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Imus Unloads on the Dickey Brothers
- Thread starter Rusty Bridges
- Start date
Did you know this is the New York Radio Discussion forum for the purposes of discussing topics such as this, wise ass.
It is jerks like you why this forum is empty. You are here all the time and are always obnoxious when anyone posts anything.
Like I said anyone will pay for airtime so they do not have to air infomercials and destroy the station.
Do you know what a discussion is? It's not non-stop complaining. Endless whining is worse than anything on the radio.
Who is "anyone"?
And who would pay for airtime and do anything else but use it as an infomercial?
That is an infomercial for a cause rather than a product. It is still an infomercial.
They are not working for "free". They are paying for time and producing content that will make them money or advance a cause. Whether we call the deal "time brokering" or "infomercial" it is the same thing: someone else is renting time by the half hour, hour or more to "take over" the radio station. Some companies won't sell time in that fashion for selling religion and politics and social issues due to the legal responsibilities and liabilities involved.
"Brokered time" and "infomercial" are pretty much the same. The only difference is that an infomercial buys time to promote its own product, while a broker buys time to sell ads to third parties. But in the end, it is like the difference between a hog and a pig.
That is brokering, except that rarely do advertisers on brokered shows pay in advance. But usually, the broker pays the station in advance or they don't go on the air.
In radio, there are many kinds of consultants such as programming, research, sales, engineering, legal, and management. They are hired by stations to do specific tasks such as a consulting engineer hired to design a modification to a directional antenna system. Being a consultant or not has nothing to do with the fact that you are arguing for something that is not economically (and probably legally) viable for WABC.
I was trying to make the point that if it can be done in those instances then why are that not doing so with regular talk programming? It just seems to me an obvious way to maintain the brand, habits and therefore audience through the weekend.
Yes, then what I am describing is "brokered time". Thanks.
Some people here demonstrate a pattern of always overtly defending the management decisions of stations in this market and get quite defensive about it. It just leads me to believe they have a vested interest in defending the station in perhaps the eyes of those that they contract with, employed by and/or to curry favor.
Are you saying for example "brokered time" for a generic talk - call-in program is probably not legal or viable for WABC?
I don't think anyone is "defending" anything.
K
K.M. Richards
Guest
If a station cannot sell enough spot advertising to fill the available commercial positions in its regular talk programming, that task is going to be two or three times more difficult for a broker to do the same with similar programming. That's why practically all brokered time ends up being infomercials.
Since I am also a consultant, like BigA and David, I'll presume I fall into that category with you.
We have no "vested interests" in defending our clients. We are paid for advice given to them, which they can implement or reject. We get paid either way.
What we are defending is the correction of misinterpretations of the radio business by people like yourself, so that those misinterpretations will not become accepted (and incorrect) definitions. We challenge wrong statements with industry facts. Yes, much of this is our personal knowledge from experience, but if you really wanted to take the time to independently research what we say, instead of continuing to stand on a position of your contrary opinion being right, you could also see some of the same fallacies.
The latter, and all three of us have now said it. For one thing, no one has shown interest in doing a generic talk/call-in program on a brokered time basis ... at least, none who could afford to put up the cash for the time upfront and then try to get it back in spot sales.
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Stations that sell brokered time are almost exclusively those that are not interested in selling to agencies and advertisers based on audience delivery. I do not intend to demean such stations, as they have a valid business model for their type of facility which is usually a technical plant that can not compete in the more competitive ratings based environment. Such stations are nearly always AM, and tend to be the ones that do not cover their whole market, or are daytimers, or have very limited night coverage.
As KM said, it is better to understand the terms of the trade. That does not mean you accept the underlying practices... just that you are making sure your points are made in the correct manner.
Any individual consultant will only, at most, be interested in the operations of one cluster owned by a single owner. In the case of WABC, who other than other AM talk stations might care about their programming?
Personally, I couldn't care less about what WABC does. However, realizing what it could do and should do almost certainly does not include brokering time to oursiders.
I am saying two things. One, Cumulus and the other large broadcasters are not set up to do brokered shows. They don't have the monitoring and oversight staff, they don't sell to that kind of client and it's just not part of their business model. Second, letting "outsiders" on the air has all kinds of legal issues that Risk Management at any large company would reject instantly. While a shortwave station nearly nobody listens to might get away with Brother Stair and his ilk, if put on a significant NYC station would likely cause all kinds of protests and such. It is just not worth it, as the potential revenue is much less than the potential cost of liability and compliance issues.
I wouldn't call that "defending." I'd call it explaining. People need to understand why things happen.
The problems with this station didn't start last week or last year, they didn't start with the current owners, and the infomercials aren't the problem. The infomercials are indicative of the problem, which is a radio station that has completely lost its way, lost it's way over ten years ago, has been unable to revive itself in any way, and is now completely stuck with no real revenue base other than selling its signal for this kind of purpose.
