In This Issue: February 2009

The following text is a collection of excerpts from all of the articles featured in this month’s issue of TALKERS magazine. If you wish to read the complete story – you may subscribe to the publication by clicking here.

A new TALKERS 250 and Heavy Hundred By Michael Harrison NEW YORK –– Welcome to the February issue of TALKERS magazine in which we greet each year with our annual marquee feature, “The Talkers 250 featuring the 100 Most Important Radio Talk Show Hosts in America.” As most folks in these parts know, the latter segment of that mouthful of a title has come to be known as “The Heavy Hundred” –– an industry institution that has grown into this magazine’s most popular as well as unpopular feature. Reflecting the changing industry it serves, this landmark presentation has evolved since first appearing in 1995 when it was simply an alphabetical list of 25 radio talk show hosts deemed the most “important” in the business by the editors of this publication. Picked up that year by USA Today, it tapped into the huge public and media interest in talk radio and quickly expanded to 100, maintaining its array of subjective criteria for inclusion: courage, effort, longevity, potential, ratings, recognition, revenue, service, talent and uniqueness and continuing for the next decade to list the hosts in alphabetical order. It went on to become a standard road map –– a guide not only to the elite in the radio talk show hosting business, but a thumbnail impression of the state of the industry as well, reflecting its scope and diversity (or in the opinion of some observers, its lack thereof). Until 2006, there was only one concrete qualification for inclusion… The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … Arbitron’s landmark settlement Plus, a talk host pleads guilty in scam case By Steven J.J. Weisman BOSTON –– When I was in law school, I was taught that civil trials occurred when reasonable people were not able to come to a reasonable accommodation of interests and that justice is most often better served when the parties are able to fashion a negotiated settlement of their differences. So it came as no surprise that the attorneys general of New Jersey and New York were able to come to a negotiated settlement of their respective lawsuits against Arbitron, Inc. The settlement has something for everyone and of course as with every settlement, all sides claim victory. That is the beauty of a settlement. As we all know, Arbitron is the largest provider of radio ratings data to radio stations. This data pertaining to the numbers of listeners is used by stations and advertisers alike to help determine advertising rates. In a time when radio advertising dollars are tightening, the importance of this data is heightened. For many years Arbitron used a diary system by which randomly selected people used written journals to maintain a record of the radio stations that they listened to on a daily basis. This system was widely used and accepted although its weaknesses as to people remembering and accurately keeping a written record of the stations that they listened to were well known. In an effort to increase the accuracy of its ratings data, Arbitron developed the Portable People Meter. The Portable People Meter (PPM) is a cell-phone sized electronic device that is carried by its user and is able to automatically track exposure to many types of media including terrestrial, satellite and online radio. No input by the user is required. All that the user is required to do is to place the PPM into a docking station that extracts the information from the PPM at the end of each day. The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … Didn’t see it coming? By Matthew B. Harrison NEW YORK –– These are tough times to be an employee of a terrestrial radio station or group. Equally difficult is being an employee of a company that provides products and services for terrestrial radio stations and groups. I’m not just referring to talent. It is alarming to see how many VPs, programmers, managers and sales execs –– including “big names” — have been given the pink slip this winter. In most cases, it was through no fault of their own. Many of the cutbacks have slashed deep into the bone. First, it is bad news if you’ve lost your job in the current bloodbath…but, the good news (or at least a bit of solace) is the fact that so many others have been laid off as well, so there’s nothing to be embarrassed about. Certainly, it’s not like being blown out during times of expansion. Humbled? Perhaps a bit. These are humbling times. Not necessarily a bad thing. Worried about finances and the future? Of course. Very few people today aren’t. But, no blight on your valuable reputation. There is no shame in losing a job in this industry storm. But wait just a moment…there is one revealing aspect of this chaos in which a small dose of shame is appropriate. Even instructional. The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … New Media Seminar set for Big Apple June 5-6 By Alan Linder TALKERS MAGAZINE Assistant Publisher NEW YORK – The dates are set, the location secured and the agenda is being hammered out as TALKERS magazine prepares to present the 12th annual installment of the talk media industry’s most important national convention –– The New Media Seminar. This year’s gathering of talk radio, television and internet professionals will take place in New York City on Friday, June 5 and Saturday, June 6 at an exciting new venue, the Concierge Conference Center, conveniently located on the East Side of midtown Manhattan at 780 Third Avenue (between 48th and 49th Streets). The brand new facility combines the latest in state-of-the-art conference technology with heightened amenities and intimacy for which this annual meeting is known. According to the conference’s organizers, this year’s installment — dubbed “Challenge 2009” — will be tailored specifically to the confluence of dramatic circumstances impacting the industry, namely the devastating economy and invasion of new technology with its significant influence in changing popular culture. The seminar will be upbeat and optimistic providing attendees with both information and inspiration to succeed in what has the makings of a lucrative and exciting era ahead New Media Seminar (NMS) director Michael Harrison states, “This year’s event will focus primarily on two areas that are vital to talk media professionals and firms –– the economic survival of terrestrial broadcasting and its necessary integration with the internet and digital applications to meet the needs and opportunities of not just the future in some theoretical sense, but the immediate present as well.” The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … Now is the time to develop your media station By Jason Insalaco THE KELTON AGENCY Principal LOS ANGELES –– True or False: With massive radio layoffs in recent months, many talented and successful talk hosts have been rendered temporarily idle until the next opportunity arises. False! Yes, a significant number of talk personalities have recently been downsized. However, a layoff does not mean that your career is on hold. In fact, a layoff is a major opportunity for branding and increasing online presence. Radio has lost its luster in recent years because more listeners are gravitating towards iPods and iPhones and are spending more time with online media and less time tethered to the radio. As a result, radio is quickly evolving toward the digital download. Talk hosts can remain relevant by embracing this new technology and becoming embedded in new media. Now is the time to expand your brand in the digital marketplace. Invest a few bucks in some equipment and begin podcasting! Important note: Before you embark on your podcast journey, you or your representation should check your last employment agreement to determine your “non-compete” status. Retaining representation during your contract negotiation is important to help avoid being silenced from future digital efforts under a non-compete clause. This investment in erecting your own media station will pay dividends in developing your own digital brand. In order to garner a regular online audience, you should podcast a minimum of twice a week. The good news is that you do not have to produce a four-hour program — a 10 to 15 minute segment is probably sufficient. Online and time-shifted listening habits tend to lend themselves to shorter content packages. If you are feeling extra ambitious, produce several short-form segments at one