RADIO RECORD

Greymouth Evening Star, 19 May 1938, Page 6

RADIO RECORD

NOTES • FOR LISTENERS-IN

“Reception”)

(By

AUSTRALIAN LISTENERS YEAR’S FEES £981,109 The Commonwealth Auditor-General Mr. H. C. Brown, in his annual report for the financial year ended June 30, 1937, discloses that the concerts arranged by the Australian Broadcasting Commission during that year cost £35,639 more than was received. The proceeds were £26,328, and the expenditure £61,967. During 1936-37 licensed listeners in Australia paid £981.16'9 in fees. The Commission’s total income during the year, including the revenue from concerts, was £558,239, an increase of £87,242. compared with the previous year. The total expenditure was £544,942, £165,411 more than in 1935-36. The balance was £ 13,296. compared with £91,465. This lias been added to reserve and accumulated funds, which in the five years ended June 30, 1937, amounted to £252.163. Mr. Brown states that the rise in levenue of £87,242, was due mainly’ to an increase of £67,760 in broad-; cast listeners’ license fees, and an in- i crease of £15,468 in proceeds of con-, certs. The principal increases of ex-j penditure, he says, were artists’ fees j and programme expenses, £163,246: | copyright fees £4,112, and rental of' telephone lines for broadcasting i £2,235. I Decreases in staff salaries of £5,044, and rent of offices, £7.143. were* due to the inclusion of the salaries of. programme officers and rent of stu--dios in artists’ fees and programme' expenses. The increase under this! heading is chiefly accounted for by sal-' uries of programme officers totalling £32,953; orchestras and band £59,528 and concerts promoted by the Commission £61,967.

The Broadcasting Commission’s share of the £981,109 from listeners’ licenses was £529,135, the Post Office retained £419,312 for studio and station operation, and other technical services, and £32,602 was undistributed at June 30, 1937. The accounts showing the Post Office transactions are not yet available, but during the previous year, .the excess of Post Office receipts over expenditure on wireless services was £86,184. WGY’S NEW TOWER INCREASED SIGNAL STRENGTH From a new steel antenna tower "Oft. higher than the Washington monument, WGY. Schenectady. New York, will soon be radiating its 50,000 watt signals to the four corners of the country. Located on the company's 65acre transmitter laboratory plot, three miles from Schenectady, th>. new 625 ft tower, engineers predict, will greatly increase the strength of signals and extend the coverage area many miles, yet i none way will tend to blanket the reception of programmes from other stations.

The new antenna, which will be used for National Broadcasting Company’s programmes, rests on a point, instead of coming to a point at the top. The lofty steel structure. 9ft. square, rests on a porcelain insulator but 20in in diameter at its base. This porcelain unit insulates the “live” tower from the ground, for the entire tower, ladder, and platforms included, is the active antenna or radiator. The porcelain insulator bears a total weight of 500,0001 b,, and before installation was tested by the Bureau of Standards to an ultimate strength of 2,180,0001 b. The tower is supported on this point by eight massive steel guy lines, two attached to each of the four sides of the tower. Four guy lines are attached at 250 ft level and four at 500 ft level. These lines are stretched out 450 ft. from the tower to concrete anchors buried deep in the ground. Each cable is strung with seven insulators to prevent any diversion of signal strength from the antenna. At the point of attachment to the tower the guy starts with a 7001 b. insulator: and then at intervals along the steel cable, breaking the cable into segments, are six insulators, each weighing 3001 b.

While the tower itself occupies relatively little land, the complete antenna system with the ground system covers 20 acres. Thirteen miles of copper ribbon, lin wide and fifteenthousandths of an inch thick, arc buried ISin under the ground and radiate out to a distance of 625 ft. from the base of the tower.

A 1,100-watt flasher beacon at the lop will give warning to aviators, and in addition there will be constantlyglowing lights at different levels of the tower. To provide greater visibility during dull and misty days, the tower lias been painted in alternate sections of orange and white.

NO “MASS” TELEVISION The first ban on television reproduction or reception for mass entertainment has been announced by the 8.8. C. Just before the England v. Wales women’s international hockey match at Kennington Oval was transmitted this statement Was flashed on the screens to viewers: — “The reproduction in any form of the outside broadcast which follows, including projection in places of public entertainment, is strictly prohibited.” This announcement preceded similar television transmissions in order to retain exclusiveness of the service to viewers. It refers to those places where a charge is made for admission. The importance of the ban is that it will also prevent copyright infringement. furthermore, it is not known by th'' public how rapidly the reception radius of television is extending. When the service opened in November, 1936, it was officially stated that the reception of programmes could not be guaranteed beyond a radius of 25 miles of Alexandra Palace tranmitters.

