Radio Survivor Podcast

In 2019 we celebrated International Women’s Day by recording a fascinating interview about women’s radio history with University of Louisville Professor of History Christine Ehrick. Author of Radio and the Gendered Soundscape: Women and Broadcasting in Argentina and Uruguay, 1930-1950, Ehrick schools us on the hidden history of a pioneering women’s radio station in Uruguay. […] The post Podcast #245 – Hidden Women’s Radio History in Uruguay appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Some consider the late 1960s through the mid-1990s to be a “golden age” of college radio. History professor Katherine Rye Jewell, from Fitchburg State University, notes that the period begins with college stations taking to the FM dial, and concludes with the rise of the internet. During that time, college radio stations certainly at times […] The post Podcast #244 – Exploring the So-Called ‘Golden Age’ of College Radio appeared first on Radio Survivor.

A common theme on Radio Survivor is that claims of being first should be viewed skeptically. From purported first college radio station to first internet simulcast, we’ve learned that there’s always another challenger to the prize. This time around, however, we can say this is definitively the first ever episode of Radio Survivor broadcast, and […] The post Podcast #243 – A Radio Survivor First appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Did you know that a lot of folks in Europe listen to radio on their televisions? Neither did we, until we talked with James Cridland, editor of the daily Podnews email newsletter and radio futurologist. He explains that outside of North America much of radio is enjoyed on more platforms, from digital DAB to, yes, […] The post Podcast #242 – Radio on the TV with James Cridland appeared first on Radio Survivor.

WBCN in Boston, MA is one of the storied freeform FM stations in American commercial radio history. We’re talking about it because there’s a recent documentary film, entitled “WBCN and the American Revolution,” that dives into its history, and how WBCN’s early days in the late 60s and early 70s are intertwined with the counter […] The post Podcast #241 – WBCN and the American Revolution appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Ken Freedman is the General Manager and the Program Director of WFMU, a free form community radio station in Jersey City, New Jersey that prides itself on it’s live, in studio sound from every one of it’s DJ’s. So this particular crisis, the Pandemic and the Lock Down, is a unique challenge. “This disaster is […] The post Podcast #240 – WFMU is Still On the Air During the Pandemic appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Raven Radio, KCAW-FM, serves Sitka and the remote communities of Southeast Alaska with public radio content, local news and volunteer-produced programming. Like “shelter in place” elsewhere in the lower 48, Sitka is on what they call a “hunker down” advisory. We talk with KCAW General Manager and friend of the show, Becky Meiers about how […] The post Podcast #239 – Hunkering Down with Raven Radio in Sitka, Alaska appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The University of Virgina’s WTJU now only permits one person in their studios at one time and has five remote locations ready to take over live broadcasting. That’s a couple of ways that community and college stations are coping with the COVID-19 pandemic. Community radio WTJU General Manager Nathan Moore joins this week to explain […] The post Podcast #238 – Social Distancing, Going Remote and Automation during Global Pandemic appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Community and college radio stations are unique in broadcasting because in addition to being important community services, many are also a community crossroads, hosting dozens or hundreds of people in their studios and spaces in any given week. That means the novel coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic poses a specific challenge for these broadcasters. KPFA’s “UpFront” co-host […] The post Podcast #237 – How Community & College Radio Can Deal with COVID-19 appeared first on Radio Survivor.

FCC policy has left media ownership diversity at “obnoxiously low levels,” especially considering that more minority and women ownership is one of the desired objectives. That’s what Prof. Chris Terry from the University of Minnesota tells us on this week’s show. The Commission may be headed to the Supreme Court to defend its diversity policy, […] The post Podcast #236 – FCC and the Supremes appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Jennifer, Eric and Paul have some college radio news to review, but first they pull back the curtain to survey the state of affairs in Radio Survivorland. They note some recent attention from The A.V. Club and Podnews along with a nice uptick in podcast audience as they reflect on the importance of sticking with […] The post Podcast #235 – Pulling Back the Curtain appeared first on Radio Survivor.

