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T-Radio: New threat to riders, buskers

The MBTA formally announces its new effort to blast your brain with music and ads while you idly wonder why flames are shooting out from under that Red Line train.

Poll: T-Radio: Yay or nay?

T riders without earbuds or headphones will soon have no choice but to listen to T Radio on the Orange and Green Line platforms at North Station, the Red and Silver Line platforms at South Station and at Airport Station:

... T-Radio will provide streamlined information in attention-grabbing mini-features, interspersed with music. The Mini-features range from health and lifestyle reports to sports and entertainment news. T-Radio encourages public transportation travel by highlighting fun and family-oriented events and places that are accessible by the MBTA. T-Radio encompasses music across the last five decades up to and including current chart hits. The music covers many genres: Rock, R&B, Top 40, pop hits, Latin chart toppers, and mainstream crowd pleasers. According to Ed McMann, who will anchor T-Radio, "We'll try to play something for everyone, from Motown to modern rock". ...

Roving gangs of mercenary Emerson students will corner commuters, demanding to know what they think of having more Phil Collins and Shakira in their otherwise boring existences. If enough commuters emulate that shampoo commercial where the woman has an orgasm at the mere thought of it all, the program will be expanded systemwide.

Via Ron Newman.

Meanwhile, one subway busker counts the ways the new program sucks:

... I'm a subway musician. If there's radio, I can't do my job, and right now, they're piloting this in two of the busiest and most lucrative stations in the system (North Station and South Station for those of you who don't care for the linkage). The T did this without running it by any subway performers, and opposition is mobilizing, but it takes time.

Please, if you're local to Boston and you care at all, please contact the T and tell them this is a horrible idea. Even if you don't like buskers, think about having bad radio blasted at you ALL THE TIME. At least now there's a chance you can wait in peace; T Radio will never leave you alone. Ever. ...

Street Arts and Buskers Advocates will try to mount a counter attack:

... The MBTA is desperate for cash. It will abuse patrons and subway artists to get it. The new program violates many previous agreements with the subway artists.

The negative impact on subway performers will be immediate. South Station, one of the pilot stations for T-Radio, is a favorite performance spot. The subway artists were not contacted in advance even though the MBTA has their addresses and telephone numbers as required by the permit system. ...

Earlier:
The T tries to get even more annoying.

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Comments

Rather than having to hear DJ Dan Grabauskas spinning Phil Collins and Maroon 5, I'd be much happier having that money put into reupholstering more of the Orange Line trains with the funky carpet remnants that look like they came from a suburban General Cinemas complex. Have you seen those? Trippy!

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They're MAKING money off of T radio. It has ads on it.

More importantly, they didn't contact anyone in the Subway Performers Program before doing this. The MBTA has access to the addresses and phone numbers of everyone who has a performing permit, but they didn't notify them. That line from Dan Grabauskas in the Metro about planning to feature the subway performers on the radio is news to any of them. But even if he does, and the exposure possibly helps someone to get a couple gigs, T-Radio will have taken a lot more money out of their pockets before this ever happens. Many of the people who play in the subway are making their living or a large portion of it this way. The MBTA has effectively yanked these people's jobs out from under them with no notice. Remember, these aren't panhandlers; they're people who've applied for a permit for their particular musical act and (allegedly) have the blessing of the MBTA to be making their living this way.

http://communityartsadvocates.org/saahistorysubway... has more info on the history of the MBTA trying out TV and radio in stations (and he plans to update today with the stuff specific to this new program).

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...thanks for posting it.

I remember the giant television sets that hung from the ceilings at Downtown Crossing. I think they actually were functional for maybe a week.

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I just went to the Community Arts Advocates website. The T tried something similar to this in 1989, but stopped it. A letter from Gov. Mike Dukakis to the then-president of the Subway Artists Guild includes this phrase:

"The T will not play any pre-recorded music in the future until such a time as a formal agreement can be reached with the Subway Artists Guild."

Is there such an agreement?

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I saw this as a Metro headline this morning. Sadly, I didn't read the article, so I didn't know it was already running and didn't get the full experience as I waited for the Red Line at South Station this morning with my iPod. I can't say I'm disappointed I missed my chance.

Seriously, how much did this system cost? Why wasn't this money used for something... You know... Useful? And the MBTA is wondering why they're swimming in debt.

I want to get a job at the MBTA headquarters, because whatever they're on over there must be really *really* good.

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Ok so let me get this right, the T can barely make normal announcements audible at their stations, and now they're saying they can get music and news to work wonderfully, adjusting to the ambient noise of the room?

I enjoy the quiet in the T stations as well as the local performers who are there. I don't need more canned crap to clog up my brain.

I predict this scheme is going the same way as the T TV they wanted to install in all the subway cars.

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I had my first experience with T radio this morning at N. Station and it just sucks. Sadly, because of the new PA at N. Station, it's also impossible to escape the noise of it.

And I had noise-cancelling headphones on!

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This is not only the worst idea the T has ever come up with, but the most offensive as well. Not only is the content of what they play HORRIBLE, it is nothing short of noise pollution. The T needs advirtising money to be sure, but this is offensive. Whoever thought of this should be ashamed of themselves. Hopefully the radio will break before it drives someone to tear the speakers out of the ceiling. Let's all hope Deval gets his MBTA oversight board and fires the lot of them.

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Maybe we could put slot machines inside the T stations. Then both the MBTA and "why the hell did I vote for this man" Deval would be happy.

