I think I can say this now without divulging information most of you don't know.
Ed Histed left Rt 81 about a month ago. I believe he saw changes coming that he didn't like, but that is my opinion only.
He formed his own radio consulting firm and his first job was consulting WQFM from the Scranton Times Building. No doubt "the Q" moniker was Ed's and I know Ed.
There will be change at Q. Not tomorrow. But soon.
I worked for Ed when he owned WDNH in Honesdale. Even in 1990, WDNH was amongst the very first local stations to use computer automation. Ed taught all of us how to voice track, and he is still amongst the very best voicetracker. He really DOES sound like he is live, you really can not tell if he is there or not. And that is a fact: I once called Ed at WCDL convinced he was there, and it was early: but he emailed me back saying he needed to step out for an early meeting.
Inasmuch as in that year, computers inside businesses were just coming to fruitation, WDNH had a very ingenious automation system, that really allowed you to do anything you can do now, just not as smoothly. It was a pioneering system.
Now, everything is on hard disc, but this automation system was hooked up to a bank of (IIRC) about 30 CD decks that each held 5 CD's. These were in another room across from the studio.
When Ed or Pete wanted to change songs in the CD players they would just delete the song from the computer and add in a new title (this is what we saw in the studio). Interestingly, everyweek we did the Weekly TOP 40 program, and part of my job was to time this out on a CD deck that had a very accurate timer. I wrote every time break down on paper and Ed would go in and program it into a log. Therefore, if a commercial break ran over or under 2 seconds, it was MY fault!
It was a simple matter of just putting the cd's into the proper player and when it was time for the show, it fired off automatically.
In 1996, it was becoming the end of the analog era. The DJ's could record shows 2 days in advance onto the computer if they wanted the weekend off. However that automation system was restricted to two days out. IF there was a holicay weekend (like Labor Day) that someone wanted the day off, he recorded his liners onto a reel, and I dumped that audio into the computer on Sunday night. We did get agency spots on reel that I dumped into automation, but other than that we didn't use much analog even at that time.
So, for the person wondering if the QFM website will change....I would imagine YES. Ed did all the Route 81 sites, and he also owns his own computer programming company. Write him at edhisted.com.
Carl