In New Zealand a dozen partially government-funded radio stations are charged with providing access to under-represented groups and communities. Wellington Access Radio, situated in New Zealand’s capital city, was the first station of its kind in that country, and station manager Kristen Paterson tells us more about its history and mission. Kristen explains the funding […] The post Podcast #234 – Community Access Radio in New Zealand appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Radio waves don’t obey borders, and stations have been taking advantage of this fact since the dawn of the medium – often despite the rules of government regulators where the signals go. Dr. Kevin Curran of Arizona State University has been studying border radio stations extensively, making it the subject of his doctoral dissertation. Everyone […] The post Podcast #233 – Border Radio in North America (rebroadcast) appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Scholar Jocelyn Robinson says about one-third of Historically Black Colleges and Universities have radio stations. Her mission is to survey them and help preserve their histories and recorded legacies through the HBCU Radio Station Archival Survey Project, which she directs. On this episode Robinson tells us about this project, and explains why it’s important to […] The post Podcast #232 – Documenting & Preserving Radio at HBCUs appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Eric Nuzum started NPR’s podcasting efforts in 2005 where he worked for over a decade and helped produce hit shows like “TED Radio Hour” and “Invisibila” – he left NPR for Audible, where he led Amazons efforts in the realm of short form audio and podcasts until 2018. Eric Nuzum is currently a consultant and […] The post Podcast #231 – Eric Nuzum appeared first on Radio Survivor.

On this week’s episode we learn about a brand new project at the Library of Congress that is focused entirely on archiving podcasts. Ted Westervelt, Manager of the Podcast Preservation Project at Library of Congress, joins us to share early details from this new initiative. He explains that the hope is that a wide variety […] The post Podcast #230 – The Library of Congress Launches Podcast Preservation Project appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The PIRATE Act, recently passed by Congress, is intended to stem the tide of unlicensed radio broadcasting by providing the Federal Communications Commission with new tools. Chief amongst them are new maximum fines, and a shortcut to issuing them. But will this really work? Author and radio scholar John Anderson says that a lot of […] The post Podcast #229 – Reading the PIRATE Act appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Last week we declared that the 2010s were a banner decade for community radio. As Jennifer notes, though college radio had a tough start to the last decade, with the loss of prominent stations like KUSF, KTRU and WRVU, the service seriously bounced back, aided by factors like the low-power FM boom, internet radio, HD […] The post Podcast #228 – College Radio’s Biggest Decade appeared first on Radio Survivor.

We begin part one of our review of the last decade in radio with the observation that it saw the greatest expansion of community radio in history. Though the second US LPFM licensing window that happened in 2013 is a significant driver, the growth happened all over the world. The 2010s were also a growth […] The post Podcast #227 – A Banner Decade for Community Radio and FrankenFMs appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Here at the close of 2019 and the beginning of 2020 we’re celebrating the 31st anniversary of the end of one of the most fascinating periods in radio broadcast history, when pirate radio ruled the Irish airwaves. We enjoyed this interview – recorded at the beginning of 2019 – and we think you will, too. […] The post Podcast #226 – Irish Pirate Radio Encore appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Matthew Lasar starts off this episode by declaring that this was the year that his undergraduate students stopped listening to broadcast AM/FM radio. Then he admits, he’s nearly stopped, too. Find out why in this lively rundown of what was significant to radio in 2019. On the other hand, our resident college radio expert Jennifer […] The post Podcast #225 – A Review of 2019 in Radio appeared first on Radio Survivor.

All nine judges on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals recently denied the FCC’s request for a rehearing on its many-times rejected media ownership rules. Prof. Christopher Terry calls this the Commission’s “Legacy of Failure.” But it begs the question, what does success look like? Prof. Terry, who teaches media law at the University of […] The post Podcast #224: How the FCC Could Support Diversity, Localism & Competition in Radio & TV appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The Federal Communications Commission is all about radio at the end of 2019, and we catch you up on what you need to know. We all have questions about the possibility of AM stations going all-digital, including the FCC. The regulatory body released the things it wants to know about how digital stations would work, […] The post Podcast #223: Will CMJ Return, Will AM Go Digital and Will FrankenFMs Disappear? Plus Other Big Questions appeared first on Radio Survivor.

November 30 was the 20th anniversary of the “Battle of Seattle” protests against the World Trade Organization ministerial meetings in that Pacific Northwest city. The broad array of groups and 80,000 people who assembled understood they would not receive a fair hearing in the mainstream press, so they built their own internet-based platform to instantly […] The post Podcast #222 – Marking the 20th Anniversary of Indymedia appeared first on Radio Survivor.

On this week’s show, we take a trip back to the early 20th century to learn about the recording industry’s intertwined relationship with radio and music culture. Our guest is Kyle Barnett, Associate Professor of Media Studies in the Department of Communication at Bellarmine University. Barnett’s forthcoming book, Record Cultures: The Transformation of the U.S. […] The post Podcast #221 – The Intertwined History of the Radio and Recording Industries appeared first on Radio Survivor.

