WDEL's Stale Weekday News Stories/Loudell's "interviews"

[650AM]

This problem is nothing new at WDEL, but it was very conspicious today. All through AM drive on WDEL we heard the same cuts and teasers for the Christine O'Donnell - CNN story..... and the same riviting story about the Stoney's barmaid who just loves Prince Harry. OK, fine.

But all this afternoon, these same stories and cuts continued to play during the Loudell-a-thon. Is WDEL simply unable to create enough new news content during a day that they must resort to overly repeating stale stories?

Also: This afternoon, between 5:00 and 5:45 or so, Loudell did two of his famous long-winded interviews... BOTH on Texas Gov. Rick Perry! They were with different people but covered the same questions. (Loudell to interviewee: "Here is my opinion and theory, in long, clause-laden sentences. Now quickly comment on it while I interrupt you.)

Does WDEL operate on the premise that people listen for 15 minutes during AM & PM drive, then go away, allowing incessent repetition of the exact versions of the same stories? If so, they are mistaken. And, I am sorry, but scheduling two "Rick Perry" interviews within a half an hour is just plain dumb. (I guess Loudell could find nothing new of interest going on in "Pock-E-ston.")

In two PM news teasers, Loudell said "Christine O'Donnell's CNN walk-off continues to draw reaction, both here an in Britian!!".... but the same AM drive stories and audio cuts were played. There were no freshend stories (that I heard) with "continued reaction" about O'Donnell. This is frustrating and sad.

 

[jhguthlac]

This is the month of August. Congress is off. Mr. Obama is taking another vacation. The General Assembly is off.

See where I am headed? August is a really bad news month. Has been for at least the 50+ years I have been paying attention. You do what you can.

But using the same version of a story is problematic.

 

[Chris Carl]

650AM,

There are many behind the scenes factors you are not aware of (I would detail them, but it will come across as making excuses), but you're right and your comments are duly noted. Same thing with your other "stale" post.

Sorry to disappoint.

 

[DX]

650 AM...

Sounds like very selective listening.

Loudell was NOT leading with the Christine O'Donnell story OR the Wilmington-woman-loves-Prince Harry story. Some half-hours, I didn't hear him do those stories at all!

From my recollection, he was leading with the severe thunderstorms (with frequent updates, beyond just in the weather slots), the Wall Street slump, several blotter stories, and a story about the invasive snakehead fish having infiltrated a pond in Bear. And, shortly after 5:30 p.m., he chatted with Congressman John Carney about the markets and the "Supercommittee". Plus, Sean Greene reported live from the ballpark about the Phillies and whether the skies were threatening.

Yes, there were several Perry interviews, but the Perry story remains the top political story of the week... it keeps changing.

And yes, August sucks. Not only are there generally fewer stories. People go on vacation. Other staffers might be working on special projects.

Ignored in this discussion are all the video, podcasts, and blog postings going up on WDEL's website. It's more than just about 1150 AM.

 

[650AM]

Didn I say he was LEADING with O'Donnell or the Prince Harry stories? No.

My question was... in listening to PM drive for about two hours, I heard each of them two or three times. They had run their course in the morning and should have been disposed of by that point.
Videos on WDEL.com are of no interest/value when driving in your car. I am obviously adressing their on-air product.

 

[650AM]

DX, I am also not talking about sports or weather content, but specifically the re-run news pieces. Did you notice that?

Chris: Not so much disappointed for me, but for WDEL. Is there a recoginition there that if one listened in the morning, they would be turned off (literally) by hearing the any of the same stories in the afternoon. Or, is the general listenership too dumb to notice they are hearing the same Stoney's barmaid story that played on their way to work? This is not an "August problem" either, but the normal course of events.

 

[Chris Carl]

From what we can determine from Arbitron, the majority of our listeners don't listen to both morning and afternoon drive. So, our stories generally have an 18-hour lifespan so that they run in both drives.

