Now that the Brownsburg station is located in Castleton, do the people who live in Brownsburg care? It was in that location on SR 267 for a long time.
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Brownsburg people
- Thread starter MightyFrenchman
- Start date
Did the people of Plainfield care when Steve picked up the network at Love 98 and closed the Plainfield studio?MightyFrenchman said:
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radio2100
Guest
Do you think the Brownsburg people cared when the station was in Brownsburg? It hasn't been a local station for years. People don't care about that stuff, especially a suburb of Indy. They all listen to Indy stations and don't care what city they are licensed to.
The people in Brownsburg didn't care when the station was there, so why should they care now? I worked there when it first signed on in '92 and most of the locals never had a clue there was a station in that town, and those that did wouldn't listen to it because of the "anything-goes" formats that the Quinns are so well-known for. I think of all the Hendricks county stations, probably the old WJMK in Plainfield did the best job of being a local station in its' day, followed by WGRT until Gordon Graham sold it to Universal out of New York. Seems to me that a station out there could really prosper if it was properly managed and programmed given the huge growth rate the county has been experiencing.But instead, they all try to be rimshotters and make the best of it.MightyFrenchman said:
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Bear the other white meat
Guest
and of course, the FCC only cares that you get a Class A signal into the city of License.
They cared the same amount the people of Shelbyville cared when Emmis moved their FM station to downtown Indianapolis.brian_stevens said:
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spark gap
Guest
Or the poeple in Greenfield with WZPL or the people in Indianapolis when they moved 104.5 to Noblesville. Or the people in Noblesvillle when they moved 93.9 to Fishers, or the people in Danville with WEDJ/WSYW or the people in Lebanon with WYJZ to Speedway. Need we go on?The only time anyone gave a sh** was back in the early 90's when Barnstable tried to buy WTTS and move it from Bloomington to Indy. IU comm professors bitched to FCC.
I think there is more of an outrage when a local service is taken from more rural markets. There was a huge backlash, not from moving the 101.7 studios from Elwood to Daleville, but from taking away local football and basketball coverage. I know a few people in the Hartford City area who are still angry that their station (93.5) was moved to Muncie in the 80s.
I trust you'll forgive my rhetorical question Gary. But that's exactly my point. You and I both have stations we can use as examples. I know both you & I took a few calls about Love 98. But as many others have said...for most it's no big thing. A few years back my cousin, who had lived in Brownsburg since the early 90s, was surprised to learn that the radio station he listened to was located just down 267 from his subdivision.MightyFrenchman said:
I think the question of do people care, depends on whether or not the people of a community have been TAUGHT to care.I was the PD of WSYW AM & FM in the late 90's. I currently manage a small community station in northeast Pennsylvania. Most of the stations like Plainfield, Brownsburg and Danville came from the badly ill-advised FCC docket 80/90 that provided signals to all sorts of "fringe" communities just outside larger cities. Most of the owners who got those signals were not interested in "plowing their own ground". They wanted to play with the big city boys, so many communities who got licenses never even really knew they had their "own" radio station. FYI in WSYW's case the AM is actually licensed to the city of Indianapolis. One of the big concerns at WSYW-FM was always that the tower is located north & west of Danville so it couldn't really push a decent signal past the center of Indy. Yes, you could and can hear it in the east, but it's very spotty, and most vehicle radios seek & scan mode will not pick up WSYW [WEDJ] much past the western end of Indy. As far as what a community will support, and this may sound odd, but if a community strongly supports it's high school football or basketball team, they will support a local radio station. The station that I currently run is a 1Kw AM that dates back to 1932. It was held by the same family from that time into the early-80's. It & it's 50Kw FM were bought up by Citadel in the mid-90's. Obviously Citadel wanted the big FM for it's Wilkes-Barre/Scranton cluster. The AM, which had always been a community station was shut down, closed up & made into a repeater for another local AM. The comunity was angry. It was purchased by a new group in 2003, and returned to it's city of license. Since then, we have done well.Our sports are fully sold out. Our news is sold out. Our weather forecasts are sold out. Our morning show is almost always sold out. We have an arrangement with a local cable-tv station to supply our local news. They have a full staff, it makes no sense for us to try and duplicate their efforts. We have a good cross-promotion program with them. Is this unusual in this day and age? Yes, but it depends on how you educate, and support your local community. WKLU or WSYW could have made a good Hendricks county station. Sure, you do some quaint, corny stuff. Lost dogs, birthdays & sometimes Aunt Tille's pie recipies. It's different in every place, but you can make a good living at it, if you do the work. Your Opinion??brian_stevens said:
Yes. Yes. Yes. I can't disagree with anything you said.MACK184 said:
WCBK In Martinsville comes to mind...they don't try to be an Indy station and seem to do a good job with community-oriented programming, news, sports, etc. It's really a shame one of the Hendricks county stations couldn't have done that...there's plenty of business out there now to support such an effort. It would require some work to see a decent ROI, but I believe it's certainly do-able.MACK184 said:
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Hionradio
Guest
I don't fully understand this thread. Each radio station which is licensed to a community, must serve THAT community, irrespective of whether it also reaches all of a large metropolitan area (like Indy) or not. This has NOTHING to do with where the studio is. WJJK still has to serve the needs of Noblesville, whether their studios are on the circle, in Fishers, or Noblesville. Also, the services that radio stations provide to their "city of license" are not always apparent on the air. Sometimes I'm miffed by these boards. People complain if jocks are not "up to the glory days of major market standards" and then they turn around and complain if stations don't broadcast high school football games. Which is it...do you want stations striving for the ultimate in professionalism or do you want a stations which are community stations that satisfy small groups of special interests (like high school football would)? It seems that no matter which direction stations take, there are those on these boards who want to bi*ch that it isn't right.
