If you walked into a radio station today, such as WOGL...you'd find a large computer monitor in the control displaying a sequential 'log' showing each item in the order it's played scrolling down the screen.

The computer screen displays which channel the element
(i.e, songs and/or spots) will play through.

Example...


Kerbeck Auto World/:60 CHANNEL ONE
Tastykake-May Sale/:30 CHANNEL TWO
WOGL (Med/Up Jingle)/:05 CHANNEL THREE
O'Jays-Back Stabbers/2:59 CHANNEL FOUR

The computer usually feeds 4-6 of the 12 or so channels on the board.

The Music Director pre-programs all of the songs from the playlist into each hour of the 24 hour day.

The DJ simply 'fires' the buttons that correspond to each channel depending on whether it's the song, a spot, or a jingle/music bed.

Some stations have it all on a monitor but rather than pressing a button on the board, the jock touches a pad on the screen and 'fires' or starts the element that way.

By the way...WOGL is a CBS station. Their oldies formats actually have every single Top 40 song from the 60's and 70's (and a slew of the 50's as well) stored in the hard drive. However...ONLY the MD (Music Director) & PD have access. The jocks don't have the password needed to play them. Songs not in regular rotation are occasionally pre-programmed for weekend 'specials' and music spotlights.

Therefore..when a listener calls to request a song and the jock says 'It's not available'...that's what exactly what they mean.

Hope that helps...a little inside 'skinny' as it were, from the other side of the glass.

Bob

• RE: FM Sound Quality ++ - John 05/14/2008 23:45:08 EDT (0)