A lot of items on our plate, from all over the map, physically and topic-wise...let's have at it.
"SUMMIT" EXPANDS TO MAHONING: Akron Public Schools AAA outlet WAPS/91.3 "The Summit" is indeed, as noted in our previous item, being heard in the Mahoning Valley.
An OMW listener in WAPS' signal range reported hearing a mention of a simulcast on WKTL/90.7 Struthers, the school district owned station which puts a decent signal into most of the Valley. A Valley listener confirmed the simulcast from the Youngstown-area end.
And now, we know details.
WAPS program director Bill Gruber tells OMW about the arrangement between the Akron station and the Struthers station:
WKTL 90.7 in Struthers/Youngstown has begun carrying WAPS 91.3 The Summit’s programming during the hours and days WKTL previously would be off-the-air.
Local WKTL student-related content, and weekend nationality programs, remain on-air.
Gruber calls it "a very logical and relatively simple" cooperation between two Northeast Ohio community public radio station - allowing the WKTL student and community program to continue as is, but allowing Mahoning Valley listeners to catch the "Summit" programming when 90.7 would otherwise be silent.
Says Gruber: "This allows WKTL to operate as a 24 hour, full-time radio station for the first time ever, with a regional Akron/Canton/Youngstown focus, without the need to turn to satellite or syndicated programming."
Gruber says WAPS has already gotten E-mails from Youngstown-area listeners thankful for their new radio option...
SPEAKING OF SIMULCASTS: A format change for a North Central Ohio station has yet to be noted by this corner.
Clear Channel classic hits/oldies WSWR/100.1 Shelby, part of the company's extensive Ashland/Mansfield cluster, has become "My 100.1".
But unlike the company's Canton market WHOF/101.7 North Canton ("My 101.7"), the WSWR format has moved towards a classic rock direction. Previously, the station had run Citadel's classic hits format ("Classic Hits Radio", also known as ABC's "Oldies Radio" and ABC/SMN's "Pure Gold", one of about a half-dozen Northern Ohio stations once doing so).
And despite the frequency in the moniker, WSWR's "My 100.1" is actually a simulcast. An OMW listener reported hearing it also on WXXR/98.3 Fredericktown, which has long been part of the "Fox" rock format trimulcast. "Fox" is now down to WFXN/102.3 Galion and WXXF/107.7 Loudonville. (We haven't compared playlists to differentiate "Fox" and "My". We get the idea that "My" is a softer classic rock station than "Fox".)
Sure enough, long-time Friend and Colleague of OMW Scott Fybush at NorthEast Radio Watch confirmed and taped the legal ID for "My 100.1" on one of his recent trips through OMW Land...with WXXR on the ID and in the simulcast...
MORE GANG BACK TOGETHER: The former Clear Channel/Jacor mass gathering under Randy Michaels at Tribune has grown by one.
Former Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100 imaging director Chris Duffy has become the latest to join Tribune, taking similar duties at the company's sole radio station, WGN/720 Chicago.
Of course, any regular reader won't have to search to remember that former Clear Channel Cleveland programming VP Kevin Metheny was Duffy's ultimate programming boss at WTAM, and is now programming WGN...let alone have to search for Tribune CEO Randy Michaels' background running Clear Channel and Jacor's radio operations...
AND SPEAKING OF WTAM: We haven't asked yet, but it sounds like former WKDD/WHLO'er Matt Patrick will be back in the Saturday afternoon (4-7 PM) time slot on WTAM next week, after former Congressman-turned-con Jim Traficant's high profile show.
That's putting it mildly - high profile - as Jimbo's debut Saturday attracted a flotilla of TV cameras (and a bunch of his relatives, apparently).
Patrick's 3 hour show got no outside attention other than from the Mighty Blog of Fun(tm), but a decent number of his Akron/Canton area listeners got into the phone lines Saturday, saying they were happy he was "back on the air".
That may have been a bit confusing to Cleveland-area listeners who didn't know him from his 30 year-plus run on WKDD or his local issues talk show on WHLO, both of which ended in mid-December.
Patrick didn't explain his radio past just down I-77 from Oak Tree, though he did mention it when prompted by callers.
He assured his new audience that despite spending his radio career "20 miles south of here", he was a native Clevelander, born and raised on the East Side (either Shaker Heights or East Cleveland, we believe he said)...
Showing posts with label mansfield. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mansfield. Show all posts
Monday, January 11, 2010
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
On The Tuesday Radio Side
After an item chock full of digital TV news, it's time to expand our Tuesday diet to radio. And yes, we know. We know...the below.
KIM'S RETURN: Yes, you let us know by E-mail, by carrier pigeon, by taking out a billboard (well, almost).
That was indeed former Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100 afternoon drive co-host Kim Mihalik on her former home station over the weekend, guest hosting the Clear Channel talk station's local Browns post-game coverage on Sunday afternoon.
(WTAM airs its own post-game show after Browns games - the network post-game call-in show airs on the FM flagship, rock-but-really-talk-considering-Rover-and-Maxwell WMMS/100.7.)
It's an on-air role that until this week was filled by WTAM sports talk host/Indians beat reporter Mark Schwab, who's since left "The Big One" for the weekend sports anchor role at Raycom CBS affiliate WOIO/19's "19 Action News".
It actually wasn't Kim's first on-air appearance on her former station, where she was let go in November 2005 for "budgetary reasons".
Your Primary Editorial Voice(tm) cut down on his Triv Diet many, many months ago, so we only occasionally check in with Mike Trivisonno's WTAM afternoon drive talk fest these days.
It was by sheer accident that we hit the button for WTAM on the OMW Mobile radio Friday, and heard Mihalik good naturedly bantering back and forth (by phone) with Triv about an "embarrassing" incident back when she was on the show.
If there was any leftover animosity between the two since her departure from Oak Tree in 2005, it wasn't showing on the air at all...though we had no idea at the time that she was about to do a fill-in sports talk stint that weekend.
After leaving WTAM, Mihalik was best known for her stint on the local post-Stern/David Lee Roth CBS Radio classic rock WNCX/98.5 morning drive show with Wynn "Mud" Richards and local radio vet and OMW reader Mike Olszewski. The 'NCX morning slot is now filled by host Scott Miller and comedian Jeff Blanchard.
Kim also did some TV work for Fox Sports Ohio's "Cleveland Rants", back when that show still existed.
Is she in line for a regular return to WTAM? That's the question on readers' minds, if our E-mail is any indication.
There is an opening at 1100, after all...but would the former Triv co-host be in the consideration for Mark Schwab's former position as Indians beat reporter and sports host?
For the moment, we don't know the answer to that question - from either side of the ledger.
We get the idea that for now, at least, Mihalik is just helping out the short staffed WTAM sports department with some weekend fill-in...
SPEAKING OF SPORTS: OMW has very much covered the march of spoken word formats to the FM dial, such as news/talk and sports. We've also tried to cover the use of FM translators to provide better "fill-in" coverage for AM stations, a practice which is now officially in the FCC rules.
This one covers both.
Gunther Meisse's WRGM/1440 Ontario, the Mansfield area's ESPN Radio affiliate, has now lit up an FM signal on 97.3.
From the story (dated October 15th) on WRGM sister TV station WMFD/68's website:
Today, WRGM AM1440 has begun simulcasting on 97.3FM in Mansfield, Ontario and Lexington to over 70,000 people. This makes WRGM AM1440 / 97.3FM the First FM sports station in the market.
97.3 is legally W247BL/Crestline, a 120 watt translator Meisse's group bought from Mansfield Christian School - owners of Christian contemporary WVMC/90.7 - a while back.
The FCC has been granting special temporary authority for AM stations in certain conditions (low power or directional night signal, etc.) to use FM translators as "fill-ins" to the anemic AM signal. As of earlier this month, what had been a piecemeal policy - STA by STA - is now reality in FCC rules.
WRGM would certainly qualify, signal wise.
The 1000 watt daytime signal on 1440 is highly directional, but serviceable for most of the Mansfield area...with some notable exceptions north and east of the WRGM tower.
But there are holes-a-plenty in WRGM's 28 watt (!) nighttime signal, and many of them not at all far from the Meisse complex on Park Avenue West in Mansfield.
The 120 watt signal of W247BL/97.3 Crestline eminates from that Meisse tower on Park Avenue West, and when you consider that mono programming will eliminate "stereo flutter" on the edges of the signal, it should cover a decent chunk of the immediate Richland County area.
Meisse also owns AC WVNO/106.1 "Mix 106", as well as the aforementioned WMFD/68 and its low-power sister station/WMFD subchannel WOHZ-CA/41, which mostly features classified advertising text, weather information and WVNO's audio...
KIM'S RETURN: Yes, you let us know by E-mail, by carrier pigeon, by taking out a billboard (well, almost).
That was indeed former Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100 afternoon drive co-host Kim Mihalik on her former home station over the weekend, guest hosting the Clear Channel talk station's local Browns post-game coverage on Sunday afternoon.
(WTAM airs its own post-game show after Browns games - the network post-game call-in show airs on the FM flagship, rock-but-really-talk-considering-Rover-and-Maxwell WMMS/100.7.)
It's an on-air role that until this week was filled by WTAM sports talk host/Indians beat reporter Mark Schwab, who's since left "The Big One" for the weekend sports anchor role at Raycom CBS affiliate WOIO/19's "19 Action News".
It actually wasn't Kim's first on-air appearance on her former station, where she was let go in November 2005 for "budgetary reasons".
Your Primary Editorial Voice(tm) cut down on his Triv Diet many, many months ago, so we only occasionally check in with Mike Trivisonno's WTAM afternoon drive talk fest these days.
It was by sheer accident that we hit the button for WTAM on the OMW Mobile radio Friday, and heard Mihalik good naturedly bantering back and forth (by phone) with Triv about an "embarrassing" incident back when she was on the show.
If there was any leftover animosity between the two since her departure from Oak Tree in 2005, it wasn't showing on the air at all...though we had no idea at the time that she was about to do a fill-in sports talk stint that weekend.
After leaving WTAM, Mihalik was best known for her stint on the local post-Stern/David Lee Roth CBS Radio classic rock WNCX/98.5 morning drive show with Wynn "Mud" Richards and local radio vet and OMW reader Mike Olszewski. The 'NCX morning slot is now filled by host Scott Miller and comedian Jeff Blanchard.
Kim also did some TV work for Fox Sports Ohio's "Cleveland Rants", back when that show still existed.
Is she in line for a regular return to WTAM? That's the question on readers' minds, if our E-mail is any indication.
There is an opening at 1100, after all...but would the former Triv co-host be in the consideration for Mark Schwab's former position as Indians beat reporter and sports host?
For the moment, we don't know the answer to that question - from either side of the ledger.
We get the idea that for now, at least, Mihalik is just helping out the short staffed WTAM sports department with some weekend fill-in...
SPEAKING OF SPORTS: OMW has very much covered the march of spoken word formats to the FM dial, such as news/talk and sports. We've also tried to cover the use of FM translators to provide better "fill-in" coverage for AM stations, a practice which is now officially in the FCC rules.
This one covers both.
Gunther Meisse's WRGM/1440 Ontario, the Mansfield area's ESPN Radio affiliate, has now lit up an FM signal on 97.3.
From the story (dated October 15th) on WRGM sister TV station WMFD/68's website:Today, WRGM AM1440 has begun simulcasting on 97.3FM in Mansfield, Ontario and Lexington to over 70,000 people. This makes WRGM AM1440 / 97.3FM the First FM sports station in the market.
97.3 is legally W247BL/Crestline, a 120 watt translator Meisse's group bought from Mansfield Christian School - owners of Christian contemporary WVMC/90.7 - a while back.
The FCC has been granting special temporary authority for AM stations in certain conditions (low power or directional night signal, etc.) to use FM translators as "fill-ins" to the anemic AM signal. As of earlier this month, what had been a piecemeal policy - STA by STA - is now reality in FCC rules.
WRGM would certainly qualify, signal wise.
The 1000 watt daytime signal on 1440 is highly directional, but serviceable for most of the Mansfield area...with some notable exceptions north and east of the WRGM tower.
But there are holes-a-plenty in WRGM's 28 watt (!) nighttime signal, and many of them not at all far from the Meisse complex on Park Avenue West in Mansfield.
The 120 watt signal of W247BL/97.3 Crestline eminates from that Meisse tower on Park Avenue West, and when you consider that mono programming will eliminate "stereo flutter" on the edges of the signal, it should cover a decent chunk of the immediate Richland County area.
Meisse also owns AC WVNO/106.1 "Mix 106", as well as the aforementioned WMFD/68 and its low-power sister station/WMFD subchannel WOHZ-CA/41, which mostly features classified advertising text, weather information and WVNO's audio...
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
We're Still Here
A combination of Other Stuff and Life Intervening, along with some Unscheduled Turbulence, has kept us away from the Mighty Blog of Fun(tm) for longer than we'd expected.
Not all of that has gone away, but for now, we're back...
THE ALL HD CAVALIERS: It wasn't that long ago that viewers hoping to see HDTV broadcasts of local sports teams had to sift through a small list of selected games.
And the NBA Cleveland Cavaliers were showing as few as 7 games in HD format via Fox Sports Ohio as recently as a couple of years ago.
Not anymore.
The RSN (that's TV speak for "Regional Sports Network") unveiled its new schedule of TV games for the Only Cleveland Team That Can Aim For A Championship Without Invoking Gales of Laughter, and every single locally-telecast Cavaliers game will be in HD this season. (We'll presume all the national games will be in HD as well.)
Quoting an FSOhio release recently received here at OMW World Headquarters:
FOX Sports Ohio announced today the 2009-10 Cavaliers telecast schedule including 70 regular season games all in high definition.
FOX Sports Ohio will telecast 34 home games and 36 games from the road during the season. The network’s Emmy-award-winning coverage of the Cavs will begin Wednesday, October 28 at 7pm when the Cavs visit Toronto to take on the Raptors.
Nothing else changes at FSOhio this year. Fred McLeod, Austin Carr and sideline reporter Jeff Phelps are back, and the network continues its usual pre-game and post-game coverage.
What's being called "a select number" of games will once again be simulcast over-air by Raycom MyNetwork TV affiliate WUAB/43. That "select number" has been somewhere in the single digits as of late.
Of course, FSOhio and the Cavaliers are late to the "all HD games" party, with SportsTime Ohio pumping out all of its Indians games in HD the past couple of years...154 of them each year.
The difference?
The Indians are a few days away from packing up the clubhouse, with no shot at a World Series title...and the Cavaliers are expected, rather strongly, to contend for Cleveland's first major pro sports championship since 1964...
PROMOTION: A long-time OMW reader will be officially be even busier than he has been, which, if you're Clear Channel Akron/Canton programming operations director Keith Kennedy, is saying something.
Since now-former market manager Dan Lankford added the company's Ashland/Mansfield cluster to his oversight, Kennedy has helped out with issues related to programming and operations at the Mid-Ohio stations.
New market manager Bill Clark wasted very little time in making it official: Keith Kennedy has been promoted to regional operations director over both the Akron/Canton and Ashland/Mansfield market clusters, giving him oversight of all programming and operations issues not only at Freedom Avenue, but at...wait, let's get out the map and see what road CC's Ashland/Mansfield cluster is on...U.S. 42.
Keith continues, of course, as hands-on program director at hot AC WKDD/98.1 Munroe Falls/Akron/almost-back-on-Bellaire Lane, as afternoon on-air personality on WKDD, and with his six or seven other jobs.
The new duties in Ashland/Mansfield bring a number of stations under his watch, including talk WMAN/1400 Mansfield, talk WNCO/1340 Ashland, country WNCO-FM/101.3 Ashland, top 40 WYHT/105.3 "Y105" Mansfield, the "Fox" rock simulcast based at WFXN/102.3 Galion (-WXXR/98.3 Fredericktown-WXXF/107.7 Loudonville), and classic hits WSWR/100.1 "Cruisin' 100" Shelby.
Whew. Add those logos to the stations out of Akron/Canton - talk WHLO/640 Akron, sports WARF/1350 Akron, the aforementioned WKDD, AC WHOF/101.7 North Canton and rock WRQK/106.9 Canton - and Keith's business card would be pretty big, or the logos really tiny, if they were all on the card...
A JIMBO SURPRISE: Making our run through the local late TV newscasts on Friday, we found out that a frequent OMW Target made a guest talk radio appearance on Friday.
It took WKYC/3's Romona Robinson to tell us, after the fact, that former Mahoning Valley congressman/released convicted felon Jim Traficant filled in for Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100 Cleveland afternoon drive host Mike Trivisonno on Friday. (Really, to our sources at Oak Tree...a siren, a bat signal over the building, anything! Tell us when Jimbo's in the building!)
It was Traficant's first WTAM sub-host appearance since getting out of a federal medical prison in Minnesota. Of course, he's subbed there in the past, and filled in for sister Clear Channel talk WKBN/570's Dan Rivers not long after becoming a free man.
We got a chuckle or two out of Traficant's comments about soon-to-be-former East Cleveland mayor Eric Brewer, who was embroiled in a controversy over photos purporting to show the mayor in...women's lingerie.
That controversy was blown sky high by a report from Channel 3 News investigative reporter Tom Meyer, by the way, prompting the mayor to walk the "I'm not confirming this is me, but it was wrong to put these out!" line while excoriating Meyer and WKYC in a press conference.
Traficant joked that he was probably the last person who should be calling out a politician on his photographic appearance, given that he "uses a weed whacker to do (his) hair" (well, maybe his toupee).
And we say "soon-to-be-former East Cleveland mayor", since Brewer was overwhelmingly defeated in Tuesday's primary election.
Youngstown's Business Journal notes that Traficant was on the show of an old TV friend on Tuesday night, Fox News Channel's Sean Hannity. Quoting:
“It sounds like you’re a kook,” he said in response to Traficant’s assertions that Israel “controls much of our foreign policy.” Attempting to pin him down, Hannity called Traficant’s claims “conspiratorial nut-job stuff.”
It's quite a different response compared to past appearances on the show...
STREAMING PHONE AUDIO: It's one problem we wish would be solved - radio stations and groups are starting to recognize the viability of streaming audio to mobile devices.
But often, they turn to solutions that require a certain brand of smartphone...most notably, Apple's iPhone, and occasionally, the Blackberry platform. As cool as it is, the iPhone is not even an option for those who do not wish to become subscribers of AT&T, which would definitely include us here at the OMW World Headquarters.
That's why we like a solution being offered up by a Northeast Ohio college station.
Mount Union College's WRMU/91.1 Alliance has hooked up with the folks at AudioNow for it. Quoting a press release:
Mobile phone listeners can now listen live simply calling 330.445.7900 . No smart phones, downloads, or data plans are required. Any cell phone will work.
Now, we recognize some of the advantages of taking to the various smartphone platforms. But when you're just trying to push audio out there, this is a pretty simple solution - and we'll assume that WRMU's potential streaming audience is small enough not to max out outgoing phone lines. This sort of solution would never work for a mass appeal station like, say, a WTAM.
