[LAU] Streaming radio and calls from listeners

[Adam Sampson]

Fons Adriaensen <fons at linuxaudio.org> writes:

> This seven seconds 'profanity delay' seems to be a US thing, and
> probably an FCC requirement. I've never seen such things used on this
> side of the Atlantic.

Some UK broadcasters certainly use this kind of delay when dealing with
live callers, with a "dump" button that the presenter can use to drop
the last few seconds. This sometimes gets reported on by Ofcom (the UK
communications regulator) when it goes wrong, e.g. when LBC were feeding
their FM service from the wrong side of the delay:

http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/enforcement/broadcast-bulletins/obb68/

The Communications Act 2003 has a requirement to not include "offensive
and harmful" material (which Ofcom interpret in a fairly liberal way,
taking context into account), and a delay's a pretty good way of doing
so when the presenter can't otherwise control what interviewees might
say.

-- 
Adam Sampson <ats at offog.org>                         <http://offog.org/>