Lights off,AC off,Laptop on Battery mode, just the network line in to work and listen to the rockout on Spin Jordan :D .. its Earth Hour!
This is the way i contributed for the past 60 minutes for Earth Hours 2009 while being at work in a dark 4 walls no windows room in which i'm writing this at the moment.. Earth Hour 2009 in which Jordan had participated this year, with lights going off in several main streets, like: Gardens, Thaqafe, Mecca Street, Zahran, Istiklal, Queen Alia, and others. As well as all the main squares in the capital Amman, and all the official governmental offices & ministries (which are already closed at this time, especially in a weekend!). In addition to a candles walk toward wild jordan in Jabal Amman...all backed by the Ministry of Environment and the GAM.
So fine so far, but the unfine thing, is how much propaganda people do about it and about the objectives behind that...! from what i've seen until now and witnessed, i officially declare that the objectives of this initiative didn't reach for most Jordanians, particularly ammanites in my witnesses case!!!!
That is, because i, as well as several colleagues of mine, we have witnessed a lot of people chitchating on the street, even just minutes before earlier around 8 PM, that all the government will CUT OFF the electricity today at 8.30 PM in the whole Amman!!! this is what people got from it! Yes! Without caring to know why, what, how! Or even if they got the message correctly!
That even included the guys in the company in which i work, and whom have sent an IT Department guy to turn off all our severs resources!!!! until we have convinced him not to! After we cleared out the message to him and his manager via phone.
Now thats a big question mark! Is the mass media in our country weak enough, or are the people just propagandists, or both!!! in all cases, this is something that needs to be solved!
Anyway, more about earth hour from fellow jordanian bloggers:
Naseem Tarawneh
Farah Nimri
Eman
28 March, 2009
22 March, 2009
Jordanian Radio Ratings 2008 - My Radio Segment Episode,Episode 10
This week's episode is available for download HERE, and for listening on the listen icon.
This week's radio segment tackled IREX Jordan's Media survey, and particularly the Radio Section of the survey about Jordan Radio Ratings for the year 2008.
I have tackled in a post last year this time IREX Jordan's survey for the Jordanian Radio Ratings for the year 2007.
1st of all, to make things clear, the study considers to survey results:
Listenership for a period of 30 days from the survey: This would show the general listenership for radio, and what the surveyed had listened to within month.
Listenership for a period of 1 days prior to the survey: This would show the loyalty of listening to radio or to a specific radio station.
On the general level, and surprisingly, the radio listenership regardless of the station listened to, has DROPPED in 2008! regardless of the fact that the number of radio stations and frequencies covering the kingdom with radio transmission had increased! As 45.9% used to listen on daily basis to radio in 2007, the number has dropped to 43.7% only in 2008! and amazingly more, the big drop was in the youth of ages 15-29, from which less than 45.9% are listening to radio now, after the listenership percentage was 54.3% last year among them!
An almost 8.5% drop among the group mostly targeted on in our Jordanian radio stations. Are the Jordanian youth getting board of the copycats among Jordanian Radio Stations, where creativity seems to be stopping, and where most of the radio stations just trying to copy each other with a show or 2 on the air, and leave the rest to computers randomly shuffling music that you can heard on several other competitive radio station, or simply, pirated from the internet and played on your car radio or headset using an MP3 player, nothing more, nothing less.
Aren't Jordanian Radio stations thinking seriously about MP3 players, MP3 car modulators, Internet radio, and even TV and DVDs as competitors?! If they aren't then ... WRONG ANSWER! THINK AGAIN .... competition is not only about what other radio stations are playing or doing, and its not only about attracting another stations' listeners... its more over to getting those who don't listen to radio, never did, or quited doing so, back to listen to the airwaves through your radio station. Otherwise, we will just have 100 radio stations with 10% of the population listening to them! And out of a sudden we will have only 5 radio stations owned by the government on the airwaves after the rest of them get shut down! Not a happy ending in my imagination!
For the time being, the sector is still in a good shape, and the best in the Jordanian media scene with 67.8% of listenership within 30 days from the survey, much more exceeding newspapers (30.45%), magazines(8.45%).
The study included this year the way & place of listening to radio. One of the interesting things was that the study showed that just under 20% of the people listen to radio through Mobile phones that have FM receivers. The majority of those (over 60%) are youth, mostly school or university students, as this is their primary entertainment mean while being on the way from and to their universities/schools, or between the classes. On the other hand, listening to Jordanian radio stations via the internet didn't exceed 6.6%, as online broadcasting is more used by Jordanian abroad that jordnaians in jordan who can receive the stations via the FM. As for places where radio is mostly listen to, home was the biggest rate with 55.2% (with a big rate of house wives) followed by cars with just under 35%, at work 7.6% and 2.6% while moving by bus.
Before starting to review the radio ratings. And since there has been some debate about this study with regards to the written media and online media. And from my own point of view, i don't have any comments on it as far as the results are concerned, and i think the results show up a real view for the situation of the Jordanian airwaves. But i rather have some comments related to the “Radio Industry knowledge”!
1st of all, The study, or the people behind it, seem to have forgotten some radio stations! Sunny 105.1 FM wasn't mentioned though it was 7 months old at the time of the survey, nor Hawa Amman Radio (The GAM's radio) which has been on air for the same period. Also, both Yarmouk FM and Sawt New Maan weren't either mentioned nor given a rate though the study covered all Jordanian cities including Maan and Irbid! Even if some of those radio stations would have got 0.0% (which is impossible I guess!), they should have been mentioned with this result..
Also, the names of some radio stations or frequencies got some mistakes, just like Radio Al-Balad, which is still mentioned in the study as AmmanNet FM, and Sawt Al-Madina, whose frequency is 88.7 FM and not 88.5 FM (which was just a testing frequency before the official lunch of the station).
And not to forget, the stations belonging to Radio Jordan Broadcasting Corporation are a bit messed up. So apart from Amman FM, The Main Program is put in the survey as Jordan AM and Jordan FM 88 Mhz, which is actually the same radio station (as the main program), and it has AM frequencies as well as FM frequencies, and the FM frequencies in Amman for the Main Program of Radio Jordan Broadcasting has been changed to 90.0 FM and 106.7 FM for over a year now, and Amman FM is being broadcasted on 88.0 FM as 99.0 FM.
Anyway, here are the rating results according to the survey. Followed by some of my comments on them.
Radio Ratings Results for a period of 30 days from the survey:
1.Fann FM (49.5 %)
2.Quran Radio (44.9 % )
3.Amman FM (31.4 %)
4.Radio Amen FM (25.9 %)
5.Radio Rotana (25.3 %)
6.Hayat FM (18.0 %)
7.Radio Jordan Broadcasting – The Main Program (17.8 %)
8.Mazaj FM (14.5 %)
9.Sawt Al-Ghad (8.4 %)
10.Melody FM (7.5 %)
11.Watan FM (7.5 %)
12.Radio Sawt Al-Madina (5.2 %)
13.Radio Jordan English Service - 96.3 FM (3.1 %)
14.Radio Al-Balad (3.1 %)
15.Radio Farah Al-Nas (2.9 %)
16.Radio Jordan Broadcasting, The Main Program, through the FM (2.6 %)
17.Ayyam FM (2.4 %)
18.Mood FM (1.8 %)
19.Play FM (1.8 %)
20.Ahlen FM (1.8 %)
21.Beat FM (1.6 %)
22.Energy FM (0.9 %)
23.Spin FM (0.8 %)
Radio Ratings Results for the day prior to the survey: (Loyalty Ratings)
1.Fann FM (23.1 %)
2.Quran Radio (19.7 % )
3.Radio Amen FM (9.5 %)
4.Radio Rotana (9.3 %)
5.Amman FM (9.1 %)
6.Radio Jordan Broadcasting – The Main Program (7.0 %)
7.Hayat FM (5.1 %)
8.Mazaj FM (4.9 %)
9.Melody FM (2.1 %)
10.Radio Sawt Al-Madina (1.9 %)
11.Watan FM (1.8 %)
12.Radio Sawt Al-Madina (1.3 %)
13.Radio Jordan English Service - 96.3 FM (1.3 %)
14.Radio Jordan Broadcasting, The Main Program, through the FM (1.0 %)
15.Radio Al-Balad (0.8 %)
16.Radio Farah Al-Nas (0.8 %)
17.Play FM (0.8 %)
18.Beat FM (0.8 %)
19.Ayyam FM (0.7 %)
20.Mood FM (0.6 %)
21.Energy FM (0.5 %)
22.Spin FM (0.4 %)
23.Ahlen FM (0.4 %)
Fann FM is still on TOP! And is still getting advantage of the full coverage through its 11 frequencies to beat even the official state owned radio station. And Quran FM (with all its 3 local frequencies) is still second, regardless of the fact that Hayat FM (the only private religious radio) is trying to attract many listeners with its variety religious programs along with quran and ad'ieah, but despite the fact Hayat FM's listenership increased, its still less the quarter from Quran FM.
