Allan Sniffen is cracking up

[dmargalotti]

Actually, we did play a Christmas song yesterday on WVNJ 1160AM...it was during a syndicated program called "Big Band Jump. The show airs on some 200 stations across the US and Canada. Yesterdays show featured a singer named Gary Stevens and his work with the Charlie Spivak Orchestra. In the first hour, one of the featured songs was "White Christmas".

A little out of place maybe, but it was not some sort of programming error.

 

[kevinsealy]

Allan doesn't need me to defend him, but I understand why he edits and delete certain posters.

The New York Radio Message Board was set up not only for radio geeks (Excuse the express) to read but also professional broadcasters.

I have absolutely no problem with, although I don't agree with everything he posts. There are those who post for the mere sake of posting. Those who start stupid or unintelligent threats make themselves deserve to have their posts deleted.




Thanks,
Kevin L. Sealy

 

[fred flintstone]

Allan doesn't need me to defend him, but I understand why he edits and delete certain posters.

The New York Radio Message Board was set up not only for radio geeks (Excuse the express) to read but also professional broadcasters.

I have absolutely no problem with, although I don't agree with everything he posts. There are those who post for the mere sake of posting. Those who start stupid or unintelligent threats make themselves deserve to have their posts deleted.

Thanks,
Kevin L. Sealy

Stupid or unintelligent threats?
Please provide an example of an intelligent threat.

That said, I have a problem with a radio wannabe - who couldn't get into medical school - making decisions on what is worthwhile or "intelligent." I personally think Sniffer's slavish devotion to the NAB (bury your head in the sand and don't worry about satellite or mp3) line shows a pronounced inability to think for himself. In my book, that's stupid. But I think Voltaire was willing to defend the right of unintelligent people to have stupid opinions.

PS: Are you color blind? I think your use of color on the other thread is not only stupid and (given the terrible foreground-background contrast) difficult to read, it shows a lack of consideration for the reader. But then Sniffer's badly designed and primitive board - with posts in reverse chronological order - doesn't let you do things with color, so maybe you have to come here to get it out of your system.

Sig heil, Kevin.

 

[neo11]

I think the problem is that Sniffen goes further than just deleting spam or irrelevant posts, to deleting legitimate threads that he just doesn't want on his board...for example, the Xmas music thread yesterday or several pirate radio threads I started. In the meantime, someone could post for the 563637356th time about bringing cbs-fm back, and that stays.

 

[PaulBWalkerJr]

"The Mecca Of All Radio Message Boards" he says at the beginning of the podcast.. HAHAHA...

He does sound like quite a loon ....

 

[RadioMan203]

Actually I posted a thread today about former NYC pirate WFAT (the precursor of WHOT), which I found a YouTube video which appears to be a news package about their bust.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFhUJNVyQnE

Then again, one would wonder what he'd sound like if you heard him describe how he runs his board? Someone off-list kindly sent me a link to an audio file that has him saying his mind about his board. Since I can't verify the source of the file I won't post the link to it publicly, but I can provide a link off-list for those who wish to privately listen to it. The link was emailed to me as I went complaining about this on another online venue.

 

[MarcB]

When you're tired enough you can fall asleep listening to Dr. Sniffen's ranting and raving. Happened to me yesterday. ;D

 

[DougR]

The biggest problem I find is that he tries to switch between a moderator position to a fan position too often.

I do agree that it is his board so he can run it anway he wants, and use whatever format he wants.

But, if he has an opinion, then that is the ONLY opinion really and he will clown or delete opposing positions. The most recent being the Stern/John Manelli thing. Sniffen dislikes Stern and satellite and is friendly with Manelli and O&A and backs regular radio. So, instead of an interesting debate, he makes it personal for all that disagree with his view. Fine for a poster, horrible for a moderator.

 

[pfa]

The biggest problem I find is that he tries to switch between a moderator position to a fan position too often.

I do agree that it is his board so he can run it anway he wants, and use whatever format he wants.

