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GBH & CRB Drop the W !
- Thread starter freqlost
- Start date
Nothing unusual in "W-land." Radio stations dropped the W, other than in their legal ID, in their branding going back to the 1960s, especially rock stations. "Super CFL" (WCFL Chicago) and "93 NAP" (WNAP Indianapolis) come to mind immediately. It didn't happen much in K-country, though.
K was always cool. Even when it wasn't real. WXRK became K-Rock.
Double-You was always harder to say. It sounded older. I had a talent who always said "Dub-ya."
But they're saying more than half of their impressions are coming from digital platforms. How unique is that?
If anyone else is saying that, it's not unique at all. There are no degrees of uniqueness.
In the case of WGBH, I doubt they have anything to worry about. The others I'm not familiar with.
I understand that, but they are making a statement here. They are branding themselves as "digital-first." Broadcast supports digital. It's possible we might see iHeart do that with WBZ. I think Entercom is heading in that direction with the hiring of their new VP of News who isn't a traditional broadcaster. I think some other companies are putting a lot of attention on podcasts.
Having said all that, my relations with WGBH was TV was top priority in that building. Radio wasn't as important. But now they're saying digital is even more important than TV.
Very few stations targeting anyone under age 50 have a call-letter based identity.
Most stations have names or some kind, as the call letters are recognized as being remnants of the first 30 or 40 years of radio.
In nations where call letters are not used or are seldom used (there are even countries that have prohibited call letter use on the air) stations have always used slogans. I once programmed a station in a market larger than New York City where nobody on the staff knew the call letters!
In one case, a comparative study was done in two markets: one where nearly all stations used names, and the other (in the US) where many stations still used call letters. Listeners on average knows 6 to 7 station names and identities in the name-based market but only 3 in the call letter based market.
So if WBIG wants to drop the "W" and call itself "B-I-G" and use the word "big" in promotions, the chances are that the memorability will be greater.
Three letters are better than four. Easier to remember. Dropping the "W" when every station has one avoids confusion. Not using call letters at all is much better. Using the same name as that of your website and stream access titles is the best.
It IS ridiculous.
I can see it when vocalized:
92 'PRO-FM
85 'HDH
'CBS-FM
but NOT in print branding (assuming there's much of that that still matters).
I can easily accept branding indirectly related to, or derived from, one's call sign:
Oldies 103.3
KISS 108
But identifying on-air (not for legal station IDs) or in print ALL your related stations as "GBH" - including WGBX 44 - just seems too avant garde to me.
Of course, I should probably be learning how to bow to the digital gods of streaming and podcasting, "where the streams have no name".
BigA made a good point: a few internet-only stations actually inserted a W or a K into their identifiers to give them authenticity.
Claiming that "W" is a holdover from "analog" is more than a "bit" disrespectful and insulting.
Call letters, whatever their first letter, are a holdover from the 20's. That's the nineteen-twenties, not the current decade. Radio began as something experimental, and the call letters were used because listeners might be thousands of miles away... and in the beginning, there were just a few frequencies in use!
As I said, in most of the world stations use names, not call letters.
How many people would know Joe Biden if he was called "JRBF" (Joseph Robineette Biden Finnegan) instead?
For about 50 years, since music formats took over radio, stations have tried to get calls that say something... WFUN in Miami, KILT in Houston, KLIF in Dallas, WAKY in Lousiville, WAPE in Jacksonville, WAYS in Charlotte. Or calls that are taken from the name of the station such as "Coast" in LA or "Easy" with an E and a Z in the calls. Or fabricated names like "Keener" in Detroit or "Wibbage" in Philly. Or phonetic calls like WZNT for "Z-93".
Or what may be the best of all, Keno in Las Vegas! Or Kern in Bakersfield. How could you be more memorable?
But some stations had ego calls. My first station job was at an AM that had been WSRS, for Sam R Segue. How unforgettable. They brilliantly named it WJMO, which was easier to say but equally forgettable. I learned from that.
I've been associated with a couple of dozen top rated stations (#1 overall or #1 in its demo) and none of them has used call letters as a name. And where legal, the calls were never, ever used on the air.
Call letters are not intuitive, and are confusing to most listeners. And today, a station's name has to be uniformly applicable to broadcast radio and every form of streaming.
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The current FM WSRS has held that call since 1963, and it stood for Worcester's Stereo Radio Station. I assume your WSRS(AM) was in your native Ohio and had nothing to do with the Worcester, Mass., FM.
My favorite ego call was Framingham, Mass.'s WVBF, which the owner bestowed on the station in honor of his wife, Virginia B. Fairbanks. Worse call letters are difficult to imagine. Listeners would be put on the air after winning contests and asked what their favorite radio station was -- the answer was usually an enthusiastic "WBBF!"
1490 and 92.3 FM in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. Sam put them on the air, sold in '59 to Richard Eaton's United Broadcasting Company.
I always thought that any station that had "VD" as the second and third or third and fourth letters back in the 50's and 60's when that was the common term for sexually transmitted diseases was just awful. Soldiers from the big war and Korea, too, thought those to be very amusing.
No, it’s truthful. For crying out loud, we’re well into the 21st century.
Hadn't the television station brand been "GBH 2" already?
To say nothing of "68 RKO" in Boston.
The NBC TV affiliate in Detroit was "DIV 4" before it became "local."
To say nothing of "68 RKO" in Boston.
The NBC TV affiliate in Detroit was "DIV 4" before it became "local."
True and also on the TV side for the past 20 years on TV the Network O&O's have been calling their stations as CBS2, NBC4, Fox 11 and ABC7 as in the case of Los Angeles.
HUH other PBS and NPR affiliates around the nation use local brandings for years such as PBS SoCal (KOCE Los Angeles), Capital Public Radio (KXJZ-FM Sacramento) to adapt to the digital age though.
i would think blackgold is kidding but there are people so tightly wound and stuck in a time many years ago, theyre out of touch and think its a big deal about stuff like this
Legally the stations will still be required to use the full set of call letters for TOH ID. There is no requirement to use government-imposed call letters as a station's marketing brand. That's what's at issue here. As others have pointed out, lots of stations have adopted other brands that aren't strictly the call letters.
This is nothing new. What I find different is the company is saying they are "digital-first." I'm surprised there haven't been any comments about that.
This is nothing new. What I find different is the company is saying they are "digital-first." I'm surprised there haven't been any comments about that.
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