My Radio Segment, Episodes 13 & 14

I'm merging both the 13th [ available for download HERE ] & 14th [available for download HERE] episodes together in this report, broadcasted on the 6th and 13th of April respectively, due to the fact that one of them has follow up information for the other. The 14th episode have extra information only about Radio Al-Balad's new programs grid and its details.

Today i have no segment, and i shall be back on the airwaves next week with more news and subjects.

Started the 12th episode with a follow-up for the subject of episode before, with regards to planning the radio frequencies with neighboring countries, that is, as i discussed this subject over a telephone interview with the chief of TRC, Dr. Ahmed Hyasat, who explained the role of the TRC in organizing the coverage of Jordanian Radio stations' frequencies and their coverage, as well as insuring they wouldn't intersect with radio stations from neighboring countries, especially in border areas. In addition to conducting periodic coordination meetings with authorities in neighboring countries to regulate the frequencies and ensure that no interference would be caused neither by Jordanian or foreign radio stations, in addition to having direct communications channels with them in case of having coverage violations, especially violations that exceed border areas in the depth of Jordanian territories.
Dr Hyasat also stated in the interview that both radio stations as well as listeners themselves have a role in detecting such violations and reporting them to the TRC that would care to investigate and make necessary actions for the reported cases.

In my weekly review of the airwaves, I start from Irbid FM, Radio Jordan's local radio station broadcasting on 95.4 FM in irbid area, which has been stopped during this week and without any prior notice or declared reason, and whether this stop is permanent or temporary; how ever, recent news from Radio Jordan Broadcasting stated that this is a temporary stop, as the station will be facing some restructuring in both its employees and programs. Irbid FM is the only local radio station with specific programs targeting residents of the area its covering, and this radio station which started around 16 years ago on 103 FM in irbid area during specific hours on the same frequency of Radio Jordan Broadcasting – Main Service, has reached 7 hours of local broadcasting lately, while the remaining hours Radio Amman FM was broadcasting on this frequency.

Also, the radio station broadcasting on 93.7 FM in Amman, which i mentioned in an earlier episode that its still untitled (except for the RDS name “Nojoum FM”) and whose broadcasting is limited to broadcasting non stop Arabic song for over a year now. We started hearing some changes on it airwaves during this week, as its transmission stopped several times and we now can hear both Arabic and Western music on its airwaves, the station is also no longer entitled as Nojoum FM. This may signify the beginning of an actual beginning for the station soon.

On the other hand, a new station started its broadcasting on 94.9 FM covering the region of Amman, the station was still untitled at the time of preparing and broadcasting the 13th episode, but the week after i followed up and figured out this is the test transmission for Jordan University Radio. The station shall officially start its programs by the end of the month.

While in Karak, Mutah University's Radio station, Sawt Al-Karak, started its test broadcasting on 91.3 FM covering Karak area. The station shall officially start its programs soon as well during next may. Being a community radio serving the local area and community.

Moving further to reviewing what was on the running stations airwaves, i start from Friday 3-4-2009, in which, as the friday before and each and every friday, Radio Sawt Al-Madina was pretty busy with its special program and live transmission from one of Amman's cafes to follow and promote for the Jordanian participants in the reality TV & musical program “Star Academy”, with a lot of people on location, and even some of the program's stars from previous years, Sawt Al-Madina made a unique action for this program and among its fans and followers in jordan.

While on Beat FM, the Jordanian English speaking CHR radio, Beat FM had broken the CHR barriers with a 1st of April fool, as it broadcasted old Arabic songs on its airwaves! Not any songs, but those from old cartoon series translated in Arabic, and which we used to follow when we were little kids back in time. Those cartoon songs were presented within Beat FM's special promotion for “Fresh New Beats” :) ... 2 of those promotions are included in the 13th episode.

On the other hand, Radio Al-Balad had also broken the barriers, by having western music, more specifically Rock and Metal music starting to be aired on its airwaves through a specialized show entitled “Rock with Ghassan”. This programs comes as part of Radio Al-Balad's new programs grid which began on Saturday 4-4-2009. the show which comes out every Thursday from 7.30 PM is now the 4th of a kind, after Beat FM's, Spin Jordan's and Radio Jordan's rock shows. [show promotion attached]

also in this new programs grid, several shows got introduced on Radio Al-Balad, like “Sa7ebat al-qarar”, a legal information show for women, “Made in Jordan”, yet another sport program called “Mala3eb Ordoniah” and a come back for the cultural show “bera2e7at al-qahwa”.

One of the good things in this new programs grid (as radio al-balad changes its programs grid several times a year being a community radio), is the fact that most of the major shows are still on their same air times and days. And this is a good step, as changing the programs timing continuously makes the station loose listenership, due to the fact that a lot of listeners may stop listening to the radio station as their favorite shows get changes in times (maybe now you might know why most the commercial stations have the same programs and timings since they were lunched).

Indeed, sometimes the change is needed if there are fatal mistakes in the programming, at that case, re-programming [content and timing] are more of a need. An example of that was the dramatic changes in the programs grid on radio al-balad at the beginning of the year.