WFLA format in FWB??

[Poledo]

The Great Ninety Eight

That magic bus is probably is the McGuire's Steak House graveyard for spare parts.

I heard an update to the story of Qantum's ownership of 98.1. Apparently Okaloosa county was going to take possession of the station for unpaid tangible property taxes. Tibbs and Wooten got their buddy Mr. Whitaker to pull some strings down at the courthouse in Crestview and paid off the back taxes. They are are now secretly preparing to take over the operations of 98.1. Look for them to debut their new station "The Great Ninety Eight" the day after Christmas. Wooten's currently collecting all the back-up transmitters from Clear Channel sites in the area and they plan to daisy chain them together and run 500KW for the first few months or until they get busted by the FCC (they think they've bribed or have dirt on all the right people). They're also going to be tethering a small blimp to the tower to raise the antenna height to 5000 feet. They may be doing all this work under fictitious names, so don't look for them to admit any of this. Still no news on weather or not they'll be carrying Coast to Coast AM overnights.
Stay tuned for details as I hear them.

 

[Tibbs4]

Secret's out. Did you mention you and Redneckriviera are part of the team? And, best part here's what we do know:

1.) All Christmas until Valentines Day

2.) Rob is preparing a New Year's Celebration with his collection of over 1,000 storbey's. We'll pick everybody's
favorite and put them up on the tower that Mr. Jimmy Whitaker is building near Eglin and he just got approval
for the government to pay for the electricity on the tower since all those strobey's will be expensive to use.
(Told you he ran everything up that way.)

3.) Sorry the magic bus didn't work out. I was hoping it was just hidden somewhere. That changes some
of the eventual format possibilities. Plus, we'll have to find another way to have a beer hall on wheels. I
think I may have one of the floats used in Animal House still.

4.) have to still keep this one secret. big. big.

The KAT is out of the bag!

 

[cceng1]

damn Tibbs.....you weren't supposed to say anything about this until Dec 24....that 's after I had all those transmitters ready to go in a combiner that fills up the environmental test hanger at Eglin...last calculations revealed about 627 kw on 98.1.....we were just going to put the balloon up from the middle of the flight line at Eglin and all the military flights would have to avoid the tether cable.

 

[redneckriviera]

That's right, I get to do mid-days (whatever the format)--meaning that I absolutely, positively have to get out of bed by 9 AM, now matter what--and also audition prospective members of the "Great 98 Beach Babes Street Team" while sipping on a Malibu rum at Juana's Pagodas in Navarre Beach. Oh, and if we need a GM, I guess I could do that, too.

I vote we take all them xmtrs and string 'em along the Gulf from South Padre to Key West and originate our award-winning programming from a different beach town every couple of days (no set schedule--that would border on being "organized.")

Don't worry about the feds. Unless you've got billions to prime the regulatory pump, you don't exist to them fellas in DC. The FCC's official motto: Anything Goes... correct change required!

 

[Tibbs4]

Mid-days start before 5pm, right? RNR, I am still so young and incredibly fit that I can party all night and ease right in
at 5:55 am shift w/out missing a beat. (That's the biggest lie I have told on here ever.) I proudly said adios to AM shifts
so long ago and still have yet to not panic at 4:30 every morning (sober or not.)


"Great 98 Beach Babes Street Team" --- such a good ideas we should just call the whole station
"WBBZ. All Beach Babez All the Time. " Somehow, I figured we'd be stuck with the WOOT-FM calls
since we ain't the engineerin' types. What would Jenny Woo think of this WBBZ idea?

Sorry for ruining the secret. Blame Poledo, he let the secret out. And we would have gotten
away with it if it hadn't been for those medallin' kids and that dog (Wooten Doo) showing up....

 

[Poledo]

WBBZ, The Redneck Riviera's Great Ninety Eight

The Redneck Riviera's Great Ninety Eight, WBBZ - Holt, Destin, Panama City, Dothan, Pensacola, Mobile, Biloxi, and a whole lotta fish.

I'm relieved to hear that Mr. Whitaker arranged to tap into Eglin's power grid. I was kinda scared of those Somalian investors that were offering 2 million barrels of crude oil to power the generators.

Did you ever find someone to synchronize the strobeys to the broadcast? That should have people flocking to the antenna site to watch the strobe lights just like a modern day Pink Floyd Laser Light Show.

