Actually the issue with BIN airing outdated news items and stories, and having lots of repetition seems to be a frequent comment about most every BIN station regardless of market. It's an issue with both local stories and their national reports. @101tm made a similar comment earlier in this thread and he's in a completely different part of the country than me, for instance.
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iHM's "Black Information Network"
- Thread starter MarkW
- Start date
Repetition in itself seems natural for all-news or all-news and feature operations, though. I hear it a lot on the local all-news station, and another one about 160 miles north of me in Canada.
But as for the promos and other things that are still playing days after the fact, it makes me wonder if BIN is operated out of one studio or office somewhere, and they're a bit understaffed.
If you listen to the online feed of NBC News Radio, it plays the same pre-recorded segments over and over again as well. Even the hourly headlines are rarely updated. So BIN is no different in that regard.
Corporate sponsorship will dry up at some point. There will end up being little interest in "black" oriented news. Ratings are pretty much zero. IHM really doesn't care about it. There are many markets where they put it on a failed AM (usually seriously underpowered and with poor signals) and don't even bother with an HD signal on a full power FM. Free and easy to do, but they don't. (Not in every case. Of course.)
IMHO, they did it for goodwill. They were getting a lot of flack for their right wing, sometimes racist, talk stations/hosts so this was something they could point to and say "we care." As someone earlier mentioned, it paid for itself the day it went on, but that will end as corporations find better ways to show some goodwill with the African American community and connect with those people. BIN is not connecting with African Americans.
(Side note. The black TV news network also pulled the plug. But that's a cable thing. So a bit different from actual broadcasting.)
As long as the bottom line is making a few dollars. It will be on. It won't be too long though.
IMHO, they did it for goodwill. They were getting a lot of flack for their right wing, sometimes racist, talk stations/hosts so this was something they could point to and say "we care." As someone earlier mentioned, it paid for itself the day it went on, but that will end as corporations find better ways to show some goodwill with the African American community and connect with those people. BIN is not connecting with African Americans.
(Side note. The black TV news network also pulled the plug. But that's a cable thing. So a bit different from actual broadcasting.)
As long as the bottom line is making a few dollars. It will be on. It won't be too long though.
IHM cares enough about it that they bought another radio station in NYC to carry it, and they even put it on FM in other markets where there was a frequency available in the cluster for it. And of course the people doing the hard work at BIN likely care about it very much.
The problem is that it seems underfunded which would account for the repeated segments and slow updates. And they are using automation to schedule pre-recorded news reports as a cost cutting measure instead of running live news like top all-news radio operations such as 1010 WINS.
But those things aren't confined to iHM's news operations, there is endless discussion here about the impact of cost cutting, automation and voicetracking on music formats too. Usually it turns out you get what you pay for and cost reduction = quality reduction.
The problem is that it seems underfunded which would account for the repeated segments and slow updates. And they are using automation to schedule pre-recorded news reports as a cost cutting measure instead of running live news like top all-news radio operations such as 1010 WINS.
But those things aren't confined to iHM's news operations, there is endless discussion here about the impact of cost cutting, automation and voicetracking on music formats too. Usually it turns out you get what you pay for and cost reduction = quality reduction.
Since listeners pay nothing for the service, it seems like a fair exchange.
It's like complaining about the service you get from Facebook. How much do you pay for it?
Oh, if you're a Farsebook user, you're paying alright. Most just don't know what they gave up because they never bothered to read the terms of service.
I was referring to the one who is paying, namely the company. Running a low budget operation produces low budget results and then you end up with stale news and low listenership as discussed.
Depends on your point of view. The sponsors are the ones who are paying, and they know what they paid for. This service was launched in June 2020, in the early days of the pandemic. Revenues were at an all-time low, and staffing was remote. So those were the circumstances behind the launch.
Other companies, including the Associated Press and CNN, have tried to do mainstream 24/7 national news networks, not aimed at the black community, and their ratings success wasn't much better. Simply put, there isn't much audience for 24/7 straight national news. That's why so many radio stations have added commentary to the mix.
Indeed, this was the mid-70's failing of the NBC radio news format. Smaller market stations could not fill the optional local news windows due to cost and so "nobody" listened, advertisers got no results and the service died almost instantly.
There is if it's live and local as we can see from some of the nation's top news stations.
People want to know what's going on where they live. 24/7 national news networks like CNN and AP can't/couldn't provide that.
This was NEVER intended to be a local service. This was presented to the sponsors as what it is, which is a 24/7 national black news service.
I agree that it might have had better local ratings success if it had been strictly a 5 minute TOH newscast within a local black news talk format. But as you see with similar stations in NY, LA, DC, and Chicago, the ratings for local black news/talk isn't very good either.
But that format only works in some of the top 10 to 12 markets... and even then, those tried in a number of Sunbelt markets have failed.
And in markets outside the very top ones, it is too expensive.
Really? Name one that's live and local 24/7. No recorded packages or replayed stories 24/7.
But there's only so much local news that one can report. That's why most stations and network serving local stations replay entire newscasts.
BIN isn't exactly an original idea. Back in the 70's, Mutual News (remember them?) offered the Mutual Black Network. Not sure how long it was around, but it was used on Mutual affiliates in major markets.
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