We also are led to believe that those who do listen to both drives may only hear one newscast - so they heard the story once...and we believe that hearing a story a second time isn't necessarily a bad thing since the audience is typically "hearing" and not "listening" intently. Personally, when I'm in the car with the radio on (which is where more than half of our audience is), I find myself distracted and then thinking to myself "what did I just hear?"

We always want to have the latest news at the top of the newscast, but once you get past the first few stories, I'm OK with re-running stories - to a point. I don't want stories run into the ground, but when a reporter invests time to create a story, you'd like to have it aired a few times.

 

[DX]

I have much the same response as Chris:

I don't think you just completely "kill" stories from one drive to the other, especially after reporters have invested all the time and effort.

But you can de-emphasize them, as Loudell did. Given how the O'Donnell story dominated talk radio, blogs, and water cooler talk, it probably would have been inadvisable to completely kill it.

That said, if staffers weren't perhaps on vacation or working on other projects, it might have been nice to perhaps have some REACTION clips to O'Donnell in P.M. drive, but it was really hearing O'Donnell herself which drove the story, I think.

But let's get to the larger issue: We probably wouldn't be having this discussion here if WDEL had flat out beat WILM 12+ in the latest book.

Bluntly, does anyone REALLY think a Hannity fan or a Rush fan would come over to WDEL and stay longer just because the station was airing a few additional new local stories?

At this point in time, we're talking about rabid fans who listen for long periods.

Furthermore, diary placement or Arbitron inflating the numbers because of too few diary returns in a particular demographic can make all the difference. WDEL could do nothing differently and see a rebound in 2012. But, of course, I imagine they'd tweak a few things.

Ultimately, though, it's an allocation of resources. The future is on the internet & telephone and smart stations are trying to extend the brand name to their websites in every possible way.

 

[jhguthlac]

DX has a very valid point about time spent listening. For example, I get to work at 5am. I do not hear the WDEL morning news more than one or two days a week, and that is for a half hour only. So if the same stories run in the afternoon, so what? I do check their web site several times a day to see the top stories. But when I was stuck at home during the blizzards, I was listening for hours. So yes, a story might get old.

But I do listen during afternoon drive. During the 45 minutes it takes me to drive from Ridley Park to Newark, I may hear a story twice. But again, so what?

I only heard the story about the Wilmington woman and Prince Harry once, but I will add that was once too many! When I was a kid, I had a crush on Princess Anne. I do not want to talk about it on WDEL!

 

[MikefromDelaware]

When I worked at WILM, we wrote three versions of the story, so that you heard some new fact or angle in the next version, so if you'd listened for 90 minutes, you heard all three versions. So it was the same story, but written differently so it wasn't literally the same thing each time. I'd assume that WDEL reporters do that too, but frankly I don't listen to any of the news casts over and over. I'll give you a half hour (8 minutes more than KYW says is needed) and then I know the next half hour block will basically be a repeat of the main stories, so I change stations to hear THEIR version of those same stories.

WDEL isn't alone in reusing stories from AM drive to PM drive. WHYY-FM does it with their local stories too, as does NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered. If you listen in the morning, you'll hear a couple repeated stories in the afternoon.

I scanned by WILM the other day just before 9am and noticed that Bruce Elliot does that with some of his features like the Colbert Report, he airs twice once at 6:55 and again at 8:55 (playing the same cut from the show), again figuring that those listening at 7am won't be listening still at 9am.

I believe Cable TV got that sort of thing going as they repeat shows and movies around the clock, because most folks aren't watching round the clock and they can get viewers with the same movie airing at different times. It saves them money.

 

[EZway2go]

For what it's worth, I much prefer WDEL's sports coverage over KYW's. Driving into work (NJ to Phila), for me it's KYW for traffic and WDEL at :15 and :45 for sports. It's more of a magazine-type style of reporting. On KYW I've heard some stories repeated word for word every half hour.

 

[jhguthlac]

When I was at WDEL, we also did the 3 versions minimum for most stories. More if you had enough good sound bites. If you listen to any of the big morning syndicated shows, you'll notice they repeat bits two hours later. Even if some of the same people are listening, if its funny enough, few mind the replay.