I haven't seen this mentioned yet, but WXRK has apparently been snatched up by Light of Life Ministries in NH.
http://transition.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/fmq?list=0&facid=174293
http://transition.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/fmq?list=0&facid=174293
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Well, that was a waste of calls...
- Thread starter MoldaMania182
- Start date
K6JHU said:
Well I pretty clearly said in NH, which unless I'm living in another reality is the abbreviation for New Hampshire.
With PPM in major markets, the days of memorable call letters having any real value in bringing in better ratings are over.
Sure call letters like WABC, WCBS and WFAN are important to some of us as brands we have known for years, but with PPM the audience no longer has to know the call letters for the stations to get ratings credit for a listener.
And it has been years since the marketing practice of nicknames for stations started. How many "The Rivers" "The Hawks" "Froggie" etc. have replaced memorable old call letters across the country over the years. Those nicknames are just so much easier to remember in smaller markets that still have diaries, and in major markets where stations like "Fresh" needed a brand name.
So many stations now hide the call letters in the top of the hour rapid ID that most listeners may have no clue what they are.
Have you ever had a conversation with an avid young Z-100 fan, called it WHTZ and gotten a blank stare in response?
And the letters WXRK may have been even more obscure to that station's NYC listeners, and the fact that CBS just let them go to some religious FM in NH just illustrates that fact. Most call letters are well on their way to becoming important only to radio trivia geeks, the FCC and legal requirements related to station ownership and identification.
(Yeah, I know most of us on this board know all this, but I was reminded over the holiday that some younger lurkers may appreciate some background)
Sure call letters like WABC, WCBS and WFAN are important to some of us as brands we have known for years, but with PPM the audience no longer has to know the call letters for the stations to get ratings credit for a listener.
And it has been years since the marketing practice of nicknames for stations started. How many "The Rivers" "The Hawks" "Froggie" etc. have replaced memorable old call letters across the country over the years. Those nicknames are just so much easier to remember in smaller markets that still have diaries, and in major markets where stations like "Fresh" needed a brand name.
So many stations now hide the call letters in the top of the hour rapid ID that most listeners may have no clue what they are.
Have you ever had a conversation with an avid young Z-100 fan, called it WHTZ and gotten a blank stare in response?
And the letters WXRK may have been even more obscure to that station's NYC listeners, and the fact that CBS just let them go to some religious FM in NH just illustrates that fact. Most call letters are well on their way to becoming important only to radio trivia geeks, the FCC and legal requirements related to station ownership and identification.
(Yeah, I know most of us on this board know all this, but I was reminded over the holiday that some younger lurkers may appreciate some background)
>> 'Most call letters are well on their way to becoming important only to radio trivia geeks, the FCC and legal requirements related to station ownership and identification.' <<
Yessir, TimeIsTight.
Apropos of not much in the way of relevance, except for reference purposes : It was 42 years ago that an AM-FM radio station combo with a huge FM signal was morphing from day-parted Top 40 into the frisky and risky realm of AoR.
For whatever reason, the jocks on the big FM station, amid the Santana and the Tull and the Moody Blues, would image the place as 'The Lion' once an hour.
The devil knows who turned such a heroic creature into a rally-cry at that particular time of crossroads. The phrase quickly got plunged into insignificance there once AoR launched big-time nationwide. Perhaps someone from Connecticut or the north shore of Long Island can explain how WPLR 99.1 from New Haven survived and flourished without the monicker 'The Lion'.
Apparently, substance counts a lot more than swagger.
Yessir, TimeIsTight.
Apropos of not much in the way of relevance, except for reference purposes : It was 42 years ago that an AM-FM radio station combo with a huge FM signal was morphing from day-parted Top 40 into the frisky and risky realm of AoR.
For whatever reason, the jocks on the big FM station, amid the Santana and the Tull and the Moody Blues, would image the place as 'The Lion' once an hour.
The devil knows who turned such a heroic creature into a rally-cry at that particular time of crossroads. The phrase quickly got plunged into insignificance there once AoR launched big-time nationwide. Perhaps someone from Connecticut or the north shore of Long Island can explain how WPLR 99.1 from New Haven survived and flourished without the monicker 'The Lion'.
Apparently, substance counts a lot more than swagger.
Well. let's look at the picture here because for a religious station to take the WXRK calls, it makes absoulte sense!
The "X" is the cross.
"RK" ....the "Rock" which sets itself as the "foundation".
Maybe it doesn't matter for the average listener what a call letter is, but there is a symbolic significance.