Signals from the -Alexandra Palace transmitters have been picked up by ships 30 miles off the Sussex coast. During the recent transmissions of a motor race meeting engineers installed a special area in Old Trafford Park, Manchester, and received the sound vision transmissions from London 200 miles away. The ban will increase the sales field for manufacturers of home receivers.

| £4O PER MINUTE J MRS. ROOSEVELT BROADCASTS £6OO for fifteen minutes is the fee paid to Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt, ! wife of the President of the United i States. It would attract notice, for a single ' address, even in America, where, large ifees are an everyday occurrence. : ’1 hat sum is however, paid for a series | of speeches of a quarter of an hour < each in a "sponsored programme.” I Mrs. Roosevelt's popularity and ■ therefore, her advertising value are I attested by the fact that her “fan j mail" amounts to approximately 100,i 000 letters a year. This number inI eludes letters, relating to her broad- • ccasts and other matters. j Well known as a writer and public ' speaker, the early directors in charge ' of her appearances were, apparently, so afraid of offending her or seeming to interfere with her that they never I asked her to rehearse before the micjrophone so that they might time her ; speech to make sure tthat it filled exi actly her allotted time. They were con- ; tent to take a chance that she neither (exceeded nor fell short of the minutes j arranged for. Later, the direction of her broad--casts was placed in the hands of Mr. ill. Calvert Haws, who has had a wide I experience of broadcasting. At Mrs. Roosevelt’s first broadcast he followed what his predecessors had done and did not time the address beforehand. On that occasion he was amazed to find that, instead of speaking for the nine minutes allotted to her. she finished in eight minutes.

A pause of a minute is a very long time in the American broadcastingworld, and sets most of the people in the studio dithering. That would, no doubt, have been the case then but for the presence of mind of the conductor of the band which was to follow Mrs. Roosevelt. Sensing what everyone was feeling, and with barely a moment’s hesitation, he gave the sharp beat for attention with his baton and the next instant "the air” was eloquent with music, which filled out the odd minute preceding his own ! programme time.

Such a contretemps could not be allowed to occur again. Mr. Haws, therefore. counted the number of words in Mrs. Roosevelt’s manuscript, and found that she had spoken at the rate of 135 words per minute, so that during the eight minutes she had spoken 1080 words.

Her next ’script, he found, contanieu 1700 instead of the 1200 or so required. In other words, the manuscript needed twelve minutes to be put over “on the air.” There was, obviously, only one thing to do in the circumstances —cut the manuscript to its proper length. Mr. Haws did it.

When Mrs. Roosevelt arrived at the studio, the cut. ’script was handed to her and she was told what had been done. Instem' of being annoyed or put out, as so many women would have been, she : miled approval, read through the dr--ss in its abbreviated form, and br- idcast it like ;i professional.

In spite of the largo fees she receives, Mrs. Roosevelt, makes no money by her broadcast addresses. All her fees are sent direct to a philanthropic society, which distributes the amounts to the various institutions to bp benefited. Like every other broadcast speaker, Mrs. Roosevelt is not immune from public criticism. On one occasion, it has been related, a man, amazed at hearing the large foe she received, v I’ote that, in his opinion, no broadca.s.or was worth so much money. “I think that you are perfectly right that no out; is worth two hundred dollars a minute,” Mrs. Roosevelt replied. “1 never dreamed for a minute that 1 was. I do not feel that this money is paid to mo as an individual, but that it is paid ot the President’s wife. It puts money into circulation. The money is spent for a good purpose, and these people would not otherwise be helped. Therefore, 1 think 1 am perfectly justified in doing it.” The result of doing exactly what the director desires is that Mrs. Roosevelt has become an exceeTTingly eiti cient speaker “on the air.” with a technique so enormously improved that the people who engage her feel that they get full value for their money even though it costs them over six hundred pounds every time she broadccasts for a quarter of an hour.

BROADCAST APPEALS British listeners responded generously to appeals for charitable causes made in programmes during 1937, a grand total of £162,265 being subscribed in response to nearly 350 national and local broadcasts, for the last. 12 years five minutes of every Sunday's programmes have been devoted 1.0 the appeals, which are broadcast under the title of "The Week’s Good Cause.” Special committees consider the many applications for the use of the period. Beneficiaries of the charity concerned, as well as persons of national and local repute—act as appellants—for example, two children once broadcast op behalf of the orphanage that had brought them up. The annual appeal on Christmas Day on behalf of the British “Wireless for the Blind” fund —which derives virtually all its income from listeners’ contributions —heads the results for 1937. the sum received to date being £22,897. The most generous response on record was to an appeal o)i bclmll of British Red Cross work in Ethiopia, £27,408 being contributed.