Do you expect changes to the WPHT lineup?

[Small Market Guy]

I'm against 1210 airing paid and brokered local/national programming that 1210 runs, even though it might make money for the station.

You've obviously never run a station.

 

[FredLeonard]

You've obviously never run a station.

Have you?

And given the state of the industry, the people who have been running stations during the last 30 years mostly did a lousy job.

But keep swallowing the industry line and management's line as gospel. It saves having to think for yourself.

Julius is not a producer of radio; he's a consumer. And radio is one of those types of businesses where the customer is always wrong. Julius does not need to know how to run a station; it's not his job. He just needs to know what he likes. But you, like a lot of people in radio, expect listeners to understand.

You go into a restaurant you've always liked. They sold out to a chain and there's new management. They fired most everybody and service sucks. They've started using cheap ingredients and even frozen, pre-prepared items and now the food sucks. And they really aren't cleaning the place well. You complain. The manager dismisses your comments because you've never run a restaurant. Then rants about the economy and all the competition in the food service biz. Are you going to keep going there?

PS: The restaurant chain had to fire staff because they ran up a lot of debt opening new locations. And they spend a lot of money trying to get health regulations rolled back.

 

[Small Market Guy]

The problem with someone who never even worked at a radio station saying that they need to drop the infomercials is that they can't afford to.

NO ONE LIKES BROKERED PROGRAMMING. I've never seen a single person who likes it. But it pays the bills. It's likely the only thing keeping 'PHT on the air at this point. And changing the regular programming isn't going to change that. There isn't a talk show in the world that can eliminate the brokered crap on these major market 50kw AM stations. They're just too damn expensive to run.

 

[Jul]

The problem with someone who never even worked at a radio station saying that they need to drop the infomercials is that they can't afford to.

NO ONE LIKES BROKERED PROGRAMMING. I've never seen a single person who likes it. But it pays the bills. It's likely the only thing keeping 'PHT on the air at this point. And changing the regular programming isn't going to change that. There isn't a talk show in the world that can eliminate the brokered crap on these major market 50kw AM stations. They're just too damn expensive to run.

well said. 1210 is not a relevant station as it once was under WCAU.

 

[FredLeonard]

The problem with someone who never even worked at a radio station saying that they need to drop the infomercials is that they can't afford to.

NO ONE LIKES BROKERED PROGRAMMING. I've never seen a single person who likes it. But it pays the bills. It's likely the only thing keeping 'PHT on the air at this point. And changing the regular programming isn't going to change that. There isn't a talk show in the world that can eliminate the brokered crap on these major market 50kw AM stations. They're just too damn expensive to run.

Excuses, excuses. Sacrifice the long-term viability of a business for short-term revenue. Drive away listeners who won't ever come back by airing something "nobody likes" and then blame "competition." This is why radio is dying.

 

[musichead1029]

(Wally Kennedy's sound would be perfect to target (WPHT's) only other format rival- WHYY. That lower-key straight-laced style has more marketwide appeal than the hotheads.

WHYY and WPHT aren't competitors. NPR is noncommercial - an entirely different animal. Designed to attract donors, not sell airtime. And NPR's appeal is not marketwide, it's extremely niche. They do quite well with the audience they attract, but they aren't competing for sponsors, nor general market ears.

It doesn't seem to be rocket science- local talk/current events focused/lots of callers/. We almost had this with Free FM but the morning zoo-all-day format just didn't have that marketwide appeal

You contradict yourself. You got it right in the second half of your sentence. Free FM didn't work and other younger-based fluff-talk formats, local or not, didn't either. Other than sports, programmers haven't found a talk format that consistently attracts younger listeners. That's why we have sports on 3 1/2 frequencies, Conservative talk on one and "Free FM" on zero. Local talk outside of sports can't carry a day's programming either which is why, as I mentioned previously, even WPHT's local hosts talk almost exclusively about national stories. It's not rocket science. It's about what works, not what someone thinks should work.

Talk radio is in a rough spot now as Limbaugh has run his course and that style has lost it's "pop".

Limbaugh hasn't run his course and the style is as strong as ever with its listeners. The demographics are aging. That may require stations to program differently and Premiere to make tighter deals, but until someone comes along with a show or a format that attracts a younger demographic audience of even a fraction of the listeners Limbaugh has, conservative talk will continue to dominate terrestrial stations, especially on AM. Taking into account the changing media landscape, attracting the "transistor phone" generation will be accomplished via multiple technology platforms (streaming, on-demand audio, video clips) and may enable the modern media personality to do his or her own thing outside of the claustrophobic management and paranoid advertising agency structure that diminishes the quality of much of the programming on radio and TV today.

Personalities with the talents of a Limbaugh or a Stern or even a Preston and Steve should do well in that kind of media environment provided avenues of monetization and promotion are developed that can snag the Samsung-slingers while allowing quality talent to make a living. Or the next generation might just have 100,000 channels of wallpaper crap one click away and spend the day looking for anything worthwhile like modern day cable viewers.