If this had been a better radio station, it would not have this problem. There are AM talk stations that are in better shape. But the problem itself goes back to Disney ownership, and is a problem with all of the former ABC stations around the country. This group of stations, and its radio network, are a huge boat anchor around the neck of its owner. We can all see why Disney sold it, why it bankrupted Citadel, and why its doing the same thing to Cumulus. So no, I'm not defending ownership, management, or anyone. And I'm really glad I don't have anything to do with it.
Unless you are an intern, it is pretty much illegal for a station to have you work for free. Even then there have been lawsuits by interns claiming wage and hour law violations.
I do know of one rim shot FM in MA that has people working for free on the overnights.
When someone works for free, it devalues all of our work and worth. And the station gets exactly what they pay for.
I remember when some of the best programs were on on the weekends... WEEI Boston back when it was on 590 in he 70's had a great Sunday afternoon trivia show, and at night there was Eddie Andlemen, Mark Witkin and Jim McCarthy and the Sports Huddle.... that was great radio.
With all the AM's going syndicated or leased time even during the week, there is no reason to have a farm team on the weekends anymore that could do fill ins and move up when there was an opening.
WRKO's Moe Lauzier was a 25 year veteran of 680, he was shown the door back in 2008 and replaced with crap.
The glory days of AM radio are over.... in Boston where 850 was once a station to be listened to, it is now ESPN radio pulling a .3 .... I don't think that is covering the electricity bill let alone the tower site.
It is a shame what happened to WABC, it (and WINS) were favorite DX targets for me, I don't even bother with WABC anymore.
Instead of infomercials, what do you think the reason is that WABC and other stations running infomercials do not at least repeat weekday programming on weekends? In the case of WABC you would think if they are not replaying weekday programming that Cumulus would at least be able to simulcast or provide something other than infomercials.
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Because repeats don't make money. They'd have to sell spots for the repeats, or bonus them, and they're having trouble selling spots for the first broadcast on weekdays.
Weekends are not big money times anyway. Infomercials make money for a station with no obligation, at a time when listenership is lower than the weekday.
You know I said to myself when I posted that do not say "free" only say token or peanuts since you know people will seize on that one thing and miss all the other points. The point being you do not need to be paying some ridiculous salary to cover weekends. There seems to be some many other options rather than product infomercials.
Sometimes people do not want to listen to music on weekends and are looking for any form talk radio programming. I know someone will say use podcasts or stream. Not everyone has the time, the cell plan minutes or consistent wifi or mobile reception for that. Therefore it is surprising in a city like NY that format is not being filled on weekends. Life tends to be spur of the moment where people are not sitting around and planning their life around podcasts or streams. It is surprising that simply flipping the dial and finding talk radio programming on AM or FM is no longer an option it seems.
There is very little agency money going into anything except 6 AM to 7 PM, particularly for formats that agencies perceive are mostly used in that times pan. So there is not any money to be made rerunning weekday shows.
I agree that in a perfect world, running weekday shows would be a viable audience alternative.
The problem is that there is no money. There is money in infomercials.
It is possible to make a talk station perform well on the weekends. In some smaller markets, local gardening shows and lawyer shows do well and are liked by some advertisers in those direct business markets.
I got a talk station in LA to get better weekend ratings than the weekday ratings (which often tied KFI in the 18-49 and 26-54 demos) by training a group of experts to do two hour shows. We had from a psychologist and a marriage counselor to a criminal attorney and a priest. But the big issue was that LA is driven by agency business and agencies did not buy weekends... so we put infomercials on Saturday and Sunday nights and Sunday morning. I resisted any other intrusion as it damaged the image of the station which would have hurt us all week long... something many managers do not understand.
I worked part time at an AM/FM for free for over a year years ago. I did the stuff nobody wanted to do and went on coffee runs and just tried to help.
During that time, I learned the board and the equipment. I'd run the board when someone went to the bathroom or out to smoke. I'd put records away, empty wastebaskets, mop the toilets and go pick up the mail.
After a while I had to fill in on a board shift. And then they called me for more fills and emergencies and after a while they had me get a Social Security number and I was on the payroll!
The station gave me training and coaching and mentoring. I gave them time in return. Eventually, they realized they had done a good job and started paying.
So "working for free" is not as bad as it's thought to be if the exchange is understood by both parties. Unfortunately, my experience is illegal on many counts today.
K
K.M. Richards
Guest
Choice of words was deliberate to hopefully make the OP understand better. I think you can read that I'm closer to you philosophically.
Not just smaller markets. Look at the big English N/T station in Montreal, CJAD. 3 out of its 4 top-rated shows are on the weekend -- a full-service local morning show, a local call-in trivia show and a local call-in home improvement show. Notice how they're all local, and not conservative/political talk.
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You were just saying that AM radio is doing fine with young listeners in the Message Board Dentist's thread.
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