Lame talk radio in Vegas

[Legend City]

Wow, I should be thankful, there is a "talk leader" station in Vegas that claims to be the best in talk, yet they have 2nd and 3rd tier shows, and, I swear, I did not hear one actual paid commercial on the station, just endless PSA's and commercial clips from other hosts. I think at one point I went over 15 minutes without any original content, just endless PSA's and promos. How the hell does a station stay on the air doing that?

Another station had a talker that sounded exactly like Terry Gilberg, but she was a complete tea party bimbo without an original thought (not much different than Terry). Interesting as the air time was taken up with D list talkers like Jerry Doyle, Roy Masters, Biblical Finance show (WTF????),

Nasty stuff, sure Limbaugh and Hannity and the other morons were on, but I only found one local host and she was nuttier than a pecan orchard at harvest.

It made Hawaii radio and its endless hours of "sell your stuff on the radio" seem fascinating.

 

[oldiesfan6479]

Your first description sounds like KDWN 720 and the second as KXNT 840,
although I'll disagree with your description of the great talkmeister El Rushbo. ;D

BTW, KXNT (CBS-owned) will soon begin an FM simulcast.

 

[smedge2006]

KDWN was spouting the Tea Party line before anyone had heard of the Tea Party. It tried to become legit a few years back with better news coverage but faltered. Vegas radio nabobs insist that actually covering news wouldn't fly. "Nobody wants to hear about dog crap on the freeway", etc.

 

[ykw]

KDWN was spouting the Tea Party line before anyone had heard of the Tea Party. It tried to become legit a few years back with better news coverage but faltered. Vegas radio nabobs insist that actually covering news wouldn't fly. "Nobody wants to hear about dog crap on the freeway", etc.

Vegas can get by without a lot of local coverage aside from news/traffic because a) there really isn't much general news going on there (it's as close as the U.S. comes these days among prominent cities to being a true "industry town" now that the auto industry isn't utterly dominant in the Detroit area, so most of what is news is business news); b) it's likely the smallest U.S. city left with two major daily newspapers (LVRJ, Sun) providing strong local news coverage; and c) a large portion of its radio audience at any given time isn't local and doesn't give a flip about local news; if they're listening to talk at all, they want the national guys. What market there is for local coverage, KXNT pretty much owns in evening and (especially) morning drive; there's no point in trying to split such a small market-within-a-market, 'cos both stations lose if you do.

But, yeah, KDWN was doing conservative/libertarian talk (shoehorned around Dodgers games) before Limbaugh went national. It's far from all-Z-list talent, too, with Beck and Miller on the schedule. True, they do some weird stuff, like putting the fringe types on in midday and PM drive and running Beck head-to-head with El Rushbo, but it somehow seems to be working out for them.

 

[EricStein]

The first station Legend City mentioned must be KMZQ 670. They're a recent sign-on with a good daytime signal, but it is being run on a shoestring budget (they have no top-of-hour national news, among other things).

The second is obviously KDWN 720. This blowtorch had the Fox News Radio affiliation, but a tiny station heavy on the Salem syndicated lineup (KDOX 1280) somehow wrestled it away from them. The last I checked, KDWN aired Dennis Miller in the middle of the night (but then again, Vegas is the city that never sleeps).

 

[davideduardo]

c) a large portion of its radio audience at any given time isn't local and doesn't give a flip about local news;

The only audience that matters to a station is the local audience that can be measured by the PPM. Since the local ratings do not include anyone who resides outside Clark COunty, whether tourists listen or not is of no value to stations and unmeasurable by Arbitron.

 

[ykw]

c) a large portion of its radio audience at any given time isn't local and doesn't give a flip about local news;

The only audience that matters to a station is the local audience that can be measured by the PPM. Since the local ratings do not include anyone who resides outside Clark COunty, whether tourists listen or not is of no value to stations and unmeasurable by Arbitron.

Ah. I was under the impression that PPM would pick up encodes wherever the measured user went, and that those impressions were tallied regardless of location. ykw regrets the error. :-[

 

[davideduardo]

Ah. I was under the impression that PPM would pick up encodes wherever the measured user went, and that those impressions were tallied regardless of location. ykw regrets the error. :-[

First, do you really think someone from another PPM market is going to take not just the PPM but the docking station / charger with them to Las Vegas?

Without the dock and charger, the meter discharges within a day or so.