With a big increase from last year, Radio Amen FM is pretty notable now on the scene, the good programming according to the station's objectives, as well as the opening of 2 new frequencies were much of a help in having this big rating. And all of us know how much this station is famous against the taxi and bus drivers, since its becoming their road assistant on the ways around jordan.
The Jordanian Broadcasting Corporation's radio stations are still in a good shape. So Amman FM for example is still a big competitor against commercial FM stations. And Radio Jordan Broadcasting – The Main Program is still with the same ratings from last year (when adding both FM and AM ratings), and is still doing pretty well in the early morning hours.
On the other hand, when looking at English speaking / western music radio stations, we can notice how low ratings they have, despite all the competition they have between them, but even Radio Jordan – English Service is doing better than them with way too much! Yes! 4 CHR radios and 2 AC Radios as well as Ahlen FM (which went off earlier this year), couldn't any of them get even close enough to RJ 96.3 FM. This might show that the re-programming and re-orientation of Radio Jordan English Service was much of a good step (though its not yet as complete as it should be). But! There you go! They have beaten our fancy CHR radios! And is doing even better than some Arabic radio station.
But Anyway, those commercial english speaking radio stations are doing much better this year than the year before, even with double or more than last year's ratings on the “loyalty rating scale”. Which might mean that those stations are attracting people either from those listening to Arabic stations or from totally non-radio fan people to listen to them. Which is pretty good!
Play FM and Beat FM are competing hardly on top of the CHR radio rating when it comes to daily listeners to them, and they have even beaten Mood FM, which was beating both of them last year. But an interesting observation is that Ahlen FM had as high monthly rating as Play and Mood FM! And was doing pretty much well to shutdown several weeks ago!!! though it didn't had that much loyal listeners.
Taking a look over the ratings of the stations lunched in 2008 (& mentioned in the survey) for a period of 30 days prior (since you can't judge they have gathered enough loyal listeners, especially that some of them were lunched just 2 months before the survey) . [Farah Al-Nas, Ayyam FM, Energy FM, Spin FM] ... I consider them doing pretty good! And with good potentials to raise to better ratings during 2009.
Another interesting chart that can be found in the survey is this ...
You can just see how the pattern of attracting listeners change along the day.
Notice how Radio Jordan Broadcasting – Main Service and Fann FM are attracting most of their listeners in the morning. And how during housewives peak listenership stations that have shows in those times like Amman FM, Hayat FM, Quran Radio, Sawt Al-Ghad are attracting this type of listeners who are making more than half of the listeners at this time in the day. (a good re-thinking point for those stations thinking they are attracting housewives and females in generals, while having the 10 AM – 3 PM time slot empty!). Notice also how the changes in the evening hours (the preferred listening hours for youth according to this survey, as over 43-51% from the listeners after 6 PM are under 24!) turn to be concentrated on Melody, Sawt Al-Ghad and Mazaj FM. Yet another message for the stations trying to attract youth, and with empty programming or “let the computer shuffle the music” after 6 PM policies ... while those times are mainly considered study times for students in schools or on campus, those times are preferred by them for listening to the radio. Things get interesting enough when seeing in this survey that those 3 stations for example are doing better in the overnight period (9 PM – 6 AM) than the drive back period (in which 2 of them have extensively famous shows! ).
This week's radio segment tackled IREX Jordan's Media survey, and particularly the Radio Section of the survey about Jordan Radio Ratings for the year 2008.I have tackled in a post last year this time IREX Jordan's survey for the Jordanian Radio Ratings for the year 2007.
1st of all, to make things clear, the study considers to survey results:
Listenership for a period of 30 days from the survey: This would show the general listenership for radio, and what the surveyed had listened to within month.
Listenership for a period of 1 days prior to the survey: This would show the loyalty of listening to radio or to a specific radio station.
On the general level, and surprisingly, the radio listenership regardless of the station listened to, has DROPPED in 2008! regardless of the fact that the number of radio stations and frequencies covering the kingdom with radio transmission had increased! As 45.9% used to listen on daily basis to radio in 2007, the number has dropped to 43.7% only in 2008! and amazingly more, the big drop was in the youth of ages 15-29, from which less than 45.9% are listening to radio now, after the listenership percentage was 54.3% last year among them!
An almost 8.5% drop among the group mostly targeted on in our Jordanian radio stations. Are the Jordanian youth getting board of the copycats among Jordanian Radio Stations, where creativity seems to be stopping, and where most of the radio stations just trying to copy each other with a show or 2 on the air, and leave the rest to computers randomly shuffling music that you can heard on several other competitive radio station, or simply, pirated from the internet and played on your car radio or headset using an MP3 player, nothing more, nothing less.
Aren't Jordanian Radio stations thinking seriously about MP3 players, MP3 car modulators, Internet radio, and even TV and DVDs as competitors?! If they aren't then ... WRONG ANSWER! THINK AGAIN .... competition is not only about what other radio stations are playing or doing, and its not only about attracting another stations' listeners... its more over to getting those who don't listen to radio, never did, or quited doing so, back to listen to the airwaves through your radio station. Otherwise, we will just have 100 radio stations with 10% of the population listening to them! And out of a sudden we will have only 5 radio stations owned by the government on the airwaves after the rest of them get shut down! Not a happy ending in my imagination!
For the time being, the sector is still in a good shape, and the best in the Jordanian media scene with 67.8% of listenership within 30 days from the survey, much more exceeding newspapers (30.45%), magazines(8.45%).
The study included this year the way & place of listening to radio. One of the interesting things was that the study showed that just under 20% of the people listen to radio through Mobile phones that have FM receivers. The majority of those (over 60%) are youth, mostly school or university students, as this is their primary entertainment mean while being on the way from and to their universities/schools, or between the classes. On the other hand, listening to Jordanian radio stations via the internet didn't exceed 6.6%, as online broadcasting is more used by Jordanian abroad that jordnaians in jordan who can receive the stations via the FM. As for places where radio is mostly listen to, home was the biggest rate with 55.2% (with a big rate of house wives) followed by cars with just under 35%, at work 7.6% and 2.6% while moving by bus.
Before starting to review the radio ratings. And since there has been some debate about this study with regards to the written media and online media. And from my own point of view, i don't have any comments on it as far as the results are concerned, and i think the results show up a real view for the situation of the Jordanian airwaves. But i rather have some comments related to the “Radio Industry knowledge”!
1st of all, The study, or the people behind it, seem to have forgotten some radio stations! Sunny 105.1 FM wasn't mentioned though it was 7 months old at the time of the survey, nor Hawa Amman Radio (The GAM's radio) which has been on air for the same period. Also, both Yarmouk FM and Sawt New Maan weren't either mentioned nor given a rate though the study covered all Jordanian cities including Maan and Irbid! Even if some of those radio stations would have got 0.0% (which is impossible I guess!), they should have been mentioned with this result..
Also, the names of some radio stations or frequencies got some mistakes, just like Radio Al-Balad, which is still mentioned in the study as AmmanNet FM, and Sawt Al-Madina, whose frequency is 88.7 FM and not 88.5 FM (which was just a testing frequency before the official lunch of the station).
And not to forget, the stations belonging to Radio Jordan Broadcasting Corporation are a bit messed up. So apart from Amman FM, The Main Program is put in the survey as Jordan AM and Jordan FM 88 Mhz, which is actually the same radio station (as the main program), and it has AM frequencies as well as FM frequencies, and the FM frequencies in Amman for the Main Program of Radio Jordan Broadcasting has been changed to 90.0 FM and 106.7 FM for over a year now, and Amman FM is being broadcasted on 88.0 FM as 99.0 FM.
Anyway, here are the rating results according to the survey. Followed by some of my comments on them.
