Tuesday, April 29, 2008

The New York Radio Message Board (NYRMB)

Do you listen to the radio? So do I. There’s a place online where people who love radio can talk about the industry in New York. The New York Radio Message Board (NYRMB) has been a unique institution since 1998, a place where professionals and fans chat, debate, and in many cases catch the eye of decision makers looking for ideas.

To be allowed to post on the NYRMB you have to send an email to the moderator, Allan Sniffen, who issues your password. One of the distinguishing characteristics of the board is that the moderator asks each poster in this mostly male board to use his real name. Most follow this rule and it leads to a higher level of civil discourse that any other board I have seen. Not much flaming goes on. Allan has been known to bounce people from the board for going off-topic.

Many professionals sign on and it’s a treat to hear the opinions of well-known radio personalities in an informal setting. For example, I’ve seen posts from Johnny Donavan, Big Jay Sorensen, Jay Diamond, and Cubby Bryant.

The range of topics this past week included the new Arbitron ratings, baseball on the radio, Opie and Anthony, and the move of WNYC’s studios. My own postings on the board have been about Imus, Whoopi, Boomer and Carton, Bob & Ray, and wherever I think I might have some fact to add to the discussion. I recently started a thread after a visit to my sister’s house to look after her cats. She uses a roof antenna and as I sat on the couch and channel surfed I checked out a topic that shows up on the board, Pulse 87, an FM station is actually VHF Channel 6. I heard the FM signal but was surprised to find that they were broadcasting a video loop of Texas wildlife. This generated some interest on the board as seen in this thread. Just spend 10 minutes on the NYRMB and you’ll learn something new.

· VHF Channel 6 (home of Pulse 87 FM) running wildlife video - Brian Black 19:20:40 04/22/08 (6)

Posted by Brian Black on April 22, 2008 at 19:20:40:

I'm seeing scenes of Texas wildlife and hearing hot dance rhythms on VHF Channel 6 tonight. Could Pulse 87 be testing in order to begin using the video carrier?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Has The Best Show on WFMU ever come up? Maybe I'll have to register to get the word out. ;)--Mike L.

Brian said...

Sure has, recently on the April 1 stunt.