CC Huntington Bloodletting of the Week

[Know It All]

Somebody had better tell Judy that it is Christmas time - Halloween is long gone. Yet in spite of that calendar based fact she came down from above with a scary face, wielding a chain saw. When it was over everybody wished she had worn a Santa suit. The saw went wild; AM, FM, business office - no one was safe. Fear spread through the building as the rampage continued unabated.

When the mess was cleaned up and the two cycle engine exhaust cleared there were persoanl effects of three now former employees laying around. The latest victims are:

Long-time Front Desk Jockey Desiree
Very long-time Sports and AM Radio God Paul Swann
Short-time KEE night Disc Jockey (Know It All loves that title) Derek Levine

All the while Judy is looking for a KEE co-host for Ms. Sheila. Right - that place is stable and everybody wants to go there. Especially if Judy's saw would run out of gas.

BTW - Last night CC hosted their annual Christmas party - it was a joy to see all the happy faces there.

[Tom Taggart]

In addition to the four layoffs previously reported?

[EZ103.3FM]

I'm very sorry Paul Swann is gone...he's a nice guy. I've sat next to him in the MU football press box.

They've already deleted Paul's name from the 'On Air' drop down list of shows at the website http://www.foxsports1420.com/main.html. But if you click 'On Air' above the list and get the schedule he's still on it. http://www.foxsports1420.com/pages/schedule.html

[Big Media]

That sucks. Desiree has been a staple at WKEE since long before I started in radio. Paul Swann and I butted heads a number of times but he is a pro and knew that station forward and backward.

Radio is overcooked.

[Mike]

When does Judy get the axe? I'd imagine at this point her pay equals a whole airstaff and she's by far the least useful person in the building.

[Lester]

When does Judy get the axe? I'd imagine at this point her pay equals a whole airstaff and she's by far the least useful person in the building.

When she stops doing her job, as dictated to her by the CC mothership. The Christmas Massacre wasn't exclusive to Huntington. CC stations across the country are in the process now. (Two were let go yesterday from the Raleigh cluster.)

So yes, Judy did see the calendar, I'm sure she noticed it was Christmas, and still did what was asked of her. Not defending it, by any stretch... just say, she won't get fired until she butts heads with the big bosses. And if she's willing to fire people at Christmas, I don't think she'll be cracking heads with them anytime soon.

Rumor mill says this is just the beginning. More to come in 2011, and they won't be as generous as the pre-Christmas killings were.

(And how come the trades are dreadfully silent about all this?)

[Bar Rat]

Who were the other four that were shown the bunker door?

Is CC still giving out the same severance package as they did a couple years ago when the herd was culled then?

[Lester]

Is CC still giving out the same severance package as they did a couple years ago when the herd was culled then?

No. Substantially lower.

[Mike]

(And how come the trades are dreadfully silent about all this?)

Because they want CC to keep subscribing to them?

This is generally the problem with any industry press (I've experienced something similar for years in the MMORPG press), it's dependent on the industry, so it sucks industry cock to get subscriptions and advertising, which means never criticizing any of the players.

As with anything else, the only place where you will ever find honest discussion of any industry is on independent websites (like this), the trades are useless.

As I said, I've had to experience FM again for the first time in years full time (thanks to a defect in the Sirius receiver in my 2011 Ford Focus that I'm waiting on a replacement for) and it is gawdawful. The industry only has itself to blame for collapsing listenership, when a morning show is so larded up with commercials that I can drive from Ashland to Huntington in morning drive, scan the whole dial and barely hear any content (commercials are easy to find though) who the hell WOULD listen to it?

Radio only has itself to blame for being replaced by Sirius, the ipod, and internet streams. Remember my prediction years ago that the ultimate threat to broadcast radio was in fact broadband wireless internet? That age has pretty much arrived. I can hook my iPhone 4 up to my car radio via Ford's Sync feature and listen to music stored on it, or use Pandora or any other streaming app. As long as I'm in a 3G area, it works fine.

[Ace Purple]

Is CC still giving out the same severance package as they did a couple years ago when the herd was culled then?

No. Substantially lower.

Tom Taylor's Radio-Info email newsletter this morning cited an anonymous victim of the CC budget cuts as having received 90 days of severance pay.

[lastone]

Send in the robots !! We must have more robots!

Radio: Dead of self inflicted wounds.

[Dave Allen]

You know, I have taken so much crap from people over the years for staying in REALLY small town radio. Let's see...we have a staff of four full time announcers, one full time news director, one full time engineer, a GM, a PD/OM (OK...that one is me...one of the four full time announcers) two full time sales people, four part timers, four or five other part time part timers who we can pull in if we need to, one overnight guy/producer, two board ops, and two office workers. We all make very liveable wages, all drive nice cars and are generally well respected within the community (well..all but me and Nunley) and we NEVER voicetrack. Anytime we are on the air there is at least one live body in the building. So what kind of mistake did I make by never joining a mega mega company?

