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WOYK - no, WHP just as bad...

R

Rip Tide

Guest
So, I'm on my way to church Sunday a.m. listening to news/talk leader WHP 580. The 9:30 a.m news break comes on and Lynne Richarde tells me that Phil saw his shadow this morning (huh?) and some other news story that I don't recall because I'm thinking to myself that I remembered seeing video on Saturday of that very event. She closed by saying more news at 10:00.

So, fast forward to 12:30 p.m., I'm now leaving church and the bottom of the hour news break comes on and Lynne Richarde tells me that Phil saw his shadow this morning (huh?) and some other (but the same) news story that I don't recall because I'm thinking to myself that this is just wrong. She closed by saying more news at 10:00!

Come on, I can't be the only one who thinks this is completely unacceptable. What, news/talk leader but only M-F with R.J. and Durgin?

Or, maybe I was actually living Bill Murray's life in Groundhog Day?
 
Stations such as this aren't news leaders, news updaters or anything close. They are pretenders where everything is mostly rip-and-read. The people employed at these facilties aren't broadcast journalists, not having the skills to update and write news. The bottom line is they don't have the qualified staff, and, management doesn't care to or have the funds to pay experienced people in this field. It's outfits like WOYK and WHP which have desecrated the business, forcing many qaulified people out and into other arenas. :-\
 
Pastywhitethighs said:
Sounds like someone's a little upset about six more weeks of winter!
Click to expand...
Not at all. I'm living in an area where the temps are in the 70s! :)
 
Name one other station in Harrisburg that does news every hour and sometimes the half hour (be it national or local) all day. I guess by default they're the news leader. They also tout that you spell "news" in the capitol region W-H-P. I guess they also spell it O-O-P-S.
 
I think problem does go much higher than two AM stations in central PA. I think we call it humanity.

I can reference a handful of times in January that FNR and ABC's national feeds have had major flubs (including Bill Vitka flat out not having a newscast and saying "I apologize...there was a newscast here somewhere.")

I think we often forget how many times any station figuratively swings the bat. When they make contact, so to speak, being the professionals we are, we don't see that as much more than someone doing their job. When anyone on-air crashes and burns, we (or at least speaking for myself) wonder aloud how that person could make such an error. I'm better than that! we may think...or even post without saying so much.

An error (whether it be a mispronounciation, dead air, flat out bad programming, etc) isn't the end of the world. While not making it permissable, I think our standards exceed what the normal listener would expect.

Yes, WHP seemingly repeated a :30 newscast that last aired Saturday several times. Truly a nasty error...but to use that instance to describe their entire product I find irresponsible.

Worthy of criticism? Absolutely...but don't forget to be there when a traffic report got you out of what may be a nasty mess on the South Bridge, a weather report that helped you plan your weekend b-b-q appropriately, or a newscast that told you Vince Fumo was paying about 4% of what he should have in property taxes on his $6 million mansion...allegedly.

Perhaps we should start tuning in the overnights on every station and point out each ill-timed segue, wrong voice track, and second of dead air.

Then again, we could just turn off every radio station: no swings equal no mistakes.
 
However, the person in charge of this so-called :30, outdated, never-updated newscast should have caught the problem and had it corrected. That defines a great news department versus an average one. Or, should I even use news department at all? Most of these are now one or two people operations. Thanks again, CC, Cumulus and Citadel. :'(
 
A great news department compared to an average one? Really? So a great newspaper never runs an advertisement from the previous week accidentially, or misidentifies someone in a picture? You act as if everything still broadcast live. Dude, it's 2008...it sucks but name me a similar market that has someone doing all content live anymore. Don't blame CC, ***, or Cit, either. While they certainly lead the way, even your mom and pops have no choice but to do the same.

Are there any "great" news departments left? KYW & KDKA top my PA list. Why? Because they have more people? Because they have history? Because they are "major" market? By that logic, I want you to grade small market stations by the same bar...they are even slimmer staffed, so they must suck.

Our industry relies heavily on technology. When something goes wrong, most times we don't know it until it's already passed our ear drums...and is off into space. The problem can be rectified, but the damage is done.

I think you need to reevaluate your defination of a "great" news department, my friend. Judge it on consistency & content...not a glitch you heard.
 
Truly, the only persons who keep WHP together are R.J. Harris and Tom Donovan.

Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Durgin, Sean Hannity, and Michael Savage....an exhausting line-up. I keep hearing the same thing 3 times a day...I'm a conservative and I become tired. I remember the nights when I'd listen to Bruce Williams and he'd treat callers as friends.

Clear Channel is quite possibly the worst thing that could ever happen to Central PA radio. They STILL insist on playing those "free laptop" commercials which undermine the integrity of their stations and treat their listeners as if they are stupid.
 
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