BSM and Backbone Tackle Sports Radio

August 29, 2022 by Leave a Comment
Backbone Networks Cloud Radio production for Sports

Live Sports needs Live Radio, and no company on the planet provides a more agile, complete broadcast platform for sports radio production than Backbone. This football season, we have teamed up with the number one sports broadcasting publication, Barrett Sports Media, to expand our brand in BSM’s newsletters, web presence, and more. 

This week, BSM’s Countdown to Coverage series covers:
MONDAY (8/28): Best Local Show
TUESDAY: Best National Radio Show
WEDNESDAY: Best College Football Podcast
THURSDAY: Best TV Show
FRIDAY: Best TV Play-by-Play Booth

Backbone’s complete, integrated suite of services comprise the Backbone Radio Platform. Everything, including live production, automation, phones, studio quality remotes on smartphones, podcasting, streaming, terrestrial syndication, and studio-transmitter links, all in the cloud for you to broadcast from anywhere—easier, faster, and more affordably. 

Your Station Anywhere

 

Filed Under: Backbone Radio Blog, Radio Production, Sports Radio, Talk Radio Tagged With: ,

Loving the New Rodecaster at NBA Summer League 2022

July 9, 2022 by Leave a Comment

Backbone is happy to be back to the annual NBA Summer League in Las Vegas with yet more technology for the games’ radio broadcasts. This year’s event includes road testing new Backbone features we’ve integrated specifically for Rode’s new Rodecaster Pro II Production Console. We plan to bring you more information about how Backbone Producer and the Pro II together comprise a game changer for both radio and podcast production. Our thanks to the NBA SoundSystem, the Golden State Warriors, and the NBA Summer League organizers for the opportunity to advance the state of total cloud radio broadcasting in live, remote events.

Filed Under: Production, Radio Production, Sports Radio, Talk Radio, Uncategorized Tagged With: , ,

TALKERS Magazine Profiles Backbone’s Cloud Strategy

September 10, 2020 by Leave a Comment

We keep a fairly low profile at Backbone, working in the background while our esteemed stations take center stage. After all, we simply provide all or most of the technology infrastructure for our clients’ “white label” radio stations. That’s why it’s such an honor to be called into the limelight by “The Bible of Talk Radio”, as TALKERS Magazine was dubbed by Business Week Magazine.

I want to thank Mike Kinosian, TALKERS’ Managing Editor for telling the Talk Radio world about what Backbone has been doing to help the broadcast industry and hosts during this long COVID crisis, as well foster media learning in K-12 through college radio curricula.

See the full article at Talkers.com.

Filed Under: Backbone Radio Blog, College Radio, High School Radio, K12 Media, Public Radio, Radio Production, Talk Radio, Uncategorized

Radio World Follows Up on a “Volunteer Miracle”

July 27, 2020 by Leave a Comment

How do you pop up a radio station virtually overnight to fight a deadly pandemic? Ask Bill Trifero who assembled an all-volunteer army of professionals and a few companies like Backbone and Technical del Arte to chip in state-of-the-art technology. He reports how it came about in Radio World

For the past four months, it’s been our honor to work with Bill on tackling this crisis with 24/7 radio coverage. Equipped with just smartphones, laptops, and Backbone Production Suite, which includes LUCI Global, operating in the cloud, the station was up and running in a matter of a hours and days instead of weeks and months.

Multiple hosts and reporters worked simultaneously, remotely in collaborative broadcasts, without having to buy or borrow many thousands of dollars in hardware. Virtually, every function an agile radio station needs to operate, including phones and terrestrial program syndication to their participating local station, was at their disposal. This is how the cloud can work magic, and Backbone is proud to have been there to help.
Read more in Radio World

Filed Under: Community Radio, Health & Safety, Talk Radio, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Broadcast Free—from Home or Anywhere

May 19, 2020 by Leave a Comment

Powerful Remotes with the Gear You Already Own

Backbone CoHost™ with LUCI Global® apps, Free for 45 Days!

