NBC (Radio) News

[AMRocks]

Westwood One/Cumulus is dumping NBC as a brand. They also dumped CNN a while back and are losing ABC. They still have CBS Radio.

Now, they are planning "Westwood One News" to be a brand. It will be built from the unbranded news they are currently offering from "powered by CNN." (I don't think they ever used the CNN brand in their "name" on the air. I think they just had access to using CNN-TV audio where they could strip sound.)

My only comment is....

In this day and age of Google, Yahoo, ABC, Fox, MSN, MSNBC, etc., why would anyone want to start up a "new" brand? Although we radio folk have heard of Westwood One, I'm not sure the general public knows, trusts or cares about Westwood One.

 

[FredLeonard]

Apparently, they think the "brand names" of these TV/cable networks (which have all exited radio) don't count for much with the general public either. Maybe it has to do with the fact that recognized names (and voices) from TV have had little or no presence on the radio side. It is clear to even the casual listener/viewer that the two have little or nothing to do with each other.

 

[TheBigA]

The rest of the story is that all network news is mainly used by AM stations. Not much use on FM. With AM in free fall, not much point spending millions for brand names that mainly over-55 men listen to.

 

[Avid Listener]

In this day and age of Google, Yahoo, ABC, Fox, MSN, MSNBC, etc., why would anyone want to start up a "new" brand? Although we radio folk have heard of Westwood One, I'm not sure the general public knows, trusts or cares about Westwood One.

I suspect that it's not so much about the newness of the brand as it is about the fact that you have to call it something. "Westwood One News" is as good a generic name as any. Spoken aloud, the three clipped syllables beginning with a "W" sound have a nice ring to them. True, the name doesn't mean anything to the public. I don't think anyone really cares about the brand of the news. The public will continue to listen to the stations that they listen to, and either ignore or pay attention to the news when it comes on regardless of what it's called.

 

[TheBigA]

I suspect that it's not so much about the newness of the brand as it is about the fact that you have to call it something. "Westwood One News" is as good a generic name as any.

According to the story in RadioInk, the "Westwood One News" name won't actually be used on the air. They're marketing it so local station branding will be used instead.

RadioInk included the email sent to stations that included this quote:

As part of our commitment to providing innovative flexibility for stations, this next-generation news product will include headlines, special reports, correspondent two-ways, newsmaker sound bites and other news elements your listeners expect -- all powered by CNN and featuring your local branding.

 

[FredLeonard]

Is this a national newscast feed, like these "brands" have had in the past? Or is WWI resurrecting something like Metro/Shadow/Source customized newscasts for stations in different markets (which they owned and sold off to Clear Channel)?

 

[TheBigA]

Is this a national newscast feed, like these "brands" have had in the past? Or is WWI resurrecting something like Metro/Shadow/Source customized newscasts for stations in different markets (which they owned and sold off to Clear Channel)?

Hmmm. I don't think they will be doing individual custom newscasts for stations like Metro. From what I can gather from the quote, it will be national news from a central location, but with local branding at the open and close.

 

[JeffM]

Westwood One already destroyed Mutual as a brand name and replaced it with their own (yet those who remember or care know that a number of their people and show ideas even now are carryovers from MBS...)

 

[FredLeonard]

Is this a national newscast feed, like these "brands" have had in the past? Or is WWI resurrecting something like Metro/Shadow/Source customized newscasts for stations in different markets (which they owned and sold off to Clear Channel)?

Too bad. Custom news might actually be a better, more attractive idea. And it was a previous incarnation of WWI that sold off Metro.

The idea of separate network newscasts and local newscasts might have made sense half a century ago. Not any more and not for a long time. Especially since the network radio news is not famous voices people know and have learned to trust (that function has pretty much been taken over by right-wing talk show hosts).

The TOH newscast should go with what's important - whether it's local or from someplace else. To the listener, there's no artificial distinction between local news and national news. There's just the news. It gets especially ridiculous when the local news reader comes on an repeats a story from the national news five minutes later with some local tie-in.