But as we recall, WRMU proudly broadcasts the football games of one of America's most successful small college programs, the Mount Union Purple Raiders...which would easily be the station's most popular programming...
Not all of that has gone away, but for now, we're back...
THE ALL HD CAVALIERS: It wasn't that long ago that viewers hoping to see HDTV broadcasts of local sports teams had to sift through a small list of selected games.
And the NBA Cleveland Cavaliers were showing as few as 7 games in HD format via Fox Sports Ohio as recently as a couple of years ago.
Not anymore.
The RSN (that's TV speak for "Regional Sports Network") unveiled its new schedule of TV games for the Only Cleveland Team That Can Aim For A Championship Without Invoking Gales of Laughter, and every single locally-telecast Cavaliers game will be in HD this season. (We'll presume all the national games will be in HD as well.)
Quoting an FSOhio release recently received here at OMW World Headquarters:
FOX Sports Ohio announced today the 2009-10 Cavaliers telecast schedule including 70 regular season games all in high definition.
FOX Sports Ohio will telecast 34 home games and 36 games from the road during the season. The network’s Emmy-award-winning coverage of the Cavs will begin Wednesday, October 28 at 7pm when the Cavs visit Toronto to take on the Raptors.
Nothing else changes at FSOhio this year. Fred McLeod, Austin Carr and sideline reporter Jeff Phelps are back, and the network continues its usual pre-game and post-game coverage.
What's being called "a select number" of games will once again be simulcast over-air by Raycom MyNetwork TV affiliate WUAB/43. That "select number" has been somewhere in the single digits as of late.
Of course, FSOhio and the Cavaliers are late to the "all HD games" party, with SportsTime Ohio pumping out all of its Indians games in HD the past couple of years...154 of them each year.
The difference?
The Indians are a few days away from packing up the clubhouse, with no shot at a World Series title...and the Cavaliers are expected, rather strongly, to contend for Cleveland's first major pro sports championship since 1964...
PROMOTION: A long-time OMW reader will be officially be even busier than he has been, which, if you're Clear Channel Akron/Canton programming operations director Keith Kennedy, is saying something.
Since now-former market manager Dan Lankford added the company's Ashland/Mansfield cluster to his oversight, Kennedy has helped out with issues related to programming and operations at the Mid-Ohio stations.
New market manager Bill Clark wasted very little time in making it official: Keith Kennedy has been promoted to regional operations director over both the Akron/Canton and Ashland/Mansfield market clusters, giving him oversight of all programming and operations issues not only at Freedom Avenue, but at...wait, let's get out the map and see what road CC's Ashland/Mansfield cluster is on...U.S. 42.
Keith continues, of course, as hands-on program director at hot AC WKDD/98.1 Munroe Falls/Akron/almost-back-on-Bellaire Lane, as afternoon on-air personality on WKDD, and with his six or seven other jobs.
The new duties in Ashland/Mansfield bring a number of stations under his watch, including talk WMAN/1400 Mansfield, talk WNCO/1340 Ashland, country WNCO-FM/101.3 Ashland, top 40 WYHT/105.3 "Y105" Mansfield, the "Fox" rock simulcast based at WFXN/102.3 Galion (-WXXR/98.3 Fredericktown-WXXF/107.7 Loudonville), and classic hits WSWR/100.1 "Cruisin' 100" Shelby.
Whew. Add those logos to the stations out of Akron/Canton - talk WHLO/640 Akron, sports WARF/1350 Akron, the aforementioned WKDD, AC WHOF/101.7 North Canton and rock WRQK/106.9 Canton - and Keith's business card would be pretty big, or the logos really tiny, if they were all on the card...
A JIMBO SURPRISE: Making our run through the local late TV newscasts on Friday, we found out that a frequent OMW Target made a guest talk radio appearance on Friday.
It took WKYC/3's Romona Robinson to tell us, after the fact, that former Mahoning Valley congressman/released convicted felon Jim Traficant filled in for Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100 Cleveland afternoon drive host Mike Trivisonno on Friday. (Really, to our sources at Oak Tree...a siren, a bat signal over the building, anything! Tell us when Jimbo's in the building!)
It was Traficant's first WTAM sub-host appearance since getting out of a federal medical prison in Minnesota. Of course, he's subbed there in the past, and filled in for sister Clear Channel talk WKBN/570's Dan Rivers not long after becoming a free man.
We got a chuckle or two out of Traficant's comments about soon-to-be-former East Cleveland mayor Eric Brewer, who was embroiled in a controversy over photos purporting to show the mayor in...women's lingerie.
That controversy was blown sky high by a report from Channel 3 News investigative reporter Tom Meyer, by the way, prompting the mayor to walk the "I'm not confirming this is me, but it was wrong to put these out!" line while excoriating Meyer and WKYC in a press conference.
Traficant joked that he was probably the last person who should be calling out a politician on his photographic appearance, given that he "uses a weed whacker to do (his) hair" (well, maybe his toupee).
And we say "soon-to-be-former East Cleveland mayor", since Brewer was overwhelmingly defeated in Tuesday's primary election.
Youngstown's Business Journal notes that Traficant was on the show of an old TV friend on Tuesday night, Fox News Channel's Sean Hannity. Quoting:
“It sounds like you’re a kook,” he said in response to Traficant’s assertions that Israel “controls much of our foreign policy.” Attempting to pin him down, Hannity called Traficant’s claims “conspiratorial nut-job stuff.”
It's quite a different response compared to past appearances on the show...
STREAMING PHONE AUDIO: It's one problem we wish would be solved - radio stations and groups are starting to recognize the viability of streaming audio to mobile devices.
But often, they turn to solutions that require a certain brand of smartphone...most notably, Apple's iPhone, and occasionally, the Blackberry platform. As cool as it is, the iPhone is not even an option for those who do not wish to become subscribers of AT&T, which would definitely include us here at the OMW World Headquarters.
That's why we like a solution being offered up by a Northeast Ohio college station.
Mount Union College's WRMU/91.1 Alliance has hooked up with the folks at AudioNow for it. Quoting a press release:
Mobile phone listeners can now listen live simply calling 330.445.7900 . No smart phones, downloads, or data plans are required. Any cell phone will work.
Now, we recognize some of the advantages of taking to the various smartphone platforms. But when you're just trying to push audio out there, this is a pretty simple solution - and we'll assume that WRMU's potential streaming audience is small enough not to max out outgoing phone lines. This sort of solution would never work for a mass appeal station like, say, a WTAM.
But as we recall, WRMU proudly broadcasts the football games of one of America's most successful small college programs, the Mount Union Purple Raiders...which would easily be the station's most popular programming...
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Thursday's Post
Some more things coming down the OMW Pipeline...
MANAGE THE MARKET: A day after OMW reported the exit of long-time Clear Channel Akron/Canton market manager Dan Lankford to Pennsylvania, we hear his replacement is heading for Freedom Avenue.
For the moment, we don't know the name of this mystery person, but expect the Akron/Canton cluster to have a new hand at the management wheel very soon.
The job presumably continues to include oversight of Clear Channel's Ashland/Mansfield cluster in the Mid-Ohio region...
HIGH SCHOOL HIJINKS: As we approach the All-Important Ohio High School Football Season, another Northeast Ohio TV outlet is talking about its plans to cover the games.
This time, it's SportsTime Ohio that has unveiled its 2009 HSFB coverage plans. From a network press release:
Home to the OHSAA State Championships, STO will launch its high school coverage Friday August 28th. New to the schedule will be a live 90 minute show previewing High School Football matchups from around the state. Ohio High School Kickoff Show will be hosted by Mike Cairns on Fridays from 3:30pm – 5pm and include interviews with coaches statewide.
In addition, STO will expand its High School Football coverage with a regular season game of the week. The season kicks off Saturday August 29th with a rematch of last year’s playoff battle between State Champion St. Ignatius and Glenville; ending on Halloween with the “Holy War” between St. Edward and St. Ignatius. For the 3rd consecutive year, STO will carry the OHSAA Football Playoffs and Championships.
A list of STO's currently-scheduled high school football schedule is here. Other games will be added by the week...
BUT NOT TO BE OUTDONE: When we wrote about this year's high school football schedule on Time Warner Cable's Northeast Ohio Network (NEON) local programming channel, we noted that it seemed to lean heavily upon games in the Cleveland and Canton areas, with very few Akron area contests.
Ah, that prompted a response directly from Time Warner Cable's downtown Akron offices, with local TWC VP and OMW reader Bill Jasso weighing in on our report.
Jasso assures us that Time Warner is not going to ignore high school football fans in Akron. He says the cable outlet is working to line up production of additional games from the Akron area...and for that matter, games in the western portion of the former Comcast service area...in places like Bay Village, Elyria and Lorain.
Yes, this is Northeast Ohio, and people take their high school football seriously.
Jasso tells OMW that we should hear some more about additional games later this week...
LIMA ACTIVITY: Ohio's smallest TV market is a hub of activity this month.
First, we note that the Dish Network satellite service is finally bringing "local-into-local" stations for the Lima TV market.
A quick check of the Local Channels dialog at Dish's website shows the available stations - and oddly enough, only Block Communications NBC affiliate WLIO/digital 8 is not listed. (Since we don't live in Lima, we used the studio address of WLIO - 1424 Rice Avenue, Lima, OH 45805 - to get the list.)
It's certainly odd, because all the other Lima network affiliates are on the Dish list, including ABC affilaite WLQP-LP/18, Fox affiliate WOHL-CA/25 and CBS affiliate WLMO-LP/38.
Of course, all three of those stations are now owned by Block Communications, which owns WLIO...so we don't know why WLIO is not listed on the Dish Network local channels availability page. Maybe it's a mistake. Maybe the previous owner of the LPTV outlets, Gregg Phipps, signed that deal before Block/WLIO bought the three stations.
The Lima stations - also including Bowling Green State University-owned PBS affiliate WBGU/27 and religious independent WTLW/44 - are only available in standard definition via Dish Network for now.
However, it looks like there's a lot of movement on the HDTV front in Lima, if you check out WLIO VP/engineering Frederick Vobbe's excellent WLIO Engineering blog.
There, you'll learn that Block has put on low-power Class A digital WOHL-DC/35, which now occupies the channel used by WLIO's analog signal for decades. WLIO exited channel 35 for RF channel 8, and the station also now uses channel 8 for both on-air and off-air marketing/PSIP purposes.
Vobbe's blog says the 9 kW WOHL-DC (DC for "Digital Class A") has been testing, and lit up regular programming on Monday, with a 720p HD feed of "ABC Lima" on 35.1, and a 720p HD feed of "CBS Lima" on 35.2.
Over on WLIO's 8.2, "Fox Lima" is still up, but, quoting Vobbe on his blog:
Fox (8.2) is in SD because that is what the network is sending us. We don't have a choice in that. However, we are sending out an HD signal in 720P format should they change their minds. That means that NBC, CBS, and ABC will be the only HD signals so far.
The Fox network uses something called a "Splicer" to seamlessly provide its HD feed to stations. Either they haven't sent the unit to WLIO yet, or there's some technical magic involved in making the "Splicer" work on a subchannel...since it's basically designed to manage the bandwidth on a full channel at the network level.
Fox HD can indeed be done on a subchannel, though. Maybe Mr. Vobbe should call Tom Zocolo, chief engineer at "Fox Youngstown", to see how it's being done there...with the "Fox Youngstown" HD feed riding along on WKBN's 27.2...
MANAGE THE MARKET: A day after OMW reported the exit of long-time Clear Channel Akron/Canton market manager Dan Lankford to Pennsylvania, we hear his replacement is heading for Freedom Avenue.
For the moment, we don't know the name of this mystery person, but expect the Akron/Canton cluster to have a new hand at the management wheel very soon.
The job presumably continues to include oversight of Clear Channel's Ashland/Mansfield cluster in the Mid-Ohio region...
HIGH SCHOOL HIJINKS: As we approach the All-Important Ohio High School Football Season, another Northeast Ohio TV outlet is talking about its plans to cover the games.
This time, it's SportsTime Ohio that has unveiled its 2009 HSFB coverage plans. From a network press release:
Home to the OHSAA State Championships, STO will launch its high school coverage Friday August 28th. New to the schedule will be a live 90 minute show previewing High School Football matchups from around the state. Ohio High School Kickoff Show will be hosted by Mike Cairns on Fridays from 3:30pm – 5pm and include interviews with coaches statewide.
In addition, STO will expand its High School Football coverage with a regular season game of the week. The season kicks off Saturday August 29th with a rematch of last year’s playoff battle between State Champion St. Ignatius and Glenville; ending on Halloween with the “Holy War” between St. Edward and St. Ignatius. For the 3rd consecutive year, STO will carry the OHSAA Football Playoffs and Championships.
A list of STO's currently-scheduled high school football schedule is here. Other games will be added by the week...
BUT NOT TO BE OUTDONE: When we wrote about this year's high school football schedule on Time Warner Cable's Northeast Ohio Network (NEON) local programming channel, we noted that it seemed to lean heavily upon games in the Cleveland and Canton areas, with very few Akron area contests.
Ah, that prompted a response directly from Time Warner Cable's downtown Akron offices, with local TWC VP and OMW reader Bill Jasso weighing in on our report.
Jasso assures us that Time Warner is not going to ignore high school football fans in Akron. He says the cable outlet is working to line up production of additional games from the Akron area...and for that matter, games in the western portion of the former Comcast service area...in places like Bay Village, Elyria and Lorain.
Yes, this is Northeast Ohio, and people take their high school football seriously.
Jasso tells OMW that we should hear some more about additional games later this week...
LIMA ACTIVITY: Ohio's smallest TV market is a hub of activity this month.
First, we note that the Dish Network satellite service is finally bringing "local-into-local" stations for the Lima TV market.
A quick check of the Local Channels dialog at Dish's website shows the available stations - and oddly enough, only Block Communications NBC affiliate WLIO/digital 8 is not listed. (Since we don't live in Lima, we used the studio address of WLIO - 1424 Rice Avenue, Lima, OH 45805 - to get the list.)
It's certainly odd, because all the other Lima network affiliates are on the Dish list, including ABC affilaite WLQP-LP/18, Fox affiliate WOHL-CA/25 and CBS affiliate WLMO-LP/38.
Of course, all three of those stations are now owned by Block Communications, which owns WLIO...so we don't know why WLIO is not listed on the Dish Network local channels availability page. Maybe it's a mistake. Maybe the previous owner of the LPTV outlets, Gregg Phipps, signed that deal before Block/WLIO bought the three stations.
The Lima stations - also including Bowling Green State University-owned PBS affiliate WBGU/27 and religious independent WTLW/44 - are only available in standard definition via Dish Network for now.
However, it looks like there's a lot of movement on the HDTV front in Lima, if you check out WLIO VP/engineering Frederick Vobbe's excellent WLIO Engineering blog.
There, you'll learn that Block has put on low-power Class A digital WOHL-DC/35, which now occupies the channel used by WLIO's analog signal for decades. WLIO exited channel 35 for RF channel 8, and the station also now uses channel 8 for both on-air and off-air marketing/PSIP purposes.
Vobbe's blog says the 9 kW WOHL-DC (DC for "Digital Class A") has been testing, and lit up regular programming on Monday, with a 720p HD feed of "ABC Lima" on 35.1, and a 720p HD feed of "CBS Lima" on 35.2.
Over on WLIO's 8.2, "Fox Lima" is still up, but, quoting Vobbe on his blog:
Fox (8.2) is in SD because that is what the network is sending us. We don't have a choice in that. However, we are sending out an HD signal in 720P format should they change their minds. That means that NBC, CBS, and ABC will be the only HD signals so far.
The Fox network uses something called a "Splicer" to seamlessly provide its HD feed to stations. Either they haven't sent the unit to WLIO yet, or there's some technical magic involved in making the "Splicer" work on a subchannel...since it's basically designed to manage the bandwidth on a full channel at the network level.
Fox HD can indeed be done on a subchannel, though. Maybe Mr. Vobbe should call Tom Zocolo, chief engineer at "Fox Youngstown", to see how it's being done there...with the "Fox Youngstown" HD feed riding along on WKBN's 27.2...
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
THIS JUST IN: CC Akron/Canton Market Manager To PA
OMW hears that long-time Clear Channel Akron/Canton market manager Dan Lankford has left the building at Freedom Avenue, bound for a new job in Pennsylvania.
Lankford is heading for a new job as market manager of Clear Channel's Harrisburg/Allentown PA stations. And by heading, we mean he's expected to start today.
At Freedom Avenue, Lankford has been in charge of five stations - hot AC WKDD/98.1, rock WRQK/106.9, AC WHOF/101.7, talk WHLO/640 and sports WARF/1350.
In addition to those stations, Lankford has also been market manager of Clear Channel's Ashland/Mansfield cluster.
At this point, we have no word of any replacement back at Freedom Avenue.
Lankford is heading for a new job as market manager of Clear Channel's Harrisburg/Allentown PA stations. And by heading, we mean he's expected to start today.
At Freedom Avenue, Lankford has been in charge of five stations - hot AC WKDD/98.1, rock WRQK/106.9, AC WHOF/101.7, talk WHLO/640 and sports WARF/1350.
In addition to those stations, Lankford has also been market manager of Clear Channel's Ashland/Mansfield cluster.
At this point, we have no word of any replacement back at Freedom Avenue.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
WMAN Schedule Shuffle, More Local
Clear Channel talk WMAN/1400 Mansfield is moving its schedule around later this month, adding more local talk and moving a syndicated host to his live time slot.
Starting July 27th, "AM Mansfield" midday local host Rusty Cates moves to afternoon drive, with his new show airing from 3-5 PM.
That, and the move of "WMAN Marketplace" to a new Saturday time slot (10 AM-noon), clears the way for the previous WMAN afternoon drive host - Premiere's Glenn Beck - to move to a live clearance on WMAN from 9 AM to Noon.
After the station's long-running news hour at 5 PM, a new one-hour local sports show will air on the Mansfield talker - "The WMAN Evening Sports Grill", with Aaron Hines and "contributions" from news director/sports voice Jeff Swank - from 6-7 PM. It replaces the third hour of Beck's show, a delayed broadcast which is no longer necessary due to the three-hour live midday clearance of Beck.
The press release announcing all the changes is below...
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1400 WMAN to increase local talk programming.
Two new local shows, and The Glenn Beck program to air live.
Mansfield, Oh (July 13, 2009): Newsradio 1400 WMAN is proud to announce that two new locally produced talk shows will soon begin airing on 1400am. Longtime popular radio host Rusty Cates, will be launching a new local talk show, and WMAN is adding a sports call in show weekday afternoons starting Monday July 27, 2009.
One of the new programs “The Rusty Cates Show” airing weekdays 3-5pm, will be hosted by Cates, a part of WMAN for over thirty years. Known as the voice of the community, Cates will continue to discuss issues that affect our local communities. “I’m thrilled that we are able to have a new platform to actively discuss what is happening around us every day” said Cates. WMAN General Manager Dan Lankford added that “Rusty is a champion for the Mansfield area, and having him on the air discussing issues each day, allows WMAN to continue to be the true voice of the community”.
