Category Archives: YouTube

Tom Boman, VP Operations, Learfield Sports

Posted on by


Tom Boman is Vice President of Broadcast Operations for Learfield Sports. He and the people that work with him are responsible for all of the game broadcasts and coaches shows for many of the top colleges and universities in country. He’ll be overseeing broadcasts for 130 schools this fall.

Based on my 40 years in and around radio, I’d say sports play-by-play announcer might be the most coveted — and hard to get — job in broadcasting. And Tom knows as much about what it takes to land one of those jobs as anybody. If you’ve ever wanted to be a “sportscaster” or know someone who does or if you just like listening to sports on the radio, you might enjoy this interview. It runs 20 minutes.

Bob Priddy gets props from national news org

Posted on by
Reply


My friend and colleague Bob Priddy received some much deserved recognition at the opening session of the the Radio Television Digital News Assn/National Assn of Broadcasters annual meeting.

Bob, a 27-year member of the RTDNA board, is stepping down this year and they gave him not one, but TWO awards. The John Hogan Award, named for the founder of RTDNA, is given for distinguished service to the organization. The second award, the newly introduced Bob Priddy award, was presented to Priddy and will now be given to board members who exemplify Priddy’s distinguished and consistent service to RTDNA.

Bob is probably the best reporter I’ve ever met. More importantly, he is one of the best people I have ever met.

Video Affiliate Advisory

Posted on by
Reply


I love this idea. The head of affiliate relations for Learfield Sports (Keith Kowalski) posts a brief (60 sec) video, explaining a new text alert service for keeping radio affiliates up to the minute on changes to broadcast times due to weather. Nothing fancy here. Just pointed the Flip camera and popped the advisory up on YouTube. Our sports ops folks are making excellent use of their website (WordPress) which serves 40+ networks.

My first iPhone video

Posted on by

Forget for a moment that I have the iPhone in portrait orientation, and check out the quality of this brief walk through the newsroom. I’ve uploaded videos to YouTube from all kinds of cameras: Sony Camcorder; Flips; my beloved Casios; the MacBook iSight.

But I don’t think I’ve ever ended up with a clip that looked and sounded this good. I know, could be some Cupertino Mind Trick but I think I’m correct on this point. And the iPhone has YouTube option built right in.

Shoestring video production

Posted on by

My colleague David produced a 2 minute video for one of our clients recently. His post provides the background. I like the piece because a) it illustrates how easy and inexpensive it is to produce video and b) it effectively tells the story (public health program, in this instance).

David shot the video with a small, consumer-grade still camera (with video setting) and edited with iMovie 08. I should note this was David’s first try and he did it while watching a World Series game.

Any company that has “communication” in their name, better have some people capable of producing a video like this. I have a hunch we’ll wind up doing a lot of these for current and future clients.

History of Learfield: J-School Genesis

Posted on by

Clyde Lear’s latest blog installment of the history of our company is the best yet.

“For two years I worked on my Masters in Journalism. I wrote my thesis on starting a state-wide radio network. Missouri –like a lot of states– had dismal radio coverage from the state capital. Every radio newsroom, big city and small town, depended instead on the two major wire services, the AP and UPI.  There wasn’t access to the voices of the news makers. There was a need for a state-wide news service for radio stations.”

The post includes some video of reports he did as part of final exam. These are priceless and make the post. You can’t miss the embedded clip but be sure to hit the text link to a series of his stand-ups. I’ve included my favorite here to give you a taste.

These started out on 16 mm film and Clyde eventually sent them off to be converted to VHS. And now they’re digital and on YouTube for the all the world to see.

Learfield is a pretty big company today and it’s fun to see the germ of the idea that started it all.

Summer Interns

Posted on by

Our summer interns are packing up and heading back to school. One of their final tasks was to prepare a presentation on what they learned working for Learfield. The interns working in our Dallas office created a Powerpoint presentation which was, I’m sure, very… nice.

The Jeff City crew asked my advice and I told them Powerpoint is for losers. I suggested they produce a video and loned them my camcorder. I forgot to give them a mic so the sound is not all that it might be but their creativity and humor comes through loud and clear. Ladies and gentlemen… Coleman, Corey and Tyler.

Thirty years of election coverage

Posted on by

The first election covered by The Missourinet (a network owned by the company I work for) was in 1976. News Director Bob Priddy orchestrated that first election night and every one since. Prior to The Missourinet, radio stations throughout the state focused on local races and relied on the wire services for news and numbers from throughout the state.

The Missourinet brought the sounds of election night from the state capitol and campaign headquarters throughout Missouri to the hometown audiences of our affiliates.

The technology has changed… and is changing… but insight and understanding Missourinet reporters bring to their election night coverage remains the focus of their reporting. Bob reflects on the past 30 years in this 10 minute video.