Second, any listening to an out of market station would be reported in the PPM in the market where the meter panelist lives, not the one where they visit. In other words, the ZIP code where the meter "lives" is the place where the listening will be reported. It would be very unusual for away from hometown listening be enough for a station to even show up in the book, as it likely would not meet the MRS for the out of market station.

 

[ykw]

Ah. I was under the impression that PPM would pick up encodes wherever the measured user went, and that those impressions were tallied regardless of location. ykw regrets the error. :-[

First, do you really think someone from another PPM market is going to take not just the PPM but the docking station / charger with them to Las Vegas?

If I got to wear the thing, I'd absolutely take it with me wherever I went! I'd take that kind of responsibility seriously, the way I did as a kid when I got to do TV sweeps diaries for a few years.

Without the dock and charger, the meter discharges within a day or so.

Second, any listening to an out of market station would be reported in the PPM in the market where the meter panelist lives, not the one where they visit. In other words, the ZIP code where the meter "lives" is the place where the listening will be reported. It would be very unusual for away from hometown listening be enough for a station to even show up in the book, as it likely would not meet the MRS for the out of market station.

Huh. I was just reading an article from (coincidentally) the LVRJ where LV radio pros and ARB folks were talking about how PPM records everything, whether listening on the road or internet DXing at home, with the LV locals encouraging everyone to measure both. (KOMP's Craig Williams specifically is quoted as saying, "We'll get credit from anywhere in the world.") I believe you, but it's confusing when insiders are claiming it all matters. <shrug>

 

[davideduardo]

...any listening to an out of market station would be reported in the PPM in the market where the meter panelist lives, not the one where they visit. In other words, the ZIP code where the meter "lives" is the place where the listening will be reported. It would be very unusual for away from hometown listening be enough for a station to even show up in the book, as it likely would not meet the MRS for the out of market station.

Huh. I was just reading an article from (coincidentally) the LVRJ where LV radio pros and ARB folks were talking about how PPM records everything, whether listening on the road or internet DXing at home, with the LV locals encouraging everyone to measure both. (KOMP's Craig Williams specifically is quoted as saying, "We'll get credit from anywhere in the world.") I believe you, but it's confusing when insiders are claiming it all matters. <shrug>

The PPM is quite new, so there can certainly be misunderstanding or misinterpretation.

The biggest new thing about the meter is the sample is an ongoing panel, not a changing weekly sample. The panel is configured to represent in miniature the composition of each metered market. So if a person travels out of the market they live in, the listening their meter registers anywhere is tabulated as part of the radio listening in the home market and not "transferred" to the market the station listend to is... as that would unbalance the panel among other things. We have to keep in mind that in both the diary and PPM sample there is ZIP Code referencing of all listening, and in multi-county markets, geographic proportionality. So, for a variety of reasons, any listening by visitors to a market does not benefit that station in the local market, and will nearly always be too little to qualify for inclusion in any other market (save for commuting between two adjacent markets)

 

[EricStein]

If you think the talk radio is bad in Vegas, check out the sports-talk stations there. The ESPN affiliate and most listened to sports station there, KWWN 1100, is also part of the New York Yankees Radio Network (?!?). I know there's probably a lot of New York and other east coast transplants living and visiting there, but I can't think of any other station west of the Mississippi that carries every Yankees game. The other co-owned sports station, KBAD 920, airs Fox Sports Radio, Dan Patrick, and Jim Rome, as well as a daily sports betting show (which is most likely brokered, much like a known afternoon duo on KDUS locally). Now, where are the The California baseball teams (Dodgers, Angels, Padres, Athletics, Giants), or even the Diamondbacks? They seem to be MIA on Vegas Radio.

 

[radioguy39nj]

If you think the talk radio is bad in Vegas, check out the sports-talk stations there. The ESPN affiliate and most listened to sports station there, KWWN 1100, is also part of the New York Yankees Radio Network (?!?). I know there's probably a lot of New York and other east coast transplants living and visiting there, but I can't think of any other station west of the Mississippi that carries every Yankees game. The other co-owned sports station, KBAD 920, airs Fox Sports Radio, Dan Patrick, and Jim Rome, as well as a daily sports betting show (which is most likely brokered, much like a known afternoon duo on KDUS locally). Now, where are the The California baseball teams (Dodgers, Angels, Padres, Athletics, Giants), or even the Diamondbacks? They seem to be MIA on Vegas Radio.

Does KWWN carry the entire Yankees' schedule?