Also new will be WMAN Evening Sports Grill, hosted by Aaron Hines, with contributions from Jeff Swank, airing weeknights, 6:00-7:00pm, following WMAN’s Evening Wrap Up news hour. Sports Grill will feature conversation on local high school sports, as well as coverage of the Indians, Cavaliers, Browns, Buckeyes, Mid Ohio racing and more.
Additional lineup adjustments include a new time slot for the syndicated Glenn Beck program. Beck will now air live weekdays 9am-Noon. The WMAN Marketplace will move to Saturday mornings, 10am-Noon.
Starting July 27th, "AM Mansfield" midday local host Rusty Cates moves to afternoon drive, with his new show airing from 3-5 PM.That, and the move of "WMAN Marketplace" to a new Saturday time slot (10 AM-noon), clears the way for the previous WMAN afternoon drive host - Premiere's Glenn Beck - to move to a live clearance on WMAN from 9 AM to Noon.
After the station's long-running news hour at 5 PM, a new one-hour local sports show will air on the Mansfield talker - "The WMAN Evening Sports Grill", with Aaron Hines and "contributions" from news director/sports voice Jeff Swank - from 6-7 PM. It replaces the third hour of Beck's show, a delayed broadcast which is no longer necessary due to the three-hour live midday clearance of Beck.
The press release announcing all the changes is below...
-------------
1400 WMAN to increase local talk programming.
Two new local shows, and The Glenn Beck program to air live.
Mansfield, Oh (July 13, 2009): Newsradio 1400 WMAN is proud to announce that two new locally produced talk shows will soon begin airing on 1400am. Longtime popular radio host Rusty Cates, will be launching a new local talk show, and WMAN is adding a sports call in show weekday afternoons starting Monday July 27, 2009.
One of the new programs “The Rusty Cates Show” airing weekdays 3-5pm, will be hosted by Cates, a part of WMAN for over thirty years. Known as the voice of the community, Cates will continue to discuss issues that affect our local communities. “I’m thrilled that we are able to have a new platform to actively discuss what is happening around us every day” said Cates. WMAN General Manager Dan Lankford added that “Rusty is a champion for the Mansfield area, and having him on the air discussing issues each day, allows WMAN to continue to be the true voice of the community”.
Also new will be WMAN Evening Sports Grill, hosted by Aaron Hines, with contributions from Jeff Swank, airing weeknights, 6:00-7:00pm, following WMAN’s Evening Wrap Up news hour. Sports Grill will feature conversation on local high school sports, as well as coverage of the Indians, Cavaliers, Browns, Buckeyes, Mid Ohio racing and more.
Additional lineup adjustments include a new time slot for the syndicated Glenn Beck program. Beck will now air live weekdays 9am-Noon. The WMAN Marketplace will move to Saturday mornings, 10am-Noon.
Monday, June 15, 2009
Monday's Very Mixed Bag
We've been hanging onto some items for a while, since we were swept up in the Digital TV Conversion wave starting on Friday. (We do still have some ODTV follow up items, which we'll put on that blog later today.)
AN SDV UPDATE: Though nearly all of the Time Warner Cable Northeast Ohio monolith is now "Switched Digital Video" (SDV) capable, there are small pockets that have not yet taken the new technology.
OMW hears that will change, soon, with the SDV rollout "scheduled to be completed" by this Friday, June 19th.
We're told that the Lakeside and Cleveland Heights areas are among the final stragglers, though we're wondering if the former Comcast systems in Mentor and Elyria are also left to be done.
We assume "Lakeside" means TWC's Cleveland customers served directly out of the company's Cleveland headquarters on Lakeside Avenue in downtown Cleveland, the former home of the Adelphia operations in Cleveland.
As we've reported numerous times, the SDV rollout is necessary before TWC customers can receive new HDTV channels that debuted starting in May.
And another batch is coming in June...the following new HD channels are set to debut "on or after" June 15: Lifetime Movies, Travel, AMC, Versus, SPEED and ESPNU. The new batch will only show up immediately in SDV areas, and will show up elsewhere as SDV is turned on...presumably, by the scheduled completion of the rollout on Friday.
Our sources at TWC say there are still more channels scheduled to be added between now and the end of the year, and we should learn more about the post-June list soon...
IS THIS ANY WAY TO RUN A TALK RADIO STATION?: No matter what format it carries, Media-Com Akron market eastern rimshot daytimer WJMP/1520 Kent/Wherever Else It Happens To Reach has been a long-neglected sister station to talk powerhouse WNIR/100.1 "The Talk of Akron".
Basically from the moment the former WKNT(AM) split from simulcasting with what used to be WKNT-FM, 1520 has been off in its own little world.
We've chronicled the station going off the air so frequently, you could almost set a calendar up to track it. WJMP has been, on numerous occasions, off for 3 or 4 days until someone fixed the situation - or noticed.
So, it wasn't a surprise to us late last week, when we tried to pick up 1520 while driving through Portage County on I-76, and found nothing at about 7:15 PM. WJMP was off, again, and we even managed to hear weak strains of co-channel Canton gospel outlet WINW/1520 "Joy 1520" in Akron's eastern suburbs.
According to the FCC's approximations, the station should be able to stay on the air in June and July all the way up to 9 PM. That link will show 8 PM at first, but it starts off in Eastern Standard Time.
But that's just the prelude to this act.
This morning, while checking on WJMP's status (through the usual heavy static, as we are not in Portage County), that definitely was not Erich "Mancow" Muller on the air with his Talk Radio Network program...and it wasn't a fill-in, either, on the TRN side.
It was a host and program quite different from the former "shock jock''s" morning show - WOR Radio Network's laid-back overnight program with host Joey Reynolds, talking about the history of women radio air personalities in New York City with the author of a new book.
Huh?
We think we've figured it out...it would have to be an automation error.
Reynolds' show is fed down both WOR Radio Network satellite channels all the way until 9 AM, though the show only airs live until 5 AM.
WJMP airs an extensive schedule of WOR Radio Network's weekend specialty show programming (pets, gardening, etc.), and that lineup takes most of the station's Sunday schedule - with the exception of Citadel financial advice star Bob Brinker's "Moneytalk" program from 4-7 PM.
The station does not list programming past 7 PM on weekends. We'll make the easy assumption that WJMP heads back to WOR Radio Network after Brinker, where it could pick up refeeds of "The Car Doctor" and "Food Talk" on the WOR2 satellite schedule (PDF) until signoff...if it hadn't already dropped carrier at 7 PM.
We're guessing that WJMP's Scott Studios automation somehow missed the command to kick it back to Talk Radio Network at 6 AM Monday for "Mancow". bringing the few thousand listeners within range of 1520 a taste of WOR's Joey Reynolds.
Obviously, Reynolds could not otherwise air on WJMP, as 1520 is filled on the local airwaves with static and a distant signal from Buffalo NY powerhouse WWKB in the overnight hours.
We should really charge a consulting fee for this kind of stuff...
WNCO ADDITIONS: We're nowhere near its signal, but we assume Clear Channel's WNCO/1340 Ashland has made the switch to its new talk format as "Mid-Ohio's Talk Station".
Our earlier item, and trade sites like AllAccess, had much more information on the switch than the Ashland Times-Gazette. The local newspaper was pretty much reduced to writing its article based upon on-air listening, because it said station officials were "on vacation", and no one else was talking.
With that lack of input, the paper openly speculated on the status of WNCO's Gene Davis, who has hosted the "Anything Goes" local talk/public affairs show from 9 AM to 9:30 AM weekdays.
Yes, Davis is no longer on the schedule, as a newspaper ad (we don't know if it ran last week, or will run this week, in the Gazette itself) shows the entire lineup, including WPGB/Pittsburgh-based "Quinn and Rose" from 6-10 AM weekdays.
But Gene hasn't been let go.
Clear Channel's Keith Kennedy. a regular reader here, had the answers in a comment on our original item, in response to another regular reader, Nathan Obral:
Gene will still be along side Ron mornings/middays on WNCO-FM.
Gene is also the PD for WNCO-AM, and will continue that role.
Anything goes will continue to air in shortform segments thru the day, rather than the full 30 mins.
WNCO/1340's big brother/sister station, "Mid-Ohio Country" WNCO-FM/101.3, is not affected by the changes...where Gene Davis is still listed from 10 AM-3 PM on the FM station's schedule...
AN SDV UPDATE: Though nearly all of the Time Warner Cable Northeast Ohio monolith is now "Switched Digital Video" (SDV) capable, there are small pockets that have not yet taken the new technology.
OMW hears that will change, soon, with the SDV rollout "scheduled to be completed" by this Friday, June 19th.
We're told that the Lakeside and Cleveland Heights areas are among the final stragglers, though we're wondering if the former Comcast systems in Mentor and Elyria are also left to be done.
We assume "Lakeside" means TWC's Cleveland customers served directly out of the company's Cleveland headquarters on Lakeside Avenue in downtown Cleveland, the former home of the Adelphia operations in Cleveland.
As we've reported numerous times, the SDV rollout is necessary before TWC customers can receive new HDTV channels that debuted starting in May.
And another batch is coming in June...the following new HD channels are set to debut "on or after" June 15: Lifetime Movies, Travel, AMC, Versus, SPEED and ESPNU. The new batch will only show up immediately in SDV areas, and will show up elsewhere as SDV is turned on...presumably, by the scheduled completion of the rollout on Friday.
Our sources at TWC say there are still more channels scheduled to be added between now and the end of the year, and we should learn more about the post-June list soon...
IS THIS ANY WAY TO RUN A TALK RADIO STATION?: No matter what format it carries, Media-Com Akron market eastern rimshot daytimer WJMP/1520 Kent/Wherever Else It Happens To Reach has been a long-neglected sister station to talk powerhouse WNIR/100.1 "The Talk of Akron".
Basically from the moment the former WKNT(AM) split from simulcasting with what used to be WKNT-FM, 1520 has been off in its own little world.
We've chronicled the station going off the air so frequently, you could almost set a calendar up to track it. WJMP has been, on numerous occasions, off for 3 or 4 days until someone fixed the situation - or noticed.
So, it wasn't a surprise to us late last week, when we tried to pick up 1520 while driving through Portage County on I-76, and found nothing at about 7:15 PM. WJMP was off, again, and we even managed to hear weak strains of co-channel Canton gospel outlet WINW/1520 "Joy 1520" in Akron's eastern suburbs.
According to the FCC's approximations, the station should be able to stay on the air in June and July all the way up to 9 PM. That link will show 8 PM at first, but it starts off in Eastern Standard Time.
But that's just the prelude to this act.
This morning, while checking on WJMP's status (through the usual heavy static, as we are not in Portage County), that definitely was not Erich "Mancow" Muller on the air with his Talk Radio Network program...and it wasn't a fill-in, either, on the TRN side.
It was a host and program quite different from the former "shock jock''s" morning show - WOR Radio Network's laid-back overnight program with host Joey Reynolds, talking about the history of women radio air personalities in New York City with the author of a new book.
Huh?
We think we've figured it out...it would have to be an automation error.
Reynolds' show is fed down both WOR Radio Network satellite channels all the way until 9 AM, though the show only airs live until 5 AM.
WJMP airs an extensive schedule of WOR Radio Network's weekend specialty show programming (pets, gardening, etc.), and that lineup takes most of the station's Sunday schedule - with the exception of Citadel financial advice star Bob Brinker's "Moneytalk" program from 4-7 PM.
The station does not list programming past 7 PM on weekends. We'll make the easy assumption that WJMP heads back to WOR Radio Network after Brinker, where it could pick up refeeds of "The Car Doctor" and "Food Talk" on the WOR2 satellite schedule (PDF) until signoff...if it hadn't already dropped carrier at 7 PM.
We're guessing that WJMP's Scott Studios automation somehow missed the command to kick it back to Talk Radio Network at 6 AM Monday for "Mancow". bringing the few thousand listeners within range of 1520 a taste of WOR's Joey Reynolds.
Obviously, Reynolds could not otherwise air on WJMP, as 1520 is filled on the local airwaves with static and a distant signal from Buffalo NY powerhouse WWKB in the overnight hours.
We should really charge a consulting fee for this kind of stuff...
WNCO ADDITIONS: We're nowhere near its signal, but we assume Clear Channel's WNCO/1340 Ashland has made the switch to its new talk format as "Mid-Ohio's Talk Station".
Our earlier item, and trade sites like AllAccess, had much more information on the switch than the Ashland Times-Gazette. The local newspaper was pretty much reduced to writing its article based upon on-air listening, because it said station officials were "on vacation", and no one else was talking.
With that lack of input, the paper openly speculated on the status of WNCO's Gene Davis, who has hosted the "Anything Goes" local talk/public affairs show from 9 AM to 9:30 AM weekdays.
Yes, Davis is no longer on the schedule, as a newspaper ad (we don't know if it ran last week, or will run this week, in the Gazette itself) shows the entire lineup, including WPGB/Pittsburgh-based "Quinn and Rose" from 6-10 AM weekdays.
But Gene hasn't been let go.
Clear Channel's Keith Kennedy. a regular reader here, had the answers in a comment on our original item, in response to another regular reader, Nathan Obral:
Gene will still be along side Ron mornings/middays on WNCO-FM.
Gene is also the PD for WNCO-AM, and will continue that role.
Anything goes will continue to air in shortform segments thru the day, rather than the full 30 mins.
WNCO/1340's big brother/sister station, "Mid-Ohio Country" WNCO-FM/101.3, is not affected by the changes...where Gene Davis is still listed from 10 AM-3 PM on the FM station's schedule...
Friday, June 12, 2009
Ashland AM To Get Talking
We actually have had this one for a while, but figured we'd put it up when it appeared on the AllAccess Net News scroll. (The fine folks at AllAccess don't have the digital TV transition in their workload, after all. Heh.)
Yes, Clear Channel standards/soft AC WNCO/1340 Ashland is changing to a talk format, featuring a lineup that does not duplicate sister news/talk WMAN/1400 Mansfield.
While WMAN carries shows like Premiere's Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Coast to Coast AM, "Mid-Ohio's Talk Station" will carry Pittsburgh-based "Quinn and Rose", Cox/Dial Global's Neal Boortz, self-syndicated financial advice guru Dave Ramsey, Premiere/Citadel afternoon driver Sean Hannity and Citadel early evening host Mark Levin.
As far as we know, WNCO's AM side will also have Ohio's first clearance of Premiere 6-9 PM (ET) host Jason Lewis, based at KTLK-FM in Minneapolis/St. Paul.
We're told WNCO will be Ohio's first affiliate for Premiere's "Jesus Christ Show", a unique Sunday morning program based at talk powerhouse KFI/640 Los Angeles and created by KFI's Neil Saveedra.
Until now, 1340 has been an affiliate of Citadel's "Timeless", the soft AC/nostalgia hybrid format that grew out of mergers with former networks like "Stardust"...which WNCO's AM side started carrying originally.
And none of this, of course, affects the other Clear Channel Ashland-based station carrying the WNCO calls, country giant WNCO-FM 101.3...
Yes, Clear Channel standards/soft AC WNCO/1340 Ashland is changing to a talk format, featuring a lineup that does not duplicate sister news/talk WMAN/1400 Mansfield.While WMAN carries shows like Premiere's Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Coast to Coast AM, "Mid-Ohio's Talk Station" will carry Pittsburgh-based "Quinn and Rose", Cox/Dial Global's Neal Boortz, self-syndicated financial advice guru Dave Ramsey, Premiere/Citadel afternoon driver Sean Hannity and Citadel early evening host Mark Levin.
As far as we know, WNCO's AM side will also have Ohio's first clearance of Premiere 6-9 PM (ET) host Jason Lewis, based at KTLK-FM in Minneapolis/St. Paul.
We're told WNCO will be Ohio's first affiliate for Premiere's "Jesus Christ Show", a unique Sunday morning program based at talk powerhouse KFI/640 Los Angeles and created by KFI's Neil Saveedra.
Until now, 1340 has been an affiliate of Citadel's "Timeless", the soft AC/nostalgia hybrid format that grew out of mergers with former networks like "Stardust"...which WNCO's AM side started carrying originally.
And none of this, of course, affects the other Clear Channel Ashland-based station carrying the WNCO calls, country giant WNCO-FM 101.3...
Thursday, May 07, 2009
Thursday's Mixed Bag
Try as we might, we can't get our daily updates to always fit into a neat, tidy little bag...
THIS IS A TEST, OR WILL BE: Say, what are you doing on May 21st, at 7:30 AM, 12:30 PM or 7:30 PM?
If you're watching over-air analog TV that day, anywhere in the nation, you could be watching a national DTV test.
The Wall Street Journal reports this week that the FCC is working on a plan that would ask TV stations across the United States to, quoting the article, "suspend regular programming and instead show a public-service ad about the digital transition for three five-minute periods May 21 as part of an effort to make sure Americans are ready for the switch."
The "test" would be similar to regional DTV tests already conducted in various parts of the country, including two tests we saw here in Ohio in late 2008 and early this year.
Stations which have already shut off their analog signals - in Northeast Ohio, Western Reserve PBS' WNEO/Alliance, Mid-State independent WMFD/Mansfield, TBN O&O WDLI/Canton, and Multicultural Broadcasting infomercial outlet WOAC/Canton (to be sold to Tri-State Christian Television) - would not have to run the tests.
We have just one comment - if the FCC was really serious about this, they'd put one of the tests in the middle of prime time. Of course, the major networks would probably cry foul...
STACIA'S MOVE: Former Youngstown TV news anchor Stacia Erdos is coming back to the Mahoning Valley media scene...but not as a member of a local TV news operation.
Erdos is joining the staff of the Youngstown Business Journal, in a role we'll let Business Journal publisher and OMW reader Andrea Wood explain:
Erdos, who anchored the 6 and 11 p.m. weeknight newscasts on WYTV Channel 33 from 1990 to 1998, has joined The Business Journal as a video reporter/anchor and columnist. Her focus will be on local business topics and the media. She will write a regular column for the biweekly publication, and will also produce and anchor video reports that will appear on the publication’s Web site, www.business-journal.com.
“I am very excited to be back working where I live, and collaborating with the Valley’s most respected source of business information,” says Ms. Erdos. “In this progressive and impressive move, The Business Journal will leap to the forefront in delivering what matters to the Valley, offering video and interviews shot on location on its Web site.”
Erdos has been an anchor and reporter for Cox-owned Pittsburgh NBC affiliate WPXI/11, and as far as we know, she's been commuting to WPXI from the home she and her husband own in the southern Youngstown suburb of North Lima.
And it looks like your Mighty Blog of Fun(tm) will see a lot of Erdos' work, as publisher Wood notes that she'll take over the business paper's "Media Scope" column on local media - from Wood herself.
