KTN Corp said:
Why? The KNX calls are well identifiable with the news demographics. KCBS is not a particularly familiar call, unless you are talking about TV. In other words, I see no benefit than the potential for a lot of confusion.
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KNX, KCBS and KTWV: speculation
- Thread starter RBRadioWaves
- Start date
Why? The KNX calls are well identifiable with the news demographics. KCBS is not a particularly familiar call, unless you are talking about TV. In other words, I see no benefit than the potential for a lot of confusion.
C
casual observer
Guest
David Eduardo makes all the right points in these posts including, most importantly, the billing info. No one in their right mind would mess with those numbers. Also, don't forget the headcount savings on JACK: Air Talent Budget = $0. That's a huge incentive to stay the course.
BTW, no one mentioned JACK's role as a flanker for KROQ. All the well researched and heavily played 80s music from the old KROQ fits very nicely with the classic hits core of JACK. It's also the highest cuming station among the KLOS - KSWD - JACK triangle and not that far behind KROQ.
BTW, no one mentioned JACK's role as a flanker for KROQ. All the well researched and heavily played 80s music from the old KROQ fits very nicely with the classic hits core of JACK. It's also the highest cuming station among the KLOS - KSWD - JACK triangle and not that far behind KROQ.
casual observer said:
The talent fees aren't exactly zero. They do pay several writers to come up with those witty nuggets the station voice says. Plus the voiceguy himself + Tami Heidi. But your point of reduced talent costs is still well taken. Jack isn't going anywhere and is a huge improvement over its predecessor "Arrow 93" by any measure.
Never cared for the Jack concept. Hate, the image voice, HATE! I'm not in to the constant smarm, funny writing or not. Plus, they put a whole staff out of work and replaced them with what, one or two people and some board ops.
That being said, David is correct. Were I CBS I'd leave it alone. It is a success, still hate it though...
That being said, David is correct. Were I CBS I'd leave it alone. It is a success, still hate it though...
calguy said:
Not really... the station has very good production people in the studio, not board ops. They take the calls, edit them and stage them with the right songs in the right moments. They can even use lists of songs to add if, for example, it rains... I'm not sure that they save any money over the average cost of full-time jocks these days. What they are doing is answering the needs of a lot of people who find jocks... any jocks... annoying and distasteful and substituting for that with attitude and timely bits from listeners.
I don't think the staff is any smaller than a live-jocked music station. It just has a neat alternative presentation that a significant group of listeners want.
DavidEduardo said:
Personally I'm old school in the respect that I like a warm body talking to me. I stopped listening to most music stations after 10 pm because very few are "live" now. If those producers at Jack are making union wages, then I have no problem with it. I will say though that I have never heard of great numbers of people who find jocks... any jocks... annoying and distasteful. Now that's not to say that there aren't jocks who are annoying and distasteful, because there are, but all jocks, wow. You obviously have research to prove your point, you always do, but that's a new one for me. Like I said earlier, this is my opinion about Jack and I may be alone. I still do not like the Jack image voice, I find him annoying and distasteful. But I must be in the minority, and that's okay it's a free country...
lauu said:
3-letter callsigns are like W's west of the Mississippi, exceptions that take a long time to fix (if ever) especially in the city that embraces modernity. I'm sure you'll love WFAA-TV in Dallas and why not bring back WBAP-FM and WBAP-TV to Fort Worth too?
It makes the network affiliation clear to the viewer/listener in that market. KNXT marks the dark ages of Los Angeles being split with San Francisco as the center of the West, which New York passed Philadelphia a century before radio's infancy.
WCBS, WCBS-FM, WCBS-TV New York - East Coast flagship stations
KCBS, KCBS-FM, KCBS-TV Los Angeles - West Coast flagship stations
Clear enough?
calguy said:
In random surveys, once you get below about 50 years of age, you find a group of perhaps 20% of the people in the 25-50 age group that simply wants no DJs... mostly male, though. The most hated thing is talking on any part of the music, tip or tail, and then talking with nothing to say. They find DJs vacuous and banal. They like a station-selected playlist, but not jocks.
Interesting, under 25 DJs are nowhere so negative, as long as they are relevant and don't sound like geezers.
