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Jeanne Jakle Reader Laments the end of FM talker KRPT

D

daypart

Reader complains that she went away for Thanksgiving vacation and when she returned, there was music where Jerry Springer used to be!

<a target="_blank" href=http://www.mysanantonio.com/entertainment/columnists/jjackle/stories/MYSA120105.5P.jakle.10b7763a.html>http://www.mysanantonio.com/entertainment/columnists/jjackle/stories/MYSA120105.5P.jakle.10b7763a.html</a>
 
> Reader complains that she went away for Thanksgiving
> vacation and when she returned, there was music where Jerry
> Springer used to be!
>
http://www.mysanantonio.com/entertainment/> columnists/jjackle/stories/MYSA120105.5P.jakle.10b7763a.html
>
From Jakele's column:
"Grace Gonzalez was one of several former fans who called or wrote in protest:"

So in a city of over a million with a huge radio audience, our only radio writer in the paper of record got "several" fans to protest about the loss of Springer and company?

No doubt an outrage I say!

I know it was only tongue in cheek, but they were actually discussing the new Outlaw format from San Antonio on the Tampa Bay board.

Lib Talk Radio just doesn't work. Good signal or not.

If CC wants to make some money in San Antonio with a realatively liberal talk show, they should do what Tampa Bay CC did with thier MJ morning show guy and put him on an AM talker in the afternoon. (You may recall The Schnitt Show).

Now that CC owns Drex up in Chicago doing mornings (with low ratings), they ought to let him (pay him to) do an afternoon talk show on an AM outlet here in SA. Talk about ratings in the afternoon.

I am a huge fan of the Thompson Brothers on WOAI, but seriously, offer an afternoon Drex talkshow, and you will get both liberals and normal people listening to him for the afternoon drive.

San Antonio Loves Drex - and now you also know the answer to why K-Rock sucks.
 
"Lib talk radio doesn't work"

Get back to me when they put it on a decent signal in San Antonio.

Where it is on a good signal, it does well. (Portland, Miami, Denver)

A rimshot-of-a-rimshot FM is no measure of the format's potential in San Antonio or anywhere else.
 
> Lib Talk Radio just doesn't work. Good signal or not.

Actually, Lib Talk is very successful, even in generally conservative areas. Good talk works; bad talk doesn't. It's that simple. Lib Talk isn't just the sub-par product of Air America and Clear Channel's hodgepodge of Air America rejects. NPR, which is definitely liberal, is more popular than every talk show except Rush Limbaugh. Nationally, Morning Edition and All Things Considered are the most popular talk programs behind Limbaugh.
 
> > Lib Talk Radio just doesn't work. Good signal or not.
>
> Actually, Lib Talk is very successful, even in generally
> conservative areas. Good talk works; bad talk doesn't.
> It's that simple. Lib Talk isn't just the sub-par product
> of Air America and Clear Channel's hodgepodge of Air America
> rejects. NPR, which is definitely liberal, is more popular
> than every talk show except Rush Limbaugh. Nationally,
> Morning Edition and All Things Considered are the most
> popular talk programs behind Limbaugh.
>


No doubt, NPR is a winner for two reasons: A) You are stationed overseas and it is all you have as a morning show (I used to really enjoy Bob Edwards - great voice, great delivery), or B) if you are yet another comatose person who purchased a car and turned on the radio only to listen to the first station that showed up on the dial.

I admit, I love the delivery and the style of some of the NPR product - it is as if I was a child in junior high and someone said, here, take this tape recorder and go record some sounds - some birds, children, the water flowing in a creek - then, talk about something bland but use the recordings you made as a background. This is very entertaining radio - especially if you have just smoked a joint.

But since most of us aren't potheads when it comes to listening to talk radio, we make our choices based on the content of the "talk". As such, I think it has been adequately proven via ratings systems that those "Talk" stations with a predominently liberal focus are not nearly as profitable or nearly listened to as those they compete with who seem to have a more conservative focus.

Let's face it, and we can rationalize all we want (I say "we" but mean "you"), head to head, a line up of Limbaugh-like hosts locally or nationally beats Frankin-like hosts.

Yes, yes, we will have some exceptions, but really, if you are an investor - look at things on a 500 station level, vice the "Well, at least Frankin owns Portland, lets switch from Limbaugh and Hannity to Frankin and Colmbs on the entire network".
 
> No doubt, NPR is a winner for two reasons: A) You are
> stationed overseas and it is all you have as a morning show
> (I used to really enjoy Bob Edwards - great voice, great
> delivery), or B) if you are yet another comatose person who
> purchased a car and turned on the radio only to listen to
> the first station that showed up on the dial.

Actually, people overseas weren't included in the statistics I saw indicating NPR was so successful. I also suspect most NPR users know how to use their radios. After all, a radio is not a VCR, and NPR listeners are among the most educated listeners around. Not quite the characteristics of potheads. Say what you want about the delivery of NPR, but I doubt they care. After all, they're successful.

> But since most of us aren't potheads when it comes to
> listening to talk radio, we make our choices based on the
> content of the "talk". As such, I think it has been
> adequately proven via ratings systems that those "Talk"
> stations with a predominently liberal focus are not nearly
> as profitable or nearly listened to as those they compete
> with who seem to have a more conservative focus.

Ratings don't prove anything about viewpoint whatsoever. In fact, they prove that good talk works regardless of viewpoint. You just have to check the Arbitron data for non-commercial stations. The Radio Research Consortium, which publishes those ratings, shows most NPR stations perform quite well. As an example, KUT in Austin mops the floor with KLBJ. KSTX also performed at roughly WOAI's level when it was a subscriber. KERA in Dallas outperforms about half of Clear Channel's stations as well as second rate talker KLIF.

