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Would like to see more STATIONS OFFERING ALL NEWS
- Thread starter joshzz
- Start date
I share you "dream". When I made the choice of getting out of the business a number of years ago, the one job that would have kept me would have been news director/journalist but even then what had appeared to be a growing trend (news on the radio with local news staff) was already beginning to wilt.
News is an expensive, intensive function. ALL NEWS is ULTRA expensive. Few sales people/managers have a vision for selling news done at that level. (I'm not sure there is an adequate supply of news people who really understand how to make it viable.) I was able to do news at a professional grade, but needed to attach at that age to a mentor who understood the genre. I didn't know where to find him/her.
News is an expensive, intensive function. ALL NEWS is ULTRA expensive. Few sales people/managers have a vision for selling news done at that level. (I'm not sure there is an adequate supply of news people who really understand how to make it viable.) I was able to do news at a professional grade, but needed to attach at that age to a mentor who understood the genre. I didn't know where to find him/her.
KYW-AM 1060 is a great example for anyone to follow -- would be nice to see in other markets. I've talked to my friends in radio that live in other major markets and perceive a station that does news and then broadcasts the talk junk as a news station..
I tell them no, no, no! ...... That's not news... When did it become that people perceive Limbaugh or any of the other talk show hosts as newsmakers?
News is objective reporting... What talk hosts offer is not at all objective .
I tell them no, no, no! ...... That's not news... When did it become that people perceive Limbaugh or any of the other talk show hosts as newsmakers?
News is objective reporting... What talk hosts offer is not at all objective .
Goat Rodeo Cowboy said:
Several problems:
- It's too expensive for anything other than the largest markets, where all-news stations already exist.
- It has to be on a full-market signal. That means on a Class B/C FM or a 50 kW AM.
- With maybe a very few exceptions, only CBS, Westinghouse before the merger, and Bonneville have been successful with this format. If they were going to expand all-news into other markets, they would have done so 20 years ago.
- The listeners are aging so the ratings will start dropping in the next few years. Moving to FM is a short-term solution.
- There are better ways to get immediate news, with the exception of when one is in the car and radio is pretty much all you have.
All-news radio is too expensive....but a constantly-updated all news podcast is not.
Our friends in local cable news, like the local Time Warner TV operations, record new segments and drop them in in place of older segments.
So it's not that hard to imagine a 20 minute play-on-demand newscast that consists of local and national news elements, along with weather, sports and traffic (for those markets that need it) and a closing feature of some kind.
Stack the individual elements in software, one after the next, and render them into a single file that is automatically uploaded to the website or e-mailed to those who want it.
New weather forecast? Swap it for the old one and re-render.
Breaking story? Same thing.
Staff requirements are much, much smaller. This could be done with a medium-market newsroom. On a more limited schedule, even a two or three person newsroom could do this.
The fallacy of the all-news argument is that over-the-air radio is the only way to achieve this. It's possible, especially if in-car wi-fi becomes widespread, that on-demand audio will become a very viable business.
Most folks spend 20-30 minutes commuting anyway.
Our friends in local cable news, like the local Time Warner TV operations, record new segments and drop them in in place of older segments.
So it's not that hard to imagine a 20 minute play-on-demand newscast that consists of local and national news elements, along with weather, sports and traffic (for those markets that need it) and a closing feature of some kind.
Stack the individual elements in software, one after the next, and render them into a single file that is automatically uploaded to the website or e-mailed to those who want it.
New weather forecast? Swap it for the old one and re-render.
Breaking story? Same thing.
Staff requirements are much, much smaller. This could be done with a medium-market newsroom. On a more limited schedule, even a two or three person newsroom could do this.
The fallacy of the all-news argument is that over-the-air radio is the only way to achieve this. It's possible, especially if in-car wi-fi becomes widespread, that on-demand audio will become a very viable business.
Most folks spend 20-30 minutes commuting anyway.
wgn is a great example. Its News and talk.
GREAT news and if there need be expanded coverage - that's what happens. If not, then other topics are covered. The Toyota story today, the weather, Obama's state of the union, the Il race for Governor, and lots of topics too, so it moves.
Its not only "dry news" like wbbm - it's "lighter" "faster" - a more broad appeal. It can also be funny or emotional (local Haiti connection) after the news traffic weather.
It's "happier" and more interesting npr. I find npr too suburban and liberal focused. WGN is seldom one sided "political" and generally does NOT favor one side in an issue. Usually, 2 sides of the story are respected.
Callers are an additional element. Not too many - but just for flavor. The hosts generally do not argue w/callers.
