Potok FM - monitoring of regional radio broadcasting

    There is an opinion that everything that got on the Internet remained there forever. With broadcasting, the situation is the opposite: in most cases, what was not heard went into oblivion.

    The inability to repeat or analyze the contents of at least yesterday’s broadcast inspired the creation of a monitoring complex that would allow working with radio archives as with a regular database. The difficulty was not so much in the audio format of the data as in the need for a physical presence in each of the connected cities.


    To implement such a complex, it was necessary to create a geo-distributed network of storages and teach it how to work with sound.

    To connect the city to the complex, a server is installed, the main task of which is to receive and analyze the broadcasts of all FM radio stations in this particular region. Having connected 25 cities in a similar way, we combine all the pieces of iron in a hardware-software complex with user access through a website.

    The output is an infrastructure that writes and stores an archive of the country's regional broadcasting, and allows you to work remotely with it in the future. Based on this infrastructure, a number of interesting analytical and search services can be implemented.

    Air Monitoring


    The first and most fundamental service is “Air Monitoring (ME)”. Its task is to automatically analyze the broadcast of a given radio station for inconsistent overlaps in regional broadcasting, as well as determine interference or silence.

    It is no secret that the broadcast content of one radio station differs in different cities of its broadcasting. Local news and programs, weather forecasts, advertising grids, traffic jams and other blocks create a unique broadcast in this city, and its uniqueness can reach 100% (24 hours). As a rule, the overlap schedule is agreed to the regional grid, but in practice it is extremely difficult to track its compliance.

    Users who have connected the ME service get access to daily reports on the real situation in the region. Any segment of the air that raises questions or requires confirmation can be requested from the archive of airs and listen. Thus, an instrument is created to monitor and control compliance with agreements or the fulfillment of commercial obligations.

    HabrFM


    For example, imagine that the Moscow radio HabrFM opens broadcasting in Omsk. Habrabosses and colleagues from Siberia shook hands and agreed that on weekdays the regional grid of allowed overlap, which determines the cost of the franchise, would look like this:


    Comment: everything that falls on the regional grid layer (yellow) can officially (but not have to) be blocked by another content for the end listener. Discrepancy of broadcasting outside the grid is unacceptable.

    But the air day passed, and the real situation turned out differently.


    Comment: 2 hours 37 minutes 45 seconds (almost 11% of the airtime) - inconsistent overlaps on the HabrFM-Omsk airtime on November 30 were made up. Any of the segments of sound can be requested from the archive and listen for confirmation.

    During the period of overlapping, Omsk listeners did not receive the content that the owners expected to convey to them, and it does not matter what it was: federal advertising, the announcement of the event, or the president’s speech.

    In any case, there is a reason for conversation, substantiation of claims or other compensation measures that the owners of HabrFM will go to. And it's not just about lost money. In the long run, the image and security of the media business is much more important. Efficiency and the lack of human factor influence on reporting make the Monitoring of Air service a serious tool for managing regional media streams, especially with a developed regional network.

    Conclusion


    I can answer the questions in the comments. I don’t give links, but for those who want to feel personally - I will provide free access to the system (contact in your personal mail). I plan to participate in Startup Weekend (Moscow) on the weekend.

    In the next part I will talk about the second basic service - “Search Media (PM)”, which allows you to search for a given sound template in the archive and provide statistics on its rotation. The service confirms regional broadcasts of advertising, music and other content.

    Thank you, have a nice winter.

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