Ever since the launching of RPI and UPI Audio, network newscasts have been an obsolete idea.

 

[Ravens]

Custom news sounds great until you start having to pay people to do it.

 

[umfan]

Westwood just built a sports network around the NBC name, so leaving NBC for news seems questionable. I'm aware the formats are distinct and that NBC Radio News isn't carried on NBC Sports Radio, but for the stations that did subscribe to the NBC Radio News product, they likely preferred the 'relationship' with a network that listerners likely assumed was conferred when they carried it.

General Electric destroyed NBC Radio by dumping it after they acquired the network. Not much impact from this change one way or the other.

 

[FredLeonard]

The brand is much more important for newscasts than for sports talk shows.

NBC has mismanaged its owned and operated stations to the point Neutron Jack Welch saw radio as a losing proposition. They had Imus and Howard Stern on one radio station and said they couldn't make money. How bad can management get? Even then, network radio news was just a drop in the bucket (of both the news and radio divisions). GE dumping radio was just the first nail in radio's coffin, not the last.

Relationship is not much of a factor in which TOH news brand a station selects. Money is number one, two and three. Format is down there somewhere. Brand relationship, yawn.

ABC divorced radio network news from TV in the late 50s, and developed a news format that has been the basis for all radio news presentations since then. Their radio operations even dropped the ABC "brand," twice - once in 1957 and 11 years later with the four network split. CBS divorced radio news from the CBS News Division in the mid-60s. From the beginning, long-standing golden age radio network affiliates and TV network affiliates have not hesitated to change one or both affiliations leaving the TV and radio sides with different network "relationships."

Even public broadcasting has different "brands" for radio and TV. And NPR is the only network where the brand means anything to listeners.

 

[NewsStud]

leaving NBC for news seems questionable.

No, it makes sense, considering how management has changed at Westwood One.

"NBC News Radio" was launched by the "old" Westwood One. It was a replacement product for an older incarnation of Fox News Radio, which was actually a WW1 produced product. When Fox took everything in-house and created the network it is today, WW1 approached NBC about creating a radio product which would actually have NBC input.

(For a while, WW1 had been using a white-label newscast produced by CBS to stand in for "NBC Radio News" - different from "NBC News Radio." That was used to fulfill obligations to whatever was left of the original NBC Radio Network that WW1 inherited even further in the past.)

However this new NBC product never really caught on. It had a tiny affiliate base comprised of also-ran stations. Its newscasts were lackluster and the "network" offered no content feeds, no ability for live interviews with NBC correspondents or analysts, etc. It's no surprise that Cumulus, owners of the "New" Westwood One, doesn't want to have to pay NBC a hefty sum for the name and talent for a product which doesn't break even.

 

[PTBoardOp94]

NewsStud: You're confusing a 1990s revival of NBC Radio with the 2012 revival. When NBC Radio came back circa 1997, it was as you say, produced without any involvement of NBC TV. This network was discontinued by 2000 with many of the stations picking up CNN Radio. In 2012, Dial Global ended its contract with CNN and created NBC News Radio, which did have involvement from NBC TV. It still didn't gather a large number of affiliates, I'm guessing largely old CNN radio affils.

 

[TheBigA]

It still didn't gather a large number of affiliates, I'm guessing largely old CNN radio affils.

The big issue remains the fact that top of the hour news is largely a product of AM radio, which is in huge decline. So having four brands or choices of product for a single platform is a waste .

Even public broadcasting has different "brands" for radio and TV. And NPR is the only network where the brand means anything to listeners.

Although "public broadcasting" had nothing to say about those brands. They were created in the Public Broadcasting Act.

 

[Ravens]

Is it possible to discuss a single issue without hearing the "AM radio is in freefall" meme, yet again? I guess if you Chicken Little often and loudly enough, the sky will eventually fall.