"Joe from Skokie, youre on wgn." The caller speaks. If the points are relevant, the host may ask the caller a question, or expand the topic. If the caller is a doofus or too opinionated, the host may say, "thanks Joe" and Joe is gone - and on to the next call. No big deal.
The whole thing is a great system. It moves, the elements are all there, and it's not really ever boring. WGN has been doing this since the mid 60's.
To me, WBBM/WCBS sound like over chewed turkey on Thanksgiving. DRY! WLS is too right wing opinionated (even though I AM a conservative), don't flaunt it.
I find KMOX and WGN to be a much better presentation.
GREAT news and if there need be expanded coverage - that's what happens. If not, then other topics are covered. The Toyota story today, the weather, Obama's state of the union, the Il race for Governor, and lots of topics too, so it moves.
Its not only "dry news" like wbbm - it's "lighter" "faster" - a more broad appeal. It can also be funny or emotional (local Haiti connection) after the news traffic weather.
It's "happier" and more interesting npr. I find npr too suburban and liberal focused. WGN is seldom one sided "political" and generally does NOT favor one side in an issue. Usually, 2 sides of the story are respected.
Callers are an additional element. Not too many - but just for flavor. The hosts generally do not argue w/callers.
"Joe from Skokie, youre on wgn." The caller speaks. If the points are relevant, the host may ask the caller a question, or expand the topic. If the caller is a doofus or too opinionated, the host may say, "thanks Joe" and Joe is gone - and on to the next call. No big deal.
The whole thing is a great system. It moves, the elements are all there, and it's not really ever boring. WGN has been doing this since the mid 60's.
To me, WBBM/WCBS sound like over chewed turkey on Thanksgiving. DRY! WLS is too right wing opinionated (even though I AM a conservative), don't flaunt it.
I find KMOX and WGN to be a much better presentation.
A WCBS/WINS/WBBM/KNX style all newser is just not financially practical below the largest markets - top 10, basically.
Several medium market stations tried "all-news" formats using CNN Headline News or AP All-News Radio as their off-drive fill. Both are now gone, though I think CNN Headline News was still offered in audio form by WW1 for a while before they became HLN...but with the talk-heavy evening slot, it withered away.
We have a medium market station around here that offers an "all-news" 24/7 audio stream on its website (Rubber City Radio/WAKR Akron's "WAKRNewsNow"). It runs the on-air live newscasts during weekdays/Sat. AM, several features repeated from the morning local newsblock, and other original content (long-form reports, etc.). It is not aired on any of the broadcast signals.
Several medium market stations tried "all-news" formats using CNN Headline News or AP All-News Radio as their off-drive fill. Both are now gone, though I think CNN Headline News was still offered in audio form by WW1 for a while before they became HLN...but with the talk-heavy evening slot, it withered away.
We have a medium market station around here that offers an "all-news" 24/7 audio stream on its website (Rubber City Radio/WAKR Akron's "WAKRNewsNow"). It runs the on-air live newscasts during weekdays/Sat. AM, several features repeated from the morning local newsblock, and other original content (long-form reports, etc.). It is not aired on any of the broadcast signals.
Remember how NOAA Weather Radio replaced real people with computer voices and then more human sounding voices? Perhaps that could be the saving grace of news radio, just input continuous wire stories and traffic updates and let the computer take it away. Sounds sad but it wouldn't be as expensive. There just wouldn't be any live reports I suppose, just rip and reading from the wires.
Maybe they could hook up some text-to-speech software to read off some RSS feeds?
Shoot, at that, I've seen websites where you can do a bunch of different voices and accents for text-to-speech. Might be weeks before listeners recognized it's not people.
Shoot, at that, I've seen websites where you can do a bunch of different voices and accents for text-to-speech. Might be weeks before listeners recognized it's not people.
Ahhhh...! Life in the 21st Century. Commute 90 minutes sitting in a cubicle on four wheels, spend the day sitting in a cubicle like a cow in a stall at a factory-farm dairy, escape for a few minutes to eat factory food in a fast food cubicle covered in gaudy Plexiglas signs. And I turn on the radio in the afternoon as I finally get my arms wrapped around the day's workload and instead of automated voice-tracked tripe, now I am going to get news, untouched by human hands or vocal chords, springing forth from a computer chip giving me some kind of rundown on the activities of mankind.... referred to by the old timers as "NEWS".