Of all the radio move-ins...all the communities DID care. Nothing they could do though, FCC law and lawyers.In Lebanon Bill Shirk and Bill Mays constructed a non com that has better numbers than the commercial station ever did. Local ballgames, 4-H Fair, a local sports show, and other local directed programs.Shirk and Mays felt it wasn't ethical to leave the community without a station. The result...the community didn't loose a station.The moves though are the reason people are leaving radio...their former old friend.spark gap said:
[. Most of the stations like Plainfield, Brownsburg and Danville came from the badly ill-advised FCC docket 80/90 that provided signals to all sorts of "fringe" communities just outside larger cities. Most of the owners who got those signals were not interested in "plowing their own ground". They wanted to play with the big city boys, so many communities who got licenses never even really knew they had their "own" radio station. FYI in WSYW's case the AM is actually licensed to the city of Indianapolis. One of the big concerns at WSYW-FM was always that the tower is located north & west of Danville so it couldn't really push a decent signal past the center of Indy. Yes, you could and can hear it in the east, but it's very spotty, and most vehicle radios seek & scan mode will not pick up WSYW [WEDJ] much past the western end of Indy. As far as what a community will support, and this may sound odd, but if a community strongly supports it's high school football or basketball team, they will support a local radio station. With sign-on dates of 1964 for the signal in Plainfield and 1975 in Danville, neither station was part of the 80/90 docket. These stations tried to serve thier communities, but were unable to garner enough ratings or revenue to make a go of it or were happy to sell to people willing to try to get into the Indy market with the FM. As late as the mid 80s, I interviewed at Danville and they were still trying to be a local Danville radio station. Many of the "local" stations in metro areas either have to stay local with lower ratings and revenue, or be purchased by bigger broadcasters who have the money and marketing know-how to make a dent in the "city" ratings. The station in Martinsville probably doesn't bill what an Indy station does, but they are there to serve Martinsville and Morgan county, and they're probably glad to do so. (You'll even see them making a dent in the 12+ in Indy from time to time.)
The noticable thing about WCBK is in the ID: "WCBK-Martinsville/Mooresville". No Indianapolis mention. Also, I would believe that they don't pay the Indy wages, or go after the national accounts, therefore they can operate profitably on a smaller budget. I have heard band contests from the Indiana State Fair and the like. When was the last time an "Indy" station did that!On Saturday night, I listened to NASCAR on CBK. I was able to pick them up in Lebanon. They had a couple of Indy sponsors, but mostly Bloomington, Mooresville, Martinsville and Spencer. If there was an anti-Indy station, CBK is it!
As a former WCBK-er I can testify that they are all about Morgan County. Back when I was there we carried the Indiana Pacers, because WIBC was hard to pick up at night, I thought that made sense.I was also an esteemed host of the "Sell and Swap Shop". :
I remember one night when some MONSTER storms blew through Morgan County. We blew off playing music and took calls from listeners in Martinsville AND Mooresville, and anywhere else there was storm damage. At that time we signed off at midnight normally, but we stayed on all night long that night.
I remember one night when some MONSTER storms blew through Morgan County. We blew off playing music and took calls from listeners in Martinsville AND Mooresville, and anywhere else there was storm damage. At that time we signed off at midnight normally, but we stayed on all night long that night.
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ScatzerFan
Guest
Actually, from what I understand...the people in Shelbyville didn't care about losing the powerhouse signal of 97.1 FM because they still had the 1,000 watt directional AM signal.You laugh....but at the time 1979-1980......AM is was still big and most of the billing was on the AM signal.
Not laughing at all. WSVL-AM put the money from the sale into an upgrade of their technical plant and continued to have a good run. While WENS did get some heat about moving to the big city, WSVL-AM remaining there helped. As did WENS continuing to do a weekly Sunday morning program block from a Shelbyville studio into the mid 80s. I seem to recall that (ironically) most of the complaints were about the loss of the country music programming on 97.1. And the lack of a local phone number to contact the Indy studios.ScatzerFan said:
Pardon me if I misunderstood the intent of the original question. But you raise an interesting point - what the definition of "to serve" is. If (for example) more Noblesville residents now listen to WJJK, does Jack now better serve Noblesville than a rarely listened to but small town Millers football coaches corner, lost dogs and swap shop programmed WHYT ever did?Hionradio said:
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