Radio Ratings Results for a period of 30 days from the survey:
1.Fann FM (49.5 %)
2.Quran Radio (44.9 % )
3.Amman FM (31.4 %)
4.Radio Amen FM (25.9 %)
5.Radio Rotana (25.3 %)
6.Hayat FM (18.0 %)
7.Radio Jordan Broadcasting – The Main Program (17.8 %)
8.Mazaj FM (14.5 %)
9.Sawt Al-Ghad (8.4 %)
10.Melody FM (7.5 %)
11.Watan FM (7.5 %)
12.Radio Sawt Al-Madina (5.2 %)
13.Radio Jordan English Service - 96.3 FM (3.1 %)
14.Radio Al-Balad (3.1 %)
15.Radio Farah Al-Nas (2.9 %)
16.Radio Jordan Broadcasting, The Main Program, through the FM (2.6 %)
17.Ayyam FM (2.4 %)
18.Mood FM (1.8 %)
19.Play FM (1.8 %)
20.Ahlen FM (1.8 %)
21.Beat FM (1.6 %)
22.Energy FM (0.9 %)
23.Spin FM (0.8 %)
Radio Ratings Results for the day prior to the survey: (Loyalty Ratings)
1.Fann FM (23.1 %)
2.Quran Radio (19.7 % )
3.Radio Amen FM (9.5 %)
4.Radio Rotana (9.3 %)
5.Amman FM (9.1 %)
6.Radio Jordan Broadcasting – The Main Program (7.0 %)
7.Hayat FM (5.1 %)
8.Mazaj FM (4.9 %)
9.Melody FM (2.1 %)
10.Radio Sawt Al-Madina (1.9 %)
11.Watan FM (1.8 %)
12.Radio Sawt Al-Madina (1.3 %)
13.Radio Jordan English Service - 96.3 FM (1.3 %)
14.Radio Jordan Broadcasting, The Main Program, through the FM (1.0 %)
15.Radio Al-Balad (0.8 %)
16.Radio Farah Al-Nas (0.8 %)
17.Play FM (0.8 %)
18.Beat FM (0.8 %)
19.Ayyam FM (0.7 %)
20.Mood FM (0.6 %)
21.Energy FM (0.5 %)
22.Spin FM (0.4 %)
23.Ahlen FM (0.4 %)
Fann FM is still on TOP! And is still getting advantage of the full coverage through its 11 frequencies to beat even the official state owned radio station. And Quran FM (with all its 3 local frequencies) is still second, regardless of the fact that Hayat FM (the only private religious radio) is trying to attract many listeners with its variety religious programs along with quran and ad'ieah, but despite the fact Hayat FM's listenership increased, its still less the quarter from Quran FM.
With a big increase from last year, Radio Amen FM is pretty notable now on the scene, the good programming according to the station's objectives, as well as the opening of 2 new frequencies were much of a help in having this big rating. And all of us know how much this station is famous against the taxi and bus drivers, since its becoming their road assistant on the ways around jordan.
The Jordanian Broadcasting Corporation's radio stations are still in a good shape. So Amman FM for example is still a big competitor against commercial FM stations. And Radio Jordan Broadcasting – The Main Program is still with the same ratings from last year (when adding both FM and AM ratings), and is still doing pretty well in the early morning hours.
On the other hand, when looking at English speaking / western music radio stations, we can notice how low ratings they have, despite all the competition they have between them, but even Radio Jordan – English Service is doing better than them with way too much! Yes! 4 CHR radios and 2 AC Radios as well as Ahlen FM (which went off earlier this year), couldn't any of them get even close enough to RJ 96.3 FM. This might show that the re-programming and re-orientation of Radio Jordan English Service was much of a good step (though its not yet as complete as it should be). But! There you go! They have beaten our fancy CHR radios! And is doing even better than some Arabic radio station.
But Anyway, those commercial english speaking radio stations are doing much better this year than the year before, even with double or more than last year's ratings on the “loyalty rating scale”. Which might mean that those stations are attracting people either from those listening to Arabic stations or from totally non-radio fan people to listen to them. Which is pretty good!
Play FM and Beat FM are competing hardly on top of the CHR radio rating when it comes to daily listeners to them, and they have even beaten Mood FM, which was beating both of them last year. But an interesting observation is that Ahlen FM had as high monthly rating as Play and Mood FM! And was doing pretty much well to shutdown several weeks ago!!! though it didn't had that much loyal listeners.
Taking a look over the ratings of the stations lunched in 2008 (& mentioned in the survey) for a period of 30 days prior (since you can't judge they have gathered enough loyal listeners, especially that some of them were lunched just 2 months before the survey) . [Farah Al-Nas, Ayyam FM, Energy FM, Spin FM] ... I consider them doing pretty good! And with good potentials to raise to better ratings during 2009.
Another interesting chart that can be found in the survey is this ...
You can just see how the pattern of attracting listeners change along the day.
Notice how Radio Jordan Broadcasting – Main Service and Fann FM are attracting most of their listeners in the morning. And how during housewives peak listenership stations that have shows in those times like Amman FM, Hayat FM, Quran Radio, Sawt Al-Ghad are attracting this type of listeners who are making more than half of the listeners at this time in the day. (a good re-thinking point for those stations thinking they are attracting housewives and females in generals, while having the 10 AM – 3 PM time slot empty!). Notice also how the changes in the evening hours (the preferred listening hours for youth according to this survey, as over 43-51% from the listeners after 6 PM are under 24!) turn to be concentrated on Melody, Sawt Al-Ghad and Mazaj FM. Yet another message for the stations trying to attract youth, and with empty programming or “let the computer shuffle the music” after 6 PM policies ... while those times are mainly considered study times for students in schools or on campus, those times are preferred by them for listening to the radio. Things get interesting enough when seeing in this survey that those 3 stations for example are doing better in the overnight period (9 PM – 6 AM) than the drive back period (in which 2 of them have extensively famous shows! ).
08 March, 2009
My Radio Segment, Episode 9
This week's episode is available for download HERE, and for listening on the listen icon.
Just like last week, this week's episode continued the review of Jordanian radio station's websites.
We Start this week from the radio stations that provide celebrity news and all sort of gossip and light news through their website, Sawt El-Ghad's website (www.sawtelghad.fm ) provides up to date celebrity news for its visitors, pretty similar to its “Al-Ghad news” that goes through its airwaves. That is, along with pretty good content about the station, its programs and radio announcers, throughout a nice and simple website. Maybe the only bad thing about it is the similarity of the URL address with Sawt El-Ghad lebanon, whose website is (www.sawtelghad.com ).
On the other side, Radio Sawt Al-Madina had tried, after a while of having its website not updated, to remake the website, and add a section for the celebrity news and gossip, along with the details about the radio station and its programs, as well as introduce a new address leading to it, that is (www.887.fm). But unfortunately, seems the dynamicity of Sawt Al-Madina and its programs on the airwaves do not match the dynamicity of its website, as the website hasn't been updated since it was redeveloped.
Whilst, news and gossip content are not that much updated either through Ayyam FM's website (www.ayyamfm.jo), whose design and colors are pretty much compatible with the station's logo, and the website do still has a lot of empty pages, and even some with rubbish characters in it. But the transmission throughout the website is of a very high 128 kpbs quality, and it can be heard for the user without the need of having any special software or codics installed on that client's machine as most of the other radio station's transmissions, since it's being done using the Flash technology from within the user's browser.
Same broadcasting technology is being used by the sister radio station, Spin FM through its website(www.spin.jo), the website is also pretty similar to Ayyam FM's in the layout, but when it comes to content, Spin FM's website is very rich and regularly updated with all sorts of news and gossip, and even some internal affair news that can be political (alrabie demonstrations during the last attack on gaza are an example). That is, along with a detailed description about the station, its programs, radio announcers and DJs, as well as an up to date review of the latest music albums, movies, video games. And even a list of the latest music that is being aired on Spin FM's airwaves that can be listened to through the website and rated, and Spin FM truly increases or decreases the frequency of airplay for those songs depending on the rating done by its listeners through the website. And not to forget that the website provides a way to communicate with the DJ being on duty at the moment and request a song from him/her. But maybe the only annoying thing is the website's font inconsistency in a lot of its pages, the visitor can even find several types and sizes of fonts within the same page!