Wandering around inside my head is this troublesome thought: when every radio station has dismissed the very last human being on staff, and every newspaper has wired the Internet into their printing press and cut out all employees.... I'm stupid enough to wonder: WHO is going to gather and wash and grind-up the news that we think is going to eternally flow down the Internet into our voice simulation device and our 24/7 printing press that never needs adjusting, lubricating and cleaning.
Wandering around inside my head is this troublesome thought: when every radio station has dismissed the very last human being on staff, and every newspaper has wired the Internet into their printing press and cut out all employees.... I'm stupid enough to wonder: WHO is going to gather and wash and grind-up the news that we think is going to eternally flow down the Internet into our voice simulation device and our 24/7 printing press that never needs adjusting, lubricating and cleaning.
"They" will do it. Probably two guys.Goat Rodeo Cowboy said:
Sadly there are only about a dozen all-news stations in the U.S. and only two in Canada. They are:
WCBS and WINS...NYC
KNX...LA
WBBM...Chicago
KCBS...San Francisco
WTOP...Washington
KYW...Philadelphia
WBZ...Boston (talk at night)
WWJ...Detroit
KOMO...Seattle
KQV...Pittsburgh (talk nights and weekends)
CFTR...Toronto
CKWX...Vancouver
In the last couple of months we lost KFWB LA, one of the first stations in the format, and CINF Montreal which was all-news in French. Mexico City has a couple of all-news stations and Cuba has Radio Reloj, heard on several frequencies in the U.S. at night.
For some reason, all-news stations are not successful in any Sunbelt market other than KNX, no matter how large. CBS has tried TWICE to make 1080 KRLD Dallas into an all-news station. There's no all-news station in such large markets as Houston, Atlanta, Miami, Phoenix, San Diego, Tampa or Orlando. Some of those markets had all-news at one time. The audience didn't support them.
But in large, non-Sunbelt markets, all-news is very successful. WCBS and WINS are the top two AM stations in NYC. In morning drive, WINS is #1 and WCBS is #2. WTOP is usually #1 in Washington. CFTR is the top AM station in Toronto. KYW is usually #2 in Philadelphia.
I also wonder if more stations should sound like WINS? They run a 20 minute news cycle, not 30 as the others. That gives you three times per hour to hear the top stories. And these days, with virtually no music on AM, I think the tele-type machine sound effects in the background quickly tell the casual listener they've tuned to the all-news station, not unlike most TV outlets keeping a small logo in the corner of the screen so you automatically know what channel you're watching.
I really can't imagine living in a large market and not having a radio station giving me traffic and weather every ten minutes. What if a tanker truck overturns on a major highway outside of drivetime? Most talk stations, even the largest, run syndicated shows after morning drive where every local minute is given to commercials except for a brief newscast at the top of the hour. If they first find out that a mjaor interstate is shut down at ten minutes after the hour, will they cut into Rush or Savage or Hannity to tell us this? Or will we have to wait 50 minutes for them to include it in their next newscast? How many motorists tuned to news-talk stations drive right into traffic jams because they don't get frequent traffic updates outside the morning show?
What is it about Sunbelt markets that they don't care about news enough to support an all-news station? In many Sunbelt markets, even the one news-talk station struggles in the ratings sometimes. They get in the car and don't care about anything but their country music or their Top 40 hits? And if they do listen to news-talk, they're content with having Rush or Hannity tell them everything they need to know?
Gregg
[email protected]
WCBS and WINS...NYC
KNX...LA
WBBM...Chicago
KCBS...San Francisco
WTOP...Washington
KYW...Philadelphia
WBZ...Boston (talk at night)
WWJ...Detroit
KOMO...Seattle
KQV...Pittsburgh (talk nights and weekends)
CFTR...Toronto
CKWX...Vancouver
In the last couple of months we lost KFWB LA, one of the first stations in the format, and CINF Montreal which was all-news in French. Mexico City has a couple of all-news stations and Cuba has Radio Reloj, heard on several frequencies in the U.S. at night.
For some reason, all-news stations are not successful in any Sunbelt market other than KNX, no matter how large. CBS has tried TWICE to make 1080 KRLD Dallas into an all-news station. There's no all-news station in such large markets as Houston, Atlanta, Miami, Phoenix, San Diego, Tampa or Orlando. Some of those markets had all-news at one time. The audience didn't support them.
But in large, non-Sunbelt markets, all-news is very successful. WCBS and WINS are the top two AM stations in NYC. In morning drive, WINS is #1 and WCBS is #2. WTOP is usually #1 in Washington. CFTR is the top AM station in Toronto. KYW is usually #2 in Philadelphia.
