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HS Football and automation made pgh radio lose the Ben story and the Mayor

lash said:
Jeff,

I agree and didn't mean to not include WDJO. What Dusty and the guys have done is tremendous. Its the best sounding oldies station in the country in my opinion. Now imagine KQV doing the same, at 1/2 the cost of their all news format.
Click to expand...

KQV's format is a vanity project for Bob Dickey and Richard M. Scaife. It is not viable as a radio station and it doesn't have to be, since Scaife is willing to bankroll it. If it actually had to turn a profit, all news would have been gone years ago.

As far as no O'Connor breaking news coverage, they turn on the night light at 7 p.m. That's the end of the all news format and pretty close to the end of the viability of their signal. Why would you put someone on overtime to cover a story no one was going to hear?
 
"Now imagine KQV doing the same, at 1/2 the cost of their all news format."

So instead of a small but select audience of aging businessmen with lots of money to spend you have a small (and shrinking) audience of aging Baby Boomers. I'm 54, and I find "oldies" to be mostly songs from before my time that don't appeal to me very much. That's not to say that my personal musical taste should be considered as anyone's criteria for programming. But it does illustrate the point that any station that plays music from yesteryear is going to mostly appeal to people who were young when the music was new. And since "oldies" are, by definition, old, that means that the people who were young when the oldies were new are even older than the songs.

It might be great for a handful of old-time radio enthusiasts, but that's hardly a mass market audience segment. So even if Scaife and Dickey decided not to continue as their vanity hobby/project, don't hold your breath waiting for KQV to ever be a music station again.
 
As much as I and some other people (mostly radio people) would enjoy it, I think returning KQV to a music format similar to its Top 40 days would be a novelty, at best. And I found KQV extremely helpful in the immediate post-9/11 period when I was commuting to see my mother in the hospital twice a day (she went in on 9/12, and had her bypass on 9/17), and KDKA had turned on the CNN feed and left or so it seemed. So I'm fine with KQV just as it is, and if it is indeed a vanity project then at least Pittsburgh has an all-news station.

But "KQV Rewound"...now, THAT would be boffo.
 
I think everything said here (on both sides of the coin) makes a world of sense. However, let me give you a scenario.

Let's say you're listening to an FM station in the middle of their satellite-fed evening programming. You don't have your TV on, you're not giving a thought to the world around you, and you're in the path of a tornado.

In a lot of cases, there is somebody present in the station keeping an eye on the feed and whatnot. What would it hurt to have a plan in place at the station to strategically break in to the programming and provide the necessary information?

All stations are required to carry an EAS box, so why shouldn't they also be required to carry the necessary information when the need arises? One cannot assume that people don't listen to the radio and watch TV all of the time.

Say what you will...but that's my 2 worthless cents.
 
In a lot of cases, there is somebody present in the station keeping an eye on the feed and whatnot. What would it hurt to have a plan in place at the station to strategically break in to the programming and provide the necessary information?

That's a good point, Eric. However, as I said earlier, KQV is a union shop, which does hurt them in instances like this. If the station is peopled with a news contingency at night, it's usually someone to switch satellites or run tapes. The person who cracks that mic has to be an AFTRA union employee. There are restrictions on how you can work AFTRA employees in that regard. It would be an entirely different ballgame if there was no union. The person in the newsroom could then pass the information on the air.
 
KQV could have some AFTRAn on duty around the clock if that's what management wanted. Management doesn't want that, because it would then have to pay that person.
 
"Let's say you're listening to an FM station in the middle of their satellite-fed evening programming. You don't have your TV on, you're not giving a thought to the world around you, and you're in the path of a tornado."

Or worse, let's say you're up reading a book, or taking a bath, or practicing your guitar.

Or let's say that instead of a tornado, it's a meteor streaking in from space, and no medium on the face of the planet could possibly warn you, and it's heading right for your house!!!!

I love it when people use hypothetical examples that might occur once in a blue moon as an excuse for creating another job for some laid-off disc jockey.
 