We need to stay safe, and we need to stay on the air. Working from home is no longer just a futuristic perk, it’s our current duty. This should be easy and affordable, and it can be. There is no need to outlay capital to survive, thanks to our unique, integrated Virtualization in the Cloud.

Remote radio broadcasting in the cloud with LUCI and Backbone

Versatile Party Line topology means unlimited remotes using free, downloadable apps. Switching amongst remote feeds available in paid accounts.

Backbone CoHost PL is a fast and easy way for stations to create an always-available “Party Line” conference room for one or more hosts, guests, and correspondents to contribute live audio for your broadcasts. These two-way conversations are enabled by using the groundbreaking LUCI Global service from Technica del Arte and their free, downloadable apps for iOS, Mac, Android, and Windows platforms. LUCI enables these phones, pads, and computers to communicate with and using the same standard formats used by commercial hardware. including COMREX® and TIELINE®.

CoHost PL is a simplified, unswitched version of Backbone CoHost, allowing users to instantly join the broadcast with the touch of a finger. There are no IT settings to configure, no port selections to worry about, and no equipment to purchase or forget in the car. It all works with whatever you’re carrying and over any decent Internet access you can find. (watch video)

Free 45-Day Demo
Backbone is offering a fully functional demo of CoHost PL and LUCI Global to our existing Phone (Talk) and Radio Customers, as well as U.S.-based call-letter radio and TV stations, for 45 days, starting March 30th. Customers who wish to continue with paid service will also get the premium switched version of Backbone CoHost and a full, unlimited version of LUCI Global, for a bundled monthly price of only $275.
To start your free 45-day trial, please email your contact information and a brief note about your organization to: info@backbone.com

Filed Under: Backbone Radio Blog, Community Radio, Health & Safety, Production, Radio Production, Talk Radio Tagged With: , , ,

“Backbone is Changing The Way Audio Programming Is Delivered”, in The Broadcast Bridge

April 24, 2020 by Leave a Comment

Our thanks to The Broadcast Bridge for reporting on the role Backbone is playing in today’s “broadcast from anywhere” world. At Backbone, we have quietly focused on building the fully virtualized radio station in our highly reliable cloud, from automation and production Backbone makes collaborative, distributed audio broadcasts easy in The Broadcast Bridgecommunications, to streaming and syndication. Recent events are now spotlighting the importance of agility and geographically distributed, collaborative broadcasts, Backbone’s core strength.

In olden times, you would need a lot of expensive hardware, plus an IT guru, to pull together a highly distributed audio broadcast. When you wanted to include multiple cohosts and roving reporters in studio quality, the IT issues could get tricky, involving port assignments and routing, not to mention the hardware management issues and equipment cost. Add phones to that, with PBXs and hybrids, and the problems compound exponentially with the complexity of the broadcast.

With Backbone in the cloud, all you need is a Mac laptop, a portable USB mixer, a couple of mics and headsets, all situated wherever you call your main studio(s). Your call screener and/or producer can be local or in another city, with a separate Mac. Then, you only need a smartphone (or tablet or laptop) for each of your remote contributors and collaborators, thanks to the free, downloadable LUCI Global app for iOS, Android, Mac, and Windows. All the calls and remotes are mixed in the cloud and managed by your producer, screener, or primary host.

Even though there are plenty of powerful features built into this integrated suite of services, it’s incredibly easy and intuitive to use. Please contact us when you would like to take it for a 30-day test drive.

Filed Under: Backbone Radio Blog, College Radio, Community Radio, Health & Safety, News, Production, Public Radio, Radio Production, Sports Radio, Talk Radio Tagged With: , , , , ,

Backbone Focusing on the Hot Topics at NAB 2019

March 25, 2019 by 1 Comment

Total Podcast and Radio Production & Streaming in the Cloud

The annual NAB Show in Las Vegas is invigorating, allowing us to reconnect with old friends and recalibrate our technological focus. Among this years top ten hot topics are Content in the Cloud, Streaming, and Podcasting, all of which you’ll see in operation at Booth N6319, Backbone Networks. No other company on the show floor will bring together such a completely virtualized radio production environment, all operating in the cloud to guarantee Your Station Anywhere.

