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Some thoughts for you T.J.

Mike_Serio

Mike_Serio

T.J.

I have a question and a few thoughts for you...

You've asked about dozens of stations from long ago... WHY? What are you doing... writing a book... starting another radio history website...or checking to see if RF exposure causes long-term memory loss in old radio guys. (and girls!)

As I've read the answers... and even posted info for you well... your theme seems to be about call letters, frequencies, dates and formats... but that's NOT what radio is about. Radio is a very personal means of communication... between the person sitting behind the mic... and the listener (just going about their daily life) who has decided to tune us in. It's an effective means of communicating information, entertaining the audience through music and the spoken word... and of course... selling product for the advertiser. That's what radio is about... that's the magic.

Instead of gathering cold, impersonal data about those stations that are long gone... how about collecting stories about what went through those transmitters and how "radio" touched the lives of the people who listened.

Instead of "what was WBRD before the dove.." I'd like to hear about the family whose home burnt to the ground and the DJ who started collecting money and clothes to help rebuild their lives. You know there is a story out there about the little girl with a deadly disease who found a bone marrow donor as a result of a radio appearance. How about update regarding one of those wacky "long-distance dedications."

That's what radio used to be about... somehow... and in some meaningful way... reaching out everyday to touch the lives of the people in the local communities we're licensed to serve.

Isn't it strange that radio's fall from grace started about the same time that "shareholder value" became more important than serving the needs of the listeners.
 
C'mon, Mike. So what? Speaking as a 30 year radio vet, the business as we know it is over. Done. I've been at stations where we did the lost pets, even funeral notices for christ's sake, but those days are over. I know there have been stories of jocks recently helping distraught listeners, but the business model that was created by CC and now being followed by others do not allow for the kind of 'serving the public interest as a public trustee' kind of radio as the FCC license requires. (Insert sarcasm there.) I got to the point to where I've grown so weary of it, I got out after 30 years. And though I miss it, I don't miss it as much as I thought I would. So what if this guy is interested in the history of Tampa Bay - or wherever - radio? I revel in it. I grew up there. I've done it. Please tell me what Salem is doing to serve the public interest other than simulcasting or syndicating their own brand of radio, and what are your stations doing to serve the public interest?
 
even funeral notices for christ's sake
Click to expand...

As part of a response to the OM of the Salem cluster here, I find the use of that phrase and the lack of capitalization to be ironic (and I'm sure, unintentionally blasphemous).

Anyway...

In the bigger picture, yeah Mike. Bored is 100% correct. Things have changed, and the only people who actually like change are babies with wet diapers.
 
Bored Op said:
C'mon, Mike. So what? Speaking as a 30 year radio vet, the business as we know it is over. Done. I've been at stations where we did the lost pets, even funeral notices for christ's sake, but those days are over. I know there have been stories of jocks recently helping distraught listeners, but the business model that was created by CC and now being followed by others do not allow for the kind of 'serving the public interest as a public trustee' kind of radio as the FCC license requires. (Insert sarcasm there.) I got to the point to where I've grown so weary of it, I got out after 30 years. And though I miss it, I don't miss it as much as I thought I would. So what if this guy is interested in the history of Tampa Bay - or wherever - radio? I revel in it. I grew up there. I've done it. Please tell me what Salem is doing to serve the public interest other than simulcasting or syndicating their own brand of radio, and what are your stations doing to serve the public interest?
Click to expand...

Bored:

I appreciate your frustration. And, anyone with half a brain and a little bit of economics knowledge knows that for some of these over-bought, over-leveraged, deep in the hole of debt-a companies, we all saw a day of reckoning coming. And it could be coming faster than they think.

All that having been said, I have to defend a little bit here, at least your comments about "serving the public interest as a public trustee." You see, like at least some on these boards, "interest, convenience and necessity" still means something to me as a broadcaster.

The stations for which I work produce some 3 hours of locally produced public affairs programming every week. Not only for the metro area in which our metro stations are located, but in the 3 counties affected by the signals of the rimshots we own. (You don't want to do the paperwork on this I have to do every quarter...)

We own a news-talk station and thus, we have a fully functional local news department. We don't live anchor 24/7, but it's close enough that you'd never know. And, should local news warrant, we'll get people in overnights...we even shut down the syndicated talk for a few days when the winds of Hurricane Ike took power out to our area and were live and local. We returned to normal programming once the "emergency" subsided. Every programming department head, the news director and the anchors are fully prepared to come in at any hour day or night on about 5 minutes notice to cover if we're not staffed or not staffed enough. And why? To serve the public "interest, convenience and necessity".

One of our FM stations, every year, does a local fund-raiser/radiothon that, each year for over the past decade, has raised around $200,000 in contributions to the local Children's Hospital. Everyone on our staff participates.

Our stations promote and participate in an annual air show/concert/fireworks display that, last year, was attended by over 75,000 people. This is a totally family-friendly event and admission is free.

Our stations are never unmanned. At the very least, there is a producer on duty for the news-talk station who monitors the operations of our other stations. You can't get this job without passing a verbal test on the rules and regs. You have to show us you can run an EAS Test correctly. You have to show us you know how to take readings and check tower lights. The producers are also responsible for the "initial response" to weather emergencies. And, yes, since some of our stations are "rimshots" we make sure that, if the bad weather is in a "home" county to one of the rimshots, getting that information on the air on that station is a priority. We don't treat every station in a "one size fits all" formula when the opposite is indicated.

It is not a 40 hour a week job. Sometimes, it is...but not always. I still do it, because I am still backed by station management. We still take "interest, convenience and necessity" seriously in our operation.

And, we're corporately owned. So, while I do not defend the companies who seem to be doing their utmost to screw up the business, not all companies are alike.
 
Mike_Serio said:
Instead of gathering cold, impersonal data about those stations that are long gone... how about collecting stories about what went through those transmitters and how "radio" touched the lives of the people who listened.
Click to expand...

While I agree with you here, I must also point out that I absolutely LOVE the "cold impersonal data". In fact, since David Sharp's page in no longer available, we need a good chronicle of this kind of information, I believe TJ said something about building a webpage for such data, I hope he/she does! Or else I'm going to have to!

And BTW is this THE TJ. Of 970 chronic fame!?!?
 
sbe1 said:
actually, Mr. Sharp's pages are still available. Someone here put up a link to it. I'm amazed that for the most part it still works.

http://web.archive.org/web/20010824134057/ddsradio.20m.com/radio01.html
Click to expand...

I'm also amazed that the site "sorta" still works. Unfortunately, when I left the United States, I felt the web page "had to go." There's something about actually living in, and being a part of, the market you live...and my web pages were an extension of this. If I had been smart, I would have archived everything because many people contributed and it was a rather involved "labor of love" on my part. But living on the other side of the world... it just became more than I could handle.

Anyway, I really love the history aspect of radio. I had my first radio when I was six and have vivid memories of what WSUN sounded like then, or seeing the teenagers in my neighborhood huddled around the Mustang and listening to WFSO or WLCY.
 
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