Mark Browne is on the cutting edge of entertainment technology.
With a handy remote control device at his Central Florida home, he is able to access 30 channels of commercial-free, deejay-less, compact disc-quality music on his stereo. Rock 'n' roll? It's time to boogie! Country music? Yee ha! Reggae? No problem, mon!"Just depending on what mood you're in, it's nice to listen to certain music," says Browne, 23. "If you want to tone things down, you can listen to a softer music."
Browne gets this magical music service, called Digital Music Express or DMX, piped into his home through his cable system 24 hours a day for $10.95 a month.
As a cable TV subscriber, Browne last spring became one of a growing number of people nationwide to experience digital audio.
DMX, provided by the Los Angeles-based International Cablecasting Technologies Inc., is one of two digital audio services being sold around the country. Sometimes known as cable radio, these services are to broadcast radio what HBO was to broadcast television more than a decade ago.
But instead of movie selections, digital audio services provide music - all varieties, all the time, with a sound quality superior to that of stations and sans commercials and chuckling announcers.
"With a radio station there is always the deejay you've got to put up with," Browne says. "There are a lot of radio stations I don't listen to in the morning because of the deejay."
Whether digital audio achieves the same market prowess as HBO remains to be seen, but cable radio is the newest premium service being hawked to cable subscribers today.
Subscribers get a special tuner for their stereo and the DMX remote control, which is dubbed the "DMX DJ." The remote control has a data window that will display, with the push of a button, the name of the song the listener is hearing, the artist, the composer and the album title.
"We've found once people hear the music and play with the remote control, it sells itself," said Randy Ittner, marketing manager at Lake County Cablevision north of Orlando.
The key to selling the music service is demonstrating it, Ittner says. The concept is so new that most people can't grasp its full benefits without hearing and seeing it.
Indeed, the rollout of digital audio hasn't happened at a dazzling rate. DMX launched its service in 1991 and its competitor Digital Cable Radio (DCR) launched in early 1990. Today DMX serves 120,000 customers nationwide and DCR, 55,000.
Initial subscribers, company officials say, tend to be owners of compact disc players and heavy cable users. The problem is that the number of subscribers tends to plateau after the so-called audiophiles have signed up for the service, says Matt Stump, national editor of the weekly trade magazine Cable World.
Though the digital audio companies are still trying to figure out their marketing strategies, the cable industry remains optimistic about the technology's potential, Stump says. Even major record companies are investing in digital audio because they believe the services can be good for music sales. The major hurdle for digital audio is the education of the consumer.
"Until 80 percent of your people really understand it and choose not to subscribe to it, you just keep marketing," Stump says.
Digital Cable Radio spokeswoman Karen Muldoon said DCR expects 25 to 30 percent of the 55 million U.S. cable homes to subscribe to a cable radio service within 10 to 15 years.
DCR has 28 channels for music and for simulcasting premium cable channels like HBO, Showtime and Cinemax. The company will be expanding to 56 channels this spring and expects eventually to offer as many as 250 channels for music, video simulcasts and information such as sports statistics and financial news.
DMX, on the other hand, sees itself primarily as a music delivery service. Individual cable operators have the option of adjusting their equipment to allow for simulcasting of premium cable channels.
In popular formats like rock 'n' roll, DMX programs a broader range of music than the typical radio station, says customer Browne. And some of the formats DMX offers are rarely found on commercial radio stations today: opera, show tunes, blues and big band music, to name a few. (DMX's competitor DCR also has a channel of music and special programming just for kids.)
Is cable radio considered a threat to radio? Not at the moment, says Steve Holbrook, operations director at WWKA-FM (92.3) in Orlando. Then again, it's not something to be taken lightly. Although most people now listen to the radio in their cars coming to and from work, cable radio could further erode radio's evening audiences. In a few years, cable radio may even be available in cars through special equipment.
Cable radio, Holbrook says, will help broadcasters better define their roles. Radio stations are far more than jukeboxes. They are sources of news and information, and the same disc jockeys some listeners hate are the very people other listeners love to spend time with.
"I think listeners like to have a personality," Holbrook says. "They like to be entertained."
"While it (cable radio) will be neat to have in the beginning, people will eventually go back to radio," he says.
If all customers were like Larry Curtis, the sell would be a cinch. Curtis, 35, ordered DMX as soon as he heard it. He is single and a big fan of both music and cable.
For Curtis, a truck driver, home entertainment is a high priority. His monthly cable bill is about $100 a month.
"I cherish my moments at home because I'm on the road a lot," he says. "Being one of those kinds of people, I don't mind spending the money."
Curtis says he uses DMX as sort of a customized Muzak. The quality of sound is as good as if it were coming from his own CD player and the selection of music is far greater than he could ever find on his radio.
"If you can't find something to listen to in 30 channels of music," he says, "you're not a music person."
- How digital audio works:
Digital audio works through a subscriber's cable system. It is hooked up with a special tuner that splits the cable signal between the television and the stereo.
For about $10 a month, customers also receive a remote control device that accesses up to 30 channels of music. In some cases, they also receive channels that simulcast in digital sound quality such cable offerings as HBO or MTV.
Two digital audio services are being sold throughout the country.
One service, Digital Music Express, uses a remote control with a data window that displays, with the push of a button, the name of the song the listener is hearing, the artist, the composer and the album title.
The other service, Digital Cable Radio, uses a simpler remote but plans to introduce an upgraded version this spring.