http://spectator.org/archives/2013/08/05/am-radio-signing-off/
[thanks to Hpaws for emailing this]
The author is Daniel J. Flynn
This is an exceptionally good opinion piece about the suicide of AM radio. It touches on many key points that scream “I loved AM radio” – the history of early AM stations being started by newspapers, Armstrong and the superheterodyne receivers, FDR forcing NBC to split off its Blue Network, the lockout of ASCAP by the NAB, the Green Hornet being created on WXYT in Detroit
I particularly like that he took a poke at Michael Harrison, the self appointed expert who runs Talkers Magazine (“the Bible of talk radio” – orly?). When I first started emailing privately with Tom Taylor, he was shocked that I have never communicated with Michael Harrison (and still haven’t). I don’t dislike him, but he’s one of these people who wants to be steering the bus when he doesn’t own the bus and has never driven s bus. He has evolved into being a shill now for the radio business – the best example of his non objective bias is his inclusion of Joe Madison of WOL-AM in Washington DC near the top of the 100 Heavy Hitters. Madison is on a station that can be heard a few blocks in a good day, and has ratings approaching 0.0%
My metaphor is more like that a forest fire is raging through AM radio – that once the old dying trees burn away, new young life will sprout and a new generation will begin.
I would like to spread gasoline on the fire – requiring all radio (and TV) stations to produce at least 6 hours a day of live programming produced at the studio where the station is licensed, including religious broadcasters (and an end to main studio waivers for satellite delivered religious broadcasting).
Can’t figure out a way to do that and stay in business? Turn in the license and let someone else try.
It may be the forest won’t grow back and all that will be left is weeds – but time is running out
At least 6 hours a day of live programming produced at the studio where the station is licensed can get expensive. I happen to listen to a top local station that does a decent job with 2, 3hr programs. A morning drive-time host and one that follows Rush. Both are very successful, Monday-Friday. They don’t run those programs on the weekends, though it has been tried many times with the “best of” shows. Success M-F, but consistent failure on the weekends. They run Rush on the weekend, usually on Sunday, but that comes and goes. They run Rush for maybe 3-4 months until they find a sucker willing to pay the freight, until it fails, usually when the host’s meager pocketbook runs dry. That station never runs sport shows because the owner has a separate station dedicated to sports 24/7.
Rush mentioned Michael Harrison on his broadcast today, and ran a couple of excepts from an interview where Harrison sorta made comments regarding the pull-out of big advertisers from talk radio. He said Progressive type shows really got hammered, much worse than Rush.
I think Rush made a very good decision to hold a caller into the 3rd hour, who basically made the point Rush wanted him to make, which is basically lefties-liberals are mostly the touchy-feely types, a point Rush has made many times over the years. And, conservative-libertarians are the researchers-detail oriented types.
No matter how you slice things up, progressive-liberals are never going to draw a large listening audience, conservatives have a better chance at it.
The government will someday step-in and support “free speech” with grants and other incentives. That’s exactly what I expect to happen, sooner or later. The idea of forcing pre-conceived solutions on free enterprise won’t yield good results, but it will probably happen.
When Ed Schultz decided to go national (a few months prior to the formation of Air America which he was not part of) – the Democratic Party put together the funding for the show. While it’s true that the Prgressive Talk stations have been clobbered by their own boycott, the hosts are not dependent on that income – however the people who own the radio stations (who aren’t zealots) don’t see value any more to carry the shows. They won.
If I had to listen to the local guy at our station, I would never turn on the radio. He has two hours from 6:00 to 8:00 every morning. I can take about 2 minutes of this joker. Then, I turn off the radio until Rush comes on at 11:00. The local station, also, lost me from 800 to 11:00 with Geraldo… Haven’t cared for him since the vault was as empty as his liberal head!
I remember that… and even as far back as his special on ABC in the 70s to encourage the Beatles to get back together for another tour…. both were disappointing but as they say on Sesame Street, guess which one was more than the other. 😉