Why were all-news stations launch in 2010-2015 failed?

[Oscar Madison]

One computer? You must work in a small newsroom.

Sure, you can do your field work with a smartphone. I use a smartphone for just about all of my field news gathering, production and live reporting. Sounds beautiful.

But smartphones cost money to buy and use. The good apps for live remotes (the ones in which you can even play you soundbite) cost money in either outright purchases or subscription fees for the service. Either the company incurs the cost itself, or pays the employee for use of their gear, which will include cost of data.

Sure, you can do it without buying the specialized apps. You can go live via Skype or Facetime. Still costs data on the smartphone. Who's gonna pay the bill to Verizon Wireless, or AT&T, or Sprint, etc? I'm sure somebody (the business or the employee) can write the cost off as a business expense, but someone still has to pay the bill. You'll also need a smartphone plugged into your control room. Or I guess you could tie up your one desktop computer in your newsroom.

(oh, and have fun using that smartphone on the public mobile internet to send/receive streaming audio when in a large crowd of people all using their smartphones.)

Those are expenses not incurred by your standard music station.

And while audience turnover is a reality, it's also not a horrible factor. News formats, if done right, engender the audience with assurance that they'll be there when the time comes. That "time" could also be every ten minutes on the 5's, or 8's or whatever for some sort of service element. The format thrives by people tuning back in when needed. If it couldn't thrive that way, WCBS, WINS, KYW, KNX et. al. would have abandoned the format decades ago.

True, more and more people are getting news-on-demand from other sources via mobile phones. But those established news radio stations are still commanding listeners.

A station just starting up may not have corporate backing to spend all that money on people, equipment and time to grow the product just to be able to get a 22 minute turnover.

Face it, something doesn't "happen" that often. One all news station with which I am very familiar tried running promos telling the audience to tune in "two, three, four times a day." It backfired. People tuned in and heard the same thing - exactly the same thing, not just the same news but the same cuts, and the same voicers they'd heard before. And on those rare occasions when stuff happens, people may not be in their car. They'll go to cable news or go online before radio, when there's a choice.

You seem to think music radio has zero expenses. Not true. I know of another news station that used cell phone service, old desktops, and the cheapest recorders from Radio Shack. Most news stations restrict themselves to sound that gets handed to them: A number on a press release to call. Or a staged event. Radio is overly obsessed with sound bites anyway. Real people are more concerned with basic information and few sound bites add real information to a story. All sound bites add is "listen to us; we've got sound."

 

[DavidZ]

No, I'm saying that KQV has been all-news for 41 years because they are NOT owned by CBS.

CBS would have pulled the plug after six months of looking at the P&L.

KQV is not all-news. Their all-news only from 5 a.m. - 7 p.m. weekdays.

 

[b-turner]

Oscar Madison hits on what I heard on a now gone all news station: no updates. What I heard at 9 am is exactly what I heard at 6 pm from the copy to the soundbite. I was always taught to freshen stories constantly. A re-write of the same details needs to be done in order to not sound stale. Mostly this is an issue involving to little staff. If you are investing in the format, I can't see not making it sound the best it can. I get the 'we'll grow the staff when revenue comes in' but at least allow for story re-writes.

 

[davideduardo]

Face it, something doesn't "happen" that often. One all news station with which I am very familiar tried running promos telling the audience to tune in "two, three, four times a day." It backfired. People tuned in and heard the same thing - exactly the same thing, not just the same news but the same cuts, and the same voicers they'd heard before. And on those rare occasions when stuff happens, people may not be in their car. They'll go to cable news or go online before radio, when there's a choice.

It did not backfire. That strategy and on-air phrasing was done primarily by the CBS all-news stations, all of which update rather frequently as they are in markets with sufficient breaking news to provide new content.

It was apparently decided that it was time to move on, and around the time of the PPM roll out, they changed the promotional focus away from indefinite and vague appointment listening.

You seem to think music radio has zero expenses. Not true. I know of another news station that used cell phone service, old desktops, and the cheapest recorders from Radio Shack. Most news stations restrict themselves to sound that gets handed to them: A number on a press release to call. Or a staged event. Radio is overly obsessed with sound bites anyway. Real people are more concerned with basic information and few sound bites add real information to a story. All sound bites add is "listen to us; we've got sound."

With only a few exceptions, the all-news stations are in Top 15 markets and are reasonably if not well equipped. For street reporting, they use digital hand-helds and avoid the compression artifacts of cellphones.

Compared to even the more expensive music formats where there are high-cost talents and greater promotional costs, all-news is much more expensive than music format.

 

[NewsStud]

You seem to think music radio has zero expenses. Not true.

Hardly what I said at all. I said the all-news format, or a radio news operation (on, say, a news-talk format or even a small town full-service station) designed to be a market frontrunner (not merely one or two people reading the newspaper headlines) is a very expensive format to build and grow, because it takes more people, more equipment and more time than a music format. These are all investments and today's big radio operators aren't all that interested in something that doesn't bring instant big results for spending that much to start.

