WBUR IS HOSTING ‘BIZLAB SUMMIT’ • KHSU MAY BE FOR SALE

Joan DiMicco

Joan DiMicco, Executive Director of WBUR’s Public Radio Business Laboratory (”BizLab”) wants to share ideas about how stations can uncover new sources of revenue. 

the goal is to generate revenue via platforms that are distinct from traditional approaches such as on-air drives, direct mail, and underwriting.

BizLab is an important part of DiMicco’s mission. She said on her career profile page [link]: 

"I am a passionate innovator, energized by building new technologies that connect and improve communication between individuals."

WBUR’s City Space

DiMicco and her team will be hosting the 2019 BizLab Summit [link] Tuesday, December 10, 2019 at WBUR’s City Space. The Summit is a one-day event that begins at 8:30qm and closes after an evening cocktail reception. Registration for the Summit is $100.00 per person.

BizLab participating stations – Capital Public Radio, Louisville Public Media, Vermont Public Radio, WAMU, WDET, and WLRN – have spent 2019 testing new ideas for revenue at their stations and in their communities. Representative from the stations will give detailed reports on their projects. CPB, the Knight Foundation and Greater Public provide funding for BizLab.

Public radio stations need additional sources of revenue to sustain their commitments to expanded news reporting. This requires new revenue streams and funding models.

Tamsen Webster

The keynote speaker for BizLab will be Tamsen Webster. 

She will discuss the biggest barriers to innovation and what it takes to implement different funding models at stations.

Webster is a 20-year brand and message strategist. 

She is also a former Executive Producer for TED events and broadcasts.

You can see what BizLab is working on now at the project’s website [link].

If you questions about the Summit, you can email

bizlab@wbur.org.

IS HUMBOLDT STATE UNIVERSITY PREPARING TO AUCTION OFF KHSU-FM

Craig Wruck is the HSU bureaucrat who engineered

the largest mass termination of station people

in public broadcasting history

The sad story of KHSU, once a Eureka area treasure, is taking a new turn that appears to include selling the station’s license. As you probably recall, a Humboldt State University vice president fired KHSU’s paid staff (see the one exception below) and shut out all volunteers to settle a grudge against people at the station.

The action has turned out to as costly as it was stupid. There was, and still is, no backup plan. It will take years for the university to regain the trust of the community.

According to a report last week in the Eureka Times Standard [link], the university is formally considering its next options, including selling the station to the highest bidder.

Since the mass terminations in April, KHSU has been simulcasting programming from KCHO in Chico, roughly 200-miles from Eureka. The university also cancelled programming from Radio Bilingüe that was on

KHSU HD2.

Also, in a twist, the university was surprised when the California State University Employees Union (CSUEU) pushed back against the university to reinstate the employment of Chief Engineer Kevin Sanders.

Steve Tillinghast, president of the local CSUEU chapter said in a press release that HSU management did not expect the Union to care. Tillinghast said:

 “Perhaps they did not even realize that one of the employees in the group they terminated was part of a Union and that they would be held accountable. Humboldt realized over the last several months that the chief engineer of KHSU is a critical employee and that the station could not operate, even in its reduced form, without him.”

WALLY SMITH CRAFTS A SWEET DEAL WITH WNET-TV • DAN MULSHALKO SETENCED

Dr. Wally Smith

Wally Smith, the President, General Manager and Program Director of WPPB in Southampton, NY, is probably smiling today. 

Peconic Public Broad Broadcasting [link], and WNET-TV, have reached an agreement to sell the FCC License of WPPB to WNIT for $944,834. 

When the FCC approves, WNET will own WPPB. Smith and his team will continue to operate the station on day-to-day basis.

The nonprofit oranization Smith leads and WNET have agreed to a Public Service Operating Agreement (PSOA) that will allow Smith to keep WPPB humming. Most importantly, the agreement means that NPR listeners on eastern Long Island will have a vibrant local station.

The sweet part of the arrangement is that WPPB will now have the resources of WNET to tap and have the stability needed to run a NPR member station. Smith could not comment on the transaction because of a contractual “silence period.”