As such, Erdos is sure to write (and talk) about the landscape she left behind some 10 years ago...which has changed dramatically.
Back when Erdos was a fixture at ABC affiliate WYTV/33, after all, "33 News" existed as a separate operation on Shady Run Road. Now, it's a "virtual set" in a corner of the WKBN/27 "27 First News" studios on Sunset Boulevard...
SOME NEEDLING: OMW reported earlier about some behind the scenes intrigue among Cleveland TV newsrooms regarding a recent news story...and the breaking of a Cleveland Clinic news embargo by Raycom Media's WOIO/19-WUAB/43's "19 Action News".
In the scheme of things...it's not terribly significant. Honoring a news embargo by a source like the Clinic is professional courtesy, usually extended because the Clinic is a major local institution that can be a helpful source.
The story in this case was a planned event, a news conference with the Steubenville-area woman who received a face transplant at the Clinic. We're not talking about a story of malfeasance or corruption that a news organization should uncover on its own, with or without cooperation from the institution, agency or government involved.
And nothing, really, can stop "19 Action News" from putting word of such an event on the air, even if asked by the Clinic to wait. Nothing, also, can stop the Cleveland Clinic from notifying the other three local newsrooms that they can air the story earlier than the embargo time wtih the Clinic's blessing.
But we had to chuckle at the latest Twitter update by Local TV Fox affiliate WJW/8's "Fox 8 News":
-----
Tonight at 6pm, Only on Fox8, an exclusive follow up to the face transplant story. Could be weeks before 19 has this one.
-----
So far, in Twitter-land, WOIO is not taking the bait. We did see its brief note Monday mentioning the face transplant patient before the embargo was set to be lifted, and this note Tuesday from 19's Paul Joncich, apparently written after the market's other stations aired the story at 5:
-----
joncich here. the face transplant patient...a look at her life before the accident is coming up on 19 action news @ 6pm.
-----
Our only reason for updating this one?
The fact that newsrooms, now encouraged to share "behind the scenes" details with viewers on blogs, in Twitter posts, Facebook pages and the like, means that this inter-station "play" is now occasionally public as well...and fodder for your Mighty Blog of Fun(tm)...
BUT ON THE POSITIVE SIDE: OK, so it's very easy to poke fun at the folks at Reserve Square.
"Honest. Fair. Everywhere." is their current slogan, and with its brash, tabloid style, "19 Action News" basically has a target painted upon its virtual back for those who talk about local media... like us.
But let's give WOIO/WUAB its props for a big event coming up:
The "Biggest Job Fair in Ohio" will be held May 15th at the Tri-C Gymnasium located at East 30th and Community College Avenue from 10am to 4pm. There will be free parking available throughout the Tri-C campus.
Representatives from local and national companies will be on hand interviewing candidates for more than 1,000 job openings.
Early registration has over five thousand people confirmed to attend with more than ten thousand expected.
Now, WOIO/WUAB isn't the first media outlet that's conducted a job fair in Ohio...a state hard hit by the deep recession, even before much of the rest of the nation.
But this does sound like it'll be pretty big. From an article by TVNewsday's Arthur Greenwald:
Previous, smaller local job fairs have proven the importance of such amenities (feeding volunteers, porta potties and crowd control), says (Raycom Cleveland marketing director Rob) Boenau. "One suburban job fair had only 90 jobs- but thousands showed up and it was closed down by the fire marshal."
To ensure a better outcome, the station partnered early on with Cuyahoga Community College (known locally as Tri-C) and also with Cleveland State University which is also offering plenty of free parking. The station and colleges have already lined up hundreds of volunteers and begun security rehearsals with the campus police forces.
That suburban job fair, of course, was the one that caused quite a mess for commuters on Rockside Road in Independence...as the mass of job seekers at the Holiday Inn Independence flowed out of the hotel and parking lot.
CSU and Tri-C are also providing a variety of services for job seekers, including resume-building help and job seeking skills seminars.
The job fair effort has also spilled over onto WOIO/WUAB's classifieds website, ClevelandClassifieds.TV, with the station actively building up job listings there as well...
THIS IS A TEST, OR WILL BE: Say, what are you doing on May 21st, at 7:30 AM, 12:30 PM or 7:30 PM?
If you're watching over-air analog TV that day, anywhere in the nation, you could be watching a national DTV test.
The Wall Street Journal reports this week that the FCC is working on a plan that would ask TV stations across the United States to, quoting the article, "suspend regular programming and instead show a public-service ad about the digital transition for three five-minute periods May 21 as part of an effort to make sure Americans are ready for the switch."
The "test" would be similar to regional DTV tests already conducted in various parts of the country, including two tests we saw here in Ohio in late 2008 and early this year.
Stations which have already shut off their analog signals - in Northeast Ohio, Western Reserve PBS' WNEO/Alliance, Mid-State independent WMFD/Mansfield, TBN O&O WDLI/Canton, and Multicultural Broadcasting infomercial outlet WOAC/Canton (to be sold to Tri-State Christian Television) - would not have to run the tests.
We have just one comment - if the FCC was really serious about this, they'd put one of the tests in the middle of prime time. Of course, the major networks would probably cry foul...
STACIA'S MOVE: Former Youngstown TV news anchor Stacia Erdos is coming back to the Mahoning Valley media scene...but not as a member of a local TV news operation.
Erdos is joining the staff of the Youngstown Business Journal, in a role we'll let Business Journal publisher and OMW reader Andrea Wood explain:
Erdos, who anchored the 6 and 11 p.m. weeknight newscasts on WYTV Channel 33 from 1990 to 1998, has joined The Business Journal as a video reporter/anchor and columnist. Her focus will be on local business topics and the media. She will write a regular column for the biweekly publication, and will also produce and anchor video reports that will appear on the publication’s Web site, www.business-journal.com.
“I am very excited to be back working where I live, and collaborating with the Valley’s most respected source of business information,” says Ms. Erdos. “In this progressive and impressive move, The Business Journal will leap to the forefront in delivering what matters to the Valley, offering video and interviews shot on location on its Web site.”
Erdos has been an anchor and reporter for Cox-owned Pittsburgh NBC affiliate WPXI/11, and as far as we know, she's been commuting to WPXI from the home she and her husband own in the southern Youngstown suburb of North Lima.
And it looks like your Mighty Blog of Fun(tm) will see a lot of Erdos' work, as publisher Wood notes that she'll take over the business paper's "Media Scope" column on local media - from Wood herself.
As such, Erdos is sure to write (and talk) about the landscape she left behind some 10 years ago...which has changed dramatically.
Back when Erdos was a fixture at ABC affiliate WYTV/33, after all, "33 News" existed as a separate operation on Shady Run Road. Now, it's a "virtual set" in a corner of the WKBN/27 "27 First News" studios on Sunset Boulevard...
SOME NEEDLING: OMW reported earlier about some behind the scenes intrigue among Cleveland TV newsrooms regarding a recent news story...and the breaking of a Cleveland Clinic news embargo by Raycom Media's WOIO/19-WUAB/43's "19 Action News".
In the scheme of things...it's not terribly significant. Honoring a news embargo by a source like the Clinic is professional courtesy, usually extended because the Clinic is a major local institution that can be a helpful source.
The story in this case was a planned event, a news conference with the Steubenville-area woman who received a face transplant at the Clinic. We're not talking about a story of malfeasance or corruption that a news organization should uncover on its own, with or without cooperation from the institution, agency or government involved.
And nothing, really, can stop "19 Action News" from putting word of such an event on the air, even if asked by the Clinic to wait. Nothing, also, can stop the Cleveland Clinic from notifying the other three local newsrooms that they can air the story earlier than the embargo time wtih the Clinic's blessing.
But we had to chuckle at the latest Twitter update by Local TV Fox affiliate WJW/8's "Fox 8 News":
-----
Tonight at 6pm, Only on Fox8, an exclusive follow up to the face transplant story. Could be weeks before 19 has this one.
-----
So far, in Twitter-land, WOIO is not taking the bait. We did see its brief note Monday mentioning the face transplant patient before the embargo was set to be lifted, and this note Tuesday from 19's Paul Joncich, apparently written after the market's other stations aired the story at 5:
-----
joncich here. the face transplant patient...a look at her life before the accident is coming up on 19 action news @ 6pm.
-----
Our only reason for updating this one?
The fact that newsrooms, now encouraged to share "behind the scenes" details with viewers on blogs, in Twitter posts, Facebook pages and the like, means that this inter-station "play" is now occasionally public as well...and fodder for your Mighty Blog of Fun(tm)...
BUT ON THE POSITIVE SIDE: OK, so it's very easy to poke fun at the folks at Reserve Square.
"Honest. Fair. Everywhere." is their current slogan, and with its brash, tabloid style, "19 Action News" basically has a target painted upon its virtual back for those who talk about local media... like us.
But let's give WOIO/WUAB its props for a big event coming up:
The "Biggest Job Fair in Ohio" will be held May 15th at the Tri-C Gymnasium located at East 30th and Community College Avenue from 10am to 4pm. There will be free parking available throughout the Tri-C campus.
Representatives from local and national companies will be on hand interviewing candidates for more than 1,000 job openings.
Early registration has over five thousand people confirmed to attend with more than ten thousand expected.
Now, WOIO/WUAB isn't the first media outlet that's conducted a job fair in Ohio...a state hard hit by the deep recession, even before much of the rest of the nation.
But this does sound like it'll be pretty big. From an article by TVNewsday's Arthur Greenwald:
Previous, smaller local job fairs have proven the importance of such amenities (feeding volunteers, porta potties and crowd control), says (Raycom Cleveland marketing director Rob) Boenau. "One suburban job fair had only 90 jobs- but thousands showed up and it was closed down by the fire marshal."
To ensure a better outcome, the station partnered early on with Cuyahoga Community College (known locally as Tri-C) and also with Cleveland State University which is also offering plenty of free parking. The station and colleges have already lined up hundreds of volunteers and begun security rehearsals with the campus police forces.
That suburban job fair, of course, was the one that caused quite a mess for commuters on Rockside Road in Independence...as the mass of job seekers at the Holiday Inn Independence flowed out of the hotel and parking lot.
CSU and Tri-C are also providing a variety of services for job seekers, including resume-building help and job seeking skills seminars.
The job fair effort has also spilled over onto WOIO/WUAB's classifieds website, ClevelandClassifieds.TV, with the station actively building up job listings there as well...
Monday, May 04, 2009
Regrouping On Monday
We're back for a Monday morning update, with some new stuff, and not one direct mention of Something Else that's been kicking around the local media world recently. But this update appears to be All About Clear Channel...like most of last week...
A CLEVELAND VALENTINE: OMW reported last week that Los Angeles-based Sean Valentine, he of the one-named "Valentine in the Morning", would be once again expanding his empire to Cleveland.
The hot AC KBIG/104.3 "My 104.3" host's syndicated offering was once heard on Clear Channel top 40 WAKS/96.5 "Kiss FM" in the market...a long run that wrapped up recently when WAKS became one of the earliest affiliates of New York-based Elvis Duran's morning show - now syndicated by CC's Premiere Radio.
It's official: Valentine starts his return to Cleveland radio this morning at hot AC WMVX/106.5 "Mix 106.5", taking the place occupied for many years by now-deposed local morning drivers "Brian and Joe".
Quoting a Clear Channel press release:
“Kicking mornings off with an amazing talent like Valentine gives this station a strong foundation for success,” said Chris Miller, Program Director for Mix 106.5. He continued, “I guarantee listeners are going to love what they hear on Cleveland’s Best Mix, Mix 106.5.”
“I know every song they play on Mix 106.5 and you're going to sing along with me…even though you're probably a better singer,” said Valentine. He continued, “It is great to back on the air in Cleveland!”
Of course, when Valentine's voicetracked show was on WAKS, "every song they play" was different. But, nevermind on that...with the Valentine show, it's not about the music they play around all the "Hollywood interviews" and other such content.
The station release confirmed who's left, locally, at "Mix":
Cleveland’s Best Mix, Mix 106.5 continues to be home for Cleveland broadcasting veterans Daune Robinson and Jay Hudson.
Now, it can be told. During the heat of the Clear Channel layoff crunch on Tuesday, there were very loud, very strong rumors that Jay Hudson was on the Involuntary Exit list.
If you go back and read our items from that day, you'll note that we talked about two unconfirmed names being rumored as being out at Oak Tree, that we were not ready to report.
Our reliable sources in the building indicated that the on-air cut list ended at four - WMVX's "Brian and Joe", along with WTAM producer/co-hosts Marty Allen and Paul Rado...information which turned out to be accurate.
Unlike some who post online, we don't just throw up stuff here to see if it sticks. We're not perfect, we don't know everything, but there IS a filter here...
WRAPPING UP CC DEPARTURES, WE THINK: We're still missing some names from Clear Channel's Purge of People last week, but someone did pass along some names we haven't printed.
This blog deals mostly with on-air or programming employees at radio stations, and we don't usually talk about office staff...but one of our sources passed along the off-air casualties of Clear Channel's 590 employee layoff a week ago. (Or is that 900 employees? Some trade reports suggest that's close to the final staff reduction numbers...)
One of our sources at the Clear Channel World Domination HQ on Oak Tree in suburban Cleveland gives us a list of the off-air exits there last week:
-----
Suzanne Holley, long-time human resources director
Adria Dudzinski (Redmon), administrative assistant (and former producer of classic hits WMJI/105.7's "Lanigan and Malone", though we suspect former co-host John Webster was still in the mix at that time as well...and the station didn't shy away from the "o" word back then, either)
Jim Brusse, traffic director
Two others, including a full-time IT assistant and a part-time assistant in national sales
-----
In Clear Channel's Ashland/Mansfield cluster, an Alert OMW Reader passes along this story from the Mansfield News Journal over the weekend:
Veteran reporter and news anchor Dave Pennell of WMAN-1400 AM is a victim of Clear Channel Communications Inc.'s recent round of job cuts.
Clear Channel, the largest owner of U.S. radio stations, announced almost 600 job cuts Tuesday that included some on-air personalities. It was the company's second round of layoffs this year
Market Manager Dan Lankford wouldn't release the positions or names of Mansfield and Ashland station employees who lost their jobs, but said he doesn't foresee further cuts.
We don't know who is left, if anyone, in the newsroom at talk WMAN/1400.
You might recall from our earlier report on the expanding Clear Channel "news hub" system that Ashland/Mansfield was a market tabbed to receive remote-anchored reports from the company's Columbus newsroom at talk WTVN/610.
In some areas, so far at least, the remote reports haven't fully taken over - even if they've forced other news employees into job changes. For now, talk WIMA/1150 Lima still has two news employees, and newscasts out of WTVN occupy middays there - along with FM morning drive casts.
We heard talk WKBN/570 Youngstown's Jim Michaels last week in a role he filled last time the station's news anchoring came from Oak Tree - doing a report from the field. How long will that last? We don't know.
But it would appear that WTAM/1100's Darren Toms, Ken Robinson and others are doing the regular anchor work on WKBN now...after the exit of veteran WKBN news director John Nagy in the Clear Channel cuts last week...
SPEAKING OF CLEAR CHANNEL NEWS EXITS: The wave of Clear Channel-related news this past week has been so strong and furious, even your Mighty Blog of Fun(tm) can't directly track news items from the company in Ohio.
So, we quote this item from Friday's AllAccess Net News scroll - a Clear Channel departure not caused directly by last's weeks round of job cuts, but affected by it:
CLEAR CHANNEL TOLEDO Director of News Operations CASSIE WILSON has announced her resignation, effective MAY 19th. WILSON tells ALL ACCESS that she is "really proud of my work here, and that I was able to use my major-market experience from BALTIMORE, WASHINGTON, DC and ATLANTA and create an award-winning news department at WSPD" and is looking for new opportunities in light of CLEAR CHANNEL's news "hub" outsourcing.
OMW reported earlier that Toledo was on the receiving end of that "news hub" list, with non-drivetime newscasts being fed out of the company's Cincinnati newsroom at talk WLW/700.
It's actually the second time around for WSPD/1370 as far as being a receiver of remote anchoring from another Clear Channel station...when the "news hub" system first started here in Ohio, WSPD received newscasts from Columbus' WTVN.
As far as we know, Cassie Wilson's departure doesn't affect her husband's presence at the Toledo news/talker....he's WSPD program director and afternoon drive host Brian Wilson, who continues both as PD and 3-6 PM host on the station.
As far as the "news hub" story is concerned, the same AllAccess scroll links to an article out of Denver-based weekly newspaper Westword, with more on the process from Colorado...
SPEAKING FRENCH: We thought it was a joke at first.
An OMW reader told us last week that WTAM Saturday afternoon host Simon Badinter and his "Simon Rendezvous" were coming to Chicago, where the French advertising executive would be heard on Tribune talk powerhouse WGN/720.
Ummm...it's no joke.
Quoting Lewis Lazare in the Chicago Sun-Times last week:
Perhaps the most intriguing hire is Simon Badinter, a native Parisian and the son of French Sen. Robert Badinter and Elisabeth Badinter, a feminist writer. Described as a highly opinionated advertising executive who loves life, Badinter will host a show called "Simon Rendezvous," which (WGN program director Kevin) Metheny indicated would be unlike any other WGN program or anything on Chicago radio.
Yeah, no kidding.
Sure enough, "Simon Rendezvous" now airs 6-9 PM Sunday on the Chicago talker. (And Badinter must be rich enough to live in both Cleveland and Chicago, as his WGN bio says he's been "proudly living and working in Chicago, IL for many years", much like his WTAM bio said for Cleveland.)
When Badinter's show began its run on WTAM in late 2007, we briefly mentioned it, but declined to spend a lot of time talking about it. It was our impression that the heavily-accented ad executive broke out the checkbook and paid for the two hour weekly show as a vanity project in Cleveland.
(We don't know the actual financial status of "Simon Rendezvous". They could well be paying him the standard going rate for non-employee weekend hosts.)
But, who knows this time around?
The connection, of course, is obvious. WGN programmer Metheny is the former programming vice president at Clear Channel's Cleveland cluster on Oak Tree, before heading into the Land of Former Jacor People at Tribune under the company's COO - ex-Jacor/Clear Channel Radio head Randy Michaels.
We're pretty sure there's at least one former Jacor employee who hasn't followed suburban Cincinnati resident Michaels to Tribune. Maybe two.
We're not sure if Badinter's show is technically still on the WTAM schedule. It's effectively pre-empted for much of the next few months due to Cleveland Indians baseball. Simon still shows up on the master WTAM Saturday schedule on non-Indians game days, but isn't found on the "Other Personalities" page at WTAM.com.
Neither the Sun-Times article, nor a brief item by Radio-Info.com columnist Tom Taylor in his E-mail newsletter this morning, mention Simon's run at WTAM.
Maybe "Simon Rendezvous" is more fit for Chicago, a "world city", than for Cleveland, a "desparately wants to be a world city"...and maybe we're missing a trend here. We never claimed to be news/talk programmers...
