HD Radio, Natale col botto? Le renne arrancano

Tramite la solita ABDX, uno dei tanti gruppi di discussione specializzata (in questo caso per DXer delle onde medie negli Stati Uniti), sono capitato sul sito di una società di consulting radiofonico e mediatico, Edison Media Research. La segnalazione su ABDX era dovuta a un contributo di uno dei columnist, Sean Ross: un non-tecnico (ma grande appassionato della radio) che mette alla prova il suo apparecchio HD Radio nuovo di pacca, appena acquistato da Radio Shack. La catena di elettronica di consumo, che sta attraversando una fase non troppo favorevole, ha messo infatti in promozione il modello HD Radio, Accurian (e pensare che pagano milioni per inventare questi nomi da deficienti), all'incredibile costo di 99 dollari. La prima vera promozione natalizia per un sistema di radio digitale che non riesce ancora a sfondare anche per colpa delle sue vistose lacune strategiche.

La "prova su strada" di Ross non è tecnica come quella di un ingegnere, ma è molto interessante il suo approccio basato sulla speranza di avere, attraverso Accurian, una maggiore scelta in fatto di programmazione. Sulla qualità dell'audio, il recensore avrebbe parecchio da eccepire, non è affatto quel suono cristallino e pieno che Ibiquity promette e che l'FM analogico riesce, guarda caso, a garantire. Ma al di là dell'aspetto qualitativo, anche Ross sottolinea come i contenuti siano fondamentali. E su questo punto HD Radio non riesce a mantenere tutte le promesse legate alla possibilità di trasmettere piccoli multiplex di programmi sulla stessa frequenza. Riporto qui il testo completo delle conclusioni tratte da Sean Ross, perché vanno meditate a fondo. Specialmente là dove il digitale terrestre viene confrontato col satellitare (Ross sottolinea che per lui la disponibilità di centinaia di canali ultraspecializzati è semma claustrofobica, ma anche che la varietà dev'essere tangibile) e dove vengono suggerite alcune banali - ma del tutto ignorate, finora -tecniche di marketing indispensabili per spingere la gente verso l'aquisto di radio digitali.
Ross riprende alcuni commenti al suo intervento nel blog The Infinite Dial, "Constructive Dialogue On The Future Of Audio Entertainment".

As a non-engineer, I would not try to write authoritatively about the Accurian's sound quality, except to say that I was somehow expecting the head-rush of loudness of, say, the THX "the audience is listening" movie trailer. What I heard lacked the fullness of even the average FM station--as if the primary goal was to demonstrate CD-style clarity. I even managed to stumble across Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass' "A Taste Of Honey" on WCBS-FM-2--a swinging '60s instrumental that should have been a great audio showcase. But that didn't have any particular punch here. And one multicast channel, WQHT-2, was roughly half the volume of its HD-1 sister.
Okay, in case any of HD's regular critics or satellite radio competitors are gloating now, I should point out that I still put up with a certain amount of signal drop-outs and futzing around with the antenna to listen to my Sirius Satellite Radio as well. If I'd felt like I were getting a lot of station options, or even one must-have station, it wouldn't have mattered. But in a market with multiple choices, there were frustratingly few new ones.
Of course, much of what I did hear on HD-2 was content that I'd heard before from stations that also stream on the Web. But hearing the programming over a radio instead of computer speakers brought home a few points, and allows me to end with some advice for targeting anybody who did buy a HDradio this month.

1. If you were given Sirius a year ago, you had the countdown to Howard Stern to build excitement. If the industry indeed believes that the greater availability of receivers at an attractive price point is finally putting HDRadio under more chimneys this holiday season, it's time to gear more programming to those people. Of the multicast stations I encountered over Thanksgiving weekend, only WCBS-FM-2's Oldies format was offering any sort of special countdown or anything that differed from what one might have heard a week (or month) earlier.

2. For the same reason, stations should devote more promo inventory to explaining the advantages of HD-2, welcoming listeners to the club, and congratulating them on being early adopters. HD-1 stations that promote HDRadio should mention that listeners are getting the radios for the holiday. And there should be some way for listeners to interact with the new stations and each other; what fun is joining the club if you can't talk to somebody about it?

3. Just as stations run the audio of their TV spots as an on-air promo, more HD-2 multicast channels should try to reflect the "secret stations" marketing heard in some of the institutional advertisements for HDRadio, and try to capitalize on the mystique that those promos hope to create.

4. Stations should also try to show off HD-2 with more audiophile programming. Early FM had music that was worth hearing in FM stereo. I'm guessing that in 2006, that's more likely to be Tool than Herb Alpert for many consumers.

The multicast channels should be high-concept and deliver on it. As with satellite radio, I'm not in favor of stations so narrow that they're claustrophobic, or so obscure that they're of interest only to a collector, but I've encountered deep cuts stations that weren't so deep and new music channels that weren't so new. As we found out after the first year of satellite radio, wide variety by itself is not enough. But first there has to be tangible variety.
This spring's optimism among many programmers about the capabilities of HD-2 multicast stations seemed a little unrealistic. A lot of the programming time and on-air inventory that broadcasters devoted to their HD-2s might then have been better devoted to stations that were being widely heard. With budget and personnel cuts now taking place across the industry, it seems unrealistic that more resources are now going to be devoted to multicast stations. But $99 pricing suggests that HDRadio finally has its driver--and that gives any station broadcasting in HD a renewed responsibility to put on a show for those listeners who do show up.

Tags: radioascolto, radiofonia, radio, dxing.