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Insurance Tunes Out WBAI Sandy Claim

They REALLY should consider a swap with Cumulus for 94.7. Cumulus gives Pacifica 94.7 plus $5 million. Both parties win in this situation. Nash gets a better signal and WBAI gets a site with much lower rent.

But of course, the radicals there are so bone-headed that they would fight amongst themselves instead of doing something to save their radio station and lower overhead.
 
WNTIRadio said:
They REALLY should consider a swap with Cumulus for 94.7. Cumulus gives Pacifica 94.7 plus $5 million. Both parties win in this situation. Nash gets a better signal and WBAI gets a site with much lower rent.

But of course, the radicals there are so bone-headed that they would fight amongst themselves instead of doing something to save their radio station and lower overhead.
Click to expand...

Hey the good news is if they keep fighting.. soon they will have nothing more to fight over than a piece of paper if they get evicted from ESB.
 
Heck Cumulus could give them 103.9 in exchange for 99.5.....Then Cumulus would have 3 Class B's in the market.
 
xmusicmatt said:
WNTIRadio said:
They REALLY should consider a swap with Cumulus for 94.7. Cumulus gives Pacifica 94.7 plus $5 million. Both parties win in this situation. Nash gets a better signal and WBAI gets a site with much lower rent.

But of course, the radicals there are so bone-headed that they would fight amongst themselves instead of doing something to save their radio station and lower overhead.
Click to expand...

Hey the good news is if they keep fighting.. soon they will have nothing more to fight over than a piece of paper if they get evicted from ESB.
Click to expand...

Why is that "good"?

For all the dysfunction associated with the station (and many of its personnel!) they do offer something completely different than what you normally hear on the FM dial. I agree they should be smart about some kind of trade + cash for a different signal, but I don't gloat over the possibility that they would disappear forever.
 
WNTIRadio said:
They REALLY should consider a swap with Cumulus for 94.7. Cumulus gives Pacifica 94.7 plus $5 million. Both parties win in this situation. Nash gets a better signal and WBAI gets a site with much lower rent.

But of course, the radicals there are so bone-headed that they would fight amongst themselves instead of doing something to save their radio station and lower overhead.
Click to expand...

I was thinking almost the same thing, but instead of 94.7, which gets a decent signal anyways for where they want to reach, Cumulus should offer up 103.9 WFAS and cash for 99.5. Cumulus gets the new big signal FM they want, and Pacifica gets a cash infusion plus a new signal in the Bronx. Sure, 103.9 would be a smaller signal footprint, but I would assume it still covers most of their intended market. Besides, I would imagine WBAI's listeners are streaming-saavy anyways.

WBAI is a cluster-#%&@. At least they were smart enough to move to cheaper digs. But they really do have dysfunctional management.
 
In addition to Cumulus being kept busy launching the Nash brand, perhaps one reason they have not yet flipped WFAS FM to rock is that they are hoping to use it in trade for a class B signal. A recent example was WDVY 106.3 being handed over to Family Radio as part of a deal to acquire WFME 94.3 for Nash FM.
Though Cumulus has the permits and the facilities to move WFAS into the Bronx, my guess is that as one of the nation's largest radio broadcasters, they would not be satisfied running a station in market #1 with its relatively modest signal. The endless financial issues of WBAI may present an opportunity for Cumulus to pick up a second class B. Cumulus may be the only broadcaster at this time that has the cash to buy a class B in New York, and be able to offer a local FM in trade.
 
This may well be the end of WBAI (at least for now), as I doubt they'll be able to raise enough money to keep their lease on their transmitter site.

Pacifica may be forced to sell-off WBAI to a commercial broadcaster, with proceeds to keep their other stations alive.
 
They should podcast and stream online, they'd still be able to reach their current audience and beyond, at a much lower cost.

In fact they should really add video, print and interactive features and make the website a full featured destination instead of just a place to post a broadcast schedule. That would be a much better allocation of their funds than paying such high rent and overhead to reach such a small, localized radio-only audience.

50 years ago FM radio was an alternative medium, perfect for special interest use. Today that platform is the Internet where plenty of good progressive organizations flourish.
 
FightingIrish said:
WNTIRadio said:
They REALLY should consider a swap with Cumulus for 94.7. Cumulus gives Pacifica 94.7 plus $5 million. Both parties win in this situation. Nash gets a better signal and WBAI gets a site with much lower rent.