Also, KBAD carried the Chargers when they were LV's ESPN affiliate. Did the Chargers move to 1100 AM or are they too MIA?

The Dallas Cowboys were carried on KDOX. Have they gone MIA in Vegas?

 

[landtuna]

... whether tourists listen or not is of no value to stations ...

I'm guessing the ad buys targeting tourists (hotels, shows, special events) would be of great interest to stations even though unmeasured by PPM.

 

[musicman3355]

Now, where are the The California baseball teams (Dodgers, Angels, Padres, Athletics, Giants), or even the Diamondbacks? They seem to be MIA on Vegas Radio.

I believe the Dodgers are on local classic country KBET 790. For the others, you're going to have to get them from other stations outside the area. I've gotten AM 830 from LA in my stay in LV, so I believe the Angels games can be found there. KNBR 680 in SF airs Giants games, so they can be found there as they have a reliable signal in LV (unless KMZQ 670 has IBOC on). Not sure where you can find the A's as I haven't got KTRB 860 down there sicne they air the games, nor can I find a place to hear the Padres (never found anyone broadcasting the games).

 

[davideduardo]

... whether tourists listen or not is of no value to stations ...

I'm guessing the ad buys targeting tourists (hotels, shows, special events) would be of great interest to stations even though unmeasured by PPM.

Yes, I think that the listening in-car by people driving from CA to LV would be quite a useful audience, but at any given moment there may not be enough of it to warrant the cost of radio buys... and I can't see most tourists spending a lot of time listening to the radio in LV, either.

 

[KMGX]

Several years ago, Diamondbacks games were carried on AM 1480 (which was called K-Shop at the time), as you can imagine, the rest of the schedule was mostly swap-n-shop type deals with occasional gambling related shows--I think they even carried "When Radio Was" for awhile or something similar. As you may also be able to imagine, the board-op skills were less than stellar for the DBacks games carried there... frequently rejoining the game late, running KTAR (local) spots and the like...

Las Vegas is quickly becoming a large market population wise, but it's radio reminds me a lot of a slightly larger Grand Forks, North Dakota .

 

[EricStein]

Does KWWN carry the entire Yankees' schedule?

From the listings on their web site, it appears they only take the weekend Yankees games (doesn't ESPN Radio cover the team too much on its Sunday Night Baseball broadcasts anyway? ). It still makes as much sense as the Nebraska Cornhuskers broadcasts on KDUS (but then, the Alumni Association has something to do with the time buy here), or if they decided to carry Pittsburgh Steelers games as well.

Also, KBAD carried the Chargers when they were LV's ESPN affiliate. Did the Chargers move to 1100 AM or are they too MIA?

The Chargers are still on KWWN. At least that arrangement makes sense geographically.

 

[oldiesfan6479]

From the listings on their web site, it appears they only take the weekend Yankees games (doesn't ESPN Radio cover the team too much
on its Sunday Night Baseball broadcasts anyway? ).

Aren't the Yankees on Fox's Saturday game about every other week?

It still makes as much sense as the Nebraska Cornhuskers broadcasts on KDUS...

Even better when KDUS sublet them to Lumberyard 1440, and it was a mid-afternoon
start, and the game was still going come monthly sunset, and...52 watts! ;D

 

[Jay F]

KDWN was spouting the Tea Party line before anyone had heard of the Tea Party. It tried to become legit a few years back with better news coverage but faltered. Vegas radio nabobs insist that actually covering news wouldn't fly. "Nobody wants to hear about dog crap on the freeway", etc.

KDWN dropped most of their news coverage purely for budget reasons. They had a HUGE news staff. At one point KDWN had more employees than most of the other LV stations combined. They weren't getting any ratings to show for it. But they didn't give it much time.

 

[radioguy39nj]

KDWN was spouting the Tea Party line before anyone had heard of the Tea Party. It tried to become legit a few years back with better news coverage but faltered. Vegas radio nabobs insist that actually covering news wouldn't fly. "Nobody wants to hear about dog crap on the freeway", etc.

KDWN dropped most of their news coverage purely for budget reasons. They had a HUGE news staff. At one point KDWN had more employees than most of the other LV stations combined. They weren't getting any ratings to show for it. But they didn't give it much time.

I think KDWN is picking up Oakland Raiders games this season. If that's the case, they'll be competing against Chargers games on KWWN. Two AFC West teams broadcasting in the same market.