The OMW Glossary

As we hit update #100 for Ohio Media Watch, it's sort of a milestone for us. (And we now officially don't dismiss anyone who says we just can't shut up.) So we thought we'd provide a glossary to some of the regular abbreviations, terms and names we use here.

OMW - Ohio Media Watch.
(And frankly, if you can't figure that one out, you're better off not reading!)

Broadcast Facilities:

CC World Domination HQ in Independence - 6200 Oak Tree Blvd., Fourth Floor, in the Cleveland suburb of Independence. The home of Clear Channel's Cleveland cluster (WTAM/1100, WGAR/99.5, WMJI/105.7, WMVX/106.5, WAKS/96.5). Secondary reference: "on Oak Tree".

Freedom Avenue - The Akron/Canton sister of the CC World Domination HQ, so named due to its location on Freedom Avenue in North Canton (actually, Jackson Township), Stark County (WKDD/98.1, WHLO/640, WARF/1350, with WJER/101.7 and AM 1450 to move up from New Philadelphia at some point). The facility's tall STL tower is visible from I-77, just north of the Portage Avenue exit.

Broadcast Park - The facilities of MediaCom's WNIR/100.1 and WJMP/1520, both licensed to Kent, but targetting the Akron market. Route 59 between Kent and Ravenna, across from a Wal-Mart, and just behind a trailer park which merited a controversial Akron Beacon Journal series a while back.

Akron Radio Center - The Rubber City Radio facilities on West Market Street in Akron (WAKR/1590, WQMX/94.9, WONE/97.5).

Reserve Square - The downtown Cleveland office/condo/apartment complex which houses Raycom's WOIO/19 (CBS) and WUAB/43 (UPN). Last we knew, the WOIO/WUAB facilities were mostly in the basement of that building, a couple of blocks from the Cleveland Greyhound terminal.

Other Terms:

Mighty Blog of Fun(tm) - What you're reading now. Tongue in cheek, as pretty much everything we do is.

The Land of Glunt, Glunt World, etc. - The Mahoning Valley's Beacon Broadcasting, Inc., a frequent OMW obsession, owned now officially by Warren steel supply magnate Harold Glunt. WANR/1570 Warren, WEXC/107.1 Greenville PA and WGRP/940 Greenville PA are under the company's official control, and Glunt has applied to purchase (on his own) WLOA/1470 Farrell PA and WRTK/1540 Niles, and is already operating 1470. But if you're a regular reader, you know all of that already, and could probably win a trip to Hawaii if it was a game show trivia question.

Afternoon motormouth Mike Trivisonno - We're still looking, but we're fairly sure Ohio law requires us to preface any mention of the WTAM afternoon drive talk host with this phrase. They'll have to amend the law if Triv ever leaves afternoons.

The Pain Feeler - Colloquial for the Cleveland market's major daily newspaper, the Plain Dealer. (Feel lucky we haven't yet used colloquial terms for the Akron and Canton newspapers.)

Sphere of Influence - OMW covers radio, TV and other media in the area generally considered Northeast Ohio. That "sphere of influence" generally extends as far as roughly Mansfield/Ashland on the southwest end, Lorain/Elyria on the northwest end, the Pennsylvania counties attached to the Youngstown/Warren market on the east end, and pretty much anything in between. We'll reach towards Sandusky and Toledo, but not usually in much detail. We'll mention big stuff in Columbus, Cincinnati and Dayton, but pretty much, we cover anything in the Cleveland, Akron, Canton and Youngstown/Warren markets and nearby. We have a map in our heads about what we generally cover, and if we ever become handy with a mapping program, we'll post it.