Look closely so you can find our diminutive stand, where a student crew from Robert Morris University Radio will be broadcasting live — demonstrating how they produce live and automated shows in the cloud, stream them, and automatically generate and publish podcasts — with just a Mac, a mixer, and a couple of mics.

What to check out at Backbone Networks, Booth 6319:

  • Backbone Production Suite™—The whole turnkey bundle for a complete radio station, or any of its component modules, including:
    • Backbone Radio™ — Professional streaming radio station in the cloud, live and automated, always-on 24/7
    • Backbone Talk™ — Broadcast multi-line call-in phone system, PBX in the cloud, take/make calls from anywhere, streamlined for online and AM/FM stations, as well as talk-show podcasters
    • Backbone Co-Host™, with LUCI® Global — Unlimited SIP/OPUS remotes and multi-location shows with no boxes or hardware; just laptops and smartphones; conference directly with Talk callers
    • Backbone Hub™ — Cloud assistant for automated production, Podcast publication, Alexa® briefings, and scheduling live audio and FTP show syndication to AM/FM stations; included with Backbone Radio™
  • New 3rd Party Hardware — including an exciting new mix-minus portable mixer for sports and talk radio remotes, and new hardware concepts for creating your own robust cloud.

See you in Las Vegas!

Filed Under: Backbone Radio Blog, News, Radio Production, Talk Radio, Uncategorized

Junior Radio to Major Leagues—To Alexa and Beyond—with new Backbone Hub

February 21, 2018 by Leave a Comment

Q: How does a Midwestern junior high classroom radio station manage to produce and deliver dynamic on-demand audio the same way as a champion NBA team or 24/7 nationwide sports network?
A: By harnessing the hottest cloud technology to reach an exploding “smart speaker” audience, including Backbone Hub, cloud based on-demand audio production and distribution software for Alexa flash briefings and Google Home, podcasts and radio automation FTP feedsAmazon’s Echo “Flash Briefings”, as well as other outlets—using Backbone, of course.   (more about Lincoln Jr. High, below)

Automatic Alexa publishing for radio stations and moreBackbone Hub™, the incredible, new product set in our “cloud-based” ecosystem, is both a multi-destination distribution engine for your recorded content and a hands-free production tool that adds music and pre-rolls to your dry voice recordings. The result is an automated workflow allowing one person to remotely—via iOS® or Android®— record a spoken segment, and have it dynamically gift-wrapped with music and simultaneously delivered to Alexa, Google Home, AM/FM automation systems, and even as a podcast, with no further effort. (We’re announcing Backbone Hub at NAB 2018 in Las Vegas—Booth 5721— and previewing at IBS NYC).

We’ll tell you more about our sports clients later, but first here is what Indiana’s Storm Radio is doing, from Literacy Shop Talk

“Alexa, Give Me LJH Storm Radio Flash Briefing For Today”

BY: PAULA NEIDLINGER – FEB• 20•2018 Twitter: @PNeidPrepare self-directed learners to think critically about the messages received and created by media

Are you completely confused by the title? If I captured your attention- please continue reading to find out how you can use the Amazon Echo in the classroom for student podcasts and Internet radio stations.

Yes, your students’ podcasts and radio shows can now be heard through the Flash Briefing setting within your Echo/Alexa device. What an exciting opportunity for all students. Their voices can now be heard beyond the classroom walls. Aren’t we all searching for global audiences? What an exciting opportunity for all students and teachers.

Within my mass media classroom structure, students have the opportunity each day to have their voices heard through our Storm Radio program. We are now finishing our fourth year with Backbone Networks, the provider of our classroom Internet radio station. Backbone has enabled our classroom station to operate 24/7 using an integrated radio automation system, which streams to a worldwide audience and automatically creates listener logs and reports for me on a regular basis. With no more than a Mac, mic, and audio board, we operate Storm Radio from the classroom 24/7. Students write and produce their shows daily, utilizing school, community, and world news. Additionally, our Lincoln Jr. High student DJ’s entertain calls from their listeners using our Backbone Talk broadcast phone system. This system provides engagement with our audience in Plymouth, Indiana, and beyond.