A CLEVELAND VALENTINE: OMW reported last week that Los Angeles-based Sean Valentine, he of the one-named "Valentine in the Morning", would be once again expanding his empire to Cleveland.
The hot AC KBIG/104.3 "My 104.3" host's syndicated offering was once heard on Clear Channel top 40 WAKS/96.5 "Kiss FM" in the market...a long run that wrapped up recently when WAKS became one of the earliest affiliates of New York-based Elvis Duran's morning show - now syndicated by CC's Premiere Radio.
It's official: Valentine starts his return to Cleveland radio this morning at hot AC WMVX/106.5 "Mix 106.5", taking the place occupied for many years by now-deposed local morning drivers "Brian and Joe".
Quoting a Clear Channel press release:
“Kicking mornings off with an amazing talent like Valentine gives this station a strong foundation for success,” said Chris Miller, Program Director for Mix 106.5. He continued, “I guarantee listeners are going to love what they hear on Cleveland’s Best Mix, Mix 106.5.”
“I know every song they play on Mix 106.5 and you're going to sing along with me…even though you're probably a better singer,” said Valentine. He continued, “It is great to back on the air in Cleveland!”
Of course, when Valentine's voicetracked show was on WAKS, "every song they play" was different. But, nevermind on that...with the Valentine show, it's not about the music they play around all the "Hollywood interviews" and other such content.
The station release confirmed who's left, locally, at "Mix":
Cleveland’s Best Mix, Mix 106.5 continues to be home for Cleveland broadcasting veterans Daune Robinson and Jay Hudson.
Now, it can be told. During the heat of the Clear Channel layoff crunch on Tuesday, there were very loud, very strong rumors that Jay Hudson was on the Involuntary Exit list.
If you go back and read our items from that day, you'll note that we talked about two unconfirmed names being rumored as being out at Oak Tree, that we were not ready to report.
Our reliable sources in the building indicated that the on-air cut list ended at four - WMVX's "Brian and Joe", along with WTAM producer/co-hosts Marty Allen and Paul Rado...information which turned out to be accurate.
Unlike some who post online, we don't just throw up stuff here to see if it sticks. We're not perfect, we don't know everything, but there IS a filter here...
WRAPPING UP CC DEPARTURES, WE THINK: We're still missing some names from Clear Channel's Purge of People last week, but someone did pass along some names we haven't printed.
This blog deals mostly with on-air or programming employees at radio stations, and we don't usually talk about office staff...but one of our sources passed along the off-air casualties of Clear Channel's 590 employee layoff a week ago. (Or is that 900 employees? Some trade reports suggest that's close to the final staff reduction numbers...)
One of our sources at the Clear Channel World Domination HQ on Oak Tree in suburban Cleveland gives us a list of the off-air exits there last week:
-----
Suzanne Holley, long-time human resources director
Adria Dudzinski (Redmon), administrative assistant (and former producer of classic hits WMJI/105.7's "Lanigan and Malone", though we suspect former co-host John Webster was still in the mix at that time as well...and the station didn't shy away from the "o" word back then, either)
Jim Brusse, traffic director
Two others, including a full-time IT assistant and a part-time assistant in national sales
-----
In Clear Channel's Ashland/Mansfield cluster, an Alert OMW Reader passes along this story from the Mansfield News Journal over the weekend:
Veteran reporter and news anchor Dave Pennell of WMAN-1400 AM is a victim of Clear Channel Communications Inc.'s recent round of job cuts.
Clear Channel, the largest owner of U.S. radio stations, announced almost 600 job cuts Tuesday that included some on-air personalities. It was the company's second round of layoffs this year
Market Manager Dan Lankford wouldn't release the positions or names of Mansfield and Ashland station employees who lost their jobs, but said he doesn't foresee further cuts.
We don't know who is left, if anyone, in the newsroom at talk WMAN/1400.
You might recall from our earlier report on the expanding Clear Channel "news hub" system that Ashland/Mansfield was a market tabbed to receive remote-anchored reports from the company's Columbus newsroom at talk WTVN/610.
In some areas, so far at least, the remote reports haven't fully taken over - even if they've forced other news employees into job changes. For now, talk WIMA/1150 Lima still has two news employees, and newscasts out of WTVN occupy middays there - along with FM morning drive casts.
We heard talk WKBN/570 Youngstown's Jim Michaels last week in a role he filled last time the station's news anchoring came from Oak Tree - doing a report from the field. How long will that last? We don't know.
But it would appear that WTAM/1100's Darren Toms, Ken Robinson and others are doing the regular anchor work on WKBN now...after the exit of veteran WKBN news director John Nagy in the Clear Channel cuts last week...
SPEAKING OF CLEAR CHANNEL NEWS EXITS: The wave of Clear Channel-related news this past week has been so strong and furious, even your Mighty Blog of Fun(tm) can't directly track news items from the company in Ohio.
So, we quote this item from Friday's AllAccess Net News scroll - a Clear Channel departure not caused directly by last's weeks round of job cuts, but affected by it:
CLEAR CHANNEL TOLEDO Director of News Operations CASSIE WILSON has announced her resignation, effective MAY 19th. WILSON tells ALL ACCESS that she is "really proud of my work here, and that I was able to use my major-market experience from BALTIMORE, WASHINGTON, DC and ATLANTA and create an award-winning news department at WSPD" and is looking for new opportunities in light of CLEAR CHANNEL's news "hub" outsourcing.
OMW reported earlier that Toledo was on the receiving end of that "news hub" list, with non-drivetime newscasts being fed out of the company's Cincinnati newsroom at talk WLW/700.
It's actually the second time around for WSPD/1370 as far as being a receiver of remote anchoring from another Clear Channel station...when the "news hub" system first started here in Ohio, WSPD received newscasts from Columbus' WTVN.
As far as we know, Cassie Wilson's departure doesn't affect her husband's presence at the Toledo news/talker....he's WSPD program director and afternoon drive host Brian Wilson, who continues both as PD and 3-6 PM host on the station.
As far as the "news hub" story is concerned, the same AllAccess scroll links to an article out of Denver-based weekly newspaper Westword, with more on the process from Colorado...
SPEAKING FRENCH: We thought it was a joke at first.
An OMW reader told us last week that WTAM Saturday afternoon host Simon Badinter and his "Simon Rendezvous" were coming to Chicago, where the French advertising executive would be heard on Tribune talk powerhouse WGN/720.
Ummm...it's no joke.
Quoting Lewis Lazare in the Chicago Sun-Times last week:
Perhaps the most intriguing hire is Simon Badinter, a native Parisian and the son of French Sen. Robert Badinter and Elisabeth Badinter, a feminist writer. Described as a highly opinionated advertising executive who loves life, Badinter will host a show called "Simon Rendezvous," which (WGN program director Kevin) Metheny indicated would be unlike any other WGN program or anything on Chicago radio.
Yeah, no kidding.
Sure enough, "Simon Rendezvous" now airs 6-9 PM Sunday on the Chicago talker. (And Badinter must be rich enough to live in both Cleveland and Chicago, as his WGN bio says he's been "proudly living and working in Chicago, IL for many years", much like his WTAM bio said for Cleveland.)
When Badinter's show began its run on WTAM in late 2007, we briefly mentioned it, but declined to spend a lot of time talking about it. It was our impression that the heavily-accented ad executive broke out the checkbook and paid for the two hour weekly show as a vanity project in Cleveland.
(We don't know the actual financial status of "Simon Rendezvous". They could well be paying him the standard going rate for non-employee weekend hosts.)
But, who knows this time around?
The connection, of course, is obvious. WGN programmer Metheny is the former programming vice president at Clear Channel's Cleveland cluster on Oak Tree, before heading into the Land of Former Jacor People at Tribune under the company's COO - ex-Jacor/Clear Channel Radio head Randy Michaels.
We're pretty sure there's at least one former Jacor employee who hasn't followed suburban Cincinnati resident Michaels to Tribune. Maybe two.
We're not sure if Badinter's show is technically still on the WTAM schedule. It's effectively pre-empted for much of the next few months due to Cleveland Indians baseball. Simon still shows up on the master WTAM Saturday schedule on non-Indians game days, but isn't found on the "Other Personalities" page at WTAM.com.
Neither the Sun-Times article, nor a brief item by Radio-Info.com columnist Tom Taylor in his E-mail newsletter this morning, mention Simon's run at WTAM.
Maybe "Simon Rendezvous" is more fit for Chicago, a "world city", than for Cleveland, a "desparately wants to be a world city"...and maybe we're missing a trend here. We never claimed to be news/talk programmers...
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Local News And Premium Choice
Isn't branding a wonderful thing?
"Local news" is a brand, really. Radio stations that still offer news on a local basis hammer that into listeners' brains. "DEPEND on us for LOCAL news!" "We're your LOCAL NEWS SOURCE!"
The reality is somewhat different in 2009.
For many stations which once had a, well, "local" newsroom...the "source" is often an anchor in a newsroom anywhere from 25 to a few hundred miles away, trying to sound like they know the area they're serving via computer file upload.
None of this is new to Clear Channel, which has been "remote anchoring" stations as far away as Milwaukee from a certain newsroom on Oak Tree Boulevard in the Cleveland suburb of Independence for years.
But...it's back with a vengeance.
Clear Channel's latest operations plan will, in effect, accelerate the feeding of news from one market to another.
Here's a list of Ohio markets that will be feeding other markets in Ohio and beyond. Much of this was already being done before this week, and some of it is new:
CLEVELAND:
--------------
Milwaukee
Pittsburgh
Akron
Youngstown
CINCINNATI:
---------------
Boston
Toledo
Memphis
Nashville
COLUMBUS:
--------------
Lima
Defiance
Marion
Ashland/Mansfield
Chillicothe
We already have evidence of some of the new arrangements taking place today.
For example, Clear Channel Cleveland has officially returned to providing remote anchoring to its Youngstown sister cluster.
We heard WTAM/1100 news director Darren Toms this morning on talk WKBN/570...filling the news hole once filled by now-former WKBN news director John Nagy.
We heard WKBN news anchor Jim Michaels doing traffic, though we don't know if that was recorded (it's construction information and the like).
We assume Jim is still at South Avenue, and don't know what role he'll play in the new Clear Channel News Universe. When the anchors in Cleveland fed Youngstown before, he contributed and voiced reports for them, and occasionally did some afternoon anchoring himself.
Eerily, we heard a pre-recorded news feature voiced by Nagy, during the fill on the WKBN streaming audio feed.
Over in Lima, we hear that the cluster's FM stations are now getting the newscasts fed out of Columbus' WTVN/610, which are also being heard in middays on talk WIMA/1150. WIMA still has local news staffers, but it appears it and other markets being fed from elsewhere that still have news staff will get midday newscasts from the remote newsroom. Again, for now.
Here's what Clear Channel lays out for its staffers about remote news anchoring... and we're guessing that they're writing it just as much for federal lawmakers and regulators as much as they are for their own staff:
-----
Improved Commitment to Local Communities
* Our goal is to utilize technology along with our very best and experienced news reporters to enhance our local commitment to news
* We will match up these regional resources with our local teams in the market to deliver superior local news coverage
* We will train and redirect local staff members to help give us more depth when it comes to the number of people in a local market assisting with news coverage and community connection
------
No, that last line doesn't read "we will train and redirect FM program directors, disc jockeys, sales people, and anyone who can speak into a phone clearly to help us try to resemble a real local news operation". That's just our own interpretation.
In the "we're pretty sure they wrote this for the FCC and Congress" department, the plan gives examples of the company using remote news anchors and resources to serve markets otherwise without local news operations.
Among the situations specifically noted was the effort by the company's Syracuse newsroom to cover the recent multiple fatal shooting incident in Binghamton NY, where Clear Channel has no newsroom. It also highlighted the Binghamton cluster's role, which was basically providing studio space and "local hits" for Syracuse from the Binghamton program director.
The plan also highlights the company's recently announced expanded commitment to localized PSAs.
When a Clear Channel station without a dedicated, local newsroom - or a decimated one - runs liners saying "DEPEND on us for local news" or "Your LOCAL NEWS SOURCE", are they lying?
We don't at all fault the existing Clear Channel news anchors and reporters, in places like Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati or the other markets that will feed "local newscasts" out to other stations.
This isn't something they begged for, it's not their choice, and we presume they aren't getting any significant extra money for this...if they're getting any extra money at all. (Our guess: they aren't getting an extra dime, or even penny.)
We don't at all fault managers like CC/Youngstown veteran market manager Bill Kelly. We have absolutely no evidence that Mr. Kelly wanted to send 40-plus year WKBN veteran newsman John Nagy packing on Tuesday.
In fact, we have evidence of Mr. Kelly's commitment to a locally-staffed newsroom just months ago, when he originally nudged aside the Cleveland-fed newscasts. We presume he hasn't changed his mind in that short time.
Our guess - and it's only a guess, since we haven't heard from Kelly, who's written us before - is that he actively lobbied to hold off as many of Tuesday's changes as he could.
And WKBN has managed to hold onto three local weekday full-time hosts - morning driver Robert Mangino, program director Dan Rivers (middays), and afternoon driver Ron Verb - despite presumed pressure from corporate masters we imagine are just itching to put Glenn Beck into middays and Sean Hannity into afternoons.
But...it's a different world at Clear Channel, even from before when it was owned by two large private equity funds.
Yes, we know other newsrooms have shrunken, even those not owned by Clear Channel. The once-full newsroom at NextMedia's WHBC/1480 Canton is now basically news/program director Pam Cook and anchor Geoff Mears.
But at least Pam and Geoff are still there, physically, on Market Avenue South on the southern edge of downtown Canton. Who'll be left if Clear Channel corporate decides that it doesn't need Jim Michaels in Youngstown? How can a company claim a devotion to local news if you force your local cluster to dump a 40 year veteran newsman still at the top of his game?
In 2009, you can count fully-staffed local radio newsrooms in Ohio concentrating only on their home market (i.e. Akron's Rubber City Radio, Cox's WHIO in Dayton) on one hand and still have room to twiddle a few fingers around.
The second part of our discourse is about "Premium Choice", Clear Channel's clever name for its canned music programming.
The names that first surfaced included existing syndicated hosts Ryan Seacrest and Cleveland's Steve Harvey.
Now, thanks to AllAccess, here's Clear Channel's list of (some) local hosts that will contribute to the "Premium Choice" menu for stations needing inexpensive, national fill on-air personalities:
WAXQ/NEW YORK middayer MARIA MILTO
WBBG/MIAMI afternooner DOC RENO
WXTB/TAMPA middayer BIG RIG
WFBQ/INDIANAPOLIS afternooner LAURA STEELE
WTUE/DAYTON afternooner JOHN "THE B-MAN" BEAULIEU
WHTZ/NEW YORK night dude BILLY THE KIDD
KIIS/LOS ANGELES middayer SISANIE
WDCG/RALEIGH PD/afternooner RANDI WEST
From what we're hearing, all of these personalities are currently voicetracking non-local-specific generic national shows for their format. And we hear that at least one Clear Channel Cleveland personality is also involved in this effort...and we suspect a couple of others at Oak Tree will join that personality.
Randi West is a name familiar to many in Ohio. She once voicetracked a number of stations during her live shift at a Cincinnati Clear Channel outlet, an effort described in a newspaper article.
But these "shows" will be different. We don't believe any of the personalities will provide ANY specific, local content in this effort. Ms. West will sound the same in one market as she will in her other markets outside Raleigh, for example. If Clear Channel wants to add local content, they'll apparently rely on those expanded local PSAs and other community announcements.
Doesn't it just excite the heck out of you? Aren't you just dying to hear this programming?
Uh, OK.
Our final comment in this very long item: To us, "Premium Choice" sounds like the name for the house brand at Wal-Mart.
Oh, wait, that's "President's Choice". Target, maybe?
"Local news" is a brand, really. Radio stations that still offer news on a local basis hammer that into listeners' brains. "DEPEND on us for LOCAL news!" "We're your LOCAL NEWS SOURCE!"
The reality is somewhat different in 2009.
For many stations which once had a, well, "local" newsroom...the "source" is often an anchor in a newsroom anywhere from 25 to a few hundred miles away, trying to sound like they know the area they're serving via computer file upload.
None of this is new to Clear Channel, which has been "remote anchoring" stations as far away as Milwaukee from a certain newsroom on Oak Tree Boulevard in the Cleveland suburb of Independence for years.
But...it's back with a vengeance.
Clear Channel's latest operations plan will, in effect, accelerate the feeding of news from one market to another.
Here's a list of Ohio markets that will be feeding other markets in Ohio and beyond. Much of this was already being done before this week, and some of it is new:
CLEVELAND:
--------------
Milwaukee
Pittsburgh
Akron
Youngstown
CINCINNATI:
---------------
Boston
Toledo
Memphis
Nashville
COLUMBUS:
--------------
Lima
Defiance
Marion
Ashland/Mansfield
Chillicothe
We already have evidence of some of the new arrangements taking place today.
For example, Clear Channel Cleveland has officially returned to providing remote anchoring to its Youngstown sister cluster.
We heard WTAM/1100 news director Darren Toms this morning on talk WKBN/570...filling the news hole once filled by now-former WKBN news director John Nagy.
We heard WKBN news anchor Jim Michaels doing traffic, though we don't know if that was recorded (it's construction information and the like).
We assume Jim is still at South Avenue, and don't know what role he'll play in the new Clear Channel News Universe. When the anchors in Cleveland fed Youngstown before, he contributed and voiced reports for them, and occasionally did some afternoon anchoring himself.
Eerily, we heard a pre-recorded news feature voiced by Nagy, during the fill on the WKBN streaming audio feed.
Over in Lima, we hear that the cluster's FM stations are now getting the newscasts fed out of Columbus' WTVN/610, which are also being heard in middays on talk WIMA/1150. WIMA still has local news staffers, but it appears it and other markets being fed from elsewhere that still have news staff will get midday newscasts from the remote newsroom. Again, for now.
Here's what Clear Channel lays out for its staffers about remote news anchoring... and we're guessing that they're writing it just as much for federal lawmakers and regulators as much as they are for their own staff:
-----
Improved Commitment to Local Communities
* Our goal is to utilize technology along with our very best and experienced news reporters to enhance our local commitment to news
* We will match up these regional resources with our local teams in the market to deliver superior local news coverage
* We will train and redirect local staff members to help give us more depth when it comes to the number of people in a local market assisting with news coverage and community connection
------
No, that last line doesn't read "we will train and redirect FM program directors, disc jockeys, sales people, and anyone who can speak into a phone clearly to help us try to resemble a real local news operation". That's just our own interpretation.
In the "we're pretty sure they wrote this for the FCC and Congress" department, the plan gives examples of the company using remote news anchors and resources to serve markets otherwise without local news operations.
Among the situations specifically noted was the effort by the company's Syracuse newsroom to cover the recent multiple fatal shooting incident in Binghamton NY, where Clear Channel has no newsroom. It also highlighted the Binghamton cluster's role, which was basically providing studio space and "local hits" for Syracuse from the Binghamton program director.