I also wonder if more stations should sound like WINS? They run a 20 minute news cycle, not 30 as the others. That gives you three times per hour to hear the top stories. And these days, with virtually no music on AM, I think the tele-type machine sound effects in the background quickly tell the casual listener they've tuned to the all-news station, not unlike most TV outlets keeping a small logo in the corner of the screen so you automatically know what channel you're watching.
I really can't imagine living in a large market and not having a radio station giving me traffic and weather every ten minutes. What if a tanker truck overturns on a major highway outside of drivetime? Most talk stations, even the largest, run syndicated shows after morning drive where every local minute is given to commercials except for a brief newscast at the top of the hour. If they first find out that a mjaor interstate is shut down at ten minutes after the hour, will they cut into Rush or Savage or Hannity to tell us this? Or will we have to wait 50 minutes for them to include it in their next newscast? How many motorists tuned to news-talk stations drive right into traffic jams because they don't get frequent traffic updates outside the morning show?
What is it about Sunbelt markets that they don't care about news enough to support an all-news station? In many Sunbelt markets, even the one news-talk station struggles in the ratings sometimes. They get in the car and don't care about anything but their country music or their Top 40 hits? And if they do listen to news-talk, they're content with having Rush or Hannity tell them everything they need to know?
Gregg
[email protected]
D
DX
Guest
All-news took root in most of those markets in the 1960's and '70's, when A.M. radio listening was still high, and people got "hooked" on the format. Kids listening in the car as dad was tuned to the all-news station had the all-news "bug" indelibly planted into their psyches. So, when those kids became responsible adults with professional jobs they almost inevitably migrated to the all-news station.
And it just happens the two companies with the inclination to do highly-expensive all-news (CBS and Westinghouse Broadcasting, Group W) happened to have mainly 50-kilowatt, blow-torch, radio stations in cities such as New York and Chicago. (But interestingly, not Washington... WTOP evolved from being a Washington Post-owned station to its current ownership, Bonneville International, the Mormons. Although NBC did attempt all-news there for some years.)
Which brings us to the second point: Demographic factors. Most Sunbelt markets (especially Dixie) are split between substantial working-class Caucasian populations and significant African-American populations. With some exceptions, you don't have the sizable upper middle-class populations, mostly white but some black.
Upper middle-class professionals represent the core for all-news listening. Only in New York City - with its massive size - could you indefinitely sustain a second all-news station with a more blue-collar focus (1010 WINS).
Working-class white folks listen to country and some rock formats, and have migrated, obviously, to conservative talk. Black listeners had urban music stations that, in many respects, functioned as "full-service" stations (WDIA Memphis even did farm reports for listeners in the Mississippi Delta).
The smaller professional class populations in the South are ardent supporters of public radio. That's why some state-based public broadcasting networks are so strong in some Southern states (Alabama).
For all these reasons, attempts at all-news radio (or even talk stations with substantial news blocks) have generally languished in the South. The best you can hope for is something like WWL / New Orleans or WSB / Atlanta, monster signals with decent news departments.
Late attempts to start all-news in markets not accustomed to the format can suck up Millions of dollars with little hope of payback. Even in cosmopolitan markets such as Montreal, where all-news start-ups in both English and French imploded. Of course there, you had a linguistically fractionated market. Plus, the "serious" listeners - both Anglophones and Francophones - have long listened to public radio: the CBC, Radio-Canada.
Cuba's all-news stations in the Radio Reloj network of course don't have to worry about making a buck. From my listening, Radio Reloj is a Spanish-equivalent of what Gordon McLendon did with first XETRA Tijuana (San Diego) and then W-NUS Chicago in the early 1960's: Rip-and-read news with time-checks every minute or every other minute. No outside reports.
And it just happens the two companies with the inclination to do highly-expensive all-news (CBS and Westinghouse Broadcasting, Group W) happened to have mainly 50-kilowatt, blow-torch, radio stations in cities such as New York and Chicago. (But interestingly, not Washington... WTOP evolved from being a Washington Post-owned station to its current ownership, Bonneville International, the Mormons. Although NBC did attempt all-news there for some years.)
Which brings us to the second point: Demographic factors. Most Sunbelt markets (especially Dixie) are split between substantial working-class Caucasian populations and significant African-American populations. With some exceptions, you don't have the sizable upper middle-class populations, mostly white but some black.
Upper middle-class professionals represent the core for all-news listening. Only in New York City - with its massive size - could you indefinitely sustain a second all-news station with a more blue-collar focus (1010 WINS).
Working-class white folks listen to country and some rock formats, and have migrated, obviously, to conservative talk. Black listeners had urban music stations that, in many respects, functioned as "full-service" stations (WDIA Memphis even did farm reports for listeners in the Mississippi Delta).