But, if he has an opinion, then that is the ONLY opinion really and he will clown or delete opposing positions. The most recent being the Stern/John Manelli thing. Sniffen dislikes Stern and satellite and is friendly with Manelli and O&A and backs regular radio. So, instead of an interesting debate, he makes it personal for all that disagree with his view. Fine for a poster, horrible for a moderator.

Yeah... What's up with Allen's Stern-hatred?

My guess is it's the same "Love Me Daddy" thing Board-op & Anthony suffer from. I read his bb for news items, but get frustrated by his non-stop "O&A rule, Stern's a has-been" attitude...

Thanks... I posted the same question at the "dr's" site, but guess what he did with my post?

 

[fred flintstone]

The biggest problem I find is that he tries to switch between a moderator position to a fan position too often.

Amen. This site used to have the same problem.
The smartest thing the current operators did was to take moderators out of the fray.

This is a common problem, not limited to "Sniffle's" board. A board supposedly dealing with Philly Talk radio - but actually a group political blog for some Dittoheads - is even worse. A "group" of moderators posts their rants and delete any who disagree. Some of them were banned from this site (under the old management) for getting into prolonged and heated arguments with other posters with whom they disagreed, so they responded by starting their own board so THEY can delete and ban people. This is just nastiness. Sniffle, on the other hand, just takes himself and his opinions too seriously.

 

[mkdanz]

I actually think that a good moderator likely has a ton of industry insight and should make comments. An excellent moderator would actualy start some good threads using his or her industry knowledge. A GREAT moderator would do all of the above, but not belittle other's opinions, and would not strike down or eliminate comments that weren't in-line with the moderators.

 

[BruceS8852]

I just feel that Alan Sniffen should be consistant. He does not have any guidelines for posting and seems to be very arbitrary at times. He should be the mayor not dictator of a virtual community. I once posted about a pirate radio station which he deleted. Yet, I have seen other threads about pirate radio. If he does delete a post, he should e-mail the poster to explain why. I rarely listen to his board reflections since I find them very obnoxious.

 

[PaulBWalkerJr]

I think Allan Sniffen (uses and thinks) in his own mind, his website and message boards as way to say, "Yeah, Im Cool... Look at the website I run. It gets me on WABC every year". You know, bragging rights I think.

 

[OldGringo]

I just feel that Alan Sniffen should be consistant. He does not have any guidelines for posting and seems to be very arbitrary at times. He should be the mayor not dictator of a virtual community. I once posted about a pirate radio station which he deleted. Yet, I have seen other threads about pirate radio. If he does delete a post, he should e-mail the poster to explain why. I rarely listen to his board reflections since I find them very obnoxious.

Alan, either despite being an outsider or maybe because of it, runs a pretty nice board. There is a tone of civility there that is definitely lacking here. The control of invective and insult seems to allow really good radio people... the kind that get headlines in the trades... to post. I see nearly nobody like that on these boards, which are now nearly 100% populated by radio haters or wannebees and those who simply do not want to understand where radio is today. Alan's board has really interesting exchanges, nearly all of which have a mix of inside and outside opinion and a degree of respect that is now seldom seen on this board, for example.

Whatever the shorcomings, the board many derisively call "The Dentist's Board" is a lively, infomative and knowledg-filled place to visit. So it is very hard for me to critcize it.

Oh, I liked WABC, too. I cut the same jingles they used, without the gong, for the first station I owned in 1964! So maybe I am biased....

 

[PaulBWalkerJr]

A pretty nice baord and tone of civility? I doubt it.. you must be thinking of some other board....

