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ROCK 104 and LEX & TERRY

T

ThatGuyOnTheRadio

CC/Premiere drops Syndication of L&T.

United Stations picks em up.

What does this mean for Rock-104?

Seeing where they are #1 with men 18-49 and 25-54... probably not much.

Your thoughts?
 
I'm sure unless there is a compelling reason to drop Lex and Terry from the Rock 104 line-up, L&T will remain on WRUF-FM under a new affiation contract with new syndicator United Stations.
 
Does anyone know why Premiere Radio Networks dropped Lex and Terry? Or was this a decison made by Lex and Terry and/or their agent? I'd be very interested in learning what the reason was behind the decision to go with United Stations.
 
At the risk of being labelled a prude--not the case--I'd say there are several compelling reasons for Rock 104 to ditch Lex & Terry.

One, the show is sleazy sexually-oriented radio. I won't call it the worst stuff on radio today, but it is certainly among the worst. It reflects poorly on any licensee who carries it, essentially telling the world that they'll do anything for a buck. As this particular licensee is the University of Florida, their choice reflects very poorly on an institution that should be trying to set a positive example instead of setting the worst example possible.

It also tells the world that UF's College of Journalism & Communications believes that they are not bright enough and/or resourceful enough to produce competitive radio programming at the same-or-better level as their local competitors. Again, a lousy example for a college purportedly preparing young students to compete in the broadcasting field.

And it indicates that UF and the College of J&C have no sense of responsibility toward the student community or the larger Gainesville-Ocala-North Central Florida community, consciously choosing to use their 100,000-watt commercial FM as a vehicle for Lex & Terry to pollute the campus and surrounding environs with this kind of content.


They are effectively saying "This is the best we can do. This is what UF & the College of Journalism and Commuications stand for."

And that is a shame.
 
AMFMXM, I could NOT have said it better myself.

To anyone from UF SOJ who might read this, your school is a joke. A complete JOKE.... all you care about is the bottom line, running a syndicated morning show, getting free labor from your students, I'm sure not paying your electric bill or taxes on your tower site with the presence of WUFT-FM there-- that makes it a non-comm expense covered by taxpayers.

Your level of education to the few Rock104 alum I've met leaves a lot to be desired.

Anyone care to prove me wrong, I'm all ears and I hope I am.
 
WRUF-AM-FM are self sustaining extensions of the Univeristy of Florida and, to my knowledge, does not receive tax dollars to sustain WRUF radio operations. I. E., WRUF AM and FM operate and sustain its operationos through the advertising dollars generated from WRUF-AM and WRUF-FM.

Last year WRUF-AM total billings was approximately $350,000, while WRUF-FM billed $1.3 million. Collectively both stations billed approximately $1.65 million.

Now, considering WRUF is a self sustaining operation, it also operates as a radio business which is in direct competition with every radio station competing in the Ocala/Gainesville radio market. Some competitors perform well while others do not. WRUF-FM is a 100,000 watt class C1 commercial FM which has successfully branded itself as Rock 104 and usually rates as a top 5 metro station with 12+ persons. These numbers are imperative to the overall long range continued success of WRUF-FM remaining the "money maker" for UF. And, although Lex and Terry may not fit the image the university "should" project for itself, L & T does provide a platform for WRUF to generate a reasonable profit during the highly competitive morning drive daypart. Although it would be nice to place a student on during morning drive, what student or students have the experience to deliver the much needed ratings during the highly competitive morning drive daypart; at least enough to give the sales department the numbers to sell and remain competitive?

Remember, WRUF-AM-FM is self sustaining and does not receive tax dollars to operate either station. Keeping this in mind, the only real way to operate WRUF is to operate it as a commercial business in the free enterprise system.

On the opposite side of the coin, you still have WUFT which delivers quality, cultural and NPR news-talk programming not found on WRUF. So, one might say there is a balance between the two stations.
 
"WRUF-AM-FM are self sustaining extensions of the Univeristy of Florida"

WRUF AM/FM pay rent/mortgage for their building in Weimer Hall?