The visitor of Play FM's website, www.play.jo, wil be also able to listen to some of the latest music that is being played on its airwaves. The website is very neat and all its sections are updated continuously, from weather to the events calendar. And the fact that Play FM has a blog in its website is also a big plus, and a one of a kind way (between the Jordanian radio stations) of communicating with the station's listeners, especially throughout the ability to comment on the posts, as its the only station the has a blog in jordan, as well as the only one that has a youtube channel. And the interaction would have been even higher if the blog was assisted by an RSS feed as well.
Rich and regularly updated content, ranging from celebrity news to the latest releases in music and movies, as well as a very nice and compliant website design with the station's logo can be found in Beat FM's website (www.mybeat.fm). The website is indeed an addition to the competency between those 3 lately mentioned CHR radio stations, which seem to have extended the competition between them beyond the FM airwaves over to the web as well, leaving behind all the other Arabic radio stations.
Mood FM as well has a nice website and up to this competency i've mentioned earlier, and one that can be even modified by the user according to his preferences, all of this can be found on www.mood.fm, along with the possibility to know the song and singer of the track currently played on the airwaves of mood fm, that is in addition to several pages that include the latest releases, variety news, and the possibility to contact the current DJ and request a song.
Mazaj FM's website is also capable of showing its visitor the song and singer of the current track, but this is probably the only thing working in the website, www.mazajfm.com ... the website is very old and completely out of date, but fortunately, it has a forum through which one can register and discuss several issues, being the only website with a forum in it.
Hayat FM's website, www.hayat.fm is on the other hand very regular and has enough useful content about the station and its programs, in addition to the live broadcasting.
On the contrary, we find Radio Farah Al-nas's website, www.farahalnas.jo, it only has the station's logo, and indication that the website is still under construction, and the live broadcasting starts up along with the website, which can be very annoying for the users.
Amen FM's website (www.amenfm.jo) as well is still under construction, as all its sections are disabled, but it seems that there is a plan to have several useful pages and services through the website when its development will end, that is, in addition to the live broadcasting link.
Last but not least, Yarmouk FM, Sawt Maan Al-Jadeeda, and Hawa Amman Radio do not have websites. The links in Yarmouk University and King Hussein University website for Yarmouk FM, Sawt Maan Al-Jadeeda respectively lead the user to a brochure about the station. While the link for Hawa Amman Radio in the GAM's website lead to the live broadcasting streaming.
As you might have mentioned, i excluded from this review the websites of non Jordanian radio broadcasting in jordan, namely BBC Arabic and their website (www.bbcarabic.com) and RMC international and their website (www.rmc-mo.com). As those are very rich and powerful websites in both content and structure, and no Jordanian websites are to be compared to them, except maybe for Radio al-balad's.
Its also interesting to mention that most of the websites don't belong to the .jo domain, for reasons that i personally don't know, but indeed the complexity and extensive costs of getting a .jo domain are indeed part of that.
This week, tomorrow that is, there will be no episode, but next Monday March the 16th , i will be reviewing IREX Jordan's media survey, and review the Jordanian Radio Station's 2008 rating results.
Just like last week, this week's episode continued the review of Jordanian radio station's websites.We Start this week from the radio stations that provide celebrity news and all sort of gossip and light news through their website, Sawt El-Ghad's website (www.sawtelghad.fm ) provides up to date celebrity news for its visitors, pretty similar to its “Al-Ghad news” that goes through its airwaves. That is, along with pretty good content about the station, its programs and radio announcers, throughout a nice and simple website. Maybe the only bad thing about it is the similarity of the URL address with Sawt El-Ghad lebanon, whose website is (www.sawtelghad.com ).
On the other side, Radio Sawt Al-Madina had tried, after a while of having its website not updated, to remake the website, and add a section for the celebrity news and gossip, along with the details about the radio station and its programs, as well as introduce a new address leading to it, that is (www.887.fm). But unfortunately, seems the dynamicity of Sawt Al-Madina and its programs on the airwaves do not match the dynamicity of its website, as the website hasn't been updated since it was redeveloped.
Whilst, news and gossip content are not that much updated either through Ayyam FM's website (www.ayyamfm.jo), whose design and colors are pretty much compatible with the station's logo, and the website do still has a lot of empty pages, and even some with rubbish characters in it. But the transmission throughout the website is of a very high 128 kpbs quality, and it can be heard for the user without the need of having any special software or codics installed on that client's machine as most of the other radio station's transmissions, since it's being done using the Flash technology from within the user's browser.
Same broadcasting technology is being used by the sister radio station, Spin FM through its website(www.spin.jo), the website is also pretty similar to Ayyam FM's in the layout, but when it comes to content, Spin FM's website is very rich and regularly updated with all sorts of news and gossip, and even some internal affair news that can be political (alrabie demonstrations during the last attack on gaza are an example). That is, along with a detailed description about the station, its programs, radio announcers and DJs, as well as an up to date review of the latest music albums, movies, video games. And even a list of the latest music that is being aired on Spin FM's airwaves that can be listened to through the website and rated, and Spin FM truly increases or decreases the frequency of airplay for those songs depending on the rating done by its listeners through the website. And not to forget that the website provides a way to communicate with the DJ being on duty at the moment and request a song from him/her. But maybe the only annoying thing is the website's font inconsistency in a lot of its pages, the visitor can even find several types and sizes of fonts within the same page!
The visitor of Play FM's website, www.play.jo, wil be also able to listen to some of the latest music that is being played on its airwaves. The website is very neat and all its sections are updated continuously, from weather to the events calendar. And the fact that Play FM has a blog in its website is also a big plus, and a one of a kind way (between the Jordanian radio stations) of communicating with the station's listeners, especially throughout the ability to comment on the posts, as its the only station the has a blog in jordan, as well as the only one that has a youtube channel. And the interaction would have been even higher if the blog was assisted by an RSS feed as well.
Rich and regularly updated content, ranging from celebrity news to the latest releases in music and movies, as well as a very nice and compliant website design with the station's logo can be found in Beat FM's website (www.mybeat.fm). The website is indeed an addition to the competency between those 3 lately mentioned CHR radio stations, which seem to have extended the competition between them beyond the FM airwaves over to the web as well, leaving behind all the other Arabic radio stations.
Mood FM as well has a nice website and up to this competency i've mentioned earlier, and one that can be even modified by the user according to his preferences, all of this can be found on www.mood.fm, along with the possibility to know the song and singer of the track currently played on the airwaves of mood fm, that is in addition to several pages that include the latest releases, variety news, and the possibility to contact the current DJ and request a song.
Mazaj FM's website is also capable of showing its visitor the song and singer of the current track, but this is probably the only thing working in the website, www.mazajfm.com ... the website is very old and completely out of date, but fortunately, it has a forum through which one can register and discuss several issues, being the only website with a forum in it.
Hayat FM's website, www.hayat.fm is on the other hand very regular and has enough useful content about the station and its programs, in addition to the live broadcasting.
On the contrary, we find Radio Farah Al-nas's website, www.farahalnas.jo, it only has the station's logo, and indication that the website is still under construction, and the live broadcasting starts up along with the website, which can be very annoying for the users.
Amen FM's website (www.amenfm.jo) as well is still under construction, as all its sections are disabled, but it seems that there is a plan to have several useful pages and services through the website when its development will end, that is, in addition to the live broadcasting link.
Last but not least, Yarmouk FM, Sawt Maan Al-Jadeeda, and Hawa Amman Radio do not have websites. The links in Yarmouk University and King Hussein University website for Yarmouk FM, Sawt Maan Al-Jadeeda respectively lead the user to a brochure about the station. While the link for Hawa Amman Radio in the GAM's website lead to the live broadcasting streaming.
As you might have mentioned, i excluded from this review the websites of non Jordanian radio broadcasting in jordan, namely BBC Arabic and their website (www.bbcarabic.com) and RMC international and their website (www.rmc-mo.com). As those are very rich and powerful websites in both content and structure, and no Jordanian websites are to be compared to them, except maybe for Radio al-balad's.
Its also interesting to mention that most of the websites don't belong to the .jo domain, for reasons that i personally don't know, but indeed the complexity and extensive costs of getting a .jo domain are indeed part of that.
This week, tomorrow that is, there will be no episode, but next Monday March the 16th , i will be reviewing IREX Jordan's media survey, and review the Jordanian Radio Station's 2008 rating results.
01 March, 2009
My Radio Segment, Episode 8
This week's episode is available for download HERE, and for listening on the listen icon.