Since the WPFM call letters are already taken and tarnished, I was thinking that WOWW would be good calls (I can't believe 107.3 ever gave up those call letters) but I like this new idea for WBBZ with an all Babez street team.

I think Weeknight Party triple-cast originating simultaneously from Sharky's, Juana's, and The Flora-Bama is just about a done deal. Still trying to negotiate an issue involving bar tabs (Tibbs, apparently you left town owing a LOT of money). They also want an assurance that everything will be up and going in time for the New Years' Polar Bear Plunge.

 

[Tibbs4]

Flora-Bama allowed credit? Wow! I would have stayed in town longer before they ran me off.

maybe we could just use WBBZWOWWWPFM as the call letters. Who'd notice on a 500kw station?

 

[Poledo]

Flora-Bama allowed credit? Wow! I would have stayed in town longer before they ran me off.

They didn't really allow credit. It has something to do with a bet you lost at the Mullet Toss back in the '90's. What made you think you could out throw Emmit Smith? You had to buy a round for the house and quickly disappeared. He's looking for some serious cash.

 

[Tibbs4]

Although I think I may have gone to the Florabama one time in college, speaking of indebtedness and owing a huge tab...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27885407/

Looks like Mr. Dickey has kahunas to admit his product has a bit to be desired...and he says basically Double 0 and Quantram
(whatever) will wash-up with 36 months. I wouldn't be so sure he's missing that his company may decide it's not worth borrowing
half a billion to keep floating along.

Does this mean we all should start saving our quarters, Charlie... (no pun intended, as the price of most radio stock is about that.)

How has the PCB shell game lasted this long, anyway? Now that times are really worse, how can these guys be making any
money?

This is a serious question. I still don't see how any station is worth $500,000 down there. How can it be profitable CW?? How??

 

[cceng1]

Tibbs....we need to talk off the list about that topic....I don't think I should talk about local competitors on the list since everyone knows who I am.....besides, deer season starts Thursday morning at daybreak.....and I am leaving for the camp mid-day Wednesday....everyone have a great turkey day!

 

[redneckriviera]

The WOWW calls got scooped up by a little AM Radio Disney affiliate up in suburban Memphis, but I'm sure they'd be delighted to give us the okay to use 'em on FM if we let them broadcast the "Annual Great 98 Beach Babes' Sharky's/Juana's/Flora-Bama Mullet Mania" remote. Their audience of 9-year olds would no doubt find our award-winning programming to be highly enlightening.

As far as PCB radio goes, keep in mind that with all of today's high-tech wizardry, operating stations #2, #3, #4 and #5 in a cluster can be obscenely profitable. Them tagalongs don't have to generate record-breaking sales revenue when 70 to 80 percent of it drops directly to the bottom line.

Which brings us back to Pirate--er, Parrot Radio. "Serving Panama City Beach, Grayton Beach, Fort Walton Beach, Pensacola Beach, Orange Beach--anyplace with 'Beach' in its name--this is..."

 

[Poledo]

Tibbs, you really brought a depressing end to this thread. The article you mentioned was big enough to get listed on Fark.com today. The only good thing posted was Wooten's weekend in the tree stand, if I didn't have to run the shop I'd be at Lake Seminole. Redneck's trying to breath some life back into the 98.1 hallucination, but I've got noting left after Tibbs overdosed this thread with Xanax.

What is better for the future of radio? The FCC changing ownership regulations to allow Clear Channel and Cumulus to buy up more stations or dividing the stations up among more owners? If Clear Channel was allowed to buy the rest of the good signals in Panama City they could diversify and have more formats, but 90% of the content will be voice tracked with better music, no local talent, syndicated morning shows, oh well, that's what you're going to get in market 253 if you want to make a profit. If every channel has separate owners they'll all go after the same audience and duplicate each other. Very few people will buy a station and put their heart and soul in it, putting profits second in order to produce something their proud of. You can only name two in this area, WSBZ and WAAZ.

Even though most posters here (including me) prefer local ownership and small clusters, I think the FCC needs to back off on their ownership rules and let the corporations try to save the medium. If they fail, small timers like Rob and the WJEP dude will be able to buy up the stations cheap and try the live and local approach... until that fails.

I also think the FCC needs to allow corporations to own TV, AM, FM, newspapers, cable companies, and billboard companies all in the same market. WSB and the Atlanta Journal Constitution are grandfathered in Atlanta and they control the media there... and I don't see any problem with it. Think of the consolidation possibilities of allowing Cox to add the cable systems in the Atlanta market to their holdings. Money, money, money... major money.