WRUF AM/FM pay all bills associated with operating 2 100KW signals at it's tower site?

Oh, then there is the whole free help thing. On average the jocks do 3 hour shifts. Ok, cool... we'll call them P/T employees. Lets say they were to pay they P/T guys $9.00 an hour, about the going rate in this economy in this market.

$9.00 per hour x 15 hours per week x 4 employees= $540 per week or $2,160 per month that UF doesn't have to pay.

What about all the repairs to equipment, upgrades, etc. They pay for that on their own?

Not fair. Not fair at all. Every commercial station in this market should hate UF for Rock104 being a commercial station having only to pay some of the bills the rest have to.
 
All "self-sustaining" means is that they bring in enough to pay their own bills. And that seems to be the case most of the time for the WRUF stations, but there also seems to be plenty of evidence that it is not the case all the time. Last few years have been very tough. When expenses exceed income, public funding--direct or indirect--is WRUF's safety net. "Public funding" is another way of saying "tax money."

They are not separately incorporated. They are part of the University of Florida. The licensee is the Board of Trustees of the University of Florida. (Merely having a commercial broadcasting license instead of a non-commercial license is immaterial. UF is involved in lots of commercial enterprises).

WRUF employees are employed by the State of Florida. If you want to know how much they all make, you can look it up on the internet, and many are in the high-five/low-six figure range. Frankly, many are undoubtedly making significantly more than many of their G-O market competitors. If WRUF can afford to pay these kinds of salaries, they should be able to hire talent capable of competing.

Who says Rock 104's air-talent has to be students? Lex & Terry aren't students, proving the fallacy of that notion.

Again, it is a shame.
 
Agreed again AMFMXM, I'd be anxious to know how much ol' Harry is pulling in. Perhaps I will go look it up.

Again, as you said... either ALL student or NO student. Don't give me a syndicated morning show then shove all the "kids" in 4 and 5 hour day parts the rest of the day.

Find some students with good chemistry and give them a shot, or... hire local (non student) people to do a morning show... plenty of good people out there w/o jobs. C'mon UF-- support the economy, huh?
 
amfmxm said:
Who says Rock 104's air-talent has to be students? Lex & Terry aren't students, proving the fallacy of that notion.
Click to expand...

There's no fallacy in my statement as it was implied Rock 104 should have students on in the morning. However in all fairness, what would you do differently with WRUF in order to best or more favorably reach your desired objective?
 
Lex & Terry's been a staple to Rock 104. I highly doubt they will drop the show just because they changed companies. As long as these guys are still on the air, I expect them to still be aired on Rock 104.

At one point while I was attending UF (1999-2004), there was a petition that I signed for UF to have an official College format station run by volunteer students. It never happened.

However, I ended up spending a couple of semesters volunteering in Digital Audio Imaging with Rock 104 back in 2002-ish. I was one who put my foot forward to volunteering. Maybe that's all they're really looking for & how they got away with some free help. I didn't get the credits, but I did gain experience & improved on my Radio Production skills.
 
Who says Rock104 needs to have an objective other than teaching? It IS a college radio station after all... you want to play with real money-- get a good education as a respectable school (or, work your ass off in an internship like I did and learn way more than any college will teach) and go apply at a real radio station.

A college teaches, not to make money, but to educate the youth, the future of this company so that they may enter the workforce and play a very important role in this economy.

Hey UF, Teach... don't make profit with your radio... TEACH.
 
amfmxm said:
One, the show is sleazy sexually-oriented radio. I won't call it the worst stuff on radio today, but it is certainly among the worst. It reflects poorly on any licensee who carries it, essentially telling the world that they'll do anything for a buck. As this particular licensee is the University of Florida, their choice reflects very poorly on an institution that should be trying to se
Click to expand...

Hello they target men 18-64! They're betting most of their male listeners will like their brand of sleazy sex radio. The goal is to dominate in ratings and selling radio advertising. Nothing more nothing less and not to change the world.
 