Realist --

Accusing the posters above of attempting to "create a job for some laid-off disc-jockey" is preposterous. I'm saddened that the lens through which you analyze these issues seems to be bile-filled and self-absorbed.

1. Disasters and crises of the type PBRTV suggested are not-at-all hypothetical. Let's start with Katrina, Ivan and Flight 427 to name a few.

2. A radio station is unique in that it is a LIMITED RESOURCE -- i.e., there are a finite number of stations. It is appropriate to regulate such a resource.

3. Moreover, this particular resource is licensed by the government and has thus been granted a player's position on a very limited roster. It is entirely appropriate for the government -- and the public -- to expect that the resource be used in a way that serves the public interest.

4. Governmental requirements -- EAS participation, Amber laws, and even certain environmental laws related to chemical releases -- impose certain requirements on conventionally licenses AM and FM stations.

5. Regarding your "save a job scenario", I for one would be satisfied if there were simply a procedure in place for all of the Clear Channel stations to simulcast a bulletin or a coordination agreement in place among all local stations to share such information. Please don't argue that it cannot be done; other industries do this and radio has also done so in the past.

I think many here are simply suggesting that there is an ethical and policy-based obligation to serve the public interest in times of emergency and that appropriate leadership and conscience would allow this. I'd also be surprised if a union shop would not allow certain waivers under certain conditions. Given all of the above, it is a most appropriate suggestion.

You likely will now argue something on the order of "yeah, and the 3% of the people tuned into radio will get the message...". However, radio -- unlike any other medium -- reaches people rapidly, in large numbers, inexpensively and across socioeconomic lines. In addition, those who hear the message rapidly carry it forward to others so that they will then turn to a news source.

Emergency communication during a time of true emergency is a critical use of the spectrum.
 
GrizzledVet said:
I think many here are simply suggesting that there is an ethical and policy-based obligation to serve the public interest in times of emergency and that appropriate leadership and conscience would allow this.
Click to expand...

I'm sure there is appropriate leadership in many markets as well as a sense of obligation, and I am specifically thinking of the superhuman effort made by Clear Channel and Entercom in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, which was a bona fide emergency situation. In many other cities, there may be inappropriate or bad leadership, and little or no conscience. Or perhaps it all boils down to budget considerations. "By their fruits ye shall know them." That's as true of people today as it was two thousand years ago, and it's not all that hard to tell when you have snakes on a plane.
 
"Let's start with Katrina, Ivan and Flight 427 to name a few."

OK, let's start with Hurricanes Katrina and Ivan. Both events had several days of advance warning. All media reported news and progress reports on the approach of the two hurricanes. No one can honestly say that either of those two events should have taken anyone by surprise.

As for flight 427, there was no advance warning possible by any media. It happened. Then it was over. Those people who needed to know, such as next-of-kin of victims were most properly notified through channels other than radio news bulletins. Anyone on the ground who might have been affected, such as emergency response teams, would also be notified by radio. But not by broadcast radio, rather by two-way private channel radio.

Go back to the title of this thread, and the topic at hand. This thread is about the fact that people on the Bob O'Connor death watch didn't get instant notification that he died via the radio. And that Steeler fans didn't find out until the next day the Ben Rothlisberger had his appendix out. To a news junkie, maybe getting that information a few hours sooner is a big deal. But in the larger scheme of things, the fact that those people who listened to the radio didn't find out those two things right away isn't going to have a serious negative impact on anyone's life.

"Emergency communication during a time of true emergency is a critical use of the spectrum."

I offer no argument there. But in this thread, I have seen very few examples of bona-fide "emergencies" about which the public needed to know right this very minute in order to take appropriate action. This thread isn't about such emergencies, it's about getting what newspaper people used to call "scoops" on the air in a hurry.

"I am specifically thinking of the superhuman effort made by Clear Channel and Entercom in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, which was a bona fide emergency situation."