Now, let’s continue with the “BIG” news! Using backbone’s new product ‘backbone hub’, we are now able to deliver media from our
radio database automatically as an Amazon Alexa flash briefing — as well as stream that same content on air and deliver to a podcast RSS feed. If you own an Echo Device, check out our podcast through the Flash Briefing content on your Echo/Alexa device.

Directions:

  • Open your Alexa app
  • Go to settings
  • Scroll down to Flash Briefings
  • Search Content for LJH Storm Radio
  • Enable Content
  • Ask Alexa for your Flash Briefings Update each day

Yes, it’s that simple. Providing students with the opportunity to have their voices heard, both within the walls of Lincoln Jr. High and beyond, is possible through an Internet radio program. Not only can you listen to Storm Radio through our LJH Digital Storm website and TuneIn app, you now can hear the latest news each day through Flash Briefings on your Echo device; just say, “Alexa, give me my LJH Storm Radio Flash Briefings today.”

Are you excited now? Think of all the possibilities for student podcasting. I’d love to hear from you. My students are always eager to connect through the “Radio Waves.”

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Filed Under: Backbone Radio Blog, High School Radio, News, Newspaper Media Stations, Radio Production, Sports Radio, Talk Radio

Alt Newspaper Teams with Community Radio to Serve New England’s Second City

November 8, 2017 by Leave a Comment

New England’s second largest city has its first community “media station”, a term coined by Talkers Magazine. Worcester Magazine, the city’s alternative newsweekly, has teamed with Unity Radio, a community-focused online andBackbone powers newspaper radio station low-power FM (LPFM) radio station, to create “ a joint venture unlike anything else in the Worcester media landscape”. The station’s technology, unlike traditional stations resides in “the cloud”, virtualized — without physical hardware, bricks or mortar.

The new media enterprise, which is based on all the elements of Backbone’s Production Suite™, was “soft-launched” during the city’s municipal elections November 7. The station intends to draw upon the resources of both WoMag and Unity’s non-profit parent, Pride Productions, as well as popular, local talk radio talents, like veteran morning host and news director Hank Stolz.

Backbone powers community radio

Worcester Magazine at local elections on Unity Radio, powered by Backbone

During election night, Unity Radio set up operations in Worcester City Hall awaiting ballot counts, where they interviewed candidates (using Backbone Producer™), took listener phone calls (Backbone Talk™), and aired studio-quality remotes from reporters with smartphones around the city (Backbone Co-Host™ with LUCI™ Global). The live production was streamed online (Backbone Radio™) and fed through a low-latency IP connection (Backbone Syndicate™) from the cloud to Unity’s new LPFM transmitter located several miles away.

Read more here: “Worcester Magazine, Unity Radio announce online station”

Filed Under: Backbone Radio Blog, Community Radio, LPFM, News, Newspaper Media Stations, Production, Radio Production, Talk Radio Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

TALKERS 2017, The All-Star Game of Talk Radio

May 15, 2017 by Leave a Comment

Talkers 2017If you’re really into talk radio, you know what an incredible institution Talkers Magazine is and the important role it plays in the talk radio industry. You probably already receive your daily email briefing from “the Bible of Talk Radio” and you’re familiar with the Heavy Hundred rosters of Talk and of Sports Talk Radio. Well, then, I don’t have to tell you what an awesome feeling it is to walk into a room full of some of the industry’s most illustrious radio talents, standing shoulder to shoulder ready to meet with and learn from each other.

Backbone is incredibly proud to be invited to sponsor the Talkers 2017 event in New York City on June 2nd, and we want everybody to know that we’re dedicated to “The New Era” of talk radio that this event celebrates. If you haven’t had the opportunity to attend an annual Talkers event, I strongly encourage you to take this opportunity to learn from the big dogs in the business. It only happens once a year, just like the Super Bowl, and it’s an event you will always remember.

See you there.

Filed Under: Backbone Radio Blog, Talk Radio
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