 

[neo11]

Actually, I find this board light years more interesting than the "dentist" board, where it seems that people go on and on about the same rehashed topics but hardly bring any fresh perspectives to the table. Of course, that's also largely because the good doctor goes and deletes stuff arbitrarily. The pirate example used above is a good one...I've posted or replied to many a pirate thread that got deleted, but others inexplicably stay on. And no, none of those deleted threads were any less "civil" than the posts he keeps. Actually, the good doctor himself is less than civil on many occassions, and not just by censoring whatever he doesn't like. Yeah yeah, it's his board, radio insiders post there, blah blah blah, but so do radio hobbyists and listeners, and that doesn't give him the right to be a dictator. On many other boards I've seen, when a post gets deleted, an explanation is posted as to why (defamed someone, violated TOS rules, etc.). There aren't even any TOS rules on the "mecca" board. It's whatever the whims of the good doctor seem to be at the time.

 

[Starscream]

A pretty nice baord and tone of civility? I doubt it.. you must be thinking of some other board....

Oh please. You're on the Philadelphia board here. Sniffen would clean that place up like Giuliani through Times Square.

 

[adma]

Alan, either despite being an outsider or maybe because of it, runs a pretty nice board. There is a tone of civility there that is definitely lacking here. The control of invective and insult seems to allow really good radio people... the kind that get headlines in the trades... to post. I see nearly nobody like that on these boards, which are now nearly 100% populated by radio haters or wannebees and those who simply do not want to understand where radio is today. Alan's board has really interesting exchanges, nearly all of which have a mix of inside and outside opinion and a degree of respect that is now seldom seen on this board, for example.

Whatever the shorcomings, the board many derisively call "The Dentist's Board" is a lively, infomative and knowledg-filled place to visit. So it is very hard for me to critcize it.

Oh, I liked WABC, too. I cut the same jingles they used, without the gong, for the first station I owned in 1964! So maybe I am biased....

I hate to say it, but it's telling when a person coming to Sniffen's defense like that owned his first station in 1964--especially when said "civility" often seems to consist of some kind of wishful-thinking nostalgia for an imagined age of cultural decorum before MTV or even Woodstock fouled everything up. But given media-consumption changes and just plain broader cultural changes, it's not the best place to be--in fact, to a lot of people born after 1964, said universe of "really good radio people" might as well be a bunch of big-voiced vulgarian fossils in plaid jackets unwittingly awaiting lampoonery in some future Will Ferrell movie.

That said, I sense a different sort of nostalgia in Sniffen's board; one for the Internet as it was in the mid-90s, the age of AOL and Usenet, when it was less a threat than a "hobby", like ham radio or short wave taken to the next level. A place where all manner of enthusiastic amateurs and dabbling pros could interact and create homespun magic--and one thing that happened (thanks to people like Sniffen, god bless) is that the Web became a glorious museum of radio like nobody had seen or heard before.

But that's problematic today--becoming a "museum piece" can become an inadvertent kiss of death--and it's also where the "enthusiastic amateur" side to Sniffen comes a cropper. He may be a great radio museologist; but unfortunately, his cultural sensibility (as borne out in his podcasts) remains stubbornly mired in a "tribute act" level of (un)sophistication. It'd be like an Elvis Presley discussion board moderated by a "Dentist Elvis" with an inherent hostility for the "rock-critic jibberish" of Greil Marcus or Peter Guralnick...

 

[pfstorms]

His logic is sound - he doesn't want people posting attacks for the sake of attacks against talent who read the boards. He thinks real names will prevent that.

What stops me from posting there as "Chris Latta" - well, *shrug*.

I mean, it's just as easy to create fake sounding real name as it is a "handle".

On the flip side, Kevin Smith did a brilliant thing - you have to pay a one-time fee of five dollars to post on his boards, the money is donated to charity, and it cuts down a lot on needless trolls.

That's one of the things that will always stop me from posting on those boards. His senseless reminders to everyone "NO HANDLES", yet he lets someone post under the name Mike Piazza. Yeah sure! That and the archaic board format.

 

[mkdanz]

His senseless reminders to everyone "NO HANDLES", yet he lets someone post under the name Mike Piazza. Yeah sure!

Mike Piazza is a an actual radio personality. I think I recall hearing him on WLIB/Air America Radio doing news, and I know he has done oldies shows in the South Jersey/Philly area.