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September radio ratings

victorres43 said:
Also, New York differs substantially from Seattle, Philly, or Baltimore.
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... starting with very significant percentages and mixes of ethnic group populations. Seattle has a larger Asian population than any of the others, Philly and Baltimore a higher Black population and smaller Hispanic one and fewer Asian descendants. As we become more aware of the contributions and influences of the various immigrant and racial groups, we can see how those communities gave vastly more than we normally think to our national, regional and local cultures.

(Now that I have presented my woke credentials for the day, I can go back to being an old curmudgeon!)
 
Regarding active rock billing, some of the stations I mentioned are top five billers for their respective markets. WRIF, WMMR, and WHQG certainly fall into that group. KUPD, KRXQ, WIYY, KISW and KQRC are top 10 for sure and possibly top 5. Others are easily top 10 billers, including some stations I didn't even list earlier (KEZO Omaha, WEBN Cincinnati).
 
MarkW said:
Regarding active rock billing, some of the stations I mentioned are top five billers for their respective markets. WRIF, WMMR, and WHQG certainly fall into that group. KUPD, KRXQ, WIYY, KISW and KQRC are top 10 for sure and possibly top 5. Others are easily top 10 billers, including some stations I didn't even list earlier (KEZO Omaha, WEBN Cincinnati
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"Active Rock" is a very ambiguous term. Most of the stations you list are classified as just plain "rock" in the Nielsen listing (accessible to subscribers only) and by accurate sites like RadioInsight.
 
DavidEduardo said:
"Active Rock" is a very ambiguous term. Most of the stations you list are classified as just plain "rock" in the Nielsen listing (accessible to subscribers only) and by accurate sites like RadioInsight.
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The distinction between Active Rock and Mainstream Rock was one that was made by Mediabase when it maintained separate charts for those two formats alongside Classic Rock and Alternative. They dropped the Mainstream Rock chart at the end of 2015 as the differences between it and Active Rock became too insignificant. In other words, "Rock" became less fragmented and there was no longer a significant difference between those two formats. People seem to use one term or the other interchangeably in this forum now, depending on what they were accustomed to calling it prior to the merger. Here's an article describing the decision:
www.insideradio.com

Mainstream Rock Gets Rolled Away By Mediabase.

Mainstream Rock is dead…at least, in name only. With rock radio growing less fragmented, Mediabase will retire its Mainstream Rock chart effective with the airplay week of December 27, 2015-January
www.insideradio.com www.insideradio.com

I almost feel like we're at a place with Alternative now as we were with Rock when it split into its Mainstream and Active variants. There's the traditional kind of "Alternative" which includes a broad range of styles from synth-based alt-pop to singer-songwriters to grunge and modern guitar rock, some of which cross over with Active Rock. And there's the Audacy-style "Alt" which is more narrowly made of very melodic, non-grunge, non-guitar, mostly synth-forward pop-sounding stuff.
 
Theater of my Mind is 100 percent correct.

When one looks at artist and playlist composition, WHQG (Rock) is harder edged than WRIF (Active Rock), when using the blurred Nielsen identifiers.

In many cases, the Rock-labeled stations in Nielsen simply never bothered to change their format identifier after evolving to Active Rock. WEBN is a perfect example. Music wise, I much prefer WFTK to WEBN in the Cinci market these days.

Nielsen should have followed Mediabase's lead.
 
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MarkW said:
When one looks at artist and playlist composition, WHQG (Rock) is harder edged than WRIF (Active Rock), when using the blurred Nielsen identifiers
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Those are not "Nielsen identifiers".
MarkW said:
In many cases, the Rock-labeled stations in Nielsen simply never bothered to change their format identifier after evolving to Active Rock. WEBN is a perfect example. Music wise, I much prefer WFTK to WEBN in the Cinci market these days.
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Those "identifiers" are not from Nielsen.
MarkW said:
Nielsen should have followed Mediabase's lead.
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The format identifiers listed in the online ratings summaries are not provided by Nielsen. The web page administrators plug in the format name they think is correct.
 
frankberry said:
The webpage is only available to Nielsen subscribers.
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So Mark has pulled back a curtain he shouldn't have? Doesn't change the fact that there's a little man behind it identifying formats, does it? That seems to conflict with David's statement. Is there any way to find the truth here without somehow infringing on Nielsen and its subscribers' proprietary interests?
 