[Lester]

Let me add, Dave... your company is paying local salaries that feed back into the local economy. I've argued for some time that someone should go after Clear Channel's license(s) because they no longer serve the public good. They're increasing the folks on unemployment, and taking money made in "City-X" and pumping it back into the mothership, instead of making a tidy profit (they could still do that), pump money back into the local economy (through the salaries of their airstaff), and serving the public interest.

Yep, small time radio still rocks.

[Clay JD Walker]

Actually...as I prepare to duck...working for corporate radio isn't so bad either. It just depends on the corporation, I suppose. I love my company, my managers, format experts, etc. We are trusted by our managers to execute our jobs as effectively as possible, and are given the tools to do so (nothing more, mind you...no posh...).

Not that I have anything against small town radio at all. I miss it, can't wait to hear it when I travel home, and love doing business with the owners/operators/programmers/talent/sales people/gms, et all.

Now, on with my typical diatribe regarding voice tracking -- If you put the same amount of effort in your voice tracked shift as you do on your live shift, would anyone (seriously, not a radio geek) know any difference? If you truly knew your market, your listeners (again, seriously, not the way a radio geek would), your target and your format, would anyone know any difference? Finally, what's so wrong with a technology that allows you to make certain your content is as focused and on-target as it possibly can be?

I know, I know, 'but what if XXX happens?'...that's why you have a staff of dedicated professionals that have no problem driving three minutes to the radio station to recut weather forecasts, etc. when the 38 and rain turns into 2 inches of snow on a Saturday, or will dip out of post-church lunch to VT 10 minutes before airtime.

It's because we're an industry (me included) of 'C' students...we've allowed a tool (automation) to turn into the thread that holds our operations together. A tool is only as good as its operator...I'm just sayin'.

Oh yeah, and CC sucks...thankfully, for some.

[Mike]

Let me add, Dave... your company is paying local salaries that feed back into the local economy. I've argued for some time that someone should go after Clear Channel's license(s) because they no longer serve the public good. They're increasing the folks on unemployment, and taking money made in "City-X" and pumping it back into the mothership, instead of making a tidy profit (they could still do that), pump money back into the local economy (through the salaries of their airstaff), and serving the public interest.

Yep, small time radio still rocks.

Not to mention that what CC is doing is as self defeating in the long term as outsourcing of jobs to cheap labor in Turd World countries... By doing so, you are removing decent wage jobs from the US, ie, people who could buy your product, and moving them to places where they couldn't afford your product. That model is based on competition NOT doing this so their workers can buy what you are selling. In the end it is doomed to fail because it is undermining the US consumer market by reducing standard of living by removing opportunity and market based wages from the market.

Where this is similar to CC is this: Without mid day, evening, overnight gigs in radio, which all seem to be becoming extinct, all they are keeping (at most) is morning and afternoon drive, HOW THE HELL WILL THERE BE A NEXT GENERATION OF TALENT?!!! No one is going to learn HOW to be a DJ because there aren't any opportunities to BE a DJ!

And I expect this new FCC is going to go after CC's licenses. Not because of their raping and pillaging of markets like Huntington where they aren't properly doing anything resembling local service, but because they are the company that employs Rush Limbaugh. Truthfully, the plethora of automated repeater NPR taxwaste stations (like WOUB in Ironton, nothing more than a 50kW translator station that originates nothing at all) are even worse than CC about giving absolutely nothing to the community of license, much less employing anyone.

[lastone]

Solution to the problem (which will never happen)

The FCC grows balls and REQUIRES a percentage of LOCAL, NON GROUP owenership.

As I said....sonwballs chance in hell.

[The Big Ear]

Uh, somebody might want to tell them at 1420 to drop the Dan Patrick ID's reminding people to tune in for "local sports talk with Paul Swann."

I heard it yesterday and after reading all of your comments about them letting him go, I thought that was pretty bad on their part. Tacky.

Then again maybe they let go of the person who was supposed to take care of those things.

I like the lineup on 1420AM, (when you can hear it when the wind blows the right way) but I figure it will be taken off the air pretty soon altogether because I haven't heard a paid commercial .... ummm.... ever, if memory serves me right. It's all PSAs and promos. I wish 94.1 FM would just stick with sports. Maybe if 1420AM goes under they can take Dan Patrick and Jim Rome and shows like that over 24/7. I understand offering a "different political spin" but I'd rather hear talented sports talk on a better signal all day over someone trying to simply be the Anti-Rush. Borrring. Besides it's the same programs on 930AM already right? Sorry, I just need some sports to decompress - maybe rather "distract" - after hearing the political gurus try to get people all wound up.

Also, why wouldn't CC just move Derek Levine to be the morning co-host? That seems dumb to fire one guy then advertise for another guy for an empty slot on another show on the same station. It's not like he couldn't figure out a morning take.

[Lee]

Paul and I butted heads as well, however, I hate to hear about someone losing their job. Especially someone like him (and Desiree) who's been there for so long.

[Lester]

Look how buried this piece is...

http://www.fmqb.com/article.asp?id=2054237

...and misleading. My simpleton ass knows names from only two CC markets, and both dumped air talent. This is getting a tad bit scary.