KYOURADIO - Open Source Radio in San Francisco

KKHI, at 1550 on the San Francisco AM dial, was, from the early 1960s to 1994, a classical music station.

That year, CBS/Infinity Broadcasting purchased a cluster of San Francisco stations including KKHI. Music formats had already abandoned the AM band. The 1550 frequency drifted from all-news to talk to, for lack of anything else, a simulcast of co-owned FM country station KYCY. Very few listeners tuned it. Infinity needed something for its station at the top (low signal) end of the AM broadcast band that, for many younger listeners, represented the past, that would attract an audience.

On May 16, 2005, KYCY became the first terrestrial radio station to go all-podcast, as "KYOURADIO."

The KYOU call sign already belonged to the Fox TV affiliate for Ottumwa, Iowa. But KYCY can still use it, with permission, any time except legally on the hour when its assigned call letters must be used.

A format was born: Open Source Radio.

"There is a profound shift underway in the way we use technology that allows everyone to have a voice," said Joel Hollander, chairman and CEO of Infinity Broadcasting. "KYOURADIO harnesses that power by serving our listeners with content developed by them for them and offering a platform to share it with the rest of the world."

Listeners in the Bay Area who appreciate the irony life offers could hear the latest thing in broadcasting on yesterday's technology - AM radio -- on their old tube sets.

Whether or not something that isn't downloaded to an I-pod can be a podcast is open for debate. KYCY still became the first traditional broadcast radio station to use exclusively content created by its listeners and submitted in the form of sound files.

As 2008 began, KYCY aired several CBS/Infinity talk shows than contractually needed an affiliate in San Francisco, and streamed the podcast format, using it to fill on AM. Now, instead of the AM station simulcasting on the website, it's the other way around.

Contributors to KYOU give the station and site (from the User Agreement):