Bob Pittman is the man who brought you Century 21 Realty, MTV and AOL.\u00a0 He is a man who closely studies what people want and figures out a way to make money from making people happy.<\/p>\n
About 6 months ago, he joined Clear Channel – he’s not running the company, but the reality is that he probably is.\u00a0\u00a0 The Mays family is effectively gone – pushed aside by the Private Equity “lenders”.\u00a0\u00a0 They’ve been searching for a new CEO without success.\u00a0\u00a0 $20 billion in debt is a big challenge.<\/p>\n
In his 20s, he quickly made a name for himself programming successful radio stations – winding up at programming WNBC-AM in New York at the age of 23 (and immediately firing Don Imus).\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 He understands radio.<\/p>\n
You probably are aware that Clear Channel is holding a major concert in Las Vegas in September and is going to revamp iHeartRadio to make it less Radio-like.\u00a0\u00a0 Premiere Networks no longer has Radio in the nmee.<\/p>\n
So based on what I found this morning, I can imagine a recent conversation that went something like this:<\/p>\n
Pittman:\u00a0\u00a0 So I’ve noticed we have around 100 of our radio stations that aren’t even streaming yet.\u00a0 Why is that?
\nCC Drone:\u00a0 Well, most of them are oldies and country music.\u00a0 “Those people” don’t use the Internet.
\nPittman:\u00a0\u00a0 Where is the research to back that up?
\nCC Drone:\u00a0 Umm…\u00a0 I don’t have any.\u00a0\u00a0 Everyone knows that though – it’s\u00a0“Common Knowledge” in the radio business
\nPittman:\u00a0\u00a0 I work from data, not “common knowledge”.\u00a0 Is there any other reason we aren’t streaming them?\u00a0 Licensing issues?\u00a0 Technical problems?
\nCC Drone:\u00a0\u00a0 Well, the main reason is we didn’t think they could make a profit.\u00a0 “Those people” don’t buy a lot of stuff.\u00a0\u00a0 Anyone with experience in radio knows that.
\nPittman:\u00a0\u00a0 Doofus, it’s not about making money today.\u00a0\u00a0 It’s about getting critical\u00a0mass, mind share\u00a0and controlling the market.\u00a0\u00a0 AOL never made money, but it\u00a0became worth so much\u00a0Steve Case and I\u00a0took over Time\/Warner.
\nCC Drone:\u00a0\u00a0 Ah!\u00a0\u00a0 Now I understand – I’ll get right on it.<\/p>\n
Most of the remaining Clear Channel stations are now streaming.\u00a0 The holdouts are a few sports stations, a few progressive talk stations and some stations that apparently are LMAed out to do “urban” programming<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Bob Pittman is the man who brought you Century 21 Realty, MTV and AOL.\u00a0 He is a man who closely studies what people want and figures out a way to make money from making people happy. About 6 months ago, … Continue reading