“The Bottom Line” Host Mike’l Severe (left) and Producer Chad Aune at a live remote last fall in Omaha, Neb.OMAHA, NEB. — The Omaha World-Herald decided in the winter of 2013 that we were going launch a sports and news talk Internet radio station.
There were several options that could be taken to set up the radio station. We ended up using Backbone Radio as our solution.
Not having any real experience in the radio field, Backbone Radio made it very easy for us to launch our station and broadcast over the Internet. The all-inclusive software was the ticket. Most of the equipment needed to operate the station was already in the building. Mac laptops, microphones and headsets were already in use for our video production. We constructed a modest studio in the newsroom where “The Bottom Line” was to be produced.
In our application we enjoy having the talent and producer together. Being a sports talk-based show, we rely on interaction from callers. Having the producer and talent side-by-side offers better communication between the two and a more well-rounded discussion for our listeners. The Backbone Talk software provides call screener capability that makes this possible. Mike’l Severe, the host of the show, can focus on the content of his show while the producer/screener can answer, conference, block and/or record calls.
We also like the optional high-fidelity guest line, which permits multiple co-hosts to call in from different locations. We have utilized this function when broadcasting from several football games during the college season.
With Backbone’s cloud-based system, our screener/producer has the phone calls and text messages funnel into one place where the producer can handle the incoming communications without getting overwhelmed or distracted. With the telco working out of the cloud we can take the show anywhere Internet is available and have good communications.
In the eight months we’ve been using Backbone, we have broadcast live remotes from locations in the baseball village outside the college world series and just outside Memorial Stadium for home Nebraska Cornhusker football games. We paid to have an Internet connection dropped at the locations and we were able to go live easily.
We recently added an affiliate on terrestrial radio that now also broadcasts “The Bottom Line.” Backbone’s customer service and support made it easy for us to get the show to our affiliate via our Comrex codec.
For information, contact Backbone Networks in Massachusetts at (617) 848-1176 or visit www.backboneradio.com.