When Jim Bolt was in college at Sacramento State University in 1989 college radio was exerting unprecedented cultural influence in the U.S. But this campus no longer had a radio station. Though he had heard stories of an earlier student-run AM station – KERS – he couldn’t get to the bottom of why it no […] The post Podcast #220 – The College Radio Station ‘That Shouldn’t Exist’ appeared first on Radio Survivor.

In April 2020 the FCC will open up the next auction for FM radio licenses. This is the next, and only currently scheduled opportunity to build a new radio station in the U.S. Jennifer, Eric and Paul discuss this news, along with celebrating the 60th birthday of KFJC-FM at Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, […] The post Podcast #219 – The Next Chance To Get an FM Station License; a College Station 60th; All-Digital AM appeared first on Radio Survivor.

On this week’s episode, Karen Cariani, the David O. Ives Executive Director of the WGBH Media Library and Archives, joins us to talk about the work of the American Archive of Public Broadcasting (AAPB). A collaboration between the Library of Congress and WGBH, the AAPB not only archives public radio and television; but it also […] The post Podcast # 218: Archiving Public Media appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Amanda Dawn Christie is an artist enamored with radios and radio waves. The Assistant Professor, Studio Arts at Concordia University (Montreal, Canada) joins us on the show to discuss her most recent transmission art project, Ghosts in the Airglow, in which she created work at the HAARP facility in Alaska. Christie also shares with us […] The post Podcast #217: Radio Spectrum and Transmission Art appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Our guest is Brian DeShazor, an independent radio researcher and founder of the Queer Radio Research Project. Formerly the Director of the Pacifica Radio Archives, DeShazor has taken a special interest in uncovering and highlighting the LGBTQ voices that have aired on community radio in decades past. On the episode, we discuss the history of […] The post Podcast #216 – Archiving LGBTQ Radio History (Rebroadcast) appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Today our online networks are largely owned and operated by corporations that spy on us for profit, but 20 years ago leftist activists built a very different kind of online network. It was called Indymedia. It was one of the first online spaces where people could self publish photos and text as well as audio […] The post Podcast #215 – Lessons Indymedia Has for Us Today appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Net neutrality received a very mixed ruling from the DC Circuit Court of Appeals last week. The Court largely upheld the significantly looser rules passed by the FCC in 2017 under the leadership of Republican Chairman Ajit Pai. But at the same time the Court said the Commission overstepped its bounds in attempting to forbid […] The post Podcast #214 – Net Neutrality Is a Local Issue Now appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The FCC lost in court for the fourth time on September 23, in what’s become a really bad habit in the case known as Prometheus Radio Project v. FCC. The Third Circuit Court of Appeals keeps sending the Commission back to do homework to justify with evidence the changes it wants to make in loosening […] The post Podcast #213: Four Strikes for the FCC’s Media Ownership Policy appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Radio waves don’t obey borders, and stations have been taking advantage of this fact since the dawn of the medium – often despite the rules of government regulators where the signals go. Dr. Kevin Curran of Arizona State University has been studying border radio stations extensively, making it the subject of his doctoral dissertation. Everyone […] The post Podcast #212 – Border Radio in North America appeared first on Radio Survivor.

More than 600 community radio recordings from 1965 – 1986 are archived at the University of Maryland. These tapes were shared through a program exchange operated by the National Federation of Community broadcasters. The breadth of programming contained in these programs is remarkable, and underscores the still-active mission of the NFCB to support and promote […] The post Podcast #211 – Surveying Community Radio’s Deep Archives appeared first on Radio Survivor.

RadiOpio Program Director Laura Civitello has the enviable job of running a youth radio station on the Hawaiian Island of Maui. From an upstairs perch at the beach side Pa’ ia Youth and Cultural Center, Civitello manages KOPO-LP, whose on-air hosts range in age from 9 to 19 years old. On this week’s show, Civitello […] The post Podcast #210 – Youth Radio by the Beach appeared first on Radio Survivor.