This week's episode (Actually last week's, as i have published this on my blog late enough that i'm already recording the 9th episode now!), as well as next week's episode (tomorrow's) will discuss the web sites of radio stations broadcasting over the Jordanian airwaves. Since the radio industry is going these days beyond the limitations of the airwaves over the FM dial, for a world with larger potentials and competition over the world wide web. That is, since on the internet there are thousands or tens of thousands of radio stations in various languages, broadcasting various genres of music and topics, from all around the world. And most of these stations do not broadcast over the airwaves, and behind them stand individuals and not companies or institutions, as with limited and simple costs, and with creative ideas and some technicalities, anyone can establish an Internet radio station and website.
Radio stations benefit from their presence on the Internet. As along with broadcasting across the network to have anyone around the world being able to listen to the station, the radio station's website is an important mean of communication between the Radio and its listeners, and can be considered a primary information reference about the station's programs and broadcasting times, and even the content of these programs. Broadcasters can also exploit their websites to provide additional added services to listeners. And even supply content that it cannot or is not licensed to be provided through the airwaves.
For the Jordanian radio stations, Radio Al-Balad may be considered a model and probably the most sophisticated radio with presence over the Internet. This is due to the fact that the radio started broadcasting the Internet through (www.ammannet.net) with the name of AmmanNet before even granting radio broadcasting licenses in jordan for private Jordanian radio stations. And continued developing its website even after starting broadcasting on the FM airwaves, and even after changing the name to Radio Al-Balad.
Radio Al-Balad provides through its website www.ammannet.net archived episodes of all its programs as well as all the news reports, in both text and recorded format. In addition to detailed live news content, and the possibility to comment on these news and programs. The site also provides a number of blogs for several of its own radio announcers, where they express their views and lives. But the only thing that might be disturbing, is the current difference between the radio naming “Radio Al-Balad” after changing its name, and the website that remained as it is when it comes to the URL through which it's accessed.
The Jordanian Broadcasting Corporation and in all divisions, Vemoqaha site is part of the Radio and Television www.jrtv.jo and more overlap with the location of the Jordanian state television. And most of the pages and links, although I have said it before, either empty or contain outdated information.
The Radio Fann FM on the other hand has a simple but nice website, in which details about its radio programs and communicating with them. But the site is relatively old, as we can find details about programs that went off the air for nearly two years now. Radio Fann FM is a pioneer in broadcasting, as it was until not so long the only Jordanian station broadcasting with a sound quality of 128 Kbps, and one that matches the sound on the FM band, the website www.radiofann.com also offers the ability to watch the radio announcers and DJs working in the studio Live through the web camera installed in their studios.
The same technique of broadcasting using a web cam can be found on Radio Rotana's website. Which is actually part of the Rotana network website www.rotana.net, making it hard to access the radio station's website directly, which contains information and details about all the network's radio stations and not only Radio Rotana Jordan. But choosing Rotana Jordan in the transmission section will enable the user to listen live through several techniques, whether with different degrees of sound quality, or through the webcams from the station's studios.
The Web Cam technology is also available to listeners of Energy FM, which is managed and operated by the same company, Al-Kawn Media. Through the website www.radioenergy.fm, but the site is currently empty and has been under construction for more than 10 months now, the age of the site and the radio station, and the user will not find more than the station's logo on the homepage in addition to the transmission link.
The same situation will face the browser of Sunny FM's website, www.sunny.jo The site is also limited to a home page containing the station's logo and a link to listen to the live broadcasting.
Last but not least, Watan FM has a website (www.watanonline.net) that is somehow confusing for the visitor, it still includes old pages with old information about the station and its programs, which radically changed since awhile after the station's radio programs were changes, especially after the news that the owners of the station have changed. At the same time, new information about the new programs can also be found in the site along with the old ones, and not to forget, there are several empty pages and inactive links.
The remaining radio stations' websites review will follow, in this week's episode.
Remember that you can contribute too, and send in your comments, feedback and any radio observations on radio@ammannet.net
This week's episode (Actually last week's, as i have published this on my blog late enough that i'm already recording the 9th episode now!), as well as next week's episode (tomorrow's) will discuss the web sites of radio stations broadcasting over the Jordanian airwaves. Since the radio industry is going these days beyond the limitations of the airwaves over the FM dial, for a world with larger potentials and competition over the world wide web. That is, since on the internet there are thousands or tens of thousands of radio stations in various languages, broadcasting various genres of music and topics, from all around the world. And most of these stations do not broadcast over the airwaves, and behind them stand individuals and not companies or institutions, as with limited and simple costs, and with creative ideas and some technicalities, anyone can establish an Internet radio station and website. Radio stations benefit from their presence on the Internet. As along with broadcasting across the network to have anyone around the world being able to listen to the station, the radio station's website is an important mean of communication between the Radio and its listeners, and can be considered a primary information reference about the station's programs and broadcasting times, and even the content of these programs. Broadcasters can also exploit their websites to provide additional added services to listeners. And even supply content that it cannot or is not licensed to be provided through the airwaves.
For the Jordanian radio stations, Radio Al-Balad may be considered a model and probably the most sophisticated radio with presence over the Internet. This is due to the fact that the radio started broadcasting the Internet through (www.ammannet.net) with the name of AmmanNet before even granting radio broadcasting licenses in jordan for private Jordanian radio stations. And continued developing its website even after starting broadcasting on the FM airwaves, and even after changing the name to Radio Al-Balad.
Radio Al-Balad provides through its website www.ammannet.net archived episodes of all its programs as well as all the news reports, in both text and recorded format. In addition to detailed live news content, and the possibility to comment on these news and programs. The site also provides a number of blogs for several of its own radio announcers, where they express their views and lives. But the only thing that might be disturbing, is the current difference between the radio naming “Radio Al-Balad” after changing its name, and the website that remained as it is when it comes to the URL through which it's accessed.
The Jordanian Broadcasting Corporation and in all divisions, Vemoqaha site is part of the Radio and Television www.jrtv.jo and more overlap with the location of the Jordanian state television. And most of the pages and links, although I have said it before, either empty or contain outdated information.
The Radio Fann FM on the other hand has a simple but nice website, in which details about its radio programs and communicating with them. But the site is relatively old, as we can find details about programs that went off the air for nearly two years now. Radio Fann FM is a pioneer in broadcasting, as it was until not so long the only Jordanian station broadcasting with a sound quality of 128 Kbps, and one that matches the sound on the FM band, the website www.radiofann.com also offers the ability to watch the radio announcers and DJs working in the studio Live through the web camera installed in their studios.
The same technique of broadcasting using a web cam can be found on Radio Rotana's website. Which is actually part of the Rotana network website www.rotana.net, making it hard to access the radio station's website directly, which contains information and details about all the network's radio stations and not only Radio Rotana Jordan. But choosing Rotana Jordan in the transmission section will enable the user to listen live through several techniques, whether with different degrees of sound quality, or through the webcams from the station's studios.
The Web Cam technology is also available to listeners of Energy FM, which is managed and operated by the same company, Al-Kawn Media. Through the website www.radioenergy.fm, but the site is currently empty and has been under construction for more than 10 months now, the age of the site and the radio station, and the user will not find more than the station's logo on the homepage in addition to the transmission link.
The same situation will face the browser of Sunny FM's website, www.sunny.jo The site is also limited to a home page containing the station's logo and a link to listen to the live broadcasting.
Last but not least, Watan FM has a website (www.watanonline.net) that is somehow confusing for the visitor, it still includes old pages with old information about the station and its programs, which radically changed since awhile after the station's radio programs were changes, especially after the news that the owners of the station have changed. At the same time, new information about the new programs can also be found in the site along with the old ones, and not to forget, there are several empty pages and inactive links.
The remaining radio stations' websites review will follow, in this week's episode.
Remember that you can contribute too, and send in your comments, feedback and any radio observations on radio@ammannet.net
23 February, 2009
How Jordanian Radio stations stand against the web revolution!
How Jordanian Radio stations stand against the web revolution!
This question is raised and discussed in today's episode of my radio segment, as well next week's. Broadcasted monday morning , at 10.30 AM throughout the show "Eye on Media" on Radio Al-Balad 92.4 FM
The episodes will be also available through my blog later in the week.
I need to know your opinions about the Jordanian radio stations websites. what do you think about them, who's hot, and who's not on the web! other than the airwaves, and are they up to the competition against 1000s of radio stations on the web?
This question is raised and discussed in today's episode of my radio segment, as well next week's. Broadcasted monday morning , at 10.30 AM throughout the show "Eye on Media" on Radio Al-Balad 92.4 FM
The episodes will be also available through my blog later in the week.
