Tom Leykis' online show outdrawing Limbaugh and Hannity in Los Angeles

[FredLeonard]

Face it, True Believer Dittoheads can't stand to hear anything that questions the everlasting greatness and supremacy of their hero. If his numbers go down, it can't be that fewer people are listening. The numbers MUST be wrong and the game MUST be rigged.
Evolution is just a theory.
Global warming is wrong.
Rush will save us from our sins.
Glory, glory, glory! El Rushbo, Almighty.

 

[flybynight]

You're assuming all revenue is profit and salary for one employee. I imagine there are other costs.

I'm not assuming anything. I just quickly gave an assessment of how much revenue you can gather with 15,000 listeners only paying 99 cents a month. Of course there are other expenses. Hefty ones where streaming is concerned. Based on his own comments, I don't think Leykis is even making a profit at this point.

 

[Avid Listener]

Obviously, ol' Avid knows things about the radio biz that even veteran industry people know nothing of. So why not just sit back and let him save the whole industry single-handed.

You don't need to be a trained fireman to recognize when a building is burning down, and the real firemen need to be summoned. You don't need to be a medical doctor to recognize when someone is sick, and needs a real doctor.

Despite some optimistic whistling in the wind and cooked numbers to support the myth, terrestrial broadcast radio is in bad shape and getting worse. I know enough to know that some new people with new ideas are needed to breathe new life into terrestrial broadcast radio.

 

[FredLeonard]

You don't need to be a trained fireman to recognize when a building is burning down, and the real firemen need to be summoned. You don't need to be a medical doctor to recognize when someone is sick, and needs a real doctor.

Despite some optimistic whistling in the wind and cooked numbers to support the myth, terrestrial broadcast radio is in bad shape and getting worse. I know enough to know that some new people with new ideas are needed to breathe new life into terrestrial broadcast radio.

And at some point, the old doctor comes in and tells the eager young resident to put away the electric paddles and "call it."
Terrestrial radio is over 100 years old. It had a good life. Time to let it go.

 

[TheBigA]

I know enough to know that some new people with new ideas are needed to breathe new life into terrestrial broadcast radio.

And they are. Unfortunately, they're leaving a lot of baby boomers upset about the changes they're making, the music formats they're canceling, and the manner of on-air presentation they're doing.

 

[davideduardo]

You don't need to be a trained fireman to recognize when a building is burning down, and the real firemen need to be summoned. You don't need to be a medical doctor to recognize when someone is sick, and needs a real doctor.

Despite some optimistic whistling in the wind and cooked numbers to support the myth, terrestrial broadcast radio is in bad shape and getting worse. I know enough to know that some new people with new ideas are needed to breathe new life into terrestrial broadcast radio.

There are no "cooked numbers". AM and FM station operators are expanding rapidly in the new media field, with either their own or "shared" apps, richer content and many music sidechannels.

"Radio" is not dying. Radio is simply changing its distribution model.

 

[Small Market Guy]

Face it, True Believer Dittoheads can't stand to hear anything that questions the everlasting greatness and supremacy of their hero. If his numbers go down, it can't be that fewer people are listening. The numbers MUST be wrong and the game MUST be rigged.
Evolution is just a theory.
Global warming is wrong.
Rush will save us from our sins.
Glory, glory, glory! El Rushbo, Almighty.

What the hell are you talking about, you ninny? This isn't even about Rush.

 

[Small Market Guy]

I imagine there are other costs.

$180k wouldn't even build a decent studio.

 

[TheBigA]

$180k wouldn't even build a decent studio.

Studio?

Today, to do a podcast, you need a laptop, interface, and microphone. Add a video camera if you have the budget.

The days of expensive studios are over.

 

[Small Market Guy]

Studio?

Today, to do a podcast, you need a laptop, interface, and microphone. Add a video camera if you have the budget.

The days of expensive studios are over.

Sure, if you want to sound like crap. I'm talking about a studio that someone of Leykis's caliber would be comfortable using. I may not like the guy, but he's a professional, not some yokel yapping into a gaming headset.

 

[TheBigA]

Sure, if you want to sound like crap.

Digital is digital. It'll sound fine. But sure, he can spend lots of money on leather couches, a cellar for his wine, and a humidor for his cigars.

 

[Small Market Guy]

Digital is digital. It'll sound fine. But sure, he can spend lots of money on leather couches, a cellar for his wine, and a humidor for his cigars.

I'm half deaf and I can tell the difference. Of course the average listener might not be able to, nor care, and that's a valid point to make.

 

[FredLeonard]

What the hell are you talking about, you ninny? This isn't even about Rush.