From the “Classical Radio Era” to today’s hottest podcasts, we’re here for the love of radio drama and fictional sound-art. Our guest is Neil Verma, author of a book and teacher of classes on the subject, although as he tells us on today’s episode, the class became a lot more popular with students after he […] The post Podcast #209 – Audio Fiction’s very long history of innovation appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Jennifer is back from travels, that included Hawaiian community radio, to join Eric and Paul. First up, a question: is “pathfinder” a good replacement for the word “pioneer,” the latter of which has an unfortunate colonial heritage? Listener Pat Flanagan suggested it to us after we asked for input a couple of episodes, so we […] The post Podcast #208 – Radio and Podcast Pathfinding in San Francisco and Podcast Movement appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Nathan Moore is the General Manager of WTJU at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia. Hear how and why he has lead the way to build a podcasting studio for the community to use, as well as a student run LPFM college radio station and a concert series and a summer camp. Show Notes: […] The post Podcast #207 – Building More Communities Around Your Station appeared first on Radio Survivor.

With mergers, acquisitions and millions of dollars changing hands, podcasts continue to be in the news. But just when it seems like well-funded networks are edging out the indies, Paul and Eric are here to assure community and college broadcasters and independent podcasters that there is growing opportunity for them, too. Show Notes: Paul on […] The post Podcast #206 – Podcasts Are Radio appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Hello, Eric Klein here. This week’s episode of the radio show features wall to wall music selected by Matthew Lasar to demonstrate his passion for the radio format he would like to hear more of in the world, Hybrid Highbrow. All that music would be against the rules in a podcast, so this web-only version […] The post Podcast #205 – A Brief Update appeared first on Radio Survivor.

This week we explore the role of radio as a tool for resistance with two of the eight organizers of the “Resistance Radio ‘The People’s Airwaves'” exhibit in Brooklyn, New York. Interference Archive volunteers Celia Easton Koehler and Elena Levi join us on the podcast to discuss the scope of the exhibit, which investigates a […] The post Podcast #204 – Resistance Radio ‘The People’s Airwaves’ appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The FCC is one step closer to a rule change that threatens to de-fund community media and technology, by undermining a long-established principle that cable and internet companies owe rent to municipalities for use of the public right-of-way. Sabrina Roach, board member of the Alliance for Community Media Foundation, joins to help us understand what’s […] The post Podcast #203 – FCC One Step Closer to Defunding Community Media appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The FCC just proposed a series of changes to help make it easier for low-power FM stations to move their transmitters and to fill in weak signal areas. We review this proposal along with a suggestion from the Commission to whittle away at protections for the few dozen remaining analog low-power TV channel 6 stations, […] The post Podcast #202 – Small Boosts Proposed for LPFM & Why Aren’t There College Stations on the Dial in San Diego? appeared first on Radio Survivor.

A different media world is possible. What if the FCC truly regulated in the public interest, creating policies and services that promoted community voices and civic values? It does happen occasionally, but not often enough. It’s easy to assume our media system turned out this way because it was inevitable, but in truth it was […] The post Podcast #201 – A Fantasy FCC Serves the Public Interest appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Radio Survivor celebrates 10 years on the internet and four years podcasting with our 200th episode. Matthew Lasar joins Jennifer Waits, Eric Klein and Paul Riismandel for this review of the last decade in radio that matters. Matthew tells the Radio Survivor origin story that sprang forth from his I.F. Stone inspired research deep into […] The post Podcast #200 – How We Survived a Decade of Independent Publishing appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The FCC was back in front of the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals again, defending its failure to address declines in minority- and women-owned broadcast stations, amongst other failures. In fact, as our guest, University of Minnesota Prof. Christopher Terry, explains, the Commission claims it’s too hard to assess the change in ownership between 1996 […] The post Podcast #199 – The FCC Is ‘Flunking Statistics 101’ appeared first on Radio Survivor.

In June 2009 a coup d’etat overthrew Honduras’ democratically elected president Manuel Zelaya. Since the coup, human rights conditions in that country have deteriorated. Radio has become a vital organizing tool for defending the rights of indigenous people and fighting environmental destruction, while providing needed information and education to people in rural areas. In April […] The post Podcast #198 – Defending Human Rights with Radio in Honduras appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Alaska’s unique geography and way-of-life leads to unique radio. Raven Radio is a public and community station serving the city of Sitka, along with seven other small towns in Southeast Alaska. The station is not just a source of news, music and culture, but also a lifeline for people living in remote communities where there […] The post Podcast #197 – Raven Radio in Sitka, Alaska appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Can US radio survive even more consolidation? The National Association of Broadcasters is asking the FCC to raise local radio ownership caps in the 75 biggest radio markets, and to get rid of limits entirely in the remaining 194. The prospect of even less diversity on the airwaves has motivated a broad coalition of music […] The post Podcast #196 – The Campaign To Keep Local Radio Local appeared first on Radio Survivor.