The plan also highlights the company's recently announced expanded commitment to localized PSAs.
When a Clear Channel station without a dedicated, local newsroom - or a decimated one - runs liners saying "DEPEND on us for local news" or "Your LOCAL NEWS SOURCE", are they lying?
We don't at all fault the existing Clear Channel news anchors and reporters, in places like Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati or the other markets that will feed "local newscasts" out to other stations.
This isn't something they begged for, it's not their choice, and we presume they aren't getting any significant extra money for this...if they're getting any extra money at all. (Our guess: they aren't getting an extra dime, or even penny.)
We don't at all fault managers like CC/Youngstown veteran market manager Bill Kelly. We have absolutely no evidence that Mr. Kelly wanted to send 40-plus year WKBN veteran newsman John Nagy packing on Tuesday.
In fact, we have evidence of Mr. Kelly's commitment to a locally-staffed newsroom just months ago, when he originally nudged aside the Cleveland-fed newscasts. We presume he hasn't changed his mind in that short time.
Our guess - and it's only a guess, since we haven't heard from Kelly, who's written us before - is that he actively lobbied to hold off as many of Tuesday's changes as he could.
And WKBN has managed to hold onto three local weekday full-time hosts - morning driver Robert Mangino, program director Dan Rivers (middays), and afternoon driver Ron Verb - despite presumed pressure from corporate masters we imagine are just itching to put Glenn Beck into middays and Sean Hannity into afternoons.
But...it's a different world at Clear Channel, even from before when it was owned by two large private equity funds.
Yes, we know other newsrooms have shrunken, even those not owned by Clear Channel. The once-full newsroom at NextMedia's WHBC/1480 Canton is now basically news/program director Pam Cook and anchor Geoff Mears.
But at least Pam and Geoff are still there, physically, on Market Avenue South on the southern edge of downtown Canton. Who'll be left if Clear Channel corporate decides that it doesn't need Jim Michaels in Youngstown? How can a company claim a devotion to local news if you force your local cluster to dump a 40 year veteran newsman still at the top of his game?
In 2009, you can count fully-staffed local radio newsrooms in Ohio concentrating only on their home market (i.e. Akron's Rubber City Radio, Cox's WHIO in Dayton) on one hand and still have room to twiddle a few fingers around.
The second part of our discourse is about "Premium Choice", Clear Channel's clever name for its canned music programming.
The names that first surfaced included existing syndicated hosts Ryan Seacrest and Cleveland's Steve Harvey.
Now, thanks to AllAccess, here's Clear Channel's list of (some) local hosts that will contribute to the "Premium Choice" menu for stations needing inexpensive, national fill on-air personalities:
WAXQ/NEW YORK middayer MARIA MILTO
WBBG/MIAMI afternooner DOC RENO
WXTB/TAMPA middayer BIG RIG
WFBQ/INDIANAPOLIS afternooner LAURA STEELE
WTUE/DAYTON afternooner JOHN "THE B-MAN" BEAULIEU
WHTZ/NEW YORK night dude BILLY THE KIDD
KIIS/LOS ANGELES middayer SISANIE
WDCG/RALEIGH PD/afternooner RANDI WEST
From what we're hearing, all of these personalities are currently voicetracking non-local-specific generic national shows for their format. And we hear that at least one Clear Channel Cleveland personality is also involved in this effort...and we suspect a couple of others at Oak Tree will join that personality.
Randi West is a name familiar to many in Ohio. She once voicetracked a number of stations during her live shift at a Cincinnati Clear Channel outlet, an effort described in a newspaper article.
But these "shows" will be different. We don't believe any of the personalities will provide ANY specific, local content in this effort. Ms. West will sound the same in one market as she will in her other markets outside Raleigh, for example. If Clear Channel wants to add local content, they'll apparently rely on those expanded local PSAs and other community announcements.
Doesn't it just excite the heck out of you? Aren't you just dying to hear this programming?
Uh, OK.
Our final comment in this very long item: To us, "Premium Choice" sounds like the name for the house brand at Wal-Mart.
Oh, wait, that's "President's Choice". Target, maybe?
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
The CC Ohio Cut List, As We Know It
UPDATE: This list will be updated as new names come in...
-----------
The following is a list of all the Clear Channel employees we know to have been cut this week in Ohio.
There are some new names on the list, that we haven't yet reported, and still some unconfirmed names.
For the most part, this list contains names on-air or programming department employees laid off at the company's stations starting Monday.
It's our belief that each cluster lost at least one or two off-air employees. If we know that information, we'll pass it along. If we don't, assume there are others not listed.
There are some markets here where we're hearing rumblings (Lima, Ashland/Mansfield, etc.) that haven't been confirmed yet.
And as such, rather unfortunately, even late at night, we can't guarantee that this approaches a final list. Last time Clear Channel went on a Mad Layoff Spree in January, we were getting updates well into the next day...
CLEVELAND:
Marty Allen, producer/co-host, talk WTAM/1100's "Mike Trivisonno Show"
Paul Rado, producer/co-host, talk WTAM/1100's "Mike Trivisonno Show"
Brian Fowler, co-host, hot AC WMVX/106.5 "Mix 106-5"'s "Brian and Joe"
Joe Cronauer, co-host, hot AC WMVX/106.5 "Mix 106-5"'s "Brian and Joe"
AKRON/CANTON:
Amy Malone, co-host, AC WHOF/101.7 "My 101.7"' morning show
Megan, nights, rock WRQK/106.9 "Rock 106-9"/afternoon traffic reporter
Chad Jensen, production
Bruce Rogers, engineering
YOUNGSTOWN:
Dan Gonder, afternoon drive, hot AC WMXY/98.9 "Mix 98-9"/morning drive, standards WNIO/1390
Sean Stevens, program director, top 40 WAKZ/95.9 "Kiss FM"
John Nagy, news director, news/talk WKBN/570
Lorraine Hall, news, news/talk WKBN/570
COLUMBUS:
Chuck Gillespie, afternoon drive, AC WLZT/93.3
Maxwell, nights/music director, top 40 WNCI/97.9
Marty Scott, part-time, top 40 WNCI/97.9
Dan Van Duesen, promotions director, talk WTVN/610
Two other WNCI part-time staff, two business office staffers
(WNCI's Maxwell, of course, is no relation to WMMS/100.7 Cleveland afternoon host Maxwell, who is not on the cut list)
TOLEDO:
Nathan Reed, program director, top 40 WVKS/92.5 "Kiss FM"
Mookie, assistant program director/afternoon drive, top 40 WVKS/92.5 "Kiss FM"
K.C. Palmer, afternoon drive, AC WRVF/101.5 "The River"
Two part-time news/programming staffers, one full-time office staffer
CINCINNATI:
Paul Daugherty, "Sportsline" host, talk WLW/700
Alan Cutler, sports talk host, talk WLW/700 and Bengals Radio Network
C. Trent Rosencrans, blogger, sports talk WCKY/1530
Travis Holmes, producer, sports talk WCKY/1530
Mark Chalifoux, producer, sports talk WCKY/1530
Matt Steinmann, producer (Bill Cunningham, Mike McConnell shows), talk WLW/700
(Our thanks to the updated item by Cincinnati Enquirer radio/TV writer John Kiesewetter for these names.)
LIMA/FINDLAY:
"DJ OL SKOOL", program director, rhythmic top 40 WLWD/93.9 "Wild 93-9"
Eric Michaels, program director, rock WZRX/107.5 "X-107.5"
John Bell, business manager
Ed Douglas, operations manager
Russ Ryder, imaging director/music director, country WIMT/102.1-rhythmic top 40 WLWD/93.9-country WCKY/103.7, nights, WCKY
Frank Barber, news anchor, talk WIMA/1150
(Note: Though WCKY/103.7 is now licensed to the Wood County town of Pemberville, in the Toledo market, it still falls under the oversight of Clear Channel's Lima cluster.)
-----------
The following is a list of all the Clear Channel employees we know to have been cut this week in Ohio.
There are some new names on the list, that we haven't yet reported, and still some unconfirmed names.
For the most part, this list contains names on-air or programming department employees laid off at the company's stations starting Monday.
It's our belief that each cluster lost at least one or two off-air employees. If we know that information, we'll pass it along. If we don't, assume there are others not listed.
There are some markets here where we're hearing rumblings (Lima, Ashland/Mansfield, etc.) that haven't been confirmed yet.
And as such, rather unfortunately, even late at night, we can't guarantee that this approaches a final list. Last time Clear Channel went on a Mad Layoff Spree in January, we were getting updates well into the next day...
CLEVELAND:
Marty Allen, producer/co-host, talk WTAM/1100's "Mike Trivisonno Show"
Paul Rado, producer/co-host, talk WTAM/1100's "Mike Trivisonno Show"
Brian Fowler, co-host, hot AC WMVX/106.5 "Mix 106-5"'s "Brian and Joe"
Joe Cronauer, co-host, hot AC WMVX/106.5 "Mix 106-5"'s "Brian and Joe"
AKRON/CANTON:
Amy Malone, co-host, AC WHOF/101.7 "My 101.7"' morning show
Megan, nights, rock WRQK/106.9 "Rock 106-9"/afternoon traffic reporter
Chad Jensen, production
Bruce Rogers, engineering
YOUNGSTOWN:
Dan Gonder, afternoon drive, hot AC WMXY/98.9 "Mix 98-9"/morning drive, standards WNIO/1390
Sean Stevens, program director, top 40 WAKZ/95.9 "Kiss FM"
John Nagy, news director, news/talk WKBN/570
Lorraine Hall, news, news/talk WKBN/570
COLUMBUS:
Chuck Gillespie, afternoon drive, AC WLZT/93.3
Maxwell, nights/music director, top 40 WNCI/97.9
Marty Scott, part-time, top 40 WNCI/97.9
Dan Van Duesen, promotions director, talk WTVN/610
Two other WNCI part-time staff, two business office staffers
(WNCI's Maxwell, of course, is no relation to WMMS/100.7 Cleveland afternoon host Maxwell, who is not on the cut list)
TOLEDO:
Nathan Reed, program director, top 40 WVKS/92.5 "Kiss FM"
Mookie, assistant program director/afternoon drive, top 40 WVKS/92.5 "Kiss FM"
K.C. Palmer, afternoon drive, AC WRVF/101.5 "The River"
Two part-time news/programming staffers, one full-time office staffer
CINCINNATI:
Paul Daugherty, "Sportsline" host, talk WLW/700
Alan Cutler, sports talk host, talk WLW/700 and Bengals Radio Network
C. Trent Rosencrans, blogger, sports talk WCKY/1530
Travis Holmes, producer, sports talk WCKY/1530
Mark Chalifoux, producer, sports talk WCKY/1530
Matt Steinmann, producer (Bill Cunningham, Mike McConnell shows), talk WLW/700
(Our thanks to the updated item by Cincinnati Enquirer radio/TV writer John Kiesewetter for these names.)
LIMA/FINDLAY:
"DJ OL SKOOL", program director, rhythmic top 40 WLWD/93.9 "Wild 93-9"
Eric Michaels, program director, rock WZRX/107.5 "X-107.5"
John Bell, business manager
Ed Douglas, operations manager
Russ Ryder, imaging director/music director, country WIMT/102.1-rhythmic top 40 WLWD/93.9-country WCKY/103.7, nights, WCKY
Frank Barber, news anchor, talk WIMA/1150
(Note: Though WCKY/103.7 is now licensed to the Wood County town of Pemberville, in the Toledo market, it still falls under the oversight of Clear Channel's Lima cluster.)
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Tuesday's Full Basket
It's a pretty random, but important, collection of items in our basket on Tuesday morning...
OH, AND BY THE WAY, THE PD: The news of the impending end of another American newspaper had everyone buzzing Monday, including your Mighty Blog of Fun(tm).
Oh, by the way, employees of the Northeast Ohio sister paper of the Ann Arbor News took a budget hit Monday as well.
Shortly after we took ourselves out of the media news stream to attend to Real Life, the Cleveland Plain Dealer announced its own latest moves designed to save parent Advance Publications some money. Quoting the item posted by the PD's Michelle Jarboe:
The Plain Dealer will require non-union employees to take pay cuts and 10-day furloughs, in an attempt to cut costs but preserve jobs and continue to print seven days a week.
During meetings with employees Monday, Publisher and President Terrance C. Z. Egger announced that full-time, non-union employees must take 10 days of unpaid leave between April 20 and Oct. 4.
Full-time and part-time non-union employees will see their first $50,000 of pay cut by 8 percent and any additional pay reduced by 10 percent as of June 1.
The Monday article says about 370 employees will be affected by the furlough order, and 450 will be hit by the pay cuts. It also details other budget-related moves by Advance-owned papers elsewhere.
The pay cuts and furloughs mirror a trend that other big media companies have started. Cleveland NBC affiliate WKYC/3 owner Gannett (a big newspaper owner) is one such company, as we've reported before.
We'll assume that at some point, the companies realize that you can't run a newspaper with a handful of people...so the only remaining choice is giving workers less money one way or the other. Or....well, you have to join the Rocky Mountain News, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and now the Ann Arbor News in basically throwing in the towel on daily newspapering.
And PD publisher Terrance Egger tells his paper that the Cleveland paper isn't headed in that direction:
Egger said The Plain Dealer is committed to protecting as many jobs as possible while curbing expenses. The company will continue to print a newspaper seven days a week, even as some other large newspapers reduce their printing schedules or switch to a Web-only product, he said.
"We want to be in it for the long haul," Egger told employees. "I don't see a way for all of us to get there without making some sacrifices."
But the short haul is looking awful for all newspapers, including the PD - which says it saw ad revenues fall "twice as much as expected" as it nears the end of 2009's first quarter.
The Plain Dealer may "want to be in it for the long haul", but is printing a newspaper seven days a week a viable model for anyone in 2009? The PD made money in 2008, Egger said, and hoped to make money in 2009...but that last piece of news makes that seem like a far off target.
We also got some comments on our "off the cuff" analysis of the Ann Arbor and Michigan situation vs. Cleveland and Northeast Ohio. One reader points out that Cleveland's most recent unemployment rate is more than Ann Arbor, which is traditionally more insulated economically due to the presence of the University of That Team Which Can't Beat Ohio State...er...Michigan.
Point well taken. It's also one reason Columbus hangs in there vs. Cleveland.
But the overall Michigan economy is awful. And those other Booth/Advance papers named are in that state's hardest hit markets - such as Flint, which has basically been falling apart economically since the 1980's.
What brought in "AnnArbor.com" as an option for Advance is likely that "college city" atmosphere...with the U of M influence making it a more connected, more intelligent city that would be a good laboratory for the Website Which Replaces Newspaper experiment...
IT'S BACK: A note in Monday's Inside Radio sent us scurrying to FCC records, and sure enough, Cleveland market top 40 outlet WAKS/96.5 "Kiss FM" is officially back in the Clear Channel fold again.
And all of this, without a single piece of equipment moving anywhere.
Of course, Clear Channel tabbed WAKS to the Aloha Station Trust in the process of its sale to two private equity firms. The sale triggered FCC local ownership guidelines, and at least technically revoked Clear Channel's grandfathered ability to operate stations like WAKS - which put the company over the ownership cap in the Cleveland market.
Ah, but since it's WAKS/*Akron*, Clear Channel was able to trigger a simple bit of shuffling that attributed 96.5, ownership limit wise, into the Akron Arbitron market. That allows the company to keep the station, and even allows it to continue operating it out of the Clear Channel Cleveland cluster on Oak Tree.
Again, without moving a single piece of equipment or changing studios...as "Kiss FM" never moved from Oak Tree, and was operated by Clear Channel even under the Aloha Trust ownership.
FCC records show the "reassignment" of WAKS to Clear Channel was approved a week ago, on March 17...
COX RADIO GOING PRIVATE: We hadn't mentioned that Atlanta-based Cox Enterprises is making a nearly $70 million bid to absorb its own Cox Radio division to make it private.
Cox, of course, was founded in Dayton, where it owns four radio stations - including the WHIO/1290-WHIO-FM/95.7 simulcast - and the Dayton Daily News...the first link in the Cox empire...
LOOKING FOR A MARKET MANAGER JOB?: We stumbled onto an ad placed in that same Monday edition of Inside Radio, with two Ohio Clear Channel clusters looking for a new leader:
Ashland/Mansfield dual market cluster - 6 FM-1 triplecast/2 AM
Lima/Marion dual market of 7FM/2 AM
Clear Channel Radio seeks experienced management professionals to assume the role of VP/Market Manager for each dual market. The ideal candidate should have previous market manager experience and a proven track record of ratings and revenue success. DOS’s and Operation Managers wanting career growth are encouraged to apply. Candidates should have a minimum of 5-7 years radio experience with a minimum of 2 years in management. College degree preferred.
We'll save her from spambots, but you can apply for this one by E-mailing one Melissa Burns at a standard Clear Channel address with a cover letter and resume. And, yes, "no phone calls, please!"...
OH, AND BY THE WAY, THE PD: The news of the impending end of another American newspaper had everyone buzzing Monday, including your Mighty Blog of Fun(tm).
Oh, by the way, employees of the Northeast Ohio sister paper of the Ann Arbor News took a budget hit Monday as well.
Shortly after we took ourselves out of the media news stream to attend to Real Life, the Cleveland Plain Dealer announced its own latest moves designed to save parent Advance Publications some money. Quoting the item posted by the PD's Michelle Jarboe:
The Plain Dealer will require non-union employees to take pay cuts and 10-day furloughs, in an attempt to cut costs but preserve jobs and continue to print seven days a week.
During meetings with employees Monday, Publisher and President Terrance C. Z. Egger announced that full-time, non-union employees must take 10 days of unpaid leave between April 20 and Oct. 4.
Full-time and part-time non-union employees will see their first $50,000 of pay cut by 8 percent and any additional pay reduced by 10 percent as of June 1.
The Monday article says about 370 employees will be affected by the furlough order, and 450 will be hit by the pay cuts. It also details other budget-related moves by Advance-owned papers elsewhere.
The pay cuts and furloughs mirror a trend that other big media companies have started. Cleveland NBC affiliate WKYC/3 owner Gannett (a big newspaper owner) is one such company, as we've reported before.
We'll assume that at some point, the companies realize that you can't run a newspaper with a handful of people...so the only remaining choice is giving workers less money one way or the other. Or....well, you have to join the Rocky Mountain News, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and now the Ann Arbor News in basically throwing in the towel on daily newspapering.
And PD publisher Terrance Egger tells his paper that the Cleveland paper isn't headed in that direction:
Egger said The Plain Dealer is committed to protecting as many jobs as possible while curbing expenses. The company will continue to print a newspaper seven days a week, even as some other large newspapers reduce their printing schedules or switch to a Web-only product, he said.
"We want to be in it for the long haul," Egger told employees. "I don't see a way for all of us to get there without making some sacrifices."