KTN Corp said:
Yes - clear and logical, but I think this was the likely sequence of events:
The KCBS-FM call letters left San Francisco in 1982, when it became KRQR ("The Rocker"). "CBS-FM 97" had piss-poor ratings and the folks programming it reportedly thought the association with CBS would actually hurt ratings in the move to their new album rock format. I don't know when the calls went to the former KNX-FM, though. CBS may have just sat on them until:
KNXT became KCBS-TV in 1984. I figure the logic of the CBS suits in that year was: both KNX 1070 and KCBS 740 in San Francisco have good ratings, so why fix what ain't broke- and confuse listeners in both markets by bringing the KCBS call letters to 1070.
In the 60s, when KRCA (Channel 4) became KNBC, the FCC reportedly had a rule that didn't allow broadcasters to split up call letters between separate markets. So in that case, KNBC radio San Francisco became KNBR.
DavidEduardo said:
I guess I am right in there then because I find the Jack concept to be fine, and some of the lines the guy spews out over the years have been LOL funny. This is a result of obviously talented writers. But since they are simply playing the same 2000 songs over and over again, nearly all of which are at least 10 years old (many much older than that), who needs a DJ when the last thing most of 'em talk about anyway is the music (see below). Most DJs ARE vacuous and banal and that is why in most circumstances I can do without them. And this may be blasphemy to Calguy and other radio insiders, but as a listener, I don't care how many jobs, union or otherwise, go into the station as long as it is entertaining. Years ago, when nearly every station was live, one of my favorite stations was KNX-FM, a station that was nearly completely automated. Didn't care then, don't care now. Sorry.
The DJ has pretty much lost all of his relevance since some time in the 90's when music radio programers decided that their stations were no longer in the business of presenting the music to their audience, but rather promoting (or perhaps reflecting) a "lifestyle" to their particular demo. The first casualty of this was DJs no longer announcing the songs or artists. They're way too cool to tell you what band and song just played (what, you mean you don't, like, already know? DUH!); they just start talking about Brittany Spears (then) or the Kardashians (now) or some other non-music topic like Jersey Shore or some non-witty comment on the weather they spent a whole shift working up. So the DJ isn't really adding anything of value for me, in fact he is just as annoying as the office girls talking about Jersey Shore in the breakroom on their extended gossip break. Ryan Seacrest when he was on Star 98.7 epitomizes the concept I am talking about perfectly.
It seems ironic that the one thing I come to a music station for, the music, is the one thing they least want to present. And then they wonder why people are finding alternative venues for getting their music. As the computer programmers say, GIGO - Garbage in, Garbage Out. The other irony is that even without DJs or the announcing of songs, Jack is more about their music that most other music stations are about theirs.
ChannelFlipper said:
May I chime in? I've been a DJ for 3 decades years now, and no, I don't think of myself as a geezer. My act after a few years in the business was to talk about the music and the artists, and depending on what my programmer wanted me to do, that info would be more at times and less at others. From your description, I'd say you were most likely listening to a CHR format. A format like that moves fast and is very forward in the way it progresses through the day, so title and artist info fell to the wayside in the 90's. More so when you could easily go to a website or now a phone for the info. At my old home we were backselling title and artist info for the entire sweep that just aired until just a few years ago. The other thing is, fewer new songs are breaking on radio. Mainstream AC's traditionally waited to play new songs until they were established by the CHR's and such. So for some, it seemed irrelevant to announce the information since it is expected that you probably already know the song. So at a lot of stations, deejays are encouraged to provide less artist content than in the past and to promote the station and it's various events and contests. This creates a somewhat less appealing station for those who just care about the music and with all of the competition that radio has now, that would bring declining ratings with less listeners tuning in. I personally believe that radio should give you something an iPod can't and content other than music seems to me to fit that bill. The trick now is to say something, but to say it briefly.
Let me finish by saying that the air talent can only do what he or she is allowed, and that varies from station to station and boss to boss. So I understand where you're coming from, but I would add that it isn't the same everywhere, so don't give up on radio. With the internet you should be able to find a station that provides what you're looking for. Not every jock is vacuous and banal either, but they don't always have the power to do much more than what they're told.
