Headlines

NAB's Joint Board Chairman Dave Lougee and President and CEO Gordon Smith will break ground on the NAB's future home in Washington D.C. on Monday, June 20 at 12:45p.m. The new 10-story building, at the corner of South Capitol and M Streets, is expected to be completed in fall 2018. It will have a curved facade facing M Street, a rooftop terrace with a view of the Capitol, and a 100-seat theater.

On Thursday, the staff at Minnesota Public Radio in St. Paul, Minn., voted to join SAG-AFTRA, with 39 voting yes for SAG-AFTRA representation, 17 voting no and 18 challenges. The result means staff will join the union. The new bargaining unit will cover the employees who create content for MPR News, American Radio Works, and the newly formed Investigative Unit. The election allows them to move forward to negotiate a first contract.

Veteran Arkansas broadcaster Bobby Caldwell adds a trio of stations to his Russellville, Arkansas group. Caldwell is purchasing KARV-AM & FM and KYEL-FM from Kermit and Diane Womack of Springdale, Arkansas. The sale price is $800K.

For the answer to that question, we reached out to broadcast attorney John Garziglia for more analysis. Garziglia has blogged about this issue before for Radio Ink (HERE). Does Garziglia believe this is the final chapter of the war? Let's find out.

This ruling will be of big interest to broadcasters, especially those running music stations. ABS Entertainment argued that pre-1972 songs were protected under state law and could not be broadcast on the radio without permission. In 2015, ABS filed a copyright case against CBS (and others) for pre-1972 recordings for artists such as Al Green. CBS lawyers responded by saying it did not publicly perform any of ABS's pre-1972 recordings and this week a judge agreed with CBS Radio. Here are the details...

Thanks to broadcast attorney David Oxenford for simplifying this one for us. In his latest blog, Oxenford points out that the FCC is asking for comments on its proposed new fees, and the proposed fees go up significantly for broadcasters. The fees are meant to recoup the costs of the FCC’s regulation of the industries that it oversees.

That was partly due to two fewer selling days for radio's biggest ad category. GM, Ford and other manufacturers reported lower U.S. vehicle sales for May due to sluggish demand for sedans and those two fewer selling days. General Motors' sales fell 18 percent, Ford was down 6 percent and Toyota's sales dropped 10 percent compared to 2015. Volkswagen's sales were down 17 percent. Fiat Chrysler and Subaru saw slight increases. Hyundai's sales jumped 12 percent.

The company, owned by Duke Wright, purchased WNFN-FM in Millersville, Tennessee, from Joule Broadcasting for $3.75 million. Midwest now has three FMs in the Nashville area. Millersville is just north of the city. Eddie Esserman of Media Services Group was the exclusive broker on this deal.

And you can watch the event via Livestrem HERE beginning at 1 p.m. Eastern. The event begins with an introduction from Ramsey. His first guest is Lizzie Widhelm from Pandora at 1:20. The event runs for two days.

AdLarge Media has announced a digital ad sales agreement streaming content partner, idobi Network. idobi focuses on new music and artists in alternative, metal, and punk rock, such as Patrick Langlois, Darrin Pfeiffer, Mike Herrera, Mike Gunz, and Sébastien Lefebvre.