And one of my friends is Russ "Famous Amos" DiBello, who is another part of that team. Of course we only know each other because my real name is Amos.
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1110 New Format
- Thread starter amos1001
- Start date
I suspect Josh meant the NINE tape online. It's there, easy to find. Now if I could find the 99 followup.
Okay, people, help me out here, was WVWA a real station, are parts of this story true and some of them an April Fool's joke, or is it entirely fiction?
Oh but of course it's real. How could you think otherwise? WVWA Pound Ridge was an inspiration to us all! Can't you hear where Chucky "Boo" Barron of Big Ways got the idea for his style? NINE! I thought that contest winner was having ... well, she was having something, that's for certain.
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Yeah, I found a couple of those NINE tapes on YT, sounds like it's readily available and has been through the mill, duplication, etc. Kinda like the old days, tapes of tapes of tapes...
If Radio One hadn’t had other plans, it seems logical to me to have put Praise on 1110 instead of 610. Better signal and a little of an audience that of *might* tolerate AM for the better signal due to the demographics of the gospel format. Plus, that would likely have run off the remaining WBT audience on 1110.
At this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if RO is running the loop to stay compliant and is looking in to an STA. 1110 was the last major draw to AM in Charlotte, and with each passing day, it becomes more of a memory, making it harder to get any potential listeners to press the AM button on their radio.
At this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if RO is running the loop to stay compliant and is looking in to an STA. 1110 was the last major draw to AM in Charlotte, and with each passing day, it becomes more of a memory, making it harder to get any potential listeners to press the AM button on their radio.
There's no need to "look into" a silent STA. Any station can file one, and they are granted routinely.
If Radio One turns in the license will it be the first Class A AM to do so? Can the channel ever be auctioned off again or could someone "upgrade" and existing nearby facility and grap 50 KW which could allow a FM translator to go way past the 25 mile rule.
I think so, although several have sharply downgraded, such as KGA 1510 in Spokane, Wash, which downgrade its night power from 50kW to 0.5 kW in order to rid itself of the directional antenna.
Theoretically, it could be auctioned or re-allocated but realistically the list of takers would be short. I don't think there has been an all-new AM license issued in 25 or 30 years.
Thanks. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if they file for one soon at the rate things are going.
When WBT 1110 was off the air for about twenty minutes the other night, it was like busting open a piñata, there were all kinds of stations slugging it out. Kind of reminded me of the expanded AM band where there are few stations, and where a fairly low-powered station can easily travel hundreds of miles unimpeded. I am often able to get KCJJ 1630 from Iowa here in Columbia SC.
Probably, but I'm not sure.
Unlike FM's, AM's don't remain on a city's frequency allocation table once deleted. The FCC has allowed dark AM allotments to be auctioned, but it's not automatic like it is with FM's. Pretty sure the last time the FCC did that was with Bob Romanik's AM's outside of St. Louis. None of the four received bids.
I believe a modification to an AM can generally be done as a minor modification now. So, someone wanting a 50,000 watt AM on 1110 in or near Charlotte might be able to move their existing station there. The biggest question, though, would be why. It would be a tough build that wouldn't cover the entire market 24/7. I don't think 1110 is going away (though stranger things have happened), but, if/when it does, it's unlikely to ever be back.
I wonder if you could duplex 1110 at the 610 site? Do they still own either property? With Charlotte's growth I bet someone could do something with that land.
I think you may be missing a lot of what I am trying to suggest with most of my ideas, and I have pitched several on different threads. The point is to get radio a future, one that I don't think it will have much of in 15 - 20 years when the Millennials age out of advertiser interest. Most of what is on the air now that makes real money is music (including 80's hits). It won't be that way in 15 years. New programming is going to be needed, and it is my thinking that the time to try the new is now, while at least some broadcasters still have flush money coming in to develop them. A suggestion made above that broadcast radio is scheduled for the scrap heap is an anathema to me. Will I be telling my grandkids one day "Yessiree, once upon a time you get entertainment outta this little box. Didn't cost nothing and ya didn't have to subscribe to nothing." Also, the idea that local radio will be no more is disconcerting on a lot of levels. An internet radio station can be a great one, but local it isn't.
On a post above you said "I learned nothing" from the San Francisco exchange on 560. If you reread my post, I stated I was "brought back down to earth" principally by helpful, instructional posts by Mr. Hagerty on the lack of Cume on AM and Mr. Fybush with his summation of the financial realities of operating a radio station in a large market. But that was for a year long dormant KZAC operated by a cash poor Cumulus (stock price .08 cents). Contrast that with still alive and kicking 1110 operated by Radio One (stock price $13.29). The recent suggestions that 1110 ought to consider a fill-in format might tee up the opportunity to try something unique when you might not get a better chance otherwise.