Though Southampton is thought of as a place where the rich and famous hangout, it is remote area. 

WPPB serves the smaller population that lives near the eastern tip of Long Island. I

t is closer to Old Saybrook, Connecticut than it is to Manhattan.

According to WPPB’s FY 2018 audited financial report, WPPB had a loss of $223,000 during the year. 

Revenue for the year was around $531,000. Major sources of cash were members (36%), underwriters (34%) and CPB (26%).

The deal was reached on October 17^th and announced on October 24^th when the paperwork was accepted for filing by the FCC.

The 2015 Spark News produced a video podcast featuring Smith. It it tells the true history of how Smith helped found American Public Radio and then saved the founders from a fiery demise. You can see the video here.

DAN MUSHALKO PLEADS GUILTY TO FALSIFYING DOCUMENTS

Dan Mushalko

The mystery of why Dan Mushalko, the former GM of NPR News/Adult alt WCBE, continued this week. Mushalko hid around $900,000 of past due invoices, mainly from NPR, for reasons that are still unknown. Mushalko pled guilty on Wednesday (10/23) to a felony charge related to falsifying invoices to conceal the debt from WCBE’s licensee Columbus City Schools.

According to a report in the Columbus Daily Dispatch [link], written before the court proceeding, Mushalko planned to plead guilty to one count of telecommunications fraud. Mushalko was expected to ne placed on probation.

KEN SAYS: Why did Mushalko continue this crazy scheme? He didn’t do it to pocket the money. Why couldn’t he not admit that WCBE was so far in debt and ask for help?

We occasionally spoke with Mushalko over the years, particularly when we were marketing nationally syndicated programs to noncom stations. Mushalko impressed us with his encyclopedic knowledge of the Columbus media scene.

Many times when we talked with Mushalko he hinted that “some bigger deal” was in the works that involved WCBE and the two Ohio State stations.

We would like to hear from Mushalko and hear his first hand account of what happened.

AUDIO HISTORY: THE ‘DISCOVERY’ OF THE TAPE RECORDER

When you think of transformative moments in media, certain tipping points come to mind: The beginning of satellite delivery in 1962, the advance of the Internet in the 1990s and the introduction of the Smart Phone by Apple in 2008.

Add to these game-changing inventions the “discovery” of the reel-to-reel tape recorder in 1945. 

We say “discovered” because very few Americans knew how far German audio engineers had progressed with audio recording and reproduction just prior, and during World War Two.

We call this discovery Jack Mullin’s Prize.
 

Jack Mullin served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps during the waning years of the war specializing in radar technology. Just after the war ended in Europe in May 1945, Mullin was assigned to investigate German war-related electronics.

In July of the year, the Army sent Mullin to inspect a site near Frankfurt, where the Germans had been experimenting with high-energy radio beams as a potential weapon.

Mullin made a stop at a German radio station in the town of Bad Nauheim. It was there he saw and heard the Magnetophone, a reel-to-real tape recorder. As can hear in the YouTube podcast below, the German device provided audio reproduction that far surpassed anything he had heard before.

Mullin decided to ship two of the machines to his home in San Francisco as a “prize of war.” He also took fifty rolls unused recording tape.

Mullin shipped the Magnetophones piece by piece the States. When he returned to California he reassembled the machines and they were in perfect working order.

The only problem Mullin had was deciding what to do with the machine because nobody new about them

Jack Mullin at Ampex in the 1950s

In 1947 radio star Bing Crosby read about Mullin’s Magnetophones in a newspaper story. 

Crosby was fascinated by the device’s ability to make edits in the recordings eliminate embarrassing flubs.

Crosby was so impressed he agreed to invest in Mullin's work. 

Mullin parlayed Crosby's cash into a stake in Ampex. 

Mullin worked at Ampex for many years. He was part of the team that introduced videotape.

Please listen to our story and learn how one person’s “discovery” changed the world of recorded audio audio forever.