Most news stations restrict themselves to sound that gets handed to them: A number on a press release to call. Or a staged event. Radio is overly obsessed with sound bites anyway. Real people are more concerned with basic information and few sound bites add real information to a story. All sound bites add is "listen to us; we've got sound."

You've just described why radio news on the cheap sounds horrible: Canned soundbites or a spokesperson reading a prepared statement, likely over the phone. No use of on-the-scene production quality (natural sound, eyewitnesses, or even - dare I say it? - a talented reporter's ability to describe the scene to his or her radio audience.) No enterprising efforts. Always playing "catch-up" to the local TV stations or newspapers. How many times in the past decade have we heard a radio newsreader play a piece of sound and needing to credit their "coverage partner" SuperNewsLocalChannel 33, or something?

 

[Oscar Madison]

Hardly what I said at all. I said the all-news format, or a radio news operation (on, say, a news-talk format or even a small town full-service station) designed to be a market frontrunner (not merely one or two people reading the newspaper headlines) is a very expensive format to build and grow, because it takes more people, more equipment and more time than a music format. These are all investments and today's big radio operators aren't all that interested in something that doesn't bring instant big results for spending that much to start.

You've just described why radio news on the cheap sounds horrible: Canned soundbites or a spokesperson reading a prepared statement, likely over the phone. No use of on-the-scene production quality (natural sound, eyewitnesses, or even - dare I say it? - a talented reporter's ability to describe the scene to his or her radio audience.) No enterprising efforts. Always playing "catch-up" to the local TV stations or newspapers. How many times in the past decade have we heard a radio newsreader play a piece of sound and needing to credit their "coverage partner" SuperNewsLocalChannel 33, or something?

You put your finer on an essential issue. The "failed stations" mentioned in the original post, those not mentioned, plus almost all all news stations launched in the past 40 years were not "designed to be market forerunners. The whole purpose of NIS, AP All News, CNN All News (both versions) was to make all news a cheap format to execute. Add to that the former "forerunners" too often "sound cheap" in precisely the way you described (Exhibit A: KYW).

Question is: The "forerunner" qualities as you describe them, are they something real people listeners notice or even care about? For the most part, I doubt it. In the real world, all news radio is like a light switch. You turn it on and don't think about it unless it doesn't work. For many people all news radio is the regular pattern of news-weather-traffic-sports, the sound of a calm human voice, the clatter of a teletype machine retired decades ago and just making sure the world didn't blow up during the night. Only radio geeks notice slick production. Who cares if a TV station got a sound-bite (especially if the TV station carries or carried the same call letters)?

And "enterprising efforts?" Never happen. Radio (and TV) get news from press releases or at staged events. Any enterprising still being done is done by newspaper reporters and radio stations get it off the wire. Radio "reporters" grab the wire copy or the press release and then go out to where nothing is happening to do guy in a diner interviews. Broadcast news is not about reporting, it's about appearing to report.

 

[NewsStud]

You put your finer on an essential issue. The "failed stations" mentioned in the original post, those not mentioned, plus almost all all news stations launched in the past 40 years were not "designed to be market forerunners. The whole purpose of NIS, AP All News, CNN All News (both versions) was to make all news a cheap format to execute. Add to that the former "forerunners" too often "sound cheap" in precisely the way you described (Exhibit A: KYW).

Question is: The "forerunner" qualities as you describe them, are they something real people listeners notice or even care about? For the most part, I doubt it. In the real world, all news radio is like a light switch. You turn it on and don't think about it unless it doesn't work. For many people all news radio is the regular pattern of news-weather-traffic-sports, the sound of a calm human voice, the clatter of a teletype machine retired decades ago and just making sure the world didn't blow up during the night. Only radio geeks notice slick production. Who cares if a TV station got a sound-bite (especially if the TV station carries or carried the same call letters)?

And "enterprising efforts?" Never happen. Radio (and TV) get news from press releases or at staged events. Any enterprising still being done is done by newspaper reporters and radio stations get it off the wire. Radio "reporters" grab the wire copy or the press release and then go out to where nothing is happening to do guy in a diner interviews. Broadcast news is not about reporting, it's about appearing to report.

Frontrunner, not forerunner. Meaning the top dog, big name, etc. And while a syndicated format (NIS, et. al.) was intended to be "cheap news" it was only intended to be cheap for the affiliate to run. NBC did not "cheap out" on NIS at all. NIS taught us that a syndicated news formats often don't work because they're usually put on as cheap filler on a bad signal or in off-hours. But as for local all-news stations launched in the past 40 (or five) years, all of their owners had big dreams for them. They all saw WTOP-style revenues in their sleep. But then they learned how much money, people, and time it would cost and they all said "neh."