ThatGuyOnTheRadio said:
Who says Rock104 needs to have an objective other than teaching?
Click to expand...

Then teaching is the obective you would like to see happen at UF. Hence, there is still an objective. There is always an objective in anything anyone does whether that objective is positive and productive or non productive, but there still remains an objective. Keeping this teaching objective in mind, isn't that exactly what WRUF is currently doing? Just because one of the tools used (WRUF-AM-FM) isn't being utilized exactly as you believe it should be for educational purposes, does not make it any less of a teaching tool to reach and meet, if not exceed, the teaching objective UF has made available to its students. WRUF is being used as a "real world" radio station giving the J-School students a "real world" broadcast experience. As far as the students are concerned, WRUF-AM-FM is much in-line with any other commercial radio station a student may find employment upon graduation.

Also keep in mind, for educational, NPR News, and cultural programming, UF has WUFT-FM and WJUF-FM Inverness which provides an outstanding public radio venue, again, another broadcast teaching tool used by UF for its J-School students benefit in addition to providing quality programming available to anyone within the listening area.

However, how would you use WRUF to teach any differently that would be more effective in meeting the teaching objective you gave reference?
 
Can we just call them "Rock 1037" so I don't get confused with "Rock 1045?" ;D
 
(Sorry to have dropped out of the conversation for awhile. Life gets in the way).

Mark, you asked a couple of times what might be done differently than plugging into L&T. Here's an idea or two.

Hire an educated, talented & responsible AT/PD whose duties would include anchoring and directing the Rock 104 morning show--designed to feature a large ensemble cast of student air talents, whose roles could include news/weather/sports/entertainment, et cetera... with an overall theme of fun.

Put a dozen 20-year old kids together and tell 'em to have fun... pay 'em all $10 an hour and/or internship credit... directed by a pro...

Same way you'd do it in Orlando or Omaha or Odessa.

BTW, the UF kids do a great job in the news arena every morning on 850/WRUF-AM. They sound as good-or-better than most mid-size market news operations. If they can do it on the AM, they can do it on the FM.

More later...
 
Part Deux.

Okay, so I googled "University of Florida salaries 2010" or something like that, and then typed in WRUF (and WUFT). Although I know that the bodies at the UF Radio-TV Palace have been shuffled recently, this stuff gives you an idea. FWIW, many of the salaries are split among the different stations, so you have to add them together to get the full amount.

Anyway, they've been paying a programming guy $60K(+), a couple of managers $150K and $120K. Get the picture? I'm not trying to embarrass anyone. But I do think it's important to realize that this isn't a shoe-string operation. They can afford to do things right, and to do things in a first class manner.

They can pay good talent. They can pay the kids.

Back to Lex & Terry for a second. Slapping any kind of syndicated crap on the air for AMD at Rock 104 is--and always has been--nothing more than Laziness, with a Capital L. But choosing Lex & Terry to be the Chosen Laziness as the Public Voice of the University of Florida is reprehensible.
 
Thanks, thatguyontheradio. I'll snag a trade-out beer at one of our trade bars and credit it to you. I've been close to the UF broadcast situation for quite awhile (a "friend of a friend" type stuff) and have heard their weak-ass excuses for way too long.

The University of Florida is a great institution with the best portfolio of electronic media properties of any university in the nation. They have the money and the facilities to take a national leadership role in media higher education. But continuing on the Lex & Terry path with WRUF-FM is hardly leadership.

A year or two ago on this same board, one of us suggested (it might have been me, but I don't really remember) that having L&T on Rock 104 was equivalent to turning a UF cafeteria into a strip club. Hey, it's legal. Hey, it would make a shitload of money (talk about being "self-sufficient")! I see no difference, at all.

It's just a terrible idea on so many levels. Just like having L&T as Rock 104's morning act--a terrible idea that has continued for more than a decade.

So, yeah, it's time to get the strippers out of the UF cafeteria.
 
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