Response to comment about my post. My responses enclosed by <<<<>>>>>
You know, you can make a statement SEEM TO BE FACTUAL if you put it in caps and use them SPARINGLY.
<<<<<I came here to share - not get graded on expression via text.>>>>
Your premise seems to be, ever body who manages radio properties is stupid. I can't agree. Sooner or later, someone with some smarts would come along and eat everyone else's lunch if that were the caSE. It isn't.
>>>>No, not that everyone is stupid but that, as an industry, there is only one way to operate and mostly, that is to follow - not to lead. How many innovative ( I mean, people who contribute or create something exceptional) do you see being recognized?
All you have to do is listen and you can confirm that radio is predominantly a collective of cloned formats - no more than templates. The imaging, jingles, brands, jingles, promotions, are all the same. If you never worked in pre-consolidation radio, you wouldn't understand the degree of individuality and originality that radio enjoyed.
Sure, this has always been a business of copycats. The movie business and TV started mimicking radio in the eighties and developing formulas for creating products. Now the movie effects business has become the cliche to movies that the filtered i.d.s with the laser blasts are to radio.
One TV show makes it big and the originating network along with their competitors rush to morph
the formula into a slightly different backdrop with a different name and the same characters. If you don't notice this, you are among a minority in the field who write and complain about it everyday.
I do not think myself the Lone Ranger when making observations about the media. There are a dozen other boards filled with people who are frustrated by it's myopic, self-serving, ivory tower attitudes and it's disregard for people. >>>>
If such a format properly done will SET THE WOODS ON FIRE then it shouild be fairly easy to rent a signal in the hinterlands, put it on, and then ride the buzz to the big city. (We call it an LMA) You can be the hro and become rich.
>>>No need for condescension, radio bro. I know what LMA means. Indeed, if it is so easy to have the open-minds of the industry listen to others outside their circle of Einsteins that keep the industry bound to non-evolving sameness, then it shouldn't be necessary for anyone with a smart product to install something revolutionary or, at the very least, economically beneficial, on one any small number of the thousands of third tier stations owned by the giants.
Since you suggested that I LMA someone else's flounder, I must assume that you already know that this business is not receptive to new ideas, unless they summon them.>>>>
In that the bulk of the folks running radio stations have some semblance of intelligence, you got to figure the current offering is what the current situation (Economically and regulatorily) will embrace.
<<<<<<Ah, there be the rub. You see, the folks who run radio may be intelligent but they only use that intelligence to operate at the capacity of the business model that defines it' own limitations. Economics is the driving machine -- and while the object is to make lots of money, a business - or even a SOCIETY, that sacrifices people and product for profit doesn't inspire new and better ideas. To the contrary, it purposely suppresses any thinking outside of following through with the blueprint. To be innovative, doesn't cost any more money but it sure can make the difference in making it.
Which leads me to this point - corporate radio mindset is to play it safe and not take risks. This, no one can deny. It's part of the mission. Anyone who has sat through the monotonous drivel
by the great business leaders of this industry at an NAB convention, know this to be fact.>>>>
You could actually call that format you've described the music your life revolves around, or perhaps MUSIC OF YOUR LIFE. Uh, oops, no ya can't, someone already servicemarked that. And it hasn't lit the whirled afire.
<<<<Obviously, I have offended you in some way or you would not find it necessary to attack something about which you have no knowledge. I simply stated that I have a great idea that is capable of attracting high cume, great quarter hours, extraordinary loyalty, and healthy revenue.
The reason it can do these things is because is gives the listener something more than the same tight rotation of a small list of songs. It IS what it says it is and not what hype calls it. Honesty makes the difference that people can actually hear.
Part of radio's big problem is that it thinks that people are basically dumb and they will buy anything they have to say and even if they don't believe it, they will consider it fun. WRONG.
Hype is a bad thing - not a good thing. Suppose you buy a boutique beer because it says it has the finest ingredients and its won all kinds of awards and does what no competitor can do for you - delivers satisfaction but, in actuality, it is just monkeypiss in a pretty bottle. You are going to KNOW that you've been had.
It doesn't cost anymore to do it than what is being done now in similar formats. It just doesn't follow the same pseudo-scientific and philosophical line of thinking dictates the current framework. It does require the commitment of more than a year to watch it work...which is a lot to ask in today's climate of "give it a new name" and change the rotation.>>>>>
Let us know which station you've got your classic format on, and we'll all give it a listen
<<<<<I am just another guy, who has been an all-star player, and has a better idea than the present dozen that have been recycling under various labels for the last twenty years. Maybe some day, I''ll find a taker to boldly go.....
As for comments about XM and the 60s channel. I used that as an example of how "oldies" radio can be presented in a manner that is more than playing the same 300 songs for two decades over and over.
I have my preferences about radio personalities too and Phlash Phelps is not one of them. I was speaking of the design of a format that gave current artist information (most people think these guys are dead), thoughtful and relative specials about the music (HERE AND THERE is freaking genius). Wheeler designed features that run daily on the sub-genres of 60s music that have NEVER be an integral part of terrestrial oldies programming. Bubblegum, psychedelic, R&B, surf...
When you listen to that channel, you realize how much is missing from ordinary radio. One has to duly note that this is all accomplished by not having to play commercials too -- but commercial radio could have incorporated these elements in an abbreviated form. They certainly found a way to do the Top Five at Five. (hey, thats exciting after 35 years!)
Take this into consideration....the 60s channel even has a constructed hourly feature that counts down the TOP SIX songs of that week from every year in the 60s... tell me that wasn't a project undertaking of proportion!...and i have NEVER heard one of these brilliant Goliath corporate classic hits stations do anything like it.
As for the guy who wishes that XM channels would just "play the hits" -- that is what I PODS are for. But pretty soon, you won't have to worry about too many PEOPLE interfering with your ideal day because practically all services will be automated in twenty years.
I don't know what any of you hear when you turn on the radio but maybe you'd just like to be proud of what you do that you feel you have to defend it. I love radio too and I enjoy just doing it but one knows when they are a part of something that is unique and they also know when they are a part of something that fails to evolve, year after year.
In this present time, there is absolutely nothing attractive about commercial radio unless you are a salesperson in a hotspot with no caps on your income.>>>>>>