The idea of Entertainment Radio is to test whether 2026 listeners will respond to programming that doesn't irritate, and which is presented for them, as opposed to their having to search for it on the internet. Any and all audio can be found on the web. A radio programmer just makes it easier by finding the good stuff and putting it out there for easy consumption. Old Time Radio was an idea because I thought it would be inexpensive as a way to get started - not an end in itself.
It seems to me we should be putting heads together, not butting heads. Programmers like you have the experience. Interested listeners like me have the ideas (although I am sure you have ideas of your own as well). We should be focusing on how an idea COULD work, instead of why they WON'T work - especially when my overall interest is not necessarily what you or I want, but what broadcast radio is going to need.
I don't totally disagree with you here. As I've mentioned before, broadcasters, especially the large ones, are frequently researching both new ideas and how to keep the existing ones fresh. Broadcast research and consulting are industries themselves. People like to complain about them, and that's sometimes justified, but a good consultant is telling you what your audience wants to hear and enabling you to deliver exactly that. Putting something new on requires taking something else off. The broadcast spectrum is a finite resource. Broadcasters have to be able to make money, and they can't take away stations that are contributing to their bottom lines in order to replace them with something that might or might not work. I realize you'll probably say, "That's why they should test on AM," but you have to test your new ideas where your target audience will go. That's not AM radio. No test will yield meaningful results if tried there. The Big A often says, "we program for the people who are listening." One can argue for or against the wisdom of that, but, if your only option is AM, that's all you can do. My 22 year-old niece isn't going to AM for anything. She wouldn't even go to AM if I put her own personal playlist there.
Kids today are also getting their entertainment out of little boxes; they're called their phones. It's true that you have to pay for your data plan. Most people, though, need that anyway at this point. If you want commercial free entertainment, you have to pay for that, too, but your phone gives you plenty of access to free entertainment. I don't see the transmitter, at least on FM, going away in my lifetime, but it will eventually happen.
While you can find internet stations that cater to particular areas, you're mostly right that internet stations aren't local. I don't like the idea of local radio potentially going away either, but it doesn't seem like the average listener cares that much. Usage of terrestrial radio started going down when the iPhone and Android hit critical mass, and local radio was more prominent then than it is now. If local was an important factor in choosing an entertainment source, usage of radio wouldn't have declined. One area where both of us likely agree, however, is that radio will be missed if it goes away. If people no longer have a reliable place to go when the weather gets bad or the power goes out, they're going to be unhappy and asking why, but private companies can't run an industry that can't be supported consistently and over the long term.
If you want Old Time Radio, you already have it. Yes, that's right. It's already being tested and already being delivered. If you go to iHeart and search "Old Time Radio," you'll find plenty of it, and it's available on-demand. I realize you're probably not a huge fan of that company, but it offers plenty of choices on its website and app. That's where it does its testing. That's where it tries new ideas. iHeart tests its ideas by gauging how many people listen to those streams and who those people are. While it can't discern how many people hear each stream, it can tell exactly how many devices are listening at any single time and exactly who is logged in on those devices. The ones that reach enough of the people it wants to target might well eventually get promoted to terrestrial radio, especially if research indicates the target audience is amenable to tuning it in there.
When coming up with a new idea, you have to look at both sides of it. Yes, you have to consider how and why it might work, but you have to consider the opposing side of it, too. You mentioned earlier that broadcasters should test their idea when they still have the money to develop them. If they don't stop to also consider why a new idea might not work, they won't have that money for long. A good programmer DOES care about what interested listeners like yourself want and will do what (s)he can to keep you listening, at least so long as the sales department can find advertisers who want to reach you.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
@SCMcKinney: I am not going to waste my time rebutting you when @Kent has already said pretty much everything I would have.
I will only say that your last paragraph only applies when listeners have some concept of how the business works and don't make suggestions that have already been considered within the industry and rejected. There is a reason why old time radio programs are not being broadcast anymore, and if you truly think you have been educated by the 560 San Francisco thread you would already know why.
Horse. Dead. Flogging. You.
I will only say that your last paragraph only applies when listeners have some concept of how the business works and don't make suggestions that have already been considered within the industry and rejected. There is a reason why old time radio programs are not being broadcast anymore, and if you truly think you have been educated by the 560 San Francisco thread you would already know why.
Horse. Dead. Flogging. You.
It wouldn't be the first time a Charlotte station did that just to keep from going silent.
WHVN 1240 (1000 watts, previously Christian talk) had been silent for as long as allowed but came back in November 2020 with music that had been on co-owned WAVO 1150 (simulcast partner after 2018 once the music could no longer produce enough listener donations) until they could sell the station to a Christian broadcaster.
WAVO is now doing CCM as part of the Billy Graham organization, which I assume really wanted the translator.