Oh and on topic, I would love it if the FCC would be as lax with the rules they use for 3 call letter stations as they have been with so many other aspects of the radio industry. I love it that KHJ is KHJ and I would love to see more come back. Call letters like KGW and KYA would be great to hear again. When I last checked there were less that 30 stations in the US that still had 3 instead of 4 call letters and I would like to see more. I don't understand why they won't budge on this, guess it's a 'government" thing.
I would have guessed there are more than 40, maybe 50, three-letter call signs still around in the U.S. I can name several 3-letter call signs that are on the wrong side of the Mississippi, starting with KYW Philadelphia, KQV Pittsburgh, WKY Oklahoma City, WRR Dallas... well, I'll stop there.
It would make sense for Jack in LA to give up KCBS-FM and let San Francisco have that call sign for it's FM News simulcast. But I don't think CBS would put the KNX-FM call letters on 93.1. Someday KNX may need an FM simulcast.
I don't know whether these call letters are available, but it would make sense to put some sort of JK call letters on 93.1, such as KCJK/KJKC or KLJK/KJKL (California's Jack or LA's Jack).
David is right that call letters don't mean much to listeners who, on many FM stations, only hear the call letters briefly at the top of the hour. But it's how people, especially advertisers, still identify broadcast stations. There are affidavits and sales contracts that specify spots are running on a given radio station. I've never seen an affidavit or contract that doesn't include the station's call letters, even for stations that rarely use them.
Gregg
[email protected]
It would make sense for Jack in LA to give up KCBS-FM and let San Francisco have that call sign for it's FM News simulcast. But I don't think CBS would put the KNX-FM call letters on 93.1. Someday KNX may need an FM simulcast.
I don't know whether these call letters are available, but it would make sense to put some sort of JK call letters on 93.1, such as KCJK/KJKC or KLJK/KJKL (California's Jack or LA's Jack).
David is right that call letters don't mean much to listeners who, on many FM stations, only hear the call letters briefly at the top of the hour. But it's how people, especially advertisers, still identify broadcast stations. There are affidavits and sales contracts that specify spots are running on a given radio station. I've never seen an affidavit or contract that doesn't include the station's call letters, even for stations that rarely use them.
Gregg
[email protected]
Why "guess" when Thomas White's been maintaining a comprehensive list for years now? As of 1/1/2012, there were 56 three-letter calls in use on AM and 13 more in use only on FM or TV, for a total of 69:
http://earlyradiohistory.us/3roll.htm
http://earlyradiohistory.us/3roll.htm
It would be stupid if 740 AM and 106.9 FM became KQW ( Herrod/ CBS O&O) in San Francisco before 1945 because the audience won't know what the hell you're talking about and 2 KCBS-AM has been on the top 3 radio stations in the ratings books in San Francisco for some time.
Also if KCBS 740/106.9 became KPIX 740/106.9 then its self defeating because some of the audience menbers will think of the 95.7 era.
Also if KCBS 740/106.9 became KPIX 740/106.9 then its self defeating because some of the audience menbers will think of the 95.7 era.
Scott Fybush said:
Very cool, the web page I found did not list that many, good to know there are more than I first thought.
recto101 said:
Why in hell would KCBS become KQW? Seems like a leap in logic. I believe a couple of the posters suggested that KNX should keep their heritage call letters, but nobody suggested KCBS should go back 7 decades.
Gregg said:
Wow the Mississippi has shifted course far to the west of where it used to be
I may be wrong, but didn't the FCC relax the rules about "W" on the east side of the Mississippi and "K" on the west? I know in states that are near the middle of the country it's common to find stations in towns with both "K" and "W". As for "K" call letters in the east, they were very early stations like KDKA and KYW that were established when the rules hadn't been completely written.
calguy said:
My understanding is that the dividing line was originally a longitude line closer to the physical center of the country....this lasted only for a short time (perhaps a year or two). Subsequently the Mississippi river became the divider, but existing stations were "grandfathered" and didn't need to change calls. This is why most of the "W" calls west of the river are generally found east of the Rockies. (WBAP, WNAX, WMT, WHB, etc.). A handful of "K" calls survive east of the Mississippi....from before there was any dividing line at all. (KDKA, KQV, KYW, and KFIZ are the ones I can think of.)
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