WRIR is a community radio station in Richmond, VA, one of the largest low-power FM stations in the United States.
As the Coronavirus descended upon us, we began to brainstorm ways that we could prepare our station for a potential shutdown. How could we continue broadcasting if volunteers weren’t able to make it to the station during the pandemic?
Our journey to prepare for the pandemic was covered in our station newsletter; download a copy here.
Objectives
- Allow remote access to critical station resources. We need to make sure volunteers have access network shares and station computers.
- Plan for remote broadcasting. Our volunteers are used to broadcasting live from the studio. We need to make sure they can feel comfortable performing the same tasks from home.
- Plan for remote playout scheduling. WRIR typically has board operators in studio while pre-recorded shows are playing out. We need to make sure we can do that from home.
Tools
- Adobe Audition, for recording and editing PSAs and programs
- Libretime, for remote playout scheduling
- Ubuntu Server, Apache httpd, Icecast, and custom Bash scripting, for building and running our station’s backend
- Radio Systems Consoles, for mixing live shows and playout of prerecorded programs
