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FCC Puts Screws to Live<br />
Event Audio Industry<br />
continued from cover<br />
about expanding the availability of broadband<br />
Internet service to rural and lower<br />
income areas of the country. (Sounds a<br />
lot like how “expanding the availability”<br />
of home mortgages to people who could<br />
never hope to repay them laid the foundation<br />
for the sub-prime loan debacle of the<br />
last few months.) A lot of work and money<br />
went into making sure the public saw it<br />
that way. Google started a huge campaign<br />
called “Free the Airwaves,” and even interest<br />
groups including FreePress.net called<br />
on their troops to support the expected<br />
FCC action. (Fun fact: When <strong>FOH</strong> Publisher<br />
Terry Lowe received an e-mail blast from<br />
FreePress.net campaign director Timothy<br />
Karr, he wrote back trying to explain how<br />
important this issue was to the live entertainment<br />
industry and Karr’s response to<br />
his own people was, “Please no one respond<br />
to this.”) Yes, boys and girls, the fix<br />
was in.<br />
What is this really about? The tech<br />
companies who actually make stuff like<br />
Dell and Motorola don’t care a lot about<br />
broadband access for lower income and<br />
rural Americans. Most of that demographic<br />
does not have the money to buy the new<br />
devices they want to build. And the audio<br />
industry has never had a problem with<br />
fixed installation of broadband transmitters<br />
in rural and low-income areas. If they<br />
are fixed, we know where they are and can<br />
avoid them. This is more about a new generation<br />
of handheld computing/communication<br />
devices akin to the iPhone or Blackberry,<br />
but operating in spectrum that they<br />
don’t have to pay for. We call this “putting<br />
a charitable face on a grab for mo’ money.”<br />
Or maybe even “Putting lipstick on a pig.”<br />
For Google and Microsoft, it is all about<br />
advancing the idea of “ubiquitous computing.”<br />
Search has become the Holy Grail for<br />
Microsoft as they lose ground to Google<br />
and the company that once ran under the<br />
mantra “Don’t Be Evil” has invested more<br />
money than any of us want to think about<br />
on server and storage “farms” and already<br />
provides computing and storage for many<br />
of the leading photo and social networking<br />
sites online. The more people are tethered<br />
to their “personal communication<br />
devices” the more potential they have to<br />
sell that capacity and the advertising that<br />
goes with it.<br />
On the FCC side, keep this in mind.<br />
Commissioners like Mr. Martin are political<br />
appointees. This means following the<br />
election they all become part of a lameduck<br />
administration, and as such, their<br />
clout is gone. Everyone from the NFL to<br />
Dolly Parton, from mega-church pastors to<br />
Guns N’ Roses and from Hillary Clinton to<br />
the companies that run entertainment up<br />
and down the Vegas strip, have asked Martin<br />
and his fellow weasels to hold off. No<br />
one even knows what these new devices<br />
will be able to do. I guess Google and Microsoft<br />
just might have use for an unemployed<br />
FCC weasel on their own staffs. Just<br />
watch.<br />
So what does it all mean? Well first, if<br />
you own any wireless gear operating in the<br />
700-mHz range it may well become useless<br />
come Feb. That entire spectrum has<br />
already been auctioned off for other uses.<br />
Every mfg will be different and none that<br />
we know of has been selling gear in this<br />
range since that spectrum continued on page 8<br />
VIENNA, Austria — AKG Acoustics<br />
has announced the acquisition of the<br />
worldwide distribution rights for the<br />
Crown family of microphones. This<br />
move represents a consolidation among<br />
the Harman Group of Companies.<br />
Crown specializes in manufacturing<br />
amplifiers, microphones and system<br />
control products for audio markets<br />
worldwide. Thomas Stubics, product<br />
manager for recording and broadcast<br />
at AKG stated, “Crown microphones are<br />
among the elite and are top-of-the-line<br />
www.fohonline.com<br />
products that are well-known for their<br />
outstanding performance. The diversity<br />
of the Crown microphone line is the<br />
perfect match for AKG’s stronghold as a<br />
source of industry-leading products.”<br />
According to the company, AKG<br />
Acoustics is looking forward to its partnership<br />
with Crown International as<br />
each company has played a major role<br />
in the professional audio industry.<br />
Stubics continues, “With AKG’s<br />
expertise in the global microphone<br />
business, the new partnership of AKG<br />
News<br />
AKG Acoustics to Distribute Crown Microphones<br />
and Crown is a logical next step that<br />
will benefit the customers and business<br />
partners for AKG and Crown microphones.<br />
AKG has invested a large<br />
amount of time and money into its distribution<br />
infrastructure, and the partnership<br />
with Crown will solidify our<br />
global distribution strategy.”<br />
Harman International acquired AKG<br />
in 1993 and then purchased Crown in<br />
2000 in order to gain a stronger foothold<br />
in the microphone market.<br />
2008 NOVEMBER<br />
5<br />
Ad info:http:// foh.hotims.com
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