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This is so offensive and idiotic I can't really understand what they are doing. How much money could they possibly make with this? Have they even said how much they expect to make with this assault on civilization?

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I heard T-Radio for the first time in South Station yesterday evening, and I found it to very difficult to ignore. I guess it’s a decent idea to collect more ad revenue at a very low cost (considering the speaker system was already in place), but I’d much rather just hear short spurts of something like:

"The next red line train to Alewife is brought to you by (pause pause) Goodyear (pause pause) and will be arriving in 60 seconds."

Now I’m not endorsing this idea, but I do realize that the T is in a major financial crunch, so I’m willing to make some [small] sacrifices if it prevents service from going down hill. I honestly wouldn’t mind riding the Budweiser Train out to Boston College on Friday nights. I’d probably already be drunk off the fumes from all the college kids by the time I got to my stop. I’m not however, willing to sacrifice my ability to zone out while waiting for a train.

I must say, after a year-and-a-half of taking the subway to work, utilizing 3 transfers (B-line => Red => Silver) twice a day, every day, I have never really had any major issues or felt the need to "write to the top." I think this extremely tacky T-Radio thing will finally motivate me to do so.

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I'm confident the speakers will fail within 2 weeks, given the usual competence of the MBTA. Unfortunately, they may just blast static rather than going silent.

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Yeah, and when the overcrowded, filthy, torn seated, "one car isolated", air conditioning-less train arrives not sixty seconds later, but five minutes later, we can all blame Goodyear. Maybe that might give us better service. Heh.

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it's on trial until november (or so i heard on NPR) so if we don't want this to offend our ears any longer, we have to make sure we tell the MBTA that this idea BLOWS.

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....but I don't think it's the worst thing in the world either. My main concern is the quote in the article where the T indicates that they aren't sure if they'll turn a profit on this new initiative. The fact that they are exploring options to increase revenues that don't include fare increases is a good sign, though. Of course, as has been pointed out, with the track record of the T this thing will implode before it gets off the ground (remember the commuter rail platform information kiosks); either that or they'll devote so many resources to T radio that trains filled with passengers will end up trapped on the Longfellow bridge for over an hour...wait a minute?

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Music by James Blunt, ads from Bob's Discount Furniture, Joyce Kulhawik...I'm an even-keeled guy but that combination will make the third rail look like a viable option.

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MBTA - quality, comfort and price (that's nice)

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But I'm not sure "viable" is quite the word you want, since, well, you know. :o)

http://1smootshort.blogspot.com

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That's only some of the ways in which it sucks. Performers pay for a permit. We pay to get into the station. I don't really know whether the MBTA pays the Transit Realty Authority to administer the program (the TRA sucks as well, by the way), but I assume they do.

Fare increases, long waits, broken and dirty trains, and now they're going to take away the one thing that makes some people smile on their crappy commute and replace it with commercials? Good thinking there, guys.

Mr. Grabauskas was quoted in the Metro as saying this is supposed to ENHANCE the live musicians. Um, how exactly? If there's radio, the musicians can't play. And that crap about how maybe they'll feature the musicians on T Radio? How will a flute playing Bach, a fiddle playing Orange Blossom Special and an urdu playing...whatever urdus play...fit into this pop music format? Does Dan think all buskers are singer-songwriters? Because while some are and some are awesome, many of us aren't.

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Isn't the whole thing moot since everyone in the world has an iPod?

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Heh. Actually, some people turn off their iPods to listen to live music. I don't think they'll turn them off to listen to T-Radio.

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Danny G. mentioned in the Boston Magazine article that the T Radio would feature music from the T buskers...

but not every busker has the funds nor the means to have a CD produced.

And what's the point of playing the buskers' music if the buskers themselves can't play? The live performance is what makes things so engaging.

It's all lies and hot air and wind blown in an attempt to take some of the "suck" out of the T Radio idea, but thankfully it appears that very many people are seeing right through this stupid transparent ruse and all the T's lies.

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Well sure, and my music is light classical, fiddle, and some standards, all on one violin. It's not going to sound right or good tossed in some mix station. I don't have CDs because I don't really think most people want to listen to solo violin for that long, unless it's Josh Bell, which I'm not...recorded fiddle tunes need a group, and I don't play anything classical that many people haven't already recorded better.

The point of my being down there is that I'm a live musician. People can smile at me, talk to me, request songs from me. You can't do that with radio.

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While I certainly feel for the buskers, mostly I'm wondering where in the hell I can go and not be advertised at 24/7. I'm goddamn sick of it.

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n/t

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Seriously.

"Buskers: Commercial Free Since 1957!"

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Can't we get those MIT students or local performance artists to hijack the system? Play some Dead Kennedy's or Chomski Lectures as a joke? Onion Radio News?

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I remember back when the T was still attempting the failed T TV someone either bought advertising space, or otherwise hijacked the TV stsytem, so that it kept flashing a screen that said "Together We Can Defeat Capitalism." It was great. I think there was even an article about this long ago, as the message was promptly removed from the TVs before they quickly broke anyway.

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Sign and circulate the online STOP T RADIO petition to send your
complaint about T-Radio straight to Beacon Hill.

http://www.Petitiononline.com/TRADIO/petition.html

Stop the MBTA from piping radio commercials and muzak through Boston's subway ceiling.
Preserve the right to free expression. Save *live* music.

Click Community Arts Advocates.org for a concise history of the long struggle for artistic expression in Boston and struggle of buskers in the MBTA.

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