CTListener said:
So Mark has pulled back a curtain he shouldn't have? Doesn't change the fact that there's a little man behind it identifying formats, does it?
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When a station reports airplay to a chart (Mediabase, Nielsen, etc), it is to a specific format chart. That chart is determined by the songs the station plays. If the majority of songs a station plays fits a specific format, that is the format chart the station reports.
 
I found the earlier URL via Google. When I clicked the URL from Google, it loaded without issue. It is not "only for subscribers.". The word "public" appears directly in the URL.

However, when clicking the URL from here, I receive the same "forbidden" message Frank and others received. This appears to be a URL referrer issue.

The point I was attempting to illustrate is the free topline AQH share results, found on Nielsen's own website, include format identifiers. I will leave it to those much more knowledgeable on the subject than I to inform us how those identifiers are procured.
 
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MarkW said:
I will leave it to those much more knowledgeable on the subject than I to inform us how those identifiers are procured.
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It doesn't help the record labels when a station plays one of their songs, and the artist doesn't get credit on the proper chart.

So the labels have a reason to complain to Nielsen. But this is an internal thing, between Nielsen and the stake holders.
 
TheBigA said:
Which is what Audacy should do with WNYL. Can't do any worse than they're doing now.
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Late to the party on this, but adjusting WNYL into a hybrid Alternative/Active would be a brave thing to do. Not sure if it would work but it would be brave. NYC isn't the same city it was when Z100 was blasting White Zombie, but positioning WNYL as the carrier of "Rock/Alternative's next generation" based on 00's golds with a smattering of 90's and 10's with a few currents every hour could have a shot. It'll never make top 5 in NYC but it has a chance of maybe pulling in 93XRT-esque numbers and occasionally scrape the top 10.

They'll need a new PD to pull it off though, as the current PD historically does not touch anything remotely guitar rock unless the popularity has hit a threshold that makes it impossible to ignore (like Beggin). They would need a PD who actually would want to play guitar rock along with synthpop and indie.
 
hotpatrick2004 said:
What is the difference between active rock and mainstream rock. Always thought they were same.
Some examples please?

Thank you
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Active rock would not only play currents more frequently than mainstream rock, but it would also play more hard rock tracks. Think the difference between KUPD and the KDKB of old, for instance.
 
MarkW said:
The point I was attempting to illustrate is the free topline AQH share results, found on Nielsen's own website, include format identifiers. I will leave it to those much more knowledgeable on the subject than I to inform us how those identifiers are procured.
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Nielsen has a list of acceptable format names. A station can not make up their own.

To be approved, and unless things have changed since I last submitted a request for Nielsen to approve an added format name, there have to be more than a certain number of stations similarly identifying in rated markets. I believe the number was something like 15 or 20 or so. That generally means that a single operator can't make up a format name and get it unilaterally approved.

I got "Spanish Adult Hits" approved because HBC, Clear Channel and Entravision all had stations in that general format area, and all of us agreed on that name as "acceptable".

But if there is "classic rock" and you want to be listed as "modern classic rock" but no other stations use that term, you are outtta' luck.

Remember, this is pretty much an internal heritage thing in the PPM markets. Since there are no diaries to review, the old need for a guide when a diary keeper wrote "Rock 107" for the rock formatted station that was not even called "Rock" on the air. Of course, that sort of ascription issue still applies in the diary markets.

Nielsen only shows "format" in the data subscribers receive, both stations and agencies. The trade sources like sites and publications, don't get that data and they apply their own criteria. Many of the sites get it very wrong, particularly on ethnic stations.
 
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