But the short haul is looking awful for all newspapers, including the PD - which says it saw ad revenues fall "twice as much as expected" as it nears the end of 2009's first quarter.
The Plain Dealer may "want to be in it for the long haul", but is printing a newspaper seven days a week a viable model for anyone in 2009? The PD made money in 2008, Egger said, and hoped to make money in 2009...but that last piece of news makes that seem like a far off target.
We also got some comments on our "off the cuff" analysis of the Ann Arbor and Michigan situation vs. Cleveland and Northeast Ohio. One reader points out that Cleveland's most recent unemployment rate is more than Ann Arbor, which is traditionally more insulated economically due to the presence of the University of That Team Which Can't Beat Ohio State...er...Michigan.
Point well taken. It's also one reason Columbus hangs in there vs. Cleveland.
But the overall Michigan economy is awful. And those other Booth/Advance papers named are in that state's hardest hit markets - such as Flint, which has basically been falling apart economically since the 1980's.
What brought in "AnnArbor.com" as an option for Advance is likely that "college city" atmosphere...with the U of M influence making it a more connected, more intelligent city that would be a good laboratory for the Website Which Replaces Newspaper experiment...
IT'S BACK: A note in Monday's Inside Radio sent us scurrying to FCC records, and sure enough, Cleveland market top 40 outlet WAKS/96.5 "Kiss FM" is officially back in the Clear Channel fold again.
And all of this, without a single piece of equipment moving anywhere.
Of course, Clear Channel tabbed WAKS to the Aloha Station Trust in the process of its sale to two private equity firms. The sale triggered FCC local ownership guidelines, and at least technically revoked Clear Channel's grandfathered ability to operate stations like WAKS - which put the company over the ownership cap in the Cleveland market.
Ah, but since it's WAKS/*Akron*, Clear Channel was able to trigger a simple bit of shuffling that attributed 96.5, ownership limit wise, into the Akron Arbitron market. That allows the company to keep the station, and even allows it to continue operating it out of the Clear Channel Cleveland cluster on Oak Tree.
Again, without moving a single piece of equipment or changing studios...as "Kiss FM" never moved from Oak Tree, and was operated by Clear Channel even under the Aloha Trust ownership.
FCC records show the "reassignment" of WAKS to Clear Channel was approved a week ago, on March 17...
COX RADIO GOING PRIVATE: We hadn't mentioned that Atlanta-based Cox Enterprises is making a nearly $70 million bid to absorb its own Cox Radio division to make it private.
Cox, of course, was founded in Dayton, where it owns four radio stations - including the WHIO/1290-WHIO-FM/95.7 simulcast - and the Dayton Daily News...the first link in the Cox empire...
LOOKING FOR A MARKET MANAGER JOB?: We stumbled onto an ad placed in that same Monday edition of Inside Radio, with two Ohio Clear Channel clusters looking for a new leader:
Ashland/Mansfield dual market cluster - 6 FM-1 triplecast/2 AM
Lima/Marion dual market of 7FM/2 AM
Clear Channel Radio seeks experienced management professionals to assume the role of VP/Market Manager for each dual market. The ideal candidate should have previous market manager experience and a proven track record of ratings and revenue success. DOS’s and Operation Managers wanting career growth are encouraged to apply. Candidates should have a minimum of 5-7 years radio experience with a minimum of 2 years in management. College degree preferred.
We'll save her from spambots, but you can apply for this one by E-mailing one Melissa Burns at a standard Clear Channel address with a cover letter and resume. And, yes, "no phone calls, please!"...
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Sports And Digital
Your Primary Editorial Voice(tm) is "on the road" for much of this week, and our updates will be a little more sporadic than usual.
But, we did manage to put some "breaking news" up here before it happened on Monday, didn't we? And as usual, our physical exit from Ohio prompted a major change...sorry, Columbus, we should have warned you!
THE SPORTS HIT THE FM FAN: And as reported here Monday, Dispatch hot AC WBNS-FM/97.1 Columbus "Mix 97.1" faded into oblivion as scheduled at 4 PM on Monday.
Those who were listening to the FM side (or its streaming audio) told us that the "Mix" format went out without any live air personalities...as we'd mentioned, we're hearing the entire FM-side staff was let go earlier that morning.
OMW readers tell us a medley of Ohio State University Buckeyes-related music, fight songs, etc. led into the new "Sports Radio 97.1 The Fan" at 4 PM - a full simulcast of the long-running "1460 The Fan" on WBNS' AM side.
Given the station's Ohio State sports contract, you could say the new two-headed "Fan" is "Powered by the Buckeyes"...an obsession in Ohio's capital city like no other.
Speaking of "power", and for that matter, former Buckeyes, "The Fan's" afternoon drive team members - including Chris Spielman and Kirk Herbstreit - gushed about the wide availability of the station on its new FM signal, and looked forward to the end of complaints from areas even relatively close to Columbus which are cut off from the tightly directional 1460 AM night pattern.
Not gushing at all were fans of the music format blown off the FM dial in the latest move of an AM sports station to a big FM signal.
Station officials issued a statement on the former "Mix 97.1" website:
Anytime there is a dramatic change in direction for a business, there will be those that are happy, and those that are disappointed. We do not make changes of this magnitude without weighing both sides of the equation.
In the end, making this format change to Mix 97.1 was about providing central Ohio with what central Ohio has continued to ask for, a "sports" radio station on the FM dial. We realize there will be disappointed music listeners, as well as many very happy sports fans that are finally getting what they want.
The site even contains a helpful feedback dialog - just in case you're a former "Mix" listener who wants to try to spit into the wind and return the old format.
With the primary branding now on the FM side for WBNS' "Fan" format, we're among those wondering if 1460 will go off in a different direction. Right now, we have no indication that will happen.
Sports radio on FM has become a Big Deal in the past few months. CBS Radio started the latest fire by flipping another 97.1 FM, Detroit's FM talker WKRK, to sports as WXYT "97.1 The Ticket", a move from its old 1270 AM home (which like 1460 now with its new 97.1 home, still simulcasts its FM side today).
That station has been so successful on FM that Clear Channel's recent "restructuring" restructured a long time sports format competitor, WDFN/1130, right out of the local sports talk radio business.
CBS Radio quickly followed by flipping another FM talker to sports in Baltimore (WJZ-FM), then one in Dallas (KRLD-FM). The troubled broadcasting giant reportedly acted quickly after seeing positive PPM (Portable People Meter) returns out of Detroit's FM "Ticket".
Long-time readers know that we've been watching traditional AM spoken word formats (news/talk/sports) and their success on FM.
Just down the Ohio and Pennsylvania Turnpikes from OMW World Headquarters, Clear Channel has reaped quite a reward pairing a popular conservative talk local morning show with a fairly traditional Clear Channel AM talk lineup on Pittsburgh's WPGB/104.7, taking a lot of wind out of the sails of CBS Radio's legendary talk KDKA/1020...particularly in younger still-talk-friendly demos.
And the march continues.
Meanwhile, we don't know if it was prompted by "The Fan"'s move to FM, but Clear Channel flipped talk WYTS/1230 to sports on Monday afternoon, featuring the Fox Sports Radio lineup - and presumably, Premiere mainstay Jim Rome sticks around to anchor the new sports format.
WYTS had been running mostly a second-tier lineup of syndicated conservative hosts...the name hosts over on big brother talker WTVN/610. WYTS had just started the new year with additions of United Stations' Lou Dobbs, and Dial Global's Neal Boortz and Clark Howard to the schedule.
The WYTS website now shows the new "Fox Sports Radio 1230" logo...and nothing else, yet...
ONE MORE TO GO: That rumbling in Congress to move the digital TV transition date now has one important vote behind it, and could well end up on President Obama's desk soon.
The U.S. Senate has weighed in, voting "unanimously" to move the digital transition deadline from February 17th to June 12th.
The issue still has to be considered in the House, which has been kicking around its own DTV-related bills, but, according to the Associated Press:
...Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., has vowed to work with House leaders to bring (Senate Commerce Committee chair Sen. Jay) Rockefeller's bill up for a floor vote on Tuesday.
If the DTV delay bill passes in the House, President Obama is expected to sign it.
As we pointed out last time this proposal was mentioned here:
(Sen.) Rockefeller managed to ease some of these concerns by allowing broadcast stations to make the switch from analog to digital signals sooner than the June deadline if they choose...
The concerns come from places like PBS, where the AP quotes president/CEO Paula Kerger that a delay to June 12th could cost public broadcasters some $22 million in extra costs.
The upshot is that right now, it does appear that television stations can abandon analog for good on their own under the new plan, and those watching the moves say that hundreds of stations have already made it clear to the FCC that they are going to shut down analog on February 17th or sooner...like WNEO/45 Alliance and WMFD/68 Mansfield have done already in Northeast Ohio.
But, what about the complicated situations? What about Gannett NBC affiliate WKYC/3, which has been trying to put up the tower holding its digital antenna set for RF channel 17 (we haven't checked on its progress as of late) for some time?
Is TBN O&O WDLI/17 Canton signing off its analog side on the night of February 17th, or will they wait until June?
We won't know that answer probably until after the date change bill is signed into law by President Obama, but if they hang around after the 17th of next month, WKYC won't be able to budge from its anemic temporary digital home on interference-plagued DT 2 until WDLI's analog 17 is gone... though it does have the authority to operate on the pre-transition DT 2 past February 17th in an STA...
"THIS" IS IT FOR WUAB-DT2: One of the folks keeping track of the digital TV application status is Virginia resident Trip Ericson, proprietor of the RabbitEars site with various TV station facilities listings.
Trip also lets us know that Raycom Media Cleveland market MyNetwork TV affiliate WUAB/43 has found new programming for its long-abandoned digital subchannel 43.2.
After the continual months-long run of a digital slide telling viewers that no, WUAB didn't kill "The Tube" music video channel, WUAB parent Raycom has signed a deal to air MGM's "This TV" service on 43.2 - and 14 other stations. TVNewsday reports the deals with Raycom, Tribune and two smaller groups give the so-called "diginet" over 60% national clearance.
"This TV" airs a number of movies and reruns, mainly from the MGM vaults. Chicago-based Weigel Broadcasting, which runs a local rerun subchannel called "Me-TV" in Chicago and Milwaukee, is also involved in the new channel.
"Me-TV" carries more sitcoms and hour-long classic TV dramas than "This". Many of the programs it carries are seen on the Retro Television Network (RTN), which is aired subchannels of Toledo Barrington NBC affiliate WNWO-DT', and of Steubenville Cox NBC affiliate WSTV-DT.
Despite that similarity, MGM/Weigel's "This TV" and RTN are competitors.
We don't know when "This TV" will start on WUAB. It may already be up, but we're out of range of Cleveland local over-air digital signals at this writing...
But, we did manage to put some "breaking news" up here before it happened on Monday, didn't we? And as usual, our physical exit from Ohio prompted a major change...sorry, Columbus, we should have warned you!
THE SPORTS HIT THE FM FAN: And as reported here Monday, Dispatch hot AC WBNS-FM/97.1 Columbus "Mix 97.1" faded into oblivion as scheduled at 4 PM on Monday.
Those who were listening to the FM side (or its streaming audio) told us that the "Mix" format went out without any live air personalities...as we'd mentioned, we're hearing the entire FM-side staff was let go earlier that morning.
OMW readers tell us a medley of Ohio State University Buckeyes-related music, fight songs, etc. led into the new "Sports Radio 97.1 The Fan" at 4 PM - a full simulcast of the long-running "1460 The Fan" on WBNS' AM side.Given the station's Ohio State sports contract, you could say the new two-headed "Fan" is "Powered by the Buckeyes"...an obsession in Ohio's capital city like no other.
Speaking of "power", and for that matter, former Buckeyes, "The Fan's" afternoon drive team members - including Chris Spielman and Kirk Herbstreit - gushed about the wide availability of the station on its new FM signal, and looked forward to the end of complaints from areas even relatively close to Columbus which are cut off from the tightly directional 1460 AM night pattern.
Not gushing at all were fans of the music format blown off the FM dial in the latest move of an AM sports station to a big FM signal.
Station officials issued a statement on the former "Mix 97.1" website:
Anytime there is a dramatic change in direction for a business, there will be those that are happy, and those that are disappointed. We do not make changes of this magnitude without weighing both sides of the equation.
In the end, making this format change to Mix 97.1 was about providing central Ohio with what central Ohio has continued to ask for, a "sports" radio station on the FM dial. We realize there will be disappointed music listeners, as well as many very happy sports fans that are finally getting what they want.
The site even contains a helpful feedback dialog - just in case you're a former "Mix" listener who wants to try to spit into the wind and return the old format.
With the primary branding now on the FM side for WBNS' "Fan" format, we're among those wondering if 1460 will go off in a different direction. Right now, we have no indication that will happen.
Sports radio on FM has become a Big Deal in the past few months. CBS Radio started the latest fire by flipping another 97.1 FM, Detroit's FM talker WKRK, to sports as WXYT "97.1 The Ticket", a move from its old 1270 AM home (which like 1460 now with its new 97.1 home, still simulcasts its FM side today).
That station has been so successful on FM that Clear Channel's recent "restructuring" restructured a long time sports format competitor, WDFN/1130, right out of the local sports talk radio business.
CBS Radio quickly followed by flipping another FM talker to sports in Baltimore (WJZ-FM), then one in Dallas (KRLD-FM). The troubled broadcasting giant reportedly acted quickly after seeing positive PPM (Portable People Meter) returns out of Detroit's FM "Ticket".
Long-time readers know that we've been watching traditional AM spoken word formats (news/talk/sports) and their success on FM.
Just down the Ohio and Pennsylvania Turnpikes from OMW World Headquarters, Clear Channel has reaped quite a reward pairing a popular conservative talk local morning show with a fairly traditional Clear Channel AM talk lineup on Pittsburgh's WPGB/104.7, taking a lot of wind out of the sails of CBS Radio's legendary talk KDKA/1020...particularly in younger still-talk-friendly demos.
And the march continues.
Meanwhile, we don't know if it was prompted by "The Fan"'s move to FM, but Clear Channel flipped talk WYTS/1230 to sports on Monday afternoon, featuring the Fox Sports Radio lineup - and presumably, Premiere mainstay Jim Rome sticks around to anchor the new sports format.WYTS had been running mostly a second-tier lineup of syndicated conservative hosts...the name hosts over on big brother talker WTVN/610. WYTS had just started the new year with additions of United Stations' Lou Dobbs, and Dial Global's Neal Boortz and Clark Howard to the schedule.
The WYTS website now shows the new "Fox Sports Radio 1230" logo...and nothing else, yet...
ONE MORE TO GO: That rumbling in Congress to move the digital TV transition date now has one important vote behind it, and could well end up on President Obama's desk soon.
The U.S. Senate has weighed in, voting "unanimously" to move the digital transition deadline from February 17th to June 12th.
The issue still has to be considered in the House, which has been kicking around its own DTV-related bills, but, according to the Associated Press:
...Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., has vowed to work with House leaders to bring (Senate Commerce Committee chair Sen. Jay) Rockefeller's bill up for a floor vote on Tuesday.
If the DTV delay bill passes in the House, President Obama is expected to sign it.
As we pointed out last time this proposal was mentioned here:
(Sen.) Rockefeller managed to ease some of these concerns by allowing broadcast stations to make the switch from analog to digital signals sooner than the June deadline if they choose...
The concerns come from places like PBS, where the AP quotes president/CEO Paula Kerger that a delay to June 12th could cost public broadcasters some $22 million in extra costs.
The upshot is that right now, it does appear that television stations can abandon analog for good on their own under the new plan, and those watching the moves say that hundreds of stations have already made it clear to the FCC that they are going to shut down analog on February 17th or sooner...like WNEO/45 Alliance and WMFD/68 Mansfield have done already in Northeast Ohio.
But, what about the complicated situations? What about Gannett NBC affiliate WKYC/3, which has been trying to put up the tower holding its digital antenna set for RF channel 17 (we haven't checked on its progress as of late) for some time?
Is TBN O&O WDLI/17 Canton signing off its analog side on the night of February 17th, or will they wait until June?
We won't know that answer probably until after the date change bill is signed into law by President Obama, but if they hang around after the 17th of next month, WKYC won't be able to budge from its anemic temporary digital home on interference-plagued DT 2 until WDLI's analog 17 is gone... though it does have the authority to operate on the pre-transition DT 2 past February 17th in an STA...
"THIS" IS IT FOR WUAB-DT2: One of the folks keeping track of the digital TV application status is Virginia resident Trip Ericson, proprietor of the RabbitEars site with various TV station facilities listings.
Trip also lets us know that Raycom Media Cleveland market MyNetwork TV affiliate WUAB/43 has found new programming for its long-abandoned digital subchannel 43.2.
After the continual months-long run of a digital slide telling viewers that no, WUAB didn't kill "The Tube" music video channel, WUAB parent Raycom has signed a deal to air MGM's "This TV" service on 43.2 - and 14 other stations. TVNewsday reports the deals with Raycom, Tribune and two smaller groups give the so-called "diginet" over 60% national clearance.
"This TV" airs a number of movies and reruns, mainly from the MGM vaults. Chicago-based Weigel Broadcasting, which runs a local rerun subchannel called "Me-TV" in Chicago and Milwaukee, is also involved in the new channel.
"Me-TV" carries more sitcoms and hour-long classic TV dramas than "This". Many of the programs it carries are seen on the Retro Television Network (RTN), which is aired subchannels of Toledo Barrington NBC affiliate WNWO-DT', and of Steubenville Cox NBC affiliate WSTV-DT.
Despite that similarity, MGM/Weigel's "This TV" and RTN are competitors.
We don't know when "This TV" will start on WUAB. It may already be up, but we're out of range of Cleveland local over-air digital signals at this writing...
Friday, January 09, 2009
A Snowy Update
As local TV weather forecasters predict anywhere from 4, to 10, to 250 inches of snow for Northeast Ohio this weekend, what else do you have to do but read this Snowbound Week-Ending OMW update?
We've stocked up on the essentials...you'll have enough here to last you through the snowy weekend. And we're only kidding about that "250" number above. It only seems like it...
WEOL EXIT: We have few details, but we hear that Elyria-Lorain Broadcasting talk WEOL/930 Elyria has parted ways with long-time newsman Larry Wright.
In addition to anchoring and reporting for WEOL, Larry has also hosted long-form programs such as a late morning show - which got clipped when the Elyria station became the Cleveland market affiliate of Premiere's Glenn Beck.
(Beck, of course, left WEOL a few months ago, when Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100 returned him to its lineup...TRN's Laura Ingraham is perched in WEOL's late morning slot these days.)
We don't know the circumstances of Wright's exit from WEOL, just that Friday was his last day...
SUSANNE GONE: We got a couple of questions in the past week about the absence of weather forecaster Susanne Horgan from Scripps Cleveland ABC affiliate WEWS/5 "NewsChannel 5".
We pointed our readers towards an earlier OMW item detailing the changes at the station's "Good Morning Cleveland"...with the move of Pete Kenworthy to the anchor desk, and Jason Nicholas in the weather position.