Exactly! After an event, when dealing with the emergency aftermath, radio broadcasters do reallocate resources in an appropriate manner to cope with the aftermath. That has nothing to do with keeping someone on perpetual standby to report news bulletins that are not bona-fide emergencies, such as the mayor finally dying or the quarterback having his appendix out.
 
"Emergency communication during a time of true emergency is a critical use of the spectrum."

This is why the EAS system was created to replace EBS. It's designed to interrupt the audio chain when there's a bona fide emergency as what we have seen given as examples. It's not perfect, but when there's a severe weather warning coming into the area, or an AMBER alert, it works.
 
But in this thread, I have seen very few examples of bona-fide "emergencies" about which the public needed to know right this very minute in order to take appropriate action. This thread isn't about such emergencies, it's about getting what newspaper people used to call "scoops" on the air in a hurry.

Very true, Realist. Mayor O'Connor's passing and Ben Roethlisberger's surgery are examples of "scoops" that were more or less "need to know" stories. O'Connor's death didn't mean we were in danger of being invaded by Cleveland :D. Nor did Roethlisberger's surgery mean a coup in the Steelers' locker room. It would have been nice to have heard O'Connor's passing first on KQV, as they bill themselves all news, but that's just me.

During Hurricane Ivan, that was a very cooperative effort made by ALL radio stations to get the word out everywhere. I was live on KDKA and KQV (Joe Fenn is an old friend of mine) giving listeners an update of what was happening in Armstrong County (lots of people commute to Pittsburgh from here), including interviews with the county's EMA coordinator. That's in addition to what I was giving my own stations at the time.
 
"He is dead on."

What does that have to do with getting "scoops" on breaking news about the local football team's quarterback having his appendix out? And no disrespect meant to the late Mayor O'Connor, but aside from his immediate family, how critical was it that the general public, who already knew he was terminally ill and not likely to last more than a day or so, were told of the exact moment of his passing within minutes of it happening?

All of the examples in that article, and they were good examples, were of programming that was produced and scheduled for broadcast in advance. There's not a word about keeping someone on stand-by duty in the evening hours when relatively few people even have their radios turned on just in case something important happens that needs to be reported.

And, to those who keep insisting that there only needs to be one person on duty at the station at night for such emergencies, who is supposed to convey the details of such a story to that one person? How does a booth announcer report a story over the air without also having a reporter in the field getting the story to the booth announcer?
 
"What does that have to do with..."

It has to do with the conversation we were having earlier (on page three) about an "ethical and policy-based obligation to serve the public interest" and the matter of conscience in such things. That isn't limited to emergencies - or, at least, it shouldn't be.
 
"That isn't limited to emergencies - or, at least, it shouldn't be."

No, but for a long, long time it was limited to the Sunday morning "public service" ghetto. My radio career began with "public service" broadcasting. I got my start on radio on a program produced by Christian Associates that was broadcast on KQV on Sunday mornings at 9:30.

Frankly, I don't see the way broadcasters formerly honored the spirit of the rules requiring community service by clustering all their "public service" show on Sunday mornings as being all that much better than the way they simply ignore those rules now.
 
He is dead on.

Eric O'Brien forwarded that article to me from PBRTV.com. Very much right on. Let's hope that he practices what he preaches within his own broadcast group. There are broadcasters who do, and others that talk out of the other side of their mouths, whichever cheek is convenient. Let's hope more apply this in practice rather than talk...while this business is still standing.
 
Keep repeating the mantra "Its All About the Money. Its All About the Money."

Radio taught its listeners a long time ago that if something important is happening go somewhere else to find it. Trouble for radio now is that its listeners have no expectations and stations are meeting that. Wait 'til the suits finally figure out that the ad dollars they think will be back any day now followed the listeners to someplace else.
 
Radio taught its listeners a long time ago that if something important is happening go somewhere else to find it. Trouble for radio now is that its listeners have no expectations and stations are meeting that. Wait 'til the suits finally figure out that the ad dollars they think will be back any day now followed the listeners to someplace else.

Right on. We've been penny wise and pound foolish. It's ok to 'trim the fat', but you need to stop where the meat starts.
 
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