 

[FredLeonard]

Is it possible to discuss a single issue without hearing the "AM radio is in freefall" meme, yet again? I guess if you Chicken Little often and loudly enough, the sky will eventually fall.

It's in freefall whether anybody says so or not. We might as well say so. And it's an issue that affects computer in a closet sports talk stations, which are all on AM (mostly weak-stick AMs).

 

[Ravens]

It's in freefall whether anybody says so or not. We might as well say so. And it's an issue that affects computer in a closet sports talk stations, which are all on AM (mostly weak-stick AMs).

You can gleefully hope for that all you want, but a lot of those stations make plenty of money for their owners. And they're certainly cheap to run, too. The days of every marginal signal having a 24/7 live human staff are over, and even if it came back, the old jocks here wouldn't be running them. They'd demand too much money, and have horrible attitudes.

 

[FredLeonard]

You can gleefully hope for that all you want, but a lot of those stations make plenty of money for their owners. And they're certainly cheap to run, too. The days of every marginal signal having a 24/7 live human staff are over, and even if it came back, the old jocks here wouldn't be running them. They'd demand too much money, and have horrible attitudes.

What you describe is the most visible symptom of AM radio's free-fall.

Old "jocks" or jocks of any age - I assume you mean disk jockeys - seldom ran radio stations. It's usually old salesmen. But if, as your comment suggests, you are a young person wanting a career in radio, why are you so "gleeful" about automation, satellite distribution and voice tracking elimination your possible job prospects?

And those turn-key sports networks hire actual jocks, retired jocks, what the rest of the world calls "jocks" - and few broadcasters.

Demand too much money? On what planet do you live? University communication programs and proprietary broadcasting schools have been cranking about would-be disk jockeys and newscasters for the past half-century, young, eager, passionate (what you call horrible attitudes) and willing to work for minimum wage or close to it. Maybe you never worked in local radio. Maybe your impression is formed by seeing Frasier and his fancy apartment and Lexus sedan. Not the real world of local radio, kid.

But keep deferring to management and the investment firms until the day you are the one on the street and selling shoes for your uncle.

 

[Ravens]

What you describe is the most visible symptom of AM radio's free-fall.

Old "jocks" or jocks of any age - I assume you mean disk jockeys - seldom ran radio stations. It's usually old salesmen. But if, as your comment suggests, you are a young person wanting a career in radio, why are you so "gleeful" about automation, satellite distribution and voice tracking elimination your possible job prospects?

And those turn-key sports networks hire actual jocks, retired jocks, what the rest of the world calls "jocks" - and few broadcasters.

Demand too much money? On what planet do you live? University communication programs and proprietary broadcasting schools have been cranking about would-be disk jockeys and newscasters for the past half-century, young, eager, passionate (what you call horrible attitudes) and willing to work for minimum wage or close to it. Maybe you never worked in local radio. Maybe your impression is formed by seeing Frasier and his fancy apartment and Lexus sedan. Not the real world of local radio, kid.

But keep deferring to management and the investment firms until the day you are the one on the street and selling shoes for your uncle.

I've done more local radio in my life than you have. I guarantee that. I still do it every single weekday. I also know there are literally thousands of stations in this country that are owned by small companies that do very well. All radio isn't Clear Channel or Cumulus. There are still stations that interview local politicians, promote local events and have a news guy that goes out and gets news. Those stations tend to make good money. Sure, there are exceptions, but the business still works WHEN DONE RIGHT.

I'm not "gleeful" about automation. But I understand and can use it and don't hate stations out of spite for using it. Unlike so many in online radio industry forums, I don't think anyone "owes" me a job just because I put in the time. I don't demand radio change its ways to keep me working. When new technology comes out, I learn how to use it so I am still useful instead of doing nothing and cursing "management" for firing me. As a result, I've never been fired.

None of this has anything to do with NBC News radio, which was the point. Using yet another thread to make unrelated predictions of the death of radio is just piling on, and you'd think people who are supposed to be in and love this business would know better.