 

[Buster Wafflehouse]

Poledo, you just ruined my thanksgiving. I think I hear the 4 horsemen riding off with my turkey....

 

[redneckriviera]

Tibbs, you really brought a depressing end to this thread. The article you mentioned was big enough to get listed on Fark.com today. The only good thing posted was Wooten's weekend in the tree stand, if I didn't have to run the shop I'd be at Lake Seminole. Redneck's trying to breath some life back into the 98.1 hallucination, but I've got noting left after Tibbs overdosed this thread with Xanax.

What is better for the future of radio? The FCC changing ownership regulations to allow Clear Channel and Cumulus to buy up more stations or dividing the stations up among more owners? If Clear Channel was allowed to buy the rest of the good signals in Panama City they could diversify and have more formats, but 90% of the content will be voice tracked with better music, no local talent, syndicated morning shows, oh well, that's what you're going to get in market 253 if you want to make a profit. If every channel has separate owners they'll all go after the same audience and duplicate each other. Very few people will buy a station and put their heart and soul in it, putting profits second in order to produce something their proud of. You can only name two in this area, WSBZ and WAAZ.

Even though most posters here (including me) prefer local ownership and small clusters, I think the FCC needs to back off on their ownership rules and let the corporations try to save the medium. If they fail, small timers like Rob and the WJEP dude will be able to buy up the stations cheap and try the live and local approach... until that fails.

I also think the FCC needs to allow corporations to own TV, AM, FM, newspapers, cable companies, and billboard companies all in the same market. WSB and the Atlanta Journal Constitution are grandfathered in Atlanta and they control the media there... and I don't see any problem with it. Think of the consolidation possibilities of allowing Cox to add the cable systems in the Atlanta market to their holdings. Money, money, money... major money.

This is one of those turns in the conversation that probably merits a separate thread but, frankly, there have been quite a few threads on the subject already over the years.

I'll gently disagree, and here's why.

What we're seeing now is the bursting of a "radio bubble" not that much different than the housing bubble or the internet bubble (or the oil bubble, for that matter--again, a whole 'nother subject). This one started in the late eighties with the deregulation of S&Ls and other lending institutions--and a concurrent (modest) raising of ownership caps and deregulation of trafficking rules. With the easy money flowing, speculators bought up a fair number of radio stations at highly inflated prices; then, when the S&Ls crashed, ran to the FCC claiming that the "industry" was in dire straits and needed more deregulation--leading first to LMAs, then to the Telecom Bill of '96: the Opening of the Floodgates, as Mark Mays says.

So companies glutted with overvalued radio properties have reached the point when the house of cards is falling. Big surprise? Uh, not if we've been paying attention.

Should we bail 'em out? Ain't gonna happen. Should we fall for the same routine they pulled in 1989 and just pave the way for legal monopoly? That might have worked with the GOP in charge, but not likely with the Dems calling the shots.

Will we instead see a drop in station prices similar to what we're seeing now in housing? Yeah, probably, except that the drop may take several years to manifest itself and the FDIC, the Fed, & the Treasury aren't likely to step in and stop it. And it may be accompanied by a move by the FCC to reinstate prior ownership caps in the name of diversifying ownership. Breaking up Clear Channel & Cumulus won't be nearly as hard as breaking up AT&T or Standard Oil. In fact, some--like Citadel--might save us all the trouble of breaking them up by falling apart before our eyes.

So... given all of that, I think the chances of you, me, Tibbs & Charlie snagging The Great 98 for the price of a trailer in Ebro are looking better and better. Let's see--I've got 37 cents in my pocket... that should be a good downpayment!

 

[redneckriviera]

Part Deux.

Poledo, one of the key issues you may not be factoring in is the continued profitability of radio. The backwoods cluster of six properties I run up here in the mountains in towns of less than 10,000 people--all "non-rated" markets--will finish this terrible year spinning off about $1 million in profit off a bit less than $3 million in sales. I don't own the company, but the guy who does--after debt-service & the rest--will still pocket a half-mil from this cluster plus similar amounts from the other dozen clusters. And he is already a billionaire from his other business interests. So this money is just gravy.

Back before consolidation these properties were all owned by local folks who staffed them 24/7 and ran good, local operations, and at the end of the year stuck several hundred thousand dollars in their pockets.