 

[FredLeonard]

WHYY and WPHT aren't competitors. NPR is noncommercial - an entirely different animal. Designed to attract donors, not sell airtime. And NPR's appeal is not marketwide, it's extremely niche. They do quite well with the audience they attract, but they aren't competing for sponsors, nor general market ears.

Wrong! You haven't listened lately. WHYY sells lots of air time. A small portion of total revenue comes from donors. Most comes from "development" or "underwriting" - selling airtime by another name. Niche? You haven't looked at the PPM numbers lately either.

...until someone comes along with a show or a format that attracts a younger demographic audience of even a fraction of the listeners Limbaugh has, conservative talk will continue to dominate terrestrial stations...

Someone has. More than 20 years ago. You can hear it on NJ101.5. And it does attract a younger demo and gets better cume than Rush in its home markets.

 

[Joe Fiore]

Do you expect any changes to the WPHT daily and weekend lineup soon, or should they leave it the way that it is?

I'll be shocked if they don't bring back Glenn, Rush & Sean.

Dropping Glenn and Sean was a huge mistake and almost torpedo'd the station. IQ being sold was like a gift to WPHT, I'd it will be shocking if they don't go back to their old successful formular ASAP.

 

[FredLeonard]

I'll be shocked if they don't bring back Glenn, Rush & Sean.

Dropping Glenn and Sean was a huge mistake and almost torpedo'd the station. IQ being sold was like a gift to WPHT, I'd it will be shocking if they don't go back to their old successful formular ASAP.

Get ready to be shocked.

I've got the paddles ready. OK, CLEAR!

 

[Small Market Guy]

Someone has. More than 20 years ago. You can hear it on NJ101.5. And it does attract a younger demo and gets better cume than Rush in its home markets.

That station is a fluke. It's been proven to be a fluke. No one else has been able to make that format work, aside from Delaware 105.9. Everyone loves NJ 101.5. I love NJ 101.5. But for some reason the rest of the country doesn't want that kind of station. It's a real shame, but that's the truth.

 

[Jul]

That station is a fluke. It's been proven to be a fluke. No one else has been able to make that format work, aside from Delaware 105.9. Everyone loves NJ 101.5. I love NJ 101.5. But for some reason the rest of the country doesn't want that kind of station. It's a real shame, but that's the truth.

well said CBS doesn't want to have a news operation for WPHT, because of KYW.

 

[FredLeonard]

That station is a fluke. It's been proven to be a fluke. No one else has been able to make that format work, aside from Delaware 105.9. Everyone loves NJ 101.5. I love NJ 101.5. But for some reason the rest of the country doesn't want that kind of station. It's a real shame, but that's the truth.

Proven? When and by whom? Where's your evidence that anyone else has tried and failed. Keep repeating the big lie and people believe it. Keep saying it won't work any where else and people - some people - believe that. The fact is the corporate types who run the big broadcasting companies and the babbits who run smaller stations want right-wing talk. They like it. Their friends like it. So, they think everybody likes it. They killed progressive talk deliberately, all the while repeating the lie that it wouldn't work either. And they want to kill any chance of NJ 101.5 being replicated elsewhere the same way.

In any case, please provide a list of the stations that tried to replicate NJ 101.5.
But I won't hold my breath.

 

[Joe Fiore]

Get ready to be shocked.

I've got the paddles ready. OK, CLEAR!

Fred, I've been on this board for a while now and you're something of a joke. You made it quite clear that you don't like conservative talk. THe problem is, you have an inability to separate what YOU like, from what is a proven success.

I *HATE* the TV show 'The Big Bang Theory'. I don't find it funny at all. That said, I'm not so disconnected from reality that I can't recognize that my opinion isn't the only valid opinion. That show is a HUGE hit and people love it.....even without my viewership, it thrives.

You hate Rush and Sean. You made that quite clear. They are still the two most popular talk radio shows in the country, no matter if you like them or not. And WPHT's rating sunk like a stone when they lost them. And you honestly think WPHT wouldn't want those shows back?

No, the answer is FREDLEONARD doesn't want them back. Let's not confuse the two.

 

[FredLeonard]

Cupcake: It's apparent that you are a fan of right-wing talk, not a radio geek or radio pro. Don't confuse what you like or what you think is TRUTH with success.
Facts: The audience for right-wing talk has been shrinking for years. The remaining audience is aging. Ad revenue has been declining faster than the audience. Putting Rush on FM has not made things better.
That said, what any of us thinks doesn't matter. It's what advertisers buy that matters. But maybe you also think that winning games is what matters to sports team owners.
Here we are, almost to October. We know where Rush is going to be in New York. We know what's going to happen in various markets with Cumulus talk stations. And still no word on Rush in Philly. Do YOU honestly think if WPHT did want those shows back, they would have made a deal and been announcing Rush's "homecoming by now?"
And one way to tell the difference between a real radio person and a ditto-head: Radio people realize that the medium's great asset is that it is (or can be) LOCAL.

 

[Small Market Guy]

Cupcake: It's apparent that you are a fan of right-wing talk, not a radio geek or radio pro.

Project much?