But of course, the radicals there are so bone-headed that they would fight amongst themselves instead of doing something to save their radio station and lower overhead.
Click to expand...

I was thinking almost the same thing, but instead of 94.7, which gets a decent signal anyways for where they want to reach, Cumulus should offer up 103.9 WFAS and cash for 99.5. Cumulus gets the new big signal FM they want, and Pacifica gets a cash infusion plus a new signal in the Bronx. Sure, 103.9 would be a smaller signal footprint, but I would assume it still covers most of their intended market. Besides, I would imagine WBAI's listeners are streaming-saavy anyways.

WBAI is a cluster-#%&@. At least they were smart enough to move to cheaper digs. But they really do have dysfunctional management.
Click to expand...

103.9 wouldn't be a bad spot for WBAI. Sure, it is no Empire Class B, but presuming the coverage will be comparable to WVIP 93.5 (same tower) it wouldn't be bad at all. I would also presume that trading 103.9 would involve even MORE cash than 94.7 because 103.9 is a "class a". Pacifica needs cash. They also could do this in San Francisco where they have a big signal non-com on a commercial frequency.

Unless CBS is capped, I still like the swap of 1010 AM (to Pacifica) for 99.5 + cash (to CBS). As mentioned, most of BAI is talk anyway, and the big 1010 signal would get them way out northeast and east.
 
In a place like NYC, if all they really needed is $500-k to assure they could continue as before, they would have a very good chance of finding a "white knight" to come to their rescue with the money.

While $500-k is a serious amount to most of us, Pacifica is a legitimate non-profit and donations to it are fully tax deductible. There are plenty of folks with very deep pockets who could help BAI out of a mess like this. The problem is that BAI has been in a continuing mess for years, and $500-k donated now may only postpone the inevitable demise of the organization temporarily.

Control of the station and its board seems to have shifted away from its original "radical" core group from the 1960s, probably many of those folks have died over the years, and the station hasn't attracted a new audience with the same kind of determination to keep it going.

When you have a class-B that reaches something like 15-million people, and fewer than 100,000 tune in during an entire week, you are doing something wrong, and in WBAI's case they are doing a lot wrong. Even if rescued now, and placed on an alternative frequency, the downward spiral of unattractive programming, less listener support, and dysfunctional management combined with a smaller signal spell likely doom, unless a lot of "radical" changes are made.
 
That "white knight" doesn't exist for WBAI because he would be an evil, rich capitalist.
 
That "white knight" doesn't exist for WBAI because he would be an evil, rich capitalist.
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You're right, no doubt there would be a lot of voices in the BAI community who would believe anybody with that kind of money must be a capitalist pig.

But, we're talking about $500,000 and not $500-million, and at that level there are a lot of people in NYC's "creative community" who have a world view that fits with WBAI and could be made to feel like they were doing something noble by rescuing it. ( I don't necessarily agree with that world view, but I have encountered those kinds of New Yorkers over the years)

Those creative types, whether they be involved in music or another art form, or in computer software or other high tech areas, writing books or movies, have large incomes from intellectual property rights and aren't otherwise involved in the perceived "evils" of capitalism. And even if the White Knight turned out to be a group of knights or ladies, the money could be found.

At this point, WBAI would be foolish to turn down any donation, that would save its skin. But WBAI is a perfect example of how screwed up things can get when they are run by a kind of anarchy committee of screwballs with a distorted view of reality. So, stay tuned because these folks all may just be their own worst enemies who would rather have it all go down in flames, if it meant conceding one ideological point in a verbal debate that nobody else would remember the next day.
 
A station like WBAI, for all it's dysfunctions, does have it's place. EVERY market needs that one lovable rabble rousing non-commercial station.

I don't think Pacifica is so unrealistic that they would not be open to frequency swap negotiations if push REALLY comes to shove. Their own lawyers understand this. But time IS ticking....
 
So if they default on their rent to the Empire State Building, where would 99.5 go? Would WBAI find an alternate transmitter site, or sell the station? Perhaps Cumulus can offer to move 103.9 to the Bronx only if WBAI agrees to swap 99.5 in exchange for 103.9 + cash. It would suck for such a good signal to be downgraded because Pacifica can't pay the bills.
 
What about 93.5 FM in New Rochelle? They're technically a non-commercial station, right? Perfect for WBAI.
 
They're all nuts. And this is precisely the reason that nobody will care if they disappear from the airwaves. It isn't 1969 anymore and WBAI is irrelevant.
 
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