I'm not saying that every radio station is a potential gold mine. That's not the case. But I am saying that if the radio industry as it now is structured "crashes"--whether stock devaluation or federal decree--a return to
the mom & pop ownership of yesteryear is not only preferable to what we have today, but truly viable, as well.

 

[Buster Wafflehouse]

Redneckriviera....my new hero. It is amazing what a small group can do when building for the long term rather than the short and when 35 cents on the dollar is an acceptable return....

 

[Poledo]

So, what ever happened to that radio station in Ebro? I had forgotten about it.

I'm really not qualified to make comments on the business of radio but I'll throw my 37 cents in anyway. I don't believe that government regulation should prevent people or big corporations from making as much money as possible. I don't know what to think of the government's economic bailout of wall street, but it would be absolutely insane for any radio corporations to get any of those dollars, as far as I know, there simply aren't enough people involved with those corporations. While I prefer local "mom & pop" stations, I could see where one company owning most of the stations in a market would provide more variety...
Variety is a good thing. Competition is good. The FM dial today is bad. The AM dial is almost as bad as it was before Rush came along. I've got no idea what would make it better or even if it will ever improve.
Redneck, it sounds like your job is secure. Wooten probably can't be replaced, does he have the best job at CC Panama City? Tibbs seems to have a good attitude, so he must feel safe... I'm just trying to figure out what he thought was so special about the Emerald Coast. I'm irrelevant, I haven't made any money off radio since I sold all those promo CDs to the used record store back in college. I do have a few thousand shares of Sirius I held on to "just in case." I doubt I'll make any real money off those.

 

[redneckriviera]

So, what ever happened to that radio station in Ebro? I had forgotten about it.

I'm really not qualified to make comments on the business of radio but I'll throw my 37 cents in anyway. I don't believe that government regulation should prevent people or big corporations from making as much money as possible. I don't know what to think of the government's economic bailout of wall street, but it would be absolutely insane for any radio corporations to get any of those dollars, as far as I know, there simply aren't enough people involved with those corporations. While I prefer local "mom & pop" stations, I could see where one company owning most of the stations in a market would provide more variety...
Variety is a good thing. Competition is good. The FM dial today is bad. The AM dial is almost as bad as it was before Rush came along. I've got no idea what would make it better or even if it will ever improve.
Redneck, it sounds like your job is secure. Wooten probably can't be replaced, does he have the best job at CC Panama City? Tibbs seems to have a good attitude, so he must feel safe... I'm just trying to figure out what he thought was so special about the Emerald Coast. I'm irrelevant, I haven't made any money off radio since I sold all those promo CDs to the used record store back in college. I do have a few thousand shares of Sirius I held on to "just in case." I doubt I'll make any real money off those.

You're being a tad harsh on yourself. I enjoy the exchange of ideas--that's what makes it interesting. What's so special about the Emerald Coast? What was it old Vince Whibbs used to say? "Where thousands live the way millions wish they could!" Great place to live. Great place to be. And, in some circumstances, a great place to work! I'd say both me & Tibbs wouldn't mind finding ourselves down there, again, some day...

 

[jmtillery]

Tibbs, you really brought a depressing end to this thread. The article you mentioned was big enough to get listed on Fark.com today. The only good thing posted was Wooten's weekend in the tree stand, if I didn't have to run the shop I'd be at Lake Seminole. Redneck's trying to breath some life back into the 98.1 hallucination, but I've got noting left after Tibbs overdosed this thread with Xanax.

What is better for the future of radio? The FCC changing ownership regulations to allow Clear Channel and Cumulus to buy up more stations or dividing the stations up among more owners? If Clear Channel was allowed to buy the rest of the good signals in Panama City they could diversify and have more formats, but 90% of the content will be voice tracked with better music, no local talent, syndicated morning shows, oh well, that's what you're going to get in market 253 if you want to make a profit. If every channel has separate owners they'll all go after the same audience and duplicate each other. Very few people will buy a station and put their heart and soul in it, putting profits second in order to produce something their proud of. You can only name two in this area, WSBZ and WAAZ.

Even though most posters here (including me) prefer local ownership and small clusters, I think the FCC needs to back off on their ownership rules and let the corporations try to save the medium. If they fail, small timers like Rob and the WJEP dude will be able to buy up the stations cheap and try the live and local approach... until that fails.