> Let's face it, and we can rationalize all we want (I say
> "we" but mean "you"), head to head, a line up of
> Limbaugh-like hosts locally or nationally beats Frankin-like
> hosts.

I don't know where you get the idea I was rationalizing. All you're doing with this paragraph is restating one of my original points, which is that Air America is a bad product. That's why it fails, plain and simple.
 
> Ratings don't prove anything about viewpoint whatsoever. In
> fact, they prove that good talk works regardless of
> viewpoint. You just have to check the Arbitron data for
> non-commercial stations. The Radio Research Consortium,
> which publishes those ratings, shows most NPR stations
> perform quite well. As an example, KUT in Austin mops the
> floor with KLBJ. KSTX also performed at roughly WOAI's
> level when it was a subscriber. KERA in Dallas outperforms
> about half of Clear Channel's stations as well as second
> rate talker KLIF.
>
>
I'm not doubting this factoid and will gladly take your word for it. But if these stations perform so well, why are they operating on taxpayer funds instead of selling air time for a profit? The answer probably is that they may do well for specific shows but for the other 23 hours a day, they wouldn't make a dime.



> I don't know where you get the idea I was rationalizing.
> All you're doing with this paragraph is restating one of my
> original points, which is that Air America is a bad product.
> That's why it fails, plain and simple.
>

Well, then. We agree!
 
> I'm not doubting this factoid and will gladly take your word
> for it. But if these stations perform so well, why are they
> operating on taxpayer funds instead of selling air time for
> a profit? The answer probably is that they may do well for
> specific shows but for the other 23 hours a day, they
> wouldn't make a dime.

Actually, NPR has discussed the possibilities of going commercial several times, and there is an increasingly vocal faction within the organization that thinks it should do exactly that. That group believes there is more money in going commercial than in receiving government subsidies. Remember also that a good chunk of NPR's revenue comes from underwriters in addition to subsidies and donations, and underwriting an NPR program isn't cheap. NPR worries about losing public funding a lot less than people, especially both aisles of Congress, think. It would go commercial quite quickly if Congress killed its funding. This thirtysomething won't be surprised if NPR does move to the commercial band in my lifetime, even if no action is taken by Congress.

As for why it hasn't moved yet, your guess is as good as mine. Maybe it's principle. Maybe it's a matter of just getting from here to there would be a bigger investment than they want to make right now. And, yes, it's entirely possible that NPR would struggle in some dayparts. Ratings of NPR stations do fluctuate by daypart. Morning Edition and All Things Considered are the crown jewels of the programming lineup. In that respect, it's no different than commercial radio. Stations that carry Howard Stern tend to do well in the mornings and spend the rest of the day diving, and they will be in even bigger trouble when he goes to satellite by the first of the new year. News/Talk, AC and country stations tend to drop off after people arrive home from work (which is why it's getting tough to find stations in those formats that are live after 7 PM), and those news/talk stations that carry Rush tend to climb when his show starts and dive right after he leaves the air.
 
There is also the simple matter of the non-commercial end of the dial. If NPR suddenly decided to go commercial, they would have to move every one of their stations to frequencies above 92. Most markets these days are saturated and unless NPR is willing to throw out huge amounts of money to buy out frequencies then they will be stuck on small signals on the outskirts of markets. If they do ever go commercial it will be a long and drawn out process. By the way, in the argument over liberal talk....have any of you given thought to the idea that liberal talk (Air America really) is in its infancy? It took people like Rush Limbaugh 20 years to get to a national market and then start making a dent. Air America started on the national stage...boom, here we are. I think you should give them a little time. They will be tweaking and changing things for quite some time before they find the product they like. San Antonio not withstanding, they are adding markets and improving signals steadily. I wouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater just yet.



> > I'm not doubting this factoid and will gladly take your
> word
> > for it. But if these stations perform so well, why are
> they
> > operating on taxpayer funds instead of selling air time
> for
> > a profit? The answer probably is that they may do well
> for
> > specific shows but for the other 23 hours a day, they
> > wouldn't make a dime.
>
> Actually, NPR has discussed the possibilities of going
> commercial several times, and there is an increasingly vocal
> faction within the organization that thinks it should do
> exactly that. That group believes there is more money in
> going commercial than in receiving government subsidies.
> Remember also that a good chunk of NPR's revenue comes from
> underwriters in addition to subsidies and donations, and
> underwriting an NPR program isn't cheap. NPR worries about
> losing public funding a lot less than people, especially
> both aisles of Congress, think. It would go commercial
> quite quickly if Congress killed its funding. This
> thirtysomething won't be surprised if NPR does move to the
> commercial band in my lifetime, even if no action is taken
> by Congress.
>
> As for why it hasn't moved yet, your guess is as good as
> mine. Maybe it's principle. Maybe it's a matter of just
> getting from here to there would be a bigger investment than
> they want to make right now. And, yes, it's entirely
> possible that NPR would struggle in some dayparts. Ratings
> of NPR stations do fluctuate by daypart. Morning Edition
> and All Things Considered are the crown jewels of the
> programming lineup. In that respect, it's no different than
> commercial radio. Stations that carry Howard Stern tend to
> do well in the mornings and spend the rest of the day
> diving, and they will be in even bigger trouble when he goes
> to satellite by the first of the new year. News/Talk, AC
> and country stations tend to drop off after people arrive
> home from work (which is why it's getting tough to find
> stations in those formats that are live after 7 PM), and
> those news/talk stations that carry Rush tend to climb when
> his show starts and dive right after he leaves the air.
>
 
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