Isn't it? He's in the headline. And you keep bringing it back to Mister Oxy. You go postal at any reference to that right-wing gas bag that isn't glowing, favorable and optimistic. The only good thing about Rush is he's driven a lot of small market wannabes out of the biz.

 

[Small Market Guy]

Isn't it? He's in the headline. And you keep bringing it back to Mister Oxy. You go postal at any reference to that right-wing gas bag that isn't glowing, favorable and optimistic. The only good thing about Rush is he's driven a lot of small market wannabes out of the biz.

This is about Leykis and his numbers. Knock it off with the trolling. Go burn a cross or whatever you bigots do for fun.

 

[flybynight]

Digital is digital. It'll sound fine. But sure, he can spend lots of money on leather couches, a cellar for his wine, and a humidor for his cigars.

Don't forget the compression or general tweaking of the audio that most radio pros are used to, which normally transforms that horrible raw program-feed audio into beautiful over-the-air boss jock tones. That's the only bad thing about over-the-net web-casting; It generally sounds so unpolished---including radio station streaming.

 

[Small Market Guy]

Don't forget the compression or general tweaking of the audio that most radio pros are used to, which normally transforms that horrible raw program-feed audio into beautiful over-the-air boss jock tones. That's the only bad thing about over-the-net web-casting; It generally sounds so unpolished---including radio station streaming.

We don't always agree, but you get it. Again, average people might not care about such things, but radio professionals do.

Although I'd disagree that it's the "only" thing bad about streaming. It's just one of many things.

 

[Avid Listener]

Sure, if you want to sound like crap. I'm talking about a studio that someone of Leykis's caliber would be comfortable using. I may not like the guy, but he's a professional, not some yokel yapping into a gaming headset.

Considering that regardless of the quality of the studio, most talk radio is still on AM, concerns over audio quality are marginal at best. And, there are some extraordinarily good USB mics on the market. More than a few of my friends who do professional voice-overs for commercials and other projects do their recording on home-studio equipment consisting of only a computer, a high-end USB mic or a regular mic with a USB interface adapter, and a room with good acoustics. Some of the companies that make mid-tier broadcast mic now offer the exact same mics with USB connectivity instead of XLR. You might want to check out the Audio-Technica AT2020USB+ mic, or Blue's Spark Digital.

You also might be amazed to hear the technical quality of music recordings done using USB mics, direct input boxes, and PCs. Some of the commercials I worked on were shot on a Canon EOS and sound recorded on a Zoom H1 or H4. I won't brag on the content, but the technical quality was indistinguishable from stuff shot in a multi-million dollar studio several decades ago.

 

[Avid Listener]

I'm really amazed that people will go on and on about "radio professionals" caring about audio quality when AM radio still exists.

In the 90's, I worked for a company that sold first-generation cell phones. This was back in the days when you had the choice of a hand-held or a "bag" phone, and many cell phones were actually built into automobiles. One of my clients was a very "professiona" radio station that broadcast high school football games. Many schools didn't have phone lines at their fields, so this station used a rig that connected to an analog "bag" cell phone to broadcast the play-by-play. They had the usual deal with the cell phone carrier to make calling their request like a free call by dialing *CALL LETTERS. With the carrier's permission, that's how they carried the ball games. It was on AM, so the sound was, well, typical AM radio.

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

$180k wouldn't even build a decent studio.

If you need to be in commercially zoned space that would be qualified for outside guests to come park their vehicle and be on your show, and you felt the need to have a studio that would visually demonstrate "quality and prestige" to the ad agency crowd, yes, the numbers on the cost of establishing a studio head north quickly. Particularly if you want to operate from a major market like Los Angeles or Chicago or NYC.

On the other hand, if you are a person with experience and reputation who chooses to do a podcast style delivery while living out in the mountains or some hometown that you are fond of, the cost of a studio producing quality sound can be quite affordable in this day and age.

Stop by my place here in the south end of Appalachia sometime and let's see if we can generate some audio that you could take home with you and put on your radio station with no embarrassment. I haven't gotten close to expenses that totals in the five-figures range.

 

[davideduardo]

... Some of the companies that make mid-tier broadcast mic now offer the exact same mics with USB connectivity instead of XLR. You might want to check out the Audio-Technica AT2020USB+ mic, or Blue's Spark Digital.

You also might be amazed to hear the technical quality of music recordings done using USB mics, direct input boxes, and PCs. Some of the commercials I worked on were shot on a Canon EOS and sound recorded on a Zoom H1 or H4. I won't brag on the content, but the technical quality was indistinguishable from stuff shot in a multi-million dollar studio several decades ago.

And we are still supposed to believe that you are "just a listener" who is not part of the industry. Right.