I also think the FCC needs to allow corporations to own TV, AM, FM, newspapers, cable companies, and billboard companies all in the same market. WSB and the Atlanta Journal Constitution are grandfathered in Atlanta and they control the media there... and I don't see any problem with it. Think of the consolidation possibilities of allowing Cox to add the cable systems in the Atlanta market to their holdings. Money, money, money... major money.

This is one of those turns in the conversation that probably merits a separate thread but, frankly, there have been quite a few threads on the subject already over the years.

I'll gently disagree, and here's why.

What we're seeing now is the bursting of a "radio bubble" not that much different than the housing bubble or the internet bubble (or the oil bubble, for that matter--again, a whole 'nother subject). This one started in the late eighties with the deregulation of S&Ls and other lending institutions--and a concurrent (modest) raising of ownership caps and deregulation of trafficking rules. With the easy money flowing, speculators bought up a fair number of radio stations at highly inflated prices; then, when the S&Ls crashed, ran to the FCC claiming that the "industry" was in dire straits and needed more deregulation--leading first to LMAs, then to the Telecom Bill of '96: the Opening of the Floodgates, as Mark Mays says.

So companies glutted with overvalued radio properties have reached the point when the house of cards is falling. Big surprise? Uh, not if we've been paying attention.

Should we bail 'em out? Ain't gonna happen. Should we fall for the same routine they pulled in 1989 and just pave the way for legal monopoly? That might have worked with the GOP in charge, but not likely with the Dems calling the shots.

Will we instead see a drop in station prices similar to what we're seeing now in housing? Yeah, probably, except that the drop may take several years to manifest itself and the FDIC, the Fed, & the Treasury aren't likely to step in and stop it. And it may be accompanied by a move by the FCC to reinstate prior ownership caps in the name of diversifying ownership. Breaking up Clear Channel & Cumulus won't be nearly as hard as breaking up AT&T or Standard Oil. In fact, some--like Citadel--might save us all the trouble of breaking them up by falling apart before our eyes.

So... given all of that, I think the chances of you, me, Tibbs & Charlie snagging The Great 98 for the price of a trailer in Ebro are looking better and better. Let's see--I've got 37 cents in my pocket... that should be a good downpayment!

Redneckriviera, You stated that more deregulation is not likely you happen with the "Dems" in office. It was Bill Clinton - a Democrat - who was in office and signed the Telecom Bill of 1996 allowing all these mega duoplolies in the first place. Perhaps the new Democratic Administartion will see things the way you suggest, but in the past it was the Democrats that sided with the "would Be" mega operators by authorizing deregulation in the first place. I'm all for allowing a 2-AM/2-FM combination in major cities, but I have always been against the 8-station cluster operations which essentially reduced local ownership to two or three major players in virtually all the Top 100 markets even further reducing diversity within any given radio market.

Mark Tillery,
Ocala, Florida
[email protected]

 

[redneckriviera]

Redneckriviera, You stated that more deregulation is not likely you happen with the "Dems" in office. It was Bill Clinton - a Democrat - who was in office and signed the Telecom Bill of 1996 allowing all these mega duoplolies in the first place. Perhaps the new Democratic Administartion will see things the way you suggest, but in the past it was the Democrats that sided with the "would Be" mega operators by authorizing deregulation in the first place. I'm all for allowing a 2-AM/2-FM combination in major cities, but I have always been against the 8-station cluster operations which essentially reduced local ownership to two or three major players in virtually all the Top 100 markets even further reducing diversity within any given radio market.

Mark Tillery,
Ocala, Florida
[email protected]

Yeah, what's the saying about legislation and sausage-making? In short form, Lowry Mays (NAB) wrote it, the Republican congress passed it, and Clinton signed it--agreeing to throw radio under the bus in exchange for concessions on TV, cell phones & internet. (Because, of course, radio was an afterthought in the Telecom Bill--and it was WAY under the radar). Clinton won election by being "Republican Light"--a bit different scenario than today. And radio is now definitely on the radar. Much different today.

But, yeah, I agree with your basic premise. The old AM/FM combos worked okay. Some variation on that theme would be alright.

Where I draw the line is the notion that if you're not cash-flowing $100,000,000 a year, it's not "profitable." We still live in a country where the typical (median) income for an individual is around $40,000 and the typical (median) household income is around $50,000. If an entrepreneur running a small-town Class A FM is generating a personal income of $250,000 a year, he's living like a king in Crestview, Florida or Paxton, Illinois or Lewisburg, West Virginia or Norfolk, Nebraska... and it is towns like those where most of America's radio stations happen to be.