FINALLY, some good news for Citadel: My LAST post on this matter...
We in Southeastern New England have had a front-row seat for a compelling story that radio people all-across-the-USA have been following.
Hey, it's serious business, as we see in those Before and After numbers.
Media reports have explained how-the-ratings-work...and don't work, when there's funny business.
We've also had a dang clinic in PR, specifically how-NOT-to-manage a "bad news" situation.
And right here, a forum for talking-about radio, we've had a chance to do just that...to hash-it-out.
Sure, there've been quips and snipes. That comes with the territory.
In-order-to-HAVE an unfettered conversation, you need to let people join-in anonymously.
And when you don't have to sign-your-name-to what-you're-saying, talk can sometimes be cheap.
Filtering-out the static is a small price to pay to be able to share this conversation here.
I'm told that WPRO forbids its employees from posting here.
It's obvious some do.
So anonymity lets them participate.
I choose to sign my name.
I'M NOT MAKING THIS UP!
Although I have not identified myself as-such in this thread, I am known to be associated with McVay Media, the biggest radio consulting firm in the world.
Today, my 14-year colleague and friend Mike McVay told me he's heard from SENIOR MANAGEMENT at Citadel, and they are NOT amused that I'm involved in this conversation. They're particularly miffed that I mentioned the stock price (99 cents, unchanged, at today's close).
THEY'RE miffed???
THEY'RE miffed???
I, their long-suffering shareholder, am unamused!
But I digress...
Adding-insult-to-self-inflicted-injury, CORPORATE sent Mike the bolt-from-Zeus.
Maybe they couldn't find my number, so they called him.
Yeah, that's it.
Because interrupting Mike to-shoot-the-messenger is so INCREDIBLY unfair to him, I offered to him to bow-out-of this thread...which he didn't ask me to do.
But I've said-what-I-had-to-say about this, much of it, you will note, in response to posts here which ask me, BY NAME, to explain this-or-that. And, for several reasons, this whole episode has been painful to me personally.
Accordingly, I will now exit this particular conversation, so Mike can get-back-to-doing-what-he-was-doing before he was so rudely interrupted, and so Citadel can get-back-to-work pumping-up the value of my shares. Now that I'll refrain from posting stock quotes, you can simply type "CDL" into Google, and watch how-much-better things get now that I'm not discussing the Arbitron Providence Re-Issue in a local Internet chat.
In my earlier post, the one that blew Citadel's fuse, I referred to "the WPRO politburo."
Every time I hear that unsubstantiated, self-congratulatory "STATION OF RECORD" claim, I think "USSR."
Meanwhile, people have taken control of their media, and are voting-against self-appointed authority.
Rather than reading Consumer Reports or movie reviews, they want to peruse USER COMMENTS.
"Social media." CONVERSATION.
People have become disillusioned with authority, because authorities aren't straight with 'em.
("WE WILL BE WELCOMED AS LIBERATORS.")
Good evening from Las Vegas, where I'm attending the New Media Expo podcasting convention.
110 degrees here today, "but it's 'a dry heat.'"
I thought of WPRO during a session here today.
The speaker runs a web site that has 5 million unique users per year, 10 million a month, 600,000 per day.
And her company's marketing budget is -- literally -- ZERO dollars.
(If you were here, wouldn't YOU want to hear her outline how-they-do-what-they-do?)
Her fundamental point about what-we-now-call "social media" was: “Be OK with a dialogue with the user about what’s good and bad.”
Yet that eludes A TALK RADIO STATION, the original social medium.