I need to know your opinions about the Jordanian radio stations websites. what do you think about them, who's hot, and who's not on the web! other than the airwaves, and are they up to the competition against 1000s of radio stations on the web?
18 February, 2009
My Radio Segment, Episode 7
This week's episode is available for download HERE, and for listening on the listen icon.
I was kind of confused whether to cover what most of the Jordanian Radio stations had done on the occasion of the Valentine's day during the past week, as most of them had huge notable interaction with the occasion throughout competitions and prices, special show and special segments within usual shows for this occasion, and even the variety of music was carefully selected for this occasion. But, I canceled all my plans to talk about this as i heard Sawt Al-Madina's “Anti Valentine Show” on the valentine day it self, Saturday the 14th of February 2009, with which Radio Sawt Al-Madina broke the rules with this show which was prepared and presented by Muhannad Al-Shahwan along with the guys behind the comedian comics website, 3alarasi.com, the show discussed in a comedian way the idea of celebrating this occasion, and interacted with people about it, who in return had huge interaction with the show in away that even lead to extend the 2 hours proposed for the show. [sound recording attached]
On the sector's news, Virgin Radio officially started campaigning for its radio station in Jordan. After over a year of rumors about Virgin Radio getting into the sector in Jordan, they finally did show it for the public, through a store that it seems to have rented at City Mall Amman, that is being prepared for something we don't know yet, and has on its facade the logo of the station, and a statement that Virgin Radio Jordan is coming soon on the airwaves.
What Virgin seems to do, is what i have talked about a couple of episodes ago, that is, a radio shop to intercommunicate with its listeners and attract the public to it.
For the people into Rock Music, from now on they will be able to choose and decide! As we are having more rock shows in town! After long years of exclusivity in playing this genre of music only on the airwaves of Radio Jordan's English Service, whose Rock Show was even put on hold several times due to unknown reasons, with gossips relating it to several law breaking incidents for people taking some sorts of Rock Music as a sign for their illegal actions. This entire exclusivity has broke up last year with Beat FM's Rock N Jordan, and now with Spin FM's new rock show that airs on Saturdays 7 – 10 PM.
From time to time, I will be introducing you to one of the radio stations on the Jordanian airwaves within my segment. And since we had kind of started this already a couple of weeks ago when we have talked about Melody FM Jordan, when I have spoken to its CEO, this we week i talked about Radio Sawt Al-Madina.
Sawt Al-Madina, owned by Al-Baddad Holding Group, started its test transmission in March 2007 on 88.5 FM, and later in April of the same year lunched its transmission officially on the frequency of 88.7 FM in the Greater Amman Area. After Al-Baddad group had already started its way in the media field with a weekly free newspaper. The group is also planning to lunch a radio and TV production company, as well as package of TV stations.
The station got its license from the AVC as a political , conversational, and entertainment radio station, targeting with that all sorts of people, starting from Youth and students, to women and business men, and Families in general. As this station is known for its dynamism and variety in its shows, and for depending on the strategy of show-audience-targets rather than having a station-audience-target. Thus, beside hour by hour news, as well as political debates and reports and special news coverages, the station has various sets of programs with different targets, and a big variety in them, their objectives, scopes, and even music. And we can even hear some western hit music in some the shows, something that is not that usual on similar Arabic stations in the Jordanian airwaves.
Last but not least, its worth mentioning the radio Sawt Al-Madina broadcasts through its frequency 88.7 FM for the areas of the Greater Amman Area, Zarqa, Salt, and Madaba. The strong transmission also reaches to regions in Karak, Jerash, and Mafraq.
Remember that you can contribute too, and send in your comments, feedback and any radio observations on radio@ammannet.net
and note that this segment is being replayed Wednesdays at 4 PM now, beside the basic airplay time, Mondays at 10.30 AM.
I was kind of confused whether to cover what most of the Jordanian Radio stations had done on the occasion of the Valentine's day during the past week, as most of them had huge notable interaction with the occasion throughout competitions and prices, special show and special segments within usual shows for this occasion, and even the variety of music was carefully selected for this occasion. But, I canceled all my plans to talk about this as i heard Sawt Al-Madina's “Anti Valentine Show” on the valentine day it self, Saturday the 14th of February 2009, with which Radio Sawt Al-Madina broke the rules with this show which was prepared and presented by Muhannad Al-Shahwan along with the guys behind the comedian comics website, 3alarasi.com, the show discussed in a comedian way the idea of celebrating this occasion, and interacted with people about it, who in return had huge interaction with the show in away that even lead to extend the 2 hours proposed for the show. [sound recording attached]On the sector's news, Virgin Radio officially started campaigning for its radio station in Jordan. After over a year of rumors about Virgin Radio getting into the sector in Jordan, they finally did show it for the public, through a store that it seems to have rented at City Mall Amman, that is being prepared for something we don't know yet, and has on its facade the logo of the station, and a statement that Virgin Radio Jordan is coming soon on the airwaves.
What Virgin seems to do, is what i have talked about a couple of episodes ago, that is, a radio shop to intercommunicate with its listeners and attract the public to it.
For the people into Rock Music, from now on they will be able to choose and decide! As we are having more rock shows in town! After long years of exclusivity in playing this genre of music only on the airwaves of Radio Jordan's English Service, whose Rock Show was even put on hold several times due to unknown reasons, with gossips relating it to several law breaking incidents for people taking some sorts of Rock Music as a sign for their illegal actions. This entire exclusivity has broke up last year with Beat FM's Rock N Jordan, and now with Spin FM's new rock show that airs on Saturdays 7 – 10 PM.
From time to time, I will be introducing you to one of the radio stations on the Jordanian airwaves within my segment. And since we had kind of started this already a couple of weeks ago when we have talked about Melody FM Jordan, when I have spoken to its CEO, this we week i talked about Radio Sawt Al-Madina.
Sawt Al-Madina, owned by Al-Baddad Holding Group, started its test transmission in March 2007 on 88.5 FM, and later in April of the same year lunched its transmission officially on the frequency of 88.7 FM in the Greater Amman Area. After Al-Baddad group had already started its way in the media field with a weekly free newspaper. The group is also planning to lunch a radio and TV production company, as well as package of TV stations.
The station got its license from the AVC as a political , conversational, and entertainment radio station, targeting with that all sorts of people, starting from Youth and students, to women and business men, and Families in general. As this station is known for its dynamism and variety in its shows, and for depending on the strategy of show-audience-targets rather than having a station-audience-target. Thus, beside hour by hour news, as well as political debates and reports and special news coverages, the station has various sets of programs with different targets, and a big variety in them, their objectives, scopes, and even music. And we can even hear some western hit music in some the shows, something that is not that usual on similar Arabic stations in the Jordanian airwaves.
Last but not least, its worth mentioning the radio Sawt Al-Madina broadcasts through its frequency 88.7 FM for the areas of the Greater Amman Area, Zarqa, Salt, and Madaba. The strong transmission also reaches to regions in Karak, Jerash, and Mafraq.
Remember that you can contribute too, and send in your comments, feedback and any radio observations on radio@ammannet.net
and note that this segment is being replayed Wednesdays at 4 PM now, beside the basic airplay time, Mondays at 10.30 AM.
17 February, 2009
Blogging Arabia: From Obscurity to Community
The Canadian Embassy and itoot.com invite bloggers in Amman to attend a public lecture by Canadian Professor and Arab Media Expert Adel Iskandar entitled:
information at : 0799992972
"Blogging Arabia: From Obscurity to Community"
at the City Chamber Council at the Greater Amman Municipality on Thursday 19th February at 6:00 pm.information at : 0799992972
11 February, 2009
Virgin Radio Amman ... Coming Soon! even in the Mall!
Update: Virgin Radio Jordan is on 93.7 FM
I 1st heard the news of Virgin Radio coming to Jordan exactly 1 year from now in February 2008, from a source that used to work with the Virgin Empire. and heard all sorts of ups and down, this and that, chit and chat about it. a couple of things were only confirmed to me, that its coming, and it has nothing to do with ARN the operators of Virgin radio in Dubai.
Finally, Last week we started seeing an existence for Virgin Radio in Jordan , more specifically in City Mall!
This is near the northern entrance of the mall, one empty shop has this on its facade, as if its being prepared to open "Soon, a bright star will rock Jordan" Virgin Radio.
