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Aron Bender (Conway Show sidekick) out at KFI?

henry

henry

The newscaster/co-host of The Tim Conway Jr. show on KFI has been missing since October 19. Not a big story, but Conway and Bender have worked together off and on since 2010 and had pretty good on-air chemistry -- so it's been a bit jarring to suddenly not hear a voice I've been accustomed to listening to for about a decade. Michael Crozier has been filling in and/or is Bender's interim replacement.

No comment from iHeartMedia. No mention on the show. No stories from AllAccess. Traces of him on KFI's web site, including his "News Bender" podcast, are missing. A typical radio vanish banishment. His social media accounts are all deactivated, too.

Any word on what happened? Fired? Contract dispute? Suspension? Death (not likely)?
 
LarryRadio said:
Wondering the same thing.
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This from laradio.com

One note: Aron Bender has been a big part of the nightly Conway show. He was notably absent. According to his boss Chris Little, KFI news director, Bender is gone “TFN.” No other explanation. I wonder if Bender’s other endeavors, including his aggressive podcast activities, became a distraction to his on-air duties. I have no idea, but just a guess. Bender has many diverse talents.
 
Frequency1 said:
According to his boss Chris Little, KFI news director, Bender is gone “TFN.” No other explanation. I wonder if Bender’s other endeavors, including his aggressive podcast activities, became a distraction to his on-air duties. I have no idea, but just a guess. Bender has many diverse talents.
Click to expand...

Hmmmm. The quip about "being gone 'til further notice" makes me wonder if he's still working in the Burbank building, but on something else which hasn't been announced yet? One would think that if he'd been fired, they probably would have just stated that he's no longer employed there.

Thanks for the LARadio quote. I hadn't seen that yet.
 
YouTube Has Aron Bender Calling In to another show

Interestingly, Aron Bender showed up on October 19, 2019 via YouTube....
 
Frequency1 said:
This again from laradio.com.
KFI and anchor Aron Bender have permanently parted ways, according to KFI news director Chris Little. Michael Crozier will take over the shift
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Good on Crozier for FINALLY getting that weeknight gig, but it's sad we'll probably never know why Bender was let go. I know people move on to other things all the time, but the way this was handled, with social media accounts being deleted and all, makes it sound like something scandalous went down.
 
According the the CSUN website, he's currently interim news director at KCSN, but I can't imagine he gave up KFI for a student radio station....willingly. Then again, stranger things have happened. At least they moved in Crozier.
 
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LarryRadio said:
According the the CSUN website, he's currently interim news director at KCSN, but I can't imagine he gave up KFI for a student radio station....willingly. Then again, stranger things have happened. At least they moved in Crozier.
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KCSN is hardly a student radio station. While it is a service of Cal State Northridge, it is a professionally run radio station with a paid staff and a very well defined format.

On the "what if" side, the Board of Regents or whatever they are called just asked for bids/proposals for an outside entity to run the station, putting its format and staffing in an area of uncertainty.

Likely that situation is why the position is being called "interim" as they may transition to a new operator.

In any event, Bender has been a journalism professor at that university for quite a few years; likely he stepped in when he left KFI as he already worked for the Cal State system.
 
SimiRadioListener26 said:
Good on Crozier for FINALLY getting that weeknight gig, but it's sad we'll probably never know why Bender was let go. I know people move on to other things all the time, but the way this was handled, with social media accounts being deleted and all, makes it sound like something scandalous went down.
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I kinda' see things another way as this situation does not sound scandalous to me.

When a person leaves a radio station, it is normal for the station's website and social media accounts to be totally wiped of references to the person. Photos, bios, and everything else disappear.

In many cases, photos of that person with other staff members may be cropped, edited or deleted. References in photo headings would be removed, too.

In fact, I have heard of cases where a person was going to be terminated where the cleaning of the website happened simultaneously with the meeting with HR. Station email, listings on automated phone systems, etc., also disappear.

After all, does a movie theater continue to display films they are no longer showing on the marquee, the box office or their website?
 
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While true that radio GMs are notorious for bad at "pulling an Alexander Malchenko" on its terminated staff, deleting personal social media is an entirely different manner.

It's a shame to lose Bender on TCJS. That said, Crozier is also excellent. He's a different person so he offers different value to the show, but he's a strong sidekick voice -- and one I'll gradually learn to be accustomed to hearing.

Thanks for the LARadio updates.
 
henry said:
While true that radio GMs are notorious for bad at "pulling an Alexander Malchenko" on its terminated staff, deleting personal social media is an entirely different manner.
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I was referring to station social media accounts.

And any competent general manager or program director will remove the references to a departed staffer immediately.
 
DavidEduardo said:


I was referring to station social media accounts.

And any competent general manager or program director will remove the references to a departed staffer immediately.
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Agreed. And we did, too, at the cluster I worked at.

I always assumed his handle @aronbender indicated a personal account, as opposed to something like @aronkfi

That said, it's 2019 -- and *fan* listeners are too sophisticated to buy into a staffer simply evaporating like they never existed. At minimum, it would be worth a company's PR guys putting together a 10-word tweet, as a formal send off.

For instance: "We're excited @mcrozierkfi will be joining TCJS five nights a week! Huge shoutout to @aronbender for the past ten years. Best wishes on your next chapter in life, buddy."

Run that by the lawyers/PR team and boom -- fans can rattle on about it for a day or two and then move on.

DavidEduardo said:


And how do you know that he did not pull the account himself?
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True. We don't know that. Which kinda gives me an icky feeling inside that it's more than a firing -- maybe something in his personal life going on, too. And that makes me feel sad.

Funny how I feel bad for someone I've never met, simply because I've listened to them on the radio for 10 years. Mass media is a real mind trip.
 
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