Nicholas' placement on "GMC" moved Horgan to the station's weekend newscasts, but we reported back then that we heard that was temporary - and her contract would be allowed to expire.
We have confirmation of that from an item by the Cleveland Plain Dealer's Julie Washington.
WEWS general manager Victoria Regan tells Julie that yes, the station didn't renew Horgan's contract, and that she was replaced by Jeff Mackel on the weekend casts.
Of course, the move of Jason Nicholas to mornings started the whole process, and we'd already told you about the contract non-renewal and Horgan's impending exit.
Washington also notes that "NewsChannel 5" reporter Alicia Booth is set to come back from maternity leave on January 16th...
ANOTHER JULIE ITEM: The PD media columnist also notes new programming on Winston Broadcasting CW affiliate WBNX/55.
All three programs are presumably syndicated fare, so we won't spend a lot of time on them. But one of the three shows is called "Better Cleveland".
The new show is dubbed a "lifestyle show" in the article. It sounds, from the description, to be a syndicated program that allows some sort with recorded local segments.
Handling those, says WBNX general manager Lou Spangler, will be Miss Ohio 2006 Melanie Murphy. Spangler tells Julie Washington that Murphy's segments will start airing in early February.
The 2 PM weekday show will bump a couple of non-notable courtroom shows into the late night hours on "WBNX-The CW"...
THE INTERNET BATTLEGROUND: TV stations have long trumpeted being the first local station to report breaking news stories.
That promotion has now moved into cyberspace, as the folks at WEWS' "NewsChannel 5" are crowing about breaking news about the hiring of new Cleveland Browns head coach Eric Mangini first...on a number of different platforms. Quoting a station news release that made it to the TVNewsday trade site:
Within seconds of Sports Director Andy Baskin’s confirmation of the move, WEWS used multiple platforms to deliver the news to viewers and users: Andy was Live on 5, newsnet5.com sent out an e-mail alert and posted the story, and editorial staff posted on Twitter and Facebook.
"This is a great example of how NewsChannel5 is responding to the needs of our audience. We delivered this big story in all the ways viewers and users are consuming local media," said WEWS News Director Jill Manuel. "Northeast Ohio can count on us to consistently be where they are, with local content that matters to them.”
We're not here to confirm or disclaim what the folks at 3001 Euclid are crowing...because we just don't know.
A quick check of the Twitter pages of WEWS and of NBC affiliate WKYC/3 shows very close time stamps - 2:27 PM Wednesday on WKYC's site, 2:29 PM on WEWS' site. We don't know what time the Mangini news broke on air or on the web out of WJW/8 or WOIO/19.
Our reason for bringing this up? It's a sea change in how stations compete with each other, with Internet and non-on-air reporting just as important as who broke into the soap opera to give the news. (And in Cleveland, the hiring of a new head coach for the city's pro football franchise is definitely "Level One, Break Into Programming NOW!" news.)
We note that local stations are now offering direct alerts of school closings via text messaging or other online alerts.
Broadcast TV...it's so old-fashioned, even that shiny new tower about to go up at WKYC's Broadview Road facility in Parma looks a bit dated...
FEAGLER'S PD EXIT: We haven't noted here yet that long-time Cleveland newspaper columnist Dick Feagler has written his last regular column for the Plain Dealer.
And in the week since Feagler hammered out his last PD column, he's been the subject of a number of accolades and stories in other media...among them, a Tom Beres piece which aired Friday on WKYC/3.
And that's no coincidence, for Feagler had a 19 year career at the Cleveland NBC affiliate, mostly doing commentaries. But for a short time, Feagler was paired with Connie Dieken at the "Channel 3 News" anchor desk, which he tells Beres is "the biggest mistake" he's ever made.
Beres notes that the veteran commentator is "not shy, and not retiring"...and will continue to host PBS affiliate WVIZ/25's "Feagler and Friends", and may still show up occasionally in the PD if he wants to chime in about something in the news.
WKYC will air more of the interview between Beres and Feagler on its Sunday morning "Between the Lines" segment...
DISHING IT: Mid-State Television independent WMFD/68 Mansfield has made its way onto a second satellite provider.
WMFD was already on DirecTV local-into-local channel 68 in the Cleveland market. This week, it added Dish Network coverage on channel 12. As with DirecTV, Dish Network subscribers throughout the Cleveland market are able to watch WMFD's programming.
Note here - DirecTV's mapped channel number for WMFD is its analog number, 68...channel 12, which Dish is using, is its digital RF frequency. WMFD signed off analog channel 68 in mid-2008.
But last we heard, the guidelines for digital TV have WMFD still putting out its old analog channel number in the digital PSIP information, as 68.1. In its on-air identifications, the station usually just sticks with its call letters.
The page above also notes the addition of WMFD to Doylestown Cable's channel 22...
We've stocked up on the essentials...you'll have enough here to last you through the snowy weekend. And we're only kidding about that "250" number above. It only seems like it...
WEOL EXIT: We have few details, but we hear that Elyria-Lorain Broadcasting talk WEOL/930 Elyria has parted ways with long-time newsman Larry Wright.
In addition to anchoring and reporting for WEOL, Larry has also hosted long-form programs such as a late morning show - which got clipped when the Elyria station became the Cleveland market affiliate of Premiere's Glenn Beck.
(Beck, of course, left WEOL a few months ago, when Clear Channel talk WTAM/1100 returned him to its lineup...TRN's Laura Ingraham is perched in WEOL's late morning slot these days.)
We don't know the circumstances of Wright's exit from WEOL, just that Friday was his last day...
SUSANNE GONE: We got a couple of questions in the past week about the absence of weather forecaster Susanne Horgan from Scripps Cleveland ABC affiliate WEWS/5 "NewsChannel 5".
We pointed our readers towards an earlier OMW item detailing the changes at the station's "Good Morning Cleveland"...with the move of Pete Kenworthy to the anchor desk, and Jason Nicholas in the weather position.
Nicholas' placement on "GMC" moved Horgan to the station's weekend newscasts, but we reported back then that we heard that was temporary - and her contract would be allowed to expire.
We have confirmation of that from an item by the Cleveland Plain Dealer's Julie Washington.
WEWS general manager Victoria Regan tells Julie that yes, the station didn't renew Horgan's contract, and that she was replaced by Jeff Mackel on the weekend casts.
Of course, the move of Jason Nicholas to mornings started the whole process, and we'd already told you about the contract non-renewal and Horgan's impending exit.
Washington also notes that "NewsChannel 5" reporter Alicia Booth is set to come back from maternity leave on January 16th...
ANOTHER JULIE ITEM: The PD media columnist also notes new programming on Winston Broadcasting CW affiliate WBNX/55.
All three programs are presumably syndicated fare, so we won't spend a lot of time on them. But one of the three shows is called "Better Cleveland".
The new show is dubbed a "lifestyle show" in the article. It sounds, from the description, to be a syndicated program that allows some sort with recorded local segments.
Handling those, says WBNX general manager Lou Spangler, will be Miss Ohio 2006 Melanie Murphy. Spangler tells Julie Washington that Murphy's segments will start airing in early February.
The 2 PM weekday show will bump a couple of non-notable courtroom shows into the late night hours on "WBNX-The CW"...
THE INTERNET BATTLEGROUND: TV stations have long trumpeted being the first local station to report breaking news stories.
That promotion has now moved into cyberspace, as the folks at WEWS' "NewsChannel 5" are crowing about breaking news about the hiring of new Cleveland Browns head coach Eric Mangini first...on a number of different platforms. Quoting a station news release that made it to the TVNewsday trade site:
Within seconds of Sports Director Andy Baskin’s confirmation of the move, WEWS used multiple platforms to deliver the news to viewers and users: Andy was Live on 5, newsnet5.com sent out an e-mail alert and posted the story, and editorial staff posted on Twitter and Facebook.
"This is a great example of how NewsChannel5 is responding to the needs of our audience. We delivered this big story in all the ways viewers and users are consuming local media," said WEWS News Director Jill Manuel. "Northeast Ohio can count on us to consistently be where they are, with local content that matters to them.”
We're not here to confirm or disclaim what the folks at 3001 Euclid are crowing...because we just don't know.
A quick check of the Twitter pages of WEWS and of NBC affiliate WKYC/3 shows very close time stamps - 2:27 PM Wednesday on WKYC's site, 2:29 PM on WEWS' site. We don't know what time the Mangini news broke on air or on the web out of WJW/8 or WOIO/19.
Our reason for bringing this up? It's a sea change in how stations compete with each other, with Internet and non-on-air reporting just as important as who broke into the soap opera to give the news. (And in Cleveland, the hiring of a new head coach for the city's pro football franchise is definitely "Level One, Break Into Programming NOW!" news.)
We note that local stations are now offering direct alerts of school closings via text messaging or other online alerts.
Broadcast TV...it's so old-fashioned, even that shiny new tower about to go up at WKYC's Broadview Road facility in Parma looks a bit dated...
FEAGLER'S PD EXIT: We haven't noted here yet that long-time Cleveland newspaper columnist Dick Feagler has written his last regular column for the Plain Dealer.
And in the week since Feagler hammered out his last PD column, he's been the subject of a number of accolades and stories in other media...among them, a Tom Beres piece which aired Friday on WKYC/3.
And that's no coincidence, for Feagler had a 19 year career at the Cleveland NBC affiliate, mostly doing commentaries. But for a short time, Feagler was paired with Connie Dieken at the "Channel 3 News" anchor desk, which he tells Beres is "the biggest mistake" he's ever made.
Beres notes that the veteran commentator is "not shy, and not retiring"...and will continue to host PBS affiliate WVIZ/25's "Feagler and Friends", and may still show up occasionally in the PD if he wants to chime in about something in the news.
WKYC will air more of the interview between Beres and Feagler on its Sunday morning "Between the Lines" segment...
DISHING IT: Mid-State Television independent WMFD/68 Mansfield has made its way onto a second satellite provider.
WMFD was already on DirecTV local-into-local channel 68 in the Cleveland market. This week, it added Dish Network coverage on channel 12. As with DirecTV, Dish Network subscribers throughout the Cleveland market are able to watch WMFD's programming.
Note here - DirecTV's mapped channel number for WMFD is its analog number, 68...channel 12, which Dish is using, is its digital RF frequency. WMFD signed off analog channel 68 in mid-2008.
But last we heard, the guidelines for digital TV have WMFD still putting out its old analog channel number in the digital PSIP information, as 68.1. In its on-air identifications, the station usually just sticks with its call letters.
The page above also notes the addition of WMFD to Doylestown Cable's channel 22...
Thursday, January 08, 2009
February 17...Or Not?
UPDATE 1/8/09 4:03 PM: As hinted below, President-elect Barack Obama is indeed urging a delay in the DTV transition date.
Quoting an Associated Press article we found on the TVNewsday trade news website:
In a letter to key lawmakers, transition team co-chair John Podesta warned Thursday that too many Americans who rely on analog TV sets to pick up over-the-air broadcasts won't be ready.
The letter to Congress reportedly focuses on two reasons for delay: the reported problems with the government's converter box coupon program (detailed below), and a lack of government help for those needing assistance with the transition.
Our original item is below...
---------------
The buzz in the world of broadcast TV today is over a proposed, potential move of the digital TV transition date.
Just about everyone knows - even those who watch no broadcast TV - that "TV will change" on February 17, 2009. The date has been pounded into Americans' heads. We've talked to dozens of people who don't really know all the details of what's going on, but know it'll happen on that date.
Will it?
This Broadcasting and Cable article puts it in a nutshell.
The folks at Consumers Union are pushing a delay of that date, and are getting reception from key members of Congress on the idea. Quoting:
In a letter to Rep. (Ed) Markey, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), the incoming chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committe, and others, the CU requested that Congress consider a delay "until a plan is in place to minimize the number of consumers who will lose TV signals, particularly by fixing the flaws in the federal coupon program created to offset the cost of this transition."
As such, B&C quotes Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, as saying the February 17 date "may have to move". It looks like the parties involved are looking at about a four month delay, says the article, which would push the "new" date to somewhere in June...perhaps the 1st, over Memorial Day weekend.
None of this is reality, as of yet...though it seems that the FCC transition team for the incoming Obama adminstration may be receptive to this idea. It seems plausible, as the B&C article suggests, that they don't want a DTV mess dumped upon them a month after Barack Obama moves into the White House.
One of the big problems is hinted at, in the quoted material above.
The federal government program to give consumers up to two $40 coupons to defray the cost of converters has now run out of money it can spend, and people who sign up now are being put on a waiting list.
The problem is not necessarily one of no money. The program has a set budget, and various rules prevent the agency running the DTV Coupon program from spending money it expects to get back in the future, when unused coupons expire.
But the calendar both on our computer desktop, and on the wall, tells us it's January 8th, and the current transition date is February 17th. Quoting the earlier B&C article:
It would be tough to make the move at this late date. The broadcasting and cable industries and the government have spent hundreds of millions of dollars in cash and donated airtime on hammering home that Feb. 17 date, putting it on Web sites, billboards, and even a race car. Some broadcasters have already made the switch early (Wilmington, N.C.), or are about to (Hawaii on Jan. 15), and some of the spectrum has already been auctioned for advanced services.
And here in Northeast Ohio, two stations have already consigned analog to the scrap heap - Mansfield's WMFD/68 is now only WMFD-DT (RF 12/68.1), and Alliance-licensed WNEO/45 is now only on digital 45.
And the other problem? This IS going to have to happen, at some point.
The analog stations will have to go away, be it on February 17, June 1 or whenever. The spectrum freed up by those stations - particularly in the ranges of channels being abandoned, such as 52-69 - has already been auctioned off. The commercial and public safety interests getting the new spectrum are waiting. You can't unring that bell.
Even if coupon program hadn't moved to a waiting list, there's no guarantee that consumers who waited until now to apply for the $40 coupons would get them by February 17th. (And for that matter, if the date moved to June 1, there would STILL be those who put it off.)
There are myriad offshoots of this news from Northeast Ohio...among them, stations like WKYC/3 are rushing to complete tower work for a new broadcast facility - on a digital channel they won't be able to use until a nearby analog channel (WDLI/17) goes off the air.
WKYC, of course, has applied for a temporary permit to keep running WKYC-DT on channel 2 through the construction...if it lasts past February 17th, which is almost looking likely right now. With no transition on that date, they can't turn on WKYC-DT (RF 17) until WDLI analog is gone.
All of this comes on the same week when FCC chairman Kevin Martin is visiting Ohio, talking up the DTV transition...which, at least at this moment, unless we've missed it, still on 2/17.
In this story on his local visit by WJW/8's "MyFoxCleveland.com", he doesn't seem to offer any new or solid information...but lots of, well, sympathy. To be fair, this is really only bubbling up to the surface in the past couple of days, news-wise.
Keep watching...we know we will be watching, certainly!
Quoting an Associated Press article we found on the TVNewsday trade news website:
In a letter to key lawmakers, transition team co-chair John Podesta warned Thursday that too many Americans who rely on analog TV sets to pick up over-the-air broadcasts won't be ready.
The letter to Congress reportedly focuses on two reasons for delay: the reported problems with the government's converter box coupon program (detailed below), and a lack of government help for those needing assistance with the transition.
Our original item is below...
---------------
The buzz in the world of broadcast TV today is over a proposed, potential move of the digital TV transition date.
Just about everyone knows - even those who watch no broadcast TV - that "TV will change" on February 17, 2009. The date has been pounded into Americans' heads. We've talked to dozens of people who don't really know all the details of what's going on, but know it'll happen on that date.
Will it?
This Broadcasting and Cable article puts it in a nutshell.
The folks at Consumers Union are pushing a delay of that date, and are getting reception from key members of Congress on the idea. Quoting:
In a letter to Rep. (Ed) Markey, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), the incoming chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committe, and others, the CU requested that Congress consider a delay "until a plan is in place to minimize the number of consumers who will lose TV signals, particularly by fixing the flaws in the federal coupon program created to offset the cost of this transition."
As such, B&C quotes Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, as saying the February 17 date "may have to move". It looks like the parties involved are looking at about a four month delay, says the article, which would push the "new" date to somewhere in June...perhaps the 1st, over Memorial Day weekend.
None of this is reality, as of yet...though it seems that the FCC transition team for the incoming Obama adminstration may be receptive to this idea. It seems plausible, as the B&C article suggests, that they don't want a DTV mess dumped upon them a month after Barack Obama moves into the White House.
One of the big problems is hinted at, in the quoted material above.
The federal government program to give consumers up to two $40 coupons to defray the cost of converters has now run out of money it can spend, and people who sign up now are being put on a waiting list.
The problem is not necessarily one of no money. The program has a set budget, and various rules prevent the agency running the DTV Coupon program from spending money it expects to get back in the future, when unused coupons expire.
But the calendar both on our computer desktop, and on the wall, tells us it's January 8th, and the current transition date is February 17th. Quoting the earlier B&C article:
It would be tough to make the move at this late date. The broadcasting and cable industries and the government have spent hundreds of millions of dollars in cash and donated airtime on hammering home that Feb. 17 date, putting it on Web sites, billboards, and even a race car. Some broadcasters have already made the switch early (Wilmington, N.C.), or are about to (Hawaii on Jan. 15), and some of the spectrum has already been auctioned for advanced services.
And here in Northeast Ohio, two stations have already consigned analog to the scrap heap - Mansfield's WMFD/68 is now only WMFD-DT (RF 12/68.1), and Alliance-licensed WNEO/45 is now only on digital 45.
And the other problem? This IS going to have to happen, at some point.
The analog stations will have to go away, be it on February 17, June 1 or whenever. The spectrum freed up by those stations - particularly in the ranges of channels being abandoned, such as 52-69 - has already been auctioned off. The commercial and public safety interests getting the new spectrum are waiting. You can't unring that bell.
Even if coupon program hadn't moved to a waiting list, there's no guarantee that consumers who waited until now to apply for the $40 coupons would get them by February 17th. (And for that matter, if the date moved to June 1, there would STILL be those who put it off.)
There are myriad offshoots of this news from Northeast Ohio...among them, stations like WKYC/3 are rushing to complete tower work for a new broadcast facility - on a digital channel they won't be able to use until a nearby analog channel (WDLI/17) goes off the air.
WKYC, of course, has applied for a temporary permit to keep running WKYC-DT on channel 2 through the construction...if it lasts past February 17th, which is almost looking likely right now. With no transition on that date, they can't turn on WKYC-DT (RF 17) until WDLI analog is gone.
All of this comes on the same week when FCC chairman Kevin Martin is visiting Ohio, talking up the DTV transition...which, at least at this moment, unless we've missed it, still on 2/17.
In this story on his local visit by WJW/8's "MyFoxCleveland.com", he doesn't seem to offer any new or solid information...but lots of, well, sympathy. To be fair, this is really only bubbling up to the surface in the past couple of days, news-wise.
Keep watching...we know we will be watching, certainly!
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