The "X" is the cross.
"RK" ....the "Rock" which sets itself as the "foundation".
Maybe it doesn't matter for the average listener what a call letter is, but there is a symbolic significance.
Maybe Connecticut's different, but there are several stations that go by their call signs:
CBS Radio:
WTIC-FM goes by 96.5 TIC (HOT AC)
Lite 100.5 goes by both Lite 100.5 and WRCH
WTIC 1080 goes by WTIC News-Talk 1080
Buckley Radio:
102.9 DRC-FM goes by both 102.9 DRC-FM and Hartford's Big D.
Redwolf Broadcasting:
Most of the on air mentions of the station mention the station as "Radio 104.1 WMRQ".
Marlin Broadcasting:
106.9 WCCC-FM goes by both "106.9 The Rock" and WCCC.
CBS Radio:
WTIC-FM goes by 96.5 TIC (HOT AC)
Lite 100.5 goes by both Lite 100.5 and WRCH
WTIC 1080 goes by WTIC News-Talk 1080
Buckley Radio:
102.9 DRC-FM goes by both 102.9 DRC-FM and Hartford's Big D.
Redwolf Broadcasting:
Most of the on air mentions of the station mention the station as "Radio 104.1 WMRQ".
Marlin Broadcasting:
106.9 WCCC-FM goes by both "106.9 The Rock" and WCCC.
Tony Santiago said:
Wow, how long did it take to come up with THAT one. Impressive.
I know calls are useless to the masses, I say it all the time, but it's not too often long running NYC calls disappear. I guess maybe I'm slightly surprised another rock station didn't snatch them.
That's a valid point regarding some station ownership and format changes right now, but we are in the middle of a long evolutionary devaluation in the business importance of call letters.
In the case of the former WXRK in NYC, the change to WNOW was a no-brain very low-cost natural thing to do once the call letters became available. The WNOW fits the nickname and branding perfectly in a way that most other non-word call letters do not. And it was worth doing even to enhance the station's letterhead. The station had been branding itself as 92.3-Now for over three years. In the old day, when call letters mattered so much more, CBS would likely have made the owners of WNOW in tiny Gaffney, South Carolina a financial offer for the call letters that they would have been silly to refuse. But now, getting listeners to remember the address and the nickname are what matters most, and CBS just waited until the NOW call letters were up for grabs.
And some of the other call letter changes following format or ownership changes are done just to help emphasize the image change,
or in some cases the folks in charge are just old school and following old habits.
In the old days, chain owners used to "park" well-known big city brand call letters at their smaller market stations when they had reason to change the big city station's images. They just weren't sure they wouldn't want those well known in the big markets call letter brands back at some time in the future.
But in a sign of the lack of value, top-level station owner CBS made no effort to hold onto the WXRK calls, that had been part of the NYC radio dial for most of the last 25-years. Last year, CBS similarly let "The Rock Station 94 WYSP" calls go in Philadelpia. That station's rock brand stretched all the way back to 1973, and was etched in the minds of generations of Philly Rock Music fans, and yet CBS just let those calls go when it switched the format to Sports Talk last year. The YSP calls now belong to a tiny non-comm in Pennsylvania.
I mentioned above how stations like Clear Channel's WHTZ, bury their call letters in a rapid-fire hard-to-hear top-of-the-hour audio blur. And that many major fans have no clue what that station's call letters are. And there are other New York stations where most listeners probably have no clue what the stations call letters are either. Lots of folks know "Fresh" but call letters???? And then there is "ESPN Radio" but ESPN is four letters and there are only three letters after the W in Eastern US call signs. So, what percentage of sports-talk fans have made the connection between ESPN and the call letters WEPN, or are even aware of what the station's calls are? I'd guess most regular listeners refer to it as ESPN and have no clue what the "legal" call letters are.
The one station that uses its call letters as a brand image to the max is KTU, which are calls originally picked to form the memorable phrase "92-KTU" but that catchy advantage doesn't work with KTU's current frequency. Still the call letter brand had, and has, real recognition value in the NYC market and that's something the owners of the call letters WHTZ, WWFS and WEPN make no attempt to equal in the NYC radio market.
PLJ utilizes the calls.
If every synapse here is operating correctly on this fourth day of leftovers .....
WDRC's suffix was from the Doolittle Radio Company (Corporation?). They were one of the first FM stations.
WDRC's suffix was from the Doolittle Radio Company (Corporation?). They were one of the first FM stations.
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