, but even as a subscriber to it, I found that Medianstrip/Radioscope waned as a source for radio related news. I will excuse the fact that the industry is changing, and no longer exclusively radio. Either there's not enough news, or too much of it - I got the impression by the lack of updates that a major restructuring was underway. Web 2.0 also made it far too easy for me to get the stories long before they're published at Radioscope. There are industry bloggers, and somehow word of mouth has become a quicker means of getting information. That, I find interesting. Radioscope couldn't hold the exclusive.

I like the new website, simple (and free) as it is. I'm hoping for the articles and interviews that were such a huge attraction to the original published magazine. While the costs of taking it back to press will likely prevent this from happening, I trust that Paul and the Radioscope crew will continue to truck on. Thanks for providing RSS, I look forward to the forum and profiles, and more additions to the LPFM list as well.

Welcome back Radioscope!

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