Virgin Radio seem to be coming to jordan with a concept i just discussed in my last week's segment, that is Radio Shops, as it would be made obvious by this shop.
Now i heard that Virgin Radio will be "Yet another CHR station" in Jordan. I still hope not, as the current 4 are more than enough. its like if they are all out of styles! but regardless of that, they are coming closer and closer to the public, and this shop will be a proof!
Note that according to the information i gathered until now, this shop has nothing to do with the Virgin Megastore meters away, as that one owned by Azadea Group.
I 1st heard the news of Virgin Radio coming to Jordan exactly 1 year from now in February 2008, from a source that used to work with the Virgin Empire. and heard all sorts of ups and down, this and that, chit and chat about it. a couple of things were only confirmed to me, that its coming, and it has nothing to do with ARN the operators of Virgin radio in Dubai.
Finally, Last week we started seeing an existence for Virgin Radio in Jordan , more specifically in City Mall!
This is near the northern entrance of the mall, one empty shop has this on its facade, as if its being prepared to open "Soon, a bright star will rock Jordan" Virgin Radio.
Virgin Radio seem to be coming to jordan with a concept i just discussed in my last week's segment, that is Radio Shops, as it would be made obvious by this shop.
Now i heard that Virgin Radio will be "Yet another CHR station" in Jordan. I still hope not, as the current 4 are more than enough. its like if they are all out of styles! but regardless of that, they are coming closer and closer to the public, and this shop will be a proof!
Note that according to the information i gathered until now, this shop has nothing to do with the Virgin Megastore meters away, as that one owned by Azadea Group.
10 February, 2009
My Radio Segment, Episode 6
This week's episode is available for download HERE, and for listening on the listen icon.
As promised in a previous episode, this episode will be widely take into consideration the Universities radio stations, but before that, here's what we had on the Jordanian airwaves during the past week:
We start from several activities by a couple of Jordanian radio stations to support the people of Gaza. Mazaj FM's event, which was a political-comedy play by a group of Palestinian artists entitled “Gaza – Ramallah” was held last Thursday, Friday, and Saturday 5,6, & respectively 7 February 2009, and had the revenues of this event collected for Gaza through “Tkyet Um Ali” foundation's campaign. & Mazaj FM had promotions for this event for the entire week on its airwaves. Another event is Sunny FM's poetry night with the Palestinian poet, Suhair Hammad, that is to be held on February 17th. This is the 2nd activity for Modern Media Co after the successful one held by Play 99.6 for this cause, and which was mentioned in several episodes of this segment [event announcement recording attached].
On the Jordanian Airwaves, Friday 6-2-2009 was probably the most notable one on the Jordanian airwaves with having the Tawjihi results being announced. Despite the fact that Friday is not a day with on air shows for most of the radio stations.
Starting from Friday morning, where the tawjihi results topic was all over Radio Amman FM's shows, even the sports show being aired in the morning, and the interaction followed on all the next shows on its airwaves. Same case was on Radio Jordan – English Service, whose famous show “Listener's Choice” had also a high degree of interaction on this occasion in a funny and a joyful style. Hayat FM on the other hand had a special show on its airwaves in the afternoon of that day for receiving the phone calls and greeting of listeners celebrating the occasion, the presenter of the show was also mentioning from time to time during the show positive & kind suggestions to celebrate this occasion, instead of some bad habits that are being used to celebrate it. Similar suggestions were also discussed by the presenters of “The Boring Show” on Ayyam FM, but in a more comedy style, this topic had taken quite a big part of this show the usually has no certain topic to talk about. And the day ended with “Shabab 3al FM” on Radio Al-Balad, that had a big rate of interaction and phone calls and greetings on this occasion.
Starting Sunday 8-2-2009, a new guidance radio segment started on Amen FM for the school students, the segment presented by the Jordanian comedian “Hussein Tbeishat” aims to increase the traffic and pedestrian safety and awareness of school students, and is being aired on sundays, tuesdays, and thursdays at 7.50 AM on Amen FM, and through all schools morning announcement services in the regions covered by Amen FM's frequencies according to the agreement made with the ministry of education.
Getting into the week's main topic, talking about the Jordanian Universities radio stations and their role on campus and off campus in the surrounding community.
Currently, there are 2 working university radio stations, the 1st is “Radio New Ma'an – Voice of the south”, broadcasting from King Hussein Bin Talal's University in Ma'an ever since July 2006 on 90.3 FM, ever since there was only one station Jordanian FM station reaching Ma'ans area. While there are 3 stations aside Sawt Ma'an. About the station and its role, i had spoken with mr Basem Twesee, chief of research and society development center in King Hussein's university. Who had stated that this radio station is more of a community radio that a university radio, as its main objective is oriented towards the people of Maan and the local society, but the students are making a part of the radio station throughout specialized selection and training to be gradually more and more involved, and some are even professionals now. Radio New Ma'an is also not afraid of the competition, as Dr Basem thinks that getting more stations into the airwaves will even enrich and make their station more notable in the area due to its direct interaction with the public.
[the very interesting phone call recording attached]
The 2nd radio station of this kind to go on was Yarmouk FM, which started broadcasting for a couple of hours daily starting October 2006, and extended it broadcasting to 24/7 later in October 2007. This station's efforts come from the college of media and journalism in the university (ever since it was a dept part of another college), as most of the workers in it are students of this college. The role of this radio station also exceeded the limits of being a university radio station to being a community radio for the city of irbid and its people. Especially since there are another 15 radio stations that have working frequencies in Irbid or in Ajloun covering Irbid's area, thats beside 10s of radio stations being receipted from neighboring countries, making ibrid's airwaves one of the most jammed airwaves of the kingdom.
On the way also as mentioned in a previous episode are a couple of university radio stations that got broadcasting licenses, one is for Mutah University in Karak, a city that has only 1 radio station having a working frequency in it, that is, Fann FM on 94.3 FM, and also receives the broadcasting of several stations from their working frequencies in Amman, but in a mainly weak reception and a varying one depending on the area. The other one is University of Jordan, which will be competing on the ammani airwaves with 10s of radio stations of all kinds. On this radio station i have spoken to Dr Darweesh Badran, one of the people that are participating in establishing this radio station. Dr Badran has stated that the idea behind this stations was enriching the relation between the university and its students, as well as the university and the surrounding community, noting that this station will be a pure “students' radio station”, also, as Mr Badran answered on one of my questions, that the radio station can be one that would interact and represent students from other universities and colleges and not only UJ, as there are several universities and colleges in Amman, the area that this radio station will be covering. Last but not least, Dr Badran stated that they have already several suggestions for programs and cooperations offered to them from students as well as from people in the private sector for their radio station.
[phone call recording attached]
Its very obvious that university radio stations in jordan are taking away of being apart from each other, so we are not seeing one station based on cooperation between several radio stations, and not even partial cooperation, of having for example one radio station with one identity and license but with customized shows for each and every area.
One interesting notice is also that those radio stations are exceeding their university boundaries to be community radio stations. Having priorities and concentration on their community role.
Last but not least comes the observation that the private sector is not participating in investing or cooperating with those radio stations, like some big broadcasting corporation in some European countries that took the role of supporting students radio stations and investing in them in their countries.
Thanks to the guys at Modern Media Co, specifically Mrs Ghada Odeh for her cooperation. Remember that you can contribute too, and send in your comments, feedback and any radio observations on radio@ammannet.net
and note that this segment is being replayed Wednesdays at 4 PM now, beside the basic airplay time, Mondays at 10.30 AM.
As promised in a previous episode, this episode will be widely take into consideration the Universities radio stations, but before that, here's what we had on the Jordanian airwaves during the past week:We start from several activities by a couple of Jordanian radio stations to support the people of Gaza. Mazaj FM's event, which was a political-comedy play by a group of Palestinian artists entitled “Gaza – Ramallah” was held last Thursday, Friday, and Saturday 5,6, & respectively 7 February 2009, and had the revenues of this event collected for Gaza through “Tkyet Um Ali” foundation's campaign. & Mazaj FM had promotions for this event for the entire week on its airwaves. Another event is Sunny FM's poetry night with the Palestinian poet, Suhair Hammad, that is to be held on February 17th. This is the 2nd activity for Modern Media Co after the successful one held by Play 99.6 for this cause, and which was mentioned in several episodes of this segment [event announcement recording attached].
