HealthyLife.Net Radio Network 2002-2012
10 years of Positive Talk
Back into the Time Capsule: 2002
In September 2002, after planning and with equipment bought,
Linda Mackenzie Founder of HealthyLife.net Radio, went out to find a streaming
provider. After looking high and low a fellow broadcaster asked if she knew
about Earthchannel. She called Earthchannel and it just so happened that Cliff Johnson
wasn’t just a random start-up broadcaster in this fairly new world of internet
radio. Oh no! He was one of the original designers of streaming servers and had
been involved in streaming service and technology from the beginning. After
explaining the remaining little known pieces to the puzzle about Internet
broadcasting, Linda in awe at his knowledge remembers asking Cliff jokingly,
“Did God send you?” He promptly answered, “You bet He did!”
Linda decided that EarthChannel was her streaming provider
of choice – and she has never been disappointed with service, price and
availability. Cliff still proves to be a dear friend, the voice of reason and
one of the most knowledgeable broadcast providers on the planet.
So on October 2, 2002, Linda began beta-testing the network.
Not wanting to waste anyone’s time until everything was perfect her radio show
was the only show on the network broadcasting 5 days a week. By the second week
of broadcasting Linda was out looking at golf putter at a sports store. This
incredible voice came out of nowhere and said, “Can I help you?” After a couple
of minutes of conversation Linda asked, “Have you ever been in radio?” The guy
was a little shocked and said, “Yes. In major markets in San Francisco for 15 years, until I got laid
off.” Linda responded by saying, “Would you like to be in radio again?” After
explaining what she was doing in Internet radio he decided he was interested.
And that was what started a 10 year fruitful and beneficial business
relationship with Dennis Glines, now the Program Director on the network.
During December Linda was still not satisfied with the sound
quality of the station. So after several attempts with many computer people who
didn’t know sound and many music people who didn’t know computers she put an ad
in Craigslist. Sean Fodor came into the studio and Linda, who was frustrated by
this time, turned on KABC from the radio and said to Sean “This is what I want
to sound like.” He cocked his ear at the sound for a moment, said a simple “Okay.”
Then made 2 or 3 adjustments on the sound equipment, which took about 2
minutes, and the sound was perfect.
With the streaming perfect, the sound perfect, the
production engineering taken care of and Linda’s show getting call-in audience
response, Linda started marketing to get other radio hosts onto the network.
Not just taking anyone the criteria that a radio host had to have to be on the
network was previous TV, radio, or national lecturer experience with an
audience following. With the lay offs in terrestrial radio occurring, and still
occurring to this day several hosts jumped on board …until…
More next month when we go…Back into the Time Capsule: 2003
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