Creating a Blackout

To create a blackout, please follow the following steps. Please note this is separate from Whiteout functionality. For any questions regarding this process please contact AmperWave support.

1. Login to the streaming console at https://console.amperwave.com/
2. Navigate to the 'Restrictions' page
3. If you're looking to create a new blackout, please click "Create Blackout", a form will display
4. Begin by assigning the blackout a name. Please note that a blackout will need to be created for every station needing to be blacked out. Select the station in the dropdown. 
5. For blackout type, we offer two different modes, scheduled, which will blackout based off a selected time/date, or triggered, which will blackout based off a selected start/end code. These should be formatted with underscores instead of spaces. For example: START_BLACKOUT_KNYC, END_BLACKOUT_KNYC. The fields on the page are dynamic to set start/end times for scheduled, and start/end codes for triggered. Note: If an end trigger is not received after 6 hours the blackout will automatically expire.
   
   
6. The Alternate Content will allow you to upload an audio file to play for those affected by the blackout, and to assign an alternative station if you desire to do so. Please note that the audio file should not be more than 90 seconds. 
7. The Targeting section will allow you to configure what you want to happen when your station is blacked out. Please select the Country, State, DMA, City, Source, or IP. 
   1. For Country, State, and DMA, select your target from the list of available targets
   2. For City, Source, or IP, it will display a section for you to input the requested city, source, IP
      1. For city specifically, it will blackout an IP in that city. It also has the ability to add a radius to allow for a set radius you can configure from the selected city
   3. Please note that multiple targets can be selected, and it is programmed to go from top to bottom of the selected targets in order. 
8. Once Targeting is decided, on the "Receives Original Content", decide if you want the selected area to either allow or deny the terrestrial broadcast. Once decided, click the Set Target button. This can be repeated to allow for multiple targets to be selected. 
9. The next step will be to decide what happens for unselected geographic targets, this is an Allow/Deny toggle which will either allow restricted content or deny it.
10. Click on Create at the bottom of the window to save the blackout
11. Please note that at this point the blackout will be ready and will begin when scheduled/triggered. 
    
    Note for Triggered Blackouts: Triggered blackouts are initiated at the automation level. After configuring your triggered blackout in the streaming console, your station engineer will set up two custom carts in your automation system, one to begin the BLACKOUT with an artist of "trigger_event" and a title to match the start code you entered earlier, and one to end the BLACKOUT with an artist of "trigger_event" and a title to match the end code you entered earlier. These carts should include a one-second silent audio file added to each cart to make sure the automation system sends those metadata events through to the encoder machine and allows them to be processed prior to any additional events being sent. Note that a station in triggered BLACKOUT will remain in BLACKOUT indefinitely, so it's a good idea to schedule an automatic END BLACKOUT trigger well after the expected end of the event, just in case the manual send is overlooked after the game ends.

For more information, see:

• Blackouts (Restrictions) - Overview
• Blackout Examples
• About Whiteouts
• Blackouts vs Whiteouts