On the Jordanian Airwaves, Friday 6-2-2009 was probably the most notable one on the Jordanian airwaves with having the Tawjihi results being announced. Despite the fact that Friday is not a day with on air shows for most of the radio stations.
Starting from Friday morning, where the tawjihi results topic was all over Radio Amman FM's shows, even the sports show being aired in the morning, and the interaction followed on all the next shows on its airwaves. Same case was on Radio Jordan – English Service, whose famous show “Listener's Choice” had also a high degree of interaction on this occasion in a funny and a joyful style. Hayat FM on the other hand had a special show on its airwaves in the afternoon of that day for receiving the phone calls and greeting of listeners celebrating the occasion, the presenter of the show was also mentioning from time to time during the show positive & kind suggestions to celebrate this occasion, instead of some bad habits that are being used to celebrate it. Similar suggestions were also discussed by the presenters of “The Boring Show” on Ayyam FM, but in a more comedy style, this topic had taken quite a big part of this show the usually has no certain topic to talk about. And the day ended with “Shabab 3al FM” on Radio Al-Balad, that had a big rate of interaction and phone calls and greetings on this occasion.
Starting Sunday 8-2-2009, a new guidance radio segment started on Amen FM for the school students, the segment presented by the Jordanian comedian “Hussein Tbeishat” aims to increase the traffic and pedestrian safety and awareness of school students, and is being aired on sundays, tuesdays, and thursdays at 7.50 AM on Amen FM, and through all schools morning announcement services in the regions covered by Amen FM's frequencies according to the agreement made with the ministry of education.
Getting into the week's main topic, talking about the Jordanian Universities radio stations and their role on campus and off campus in the surrounding community.
Currently, there are 2 working university radio stations, the 1st is “Radio New Ma'an – Voice of the south”, broadcasting from King Hussein Bin Talal's University in Ma'an ever since July 2006 on 90.3 FM, ever since there was only one station Jordanian FM station reaching Ma'ans area. While there are 3 stations aside Sawt Ma'an. About the station and its role, i had spoken with mr Basem Twesee, chief of research and society development center in King Hussein's university. Who had stated that this radio station is more of a community radio that a university radio, as its main objective is oriented towards the people of Maan and the local society, but the students are making a part of the radio station throughout specialized selection and training to be gradually more and more involved, and some are even professionals now. Radio New Ma'an is also not afraid of the competition, as Dr Basem thinks that getting more stations into the airwaves will even enrich and make their station more notable in the area due to its direct interaction with the public.
[the very interesting phone call recording attached]
The 2nd radio station of this kind to go on was Yarmouk FM, which started broadcasting for a couple of hours daily starting October 2006, and extended it broadcasting to 24/7 later in October 2007. This station's efforts come from the college of media and journalism in the university (ever since it was a dept part of another college), as most of the workers in it are students of this college. The role of this radio station also exceeded the limits of being a university radio station to being a community radio for the city of irbid and its people. Especially since there are another 15 radio stations that have working frequencies in Irbid or in Ajloun covering Irbid's area, thats beside 10s of radio stations being receipted from neighboring countries, making ibrid's airwaves one of the most jammed airwaves of the kingdom.
On the way also as mentioned in a previous episode are a couple of university radio stations that got broadcasting licenses, one is for Mutah University in Karak, a city that has only 1 radio station having a working frequency in it, that is, Fann FM on 94.3 FM, and also receives the broadcasting of several stations from their working frequencies in Amman, but in a mainly weak reception and a varying one depending on the area. The other one is University of Jordan, which will be competing on the ammani airwaves with 10s of radio stations of all kinds. On this radio station i have spoken to Dr Darweesh Badran, one of the people that are participating in establishing this radio station. Dr Badran has stated that the idea behind this stations was enriching the relation between the university and its students, as well as the university and the surrounding community, noting that this station will be a pure “students' radio station”, also, as Mr Badran answered on one of my questions, that the radio station can be one that would interact and represent students from other universities and colleges and not only UJ, as there are several universities and colleges in Amman, the area that this radio station will be covering. Last but not least, Dr Badran stated that they have already several suggestions for programs and cooperations offered to them from students as well as from people in the private sector for their radio station.
[phone call recording attached]
Its very obvious that university radio stations in jordan are taking away of being apart from each other, so we are not seeing one station based on cooperation between several radio stations, and not even partial cooperation, of having for example one radio station with one identity and license but with customized shows for each and every area.
One interesting notice is also that those radio stations are exceeding their university boundaries to be community radio stations. Having priorities and concentration on their community role.
Last but not least comes the observation that the private sector is not participating in investing or cooperating with those radio stations, like some big broadcasting corporation in some European countries that took the role of supporting students radio stations and investing in them in their countries.
Thanks to the guys at Modern Media Co, specifically Mrs Ghada Odeh for her cooperation. Remember that you can contribute too, and send in your comments, feedback and any radio observations on radio@ammannet.net
and note that this segment is being replayed Wednesdays at 4 PM now, beside the basic airplay time, Mondays at 10.30 AM.
05 February, 2009
My Matryoshka Collection, and that deep relation!
Being half romanian, and eastern european in general, brings me a deep inner relation with several items, locations, and traditions from that area.
A Matryoshka doll, a Babushka doll or a Russian nested doll, also called a stacking doll, is a set of dolls of decreasing sizes placed one inside the other. "Matryoshka" (Матрёшка) is a derivative of the Russian female first name "Matryona", which was a very popular name among peasants in old Russia. The name "Matryona" in turn is related to the Latin root, "mater" and means Mother. So the name is closely connected with motherhood and in turn the doll has come to symbolize fertility. [source Wikipedia]
One of them is my Matryoshka dolls collection that i have started less than a couple of years ago, and which are well known souvenir items in eastern european countries. and though I only started this collection less than 2 years ago, i have all of those already :)
The 1st one in the collection was the blue one, which i got from prague a year and a half ago. which was followed by the one to the right from Accessorize (Made in China of course), and was presented by them as a Christmas decoration apparently, just like the other one from them as well. While the other 2 are heavy original ones :D from Russia, and from the Ukraine, and not only that the one from Ukraine was a gift from my dear half Ukrainian friend and ex-colleague Diana, put its full of passion ever since the manufacturing! That is made obvious by a touch from the lady who made it and painted it, leaving a hair of her with the painting :) another fact that makes this one very special to me :)
Apparently, and Unfortunately, i still don't have any of those dolls from romania (hint hint: They are toooooo expensive in romania, those romanian bastards), but will hopefully add one or two from there this year :)
Its also worth mentioning, that if you read that Wikipedia article, you will find out that this dolls was inspired by a souvenir dolls from Japan in the late 19th century.
UPDATE:
My Matryoshka collection has been updated , with a new romanian collection this time :) a must have , isn't it!
Its the Green one to the left in the photo
A Matryoshka doll, a Babushka doll or a Russian nested doll, also called a stacking doll, is a set of dolls of decreasing sizes placed one inside the other. "Matryoshka" (Матрёшка) is a derivative of the Russian female first name "Matryona", which was a very popular name among peasants in old Russia. The name "Matryona" in turn is related to the Latin root, "mater" and means Mother. So the name is closely connected with motherhood and in turn the doll has come to symbolize fertility. [source Wikipedia]
One of them is my Matryoshka dolls collection that i have started less than a couple of years ago, and which are well known souvenir items in eastern european countries. and though I only started this collection less than 2 years ago, i have all of those already :)
The 1st one in the collection was the blue one, which i got from prague a year and a half ago. which was followed by the one to the right from Accessorize (Made in China of course), and was presented by them as a Christmas decoration apparently, just like the other one from them as well. While the other 2 are heavy original ones :D from Russia, and from the Ukraine, and not only that the one from Ukraine was a gift from my dear half Ukrainian friend and ex-colleague Diana, put its full of passion ever since the manufacturing! That is made obvious by a touch from the lady who made it and painted it, leaving a hair of her with the painting :) another fact that makes this one very special to me :)
Apparently, and Unfortunately, i still don't have any of those dolls from romania (hint hint: They are toooooo expensive in romania, those romanian bastards), but will hopefully add one or two from there this year :)
Its also worth mentioning, that if you read that Wikipedia article, you will find out that this dolls was inspired by a souvenir dolls from Japan in the late 19th century.
UPDATE:
My Matryoshka collection has been updated , with a new romanian collection this time :) a must have , isn't it!
Its the Green one to the left in the photo
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