The smaller professional class populations in the South are ardent supporters of public radio. That's why some state-based public broadcasting networks are so strong in some Southern states (Alabama).
For all these reasons, attempts at all-news radio (or even talk stations with substantial news blocks) have generally languished in the South. The best you can hope for is something like WWL / New Orleans or WSB / Atlanta, monster signals with decent news departments.
Late attempts to start all-news in markets not accustomed to the format can suck up Millions of dollars with little hope of payback. Even in cosmopolitan markets such as Montreal, where all-news start-ups in both English and French imploded. Of course there, you had a linguistically fractionated market. Plus, the "serious" listeners - both Anglophones and Francophones - have long listened to public radio: the CBC, Radio-Canada.
Cuba's all-news stations in the Radio Reloj network of course don't have to worry about making a buck. From my listening, Radio Reloj is a Spanish-equivalent of what Gordon McLendon did with first XETRA Tijuana (San Diego) and then W-NUS Chicago in the early 1960's: Rip-and-read news with time-checks every minute or every other minute. No outside reports.
Actually the explanation for lack of all-news in the South is much simpler than all the verbiage above. In a nutshell: ALL journalism schools have in their rules and regulations a prohibition for admitting any student going by the name of Bubba.
J
jhguthlac
Guest
Part of the success of a KYW, WINS, WCBS-AM is the significant amount of local news. KYW in particular covers surprisingly little international/national news. An exception, of course, was the war in Iraq while George W was president. Now you seldom hear about it.
A smaller market with less local news cannot find advertising to support the huge cost of an all-news operation.
A smaller market with less local news cannot find advertising to support the huge cost of an all-news operation.
Sunbelt cities suffer from a transient phenomenon. In other words, many people in sunbelt cities such as Phoenix, Dallas, San Diego, Las Vegas, Atlanta (to an extent) and many other markets were born somewhere else. As a result, they are less invested in the history of these communities. Not only does this mean they are less likely to care about local politics, which are a mainstay of any news format (ie, covering city hall, not just talking about political gossip), they are less likely to root for the local sports franchise, and they will probably not live here for the long term. This description does fit LA, but LA has the sheer size to support an all-news format. Conversely, cities like Detroit, NY, Philly, etc. have longtime residents who are fuly invested in their communities. This is reflected in their interest in politics, the local arts scene, and so forth. All news can florish in that environment.
buster2 said:
There is some validity in what you posted, but I want to suggest there is also some dissonance in what you said. An earlier poster suggested that Sunbelt cities have a large portion of their population that are "industrial laborers" for lack of a better term while Northern cities have a higher percentage of intellectual, educated middle management people who are better candidates to be News listeners.
I would suggest to you that Atlanta and Dallas and Houston and other Sunbelt cities are somewhat over-run with what they call "damn yankee move-ins".... and these would be in so many cases, intellectual, educated middle-management people who will be curious about understanding the economics, the history, the politics of their new place of residence. (Big companies do not normally transfer education-deprived dim-lights around.)
I would further suggest to you that many of the Rustbelt cities do not have an overabundance of news-hungry 7-th generation natives. In the years following the Great Depression and World War II, hordes and masses of non-professional southerners flocked to the factory work available in the more industrialized North.
I suspect our search for an explanation of the drought of full-time news.... actually.... drought of meaningful radio news of any kind has some major sociological foundations that so far are above our own levels of intellect and education. Hopefully, if we keep turning over rocks in our discussion, we can identify the larger foundations.
D
DX
Guest
Wonderful points.
I would only add some of those Northern transplants gravitate to public radio in the South.
I would only add some of those Northern transplants gravitate to public radio in the South.
DaveBullard said:
Gonna go with Dave here.
In fact, I think this is what Bonneville's "Federal News Radio" does in the DC Market. Anybody from DC care to elaborate? Does it work? Granted, WFED is not the market's big cahuna news leader (that would be sister WTOP), but it was designed to serve an important part of that market's population (Employees of the Federal Government).
While doing this for a general, all-appealing all-news radio station isn't ideal... I still think it could generate a loyal audience (if not a huge one) that you can sell to advertisers. Especially if the regular service elements are there. If you're automated station still draws a high cume every ten minutes for traffic and weather, people will buy spots.
We can argue that you need a sales force with the patience and foresight to let the format grow for a year in order to reap the rewards, but you also need upper echelon management to set up the sales forces' earning structure in a way that allows the sales people the time to make it work without them starving.
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