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DGH Out

D

dagrudt

Guest
I have heard from a reliable source that David G. Hall is out at KNX......
 
It's about time.

I thought for sure when he was hired that he would bring some of the mojo he had in building KFI and remake at least one of the two, give them separate identities and remove the ridiculous duplication of effort. He had the kind of programming opportunity that most programmers can only dream about - update and make more relevant one of the newsers and reshape the other in any way he wanted.

Amon other things, the what he really needed to do was give these stations attitude and personality that in recent years they have so sorely lacked. Instead he messed with their clocks for little apparent reason (and even less results!) and added cooking shows. What innovation!

This is the most overdue personnel move in town. The sad part is it probably wasn't made for the reasons I allude to above, I'm sure it was purely a cost-cutting move.

What a disaster this has turned out to be. KNX and KFWB are now both shadows of themselves and both are worse than they were when he took over.
 
This was a 5 year disaster.

Here are some of DGH's great accomplishments at KNX

-- Lets forget we have a clock, we dont have to have sports or business on at an exact time.
-- Lets go back to a clock -- we should have sports and business at exact times.
-- Lets have sports at 10 and 40
-- Lets put it back to 15 and 45
-- Lets put sports at 20 and 50
-- Lets become a business station -- lets dump news for five hours -- ill put on a three hour show from 9 to noon, then i will have a syndicated show on from noon to one and then i will have the traditional business hour
-- Lets fill the 5-9 morning with dozens of interviews by our seasoned anchors
-- Lets make the morning traffic into the afternoon news anchor. It doesnt matter if he has never done news before.
-- We dont need any street reporters after 6 oclock at night (unless there is a fire)
-- Hey we are getting great ratings for our excellent fire coverage so lets overplay any fire. if there is a relatively small fire at Universal Studios lets go into continuous coverage for almost the entire day.
-- Lets get rid of some of our best voices on the air because they were here before I arrived.
-- Lets show KFI we mean business. We will get their weekend food and computer hosts.
-- Lets stop carrying every presidential news conference. Let our listeners go to the NPR stations.

This list could go on and on........please submit some other great DGH accomplishments.

Whats really sad is the audience that Hall drove away may be gone forever.
 
In fairness to DGH when he did what he did at KFI he likely had a free reign and not so many budget constraints. Even the greatest programmers of all time would be stymied by the micro management of the consolidated owned stations of today. Unless you own the place or have a boss that lets you do what you were hired to do you can not do much in any business. In the end you are just another employee doing what the boss says to do the way things are run today.
 
4UH8SIMBKAGN said:
Gary Lycan "rumor" that he's headed to KABC.

LA Radio dot com confirms and says Braverman is out at KABC.
 
Wow, good job 1RadioListener. Very comprehensive list of DGH's greatest hits, not available in any stores, so you don't forget call before midnight tonight.

However, in the interest of fairness, let's not forget that before the Northridge quake, KNX had a cooking show on EVERY WEEKDAY MORNING. With Melinda and some poor flunky whose job was basically to toss her softball questions and add a little baritone to the show.

Oh, and didn't DGH also deep-six the KNX Drama Hour, which I know got mixed reviews but I LOVED listening to Jack Benny on Saturday nights. And there were also times that both KNX and KFWB would be in non-news programming AT THE SAME TIME, what kind of logic is that?
 
Re: DGH Out--Why?

What's lacking is "Why" he's out.

Was he fired?

Was his job victim of a budget cut?

Or did he escape to KABC before either of the two aforementioned axes were to fall?

Or neither... he just got a better job at KABC?

"Better" could mean a number of things, including not having NY interference... disagreement with local superiors.

With Hall over at KABC and former KFBK co-worker Dave Williams also out the KNX door... is there likelyhood that Hall would bring Williams back to KABC?
 
WOW! This is big for KABC. Maybe now they'll be able to compete with KFI.
 
Re: DGH Out at KNX, IN at KABC

Big E said:
WOW! This is big for KABC. Maybe now they'll be able to compete with KFI.

Now hold everything! Aren't some of you guys the same people who (in some cases rightly so) accused DGH of pretty much killing KNX? Remember, DGH had a pretty blank canvas when he worked at KFI. And it seems that, contractually, there are some programming work-arounds he'll have to manuever (Harvey, Hannity, Levin, and maybe the incoming Scarbourough).

Are you hoping for a clone of KFI? One would hope not. But for KABC to be "competitive," he will need some $$$. SOmething, according to the boards CitedelABC does not have a lot of.

His Main goal, right now, is putting together a kicka** morning show to compete with Handel he installed at KFI for AM Drive. I don't think Douggie Not-So-Fresh is it. WOuld DGH end the AM show at 8:45 to accomodate Harvey to free up that last 45 minutes between 9-noon?

PM Drive could be problematic as well. There has been not much support for Rantel. They need something promoted well, and can be very mobile.

I must say that DGH does have loyal people on his staffs. Maybe Dave Williams will come back in a news capacity, as well as Mark-Austin Thomas. I would also not be surprised is Melinda Lee would be doing some cooking on the weekends.

La Cieniga is going to be a very interesting place in the next 6 months!
 
okay maybe compete wasnt the appropriate word. He might resurect the defunct KABC News Dept, and with that, get a little closer to KFI. Money is gonna be an issue of course, so he will have to work some magic.
 
Big E said:
WOW! This is big for KABC. Maybe now they'll be able to compete with KFI.

Here's a question: with a not-as-good frequency and much lower power in a huge metro, can KABC comptete? Or do they have to move away from a KFI-like format to make up for the less desirable signal?
 
Word is ... "KABC will be moving to a more news/talk format," according to GM John Davison.
 
ChannelFlipper said:
... and added cooking shows.

I think KNX's history with cooking shows goes back to the 1950's - so it is part of tradition there.
 
oaktree said:
Word is ... "KABC will be moving to a more news/talk format," according to GM John Davison.
That will make KABC even a bigger loser than it already is. KFI will grow even stronger. An open hole for Bonneville to put an all talk format on FM.
 
regarding my mention of dgh's taking the food show and computer hosts from kfi -- he thought he was battling kfi -- and what he did in this move was to take away morning drive news from the most listened all-news station.

remember when they first came to knx -- the food show began at 8am -- this guy just made mistake after mistake. to be honest the food show as it is situated now is pretty much ok -- it is dumped where there is major breaking news.

and speaking of his ability to bring success to a talk station (i believe kfi was doing well before he got there -- and has done well since he left) -- didnt dgh program klac when it tried to become a news talk station? of course that was starting from scratch.
 
Sometimes lighting doesn't strike twice. Sure he made KFI but if you consider the disaster he made out of KNX then you have to conclude that the guy simply got lucky and was at the right place at the right time. I don't think he is the genius that everyone seems to think he is. I think he will be at the helm when the SS KABC finally goes down. It's already leaking a lot.
 
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