There have been great all-news experiments in recent years. Probably one of the most determined and least discussed was KTAR in Phoenix. They did everything right; hired a big staff of talented reporters, editors, etc. They were on FM. They were backed by a Bonneville, a believer in the all-news and news-heavy formats (Heck, they owned WTOP at the time and still own KSL and KIRO). But after a few years, it wasn't turning the profits they had hoped, and so they backed out of the format into news-talk. But they didn't try it out saying "well, maybe a few people will listen." They went for the gold. Radio One gave it a try in Houston and also called it quits after two years.

News formats take longer than that to build into the WTOP behemoths.

I also was not talking about "sleek production" for the sake of radio geeks. I was talking about the element of well-done production, the sound of a reporter on the scene, which adds a depth to the journalism being done on radio. Creative use of sound to tell a story, and the like. Smart writing. Reading wire copy and playing the canned cut might be "telling the story" in the basic sense, but it does nothing to generate interest of the listener in the story, and in your station. If you listen to those "big dogs" you'll hear it in there.

And I'm quite saddened you think broadcast news is so shallow. Perhaps when all you do is read the wire, then I suppose all you do is "appear to be reporting." In the big newsrooms, where money is spent on people and product, you actually have real journalism in progress. A good hunk of it will be "news of the day" stuff and the more local you go, the more you are likely to rely on the police blotter. But there are radio news outfits which do original reporting, and might even break a story here and there. Might not be Watergate, but you have people who work in radio news who are excellent beat reporters who have scooped the wire guys, the newspaper guys and even the TV guys.

It appears you and I have great deal different view on radio news. I'm not sure what you do or for how long you've done it, but I hope you enjoy working in radio news. I've dedicated my adult life to it. It's been a thrill ride and then some.

 

[Oscar Madison]

Frontrunner, not forerunner. Meaning the top dog, big name, etc. And while a syndicated format (NIS, et. al.) was intended to be "cheap news" it was only intended to be cheap for the affiliate to run. NBC did not "cheap out" on NIS at all. NIS taught us that a syndicated news formats often don't work because they're usually put on as cheap filler on a bad signal or in off-hours. But as for local all-news stations launched in the past 40 (or five) years, all of their owners had big dreams for them. They all saw WTOP-style revenues in their sleep. But then they learned how much money, people, and time it would cost and they all said "neh."

There have been great all-news experiments in recent years. Probably one of the most determined and least discussed was KTAR in Phoenix. They did everything right; hired a big staff of talented reporters, editors, etc. They were on FM. They were backed by a Bonneville, a believer in the all-news and news-heavy formats (Heck, they owned WTOP at the time and still own KSL and KIRO). But after a few years, it wasn't turning the profits they had hoped, and so they backed out of the format into news-talk. But they didn't try it out saying "well, maybe a few people will listen." They went for the gold. Radio One gave it a try in Houston and also called it quits after two years.

News formats take longer than that to build into the WTOP behemoths.

I also was not talking about "sleek production" for the sake of radio geeks. I was talking about the element of well-done production, the sound of a reporter on the scene, which adds a depth to the journalism being done on radio. Creative use of sound to tell a story, and the like. Smart writing. Reading wire copy and playing the canned cut might be "telling the story" in the basic sense, but it does nothing to generate interest of the listener in the story, and in your station. If you listen to those "big dogs" you'll hear it in there.

And I'm quite saddened you think broadcast news is so shallow. Perhaps when all you do is read the wire, then I suppose all you do is "appear to be reporting." In the big newsrooms, where money is spent on people and product, you actually have real journalism in progress. A good hunk of it will be "news of the day" stuff and the more local you go, the more you are likely to rely on the police blotter. But there are radio news outfits which do original reporting, and might even break a story here and there. Might not be Watergate, but you have people who work in radio news who are excellent beat reporters who have scooped the wire guys, the newspaper guys and even the TV guys.

It appears you and I have great deal different view on radio news. I'm not sure what you do or for how long you've done it, but I hope you enjoy working in radio news. I've dedicated my adult life to it. It's been a thrill ride and then some.

I get that your dedicated. Anybody not a complete cynic would, according to the theory of cognitive dissonance, have to believe in what they do. According to a fundamental principle of common law, silence implies consent. I'm not going to try to argue with or persuade you but I'm not going to pretend to agree with what you say (basically the industry line). I no longer work in broadcast news. Heck, I can barely stand to listen to it.

At the root of the problem is you all spend too much time focus on each other and not nearly enough focused on your audiences, and their lack of satisfaction with your output.

FTR: WTOP was established as an all news station under the ownership of the Washington Post. Bonneville is owned by the Mormon Church, which IMHO colors their operations. They also flipped KIRO from all news. The all news station in Seattle now is KOMO, owned by the highly disreputable Sinclair Broadcasting.

Now that almost anybody has access to "the wire" on their desktop or smartphone, it will become apparent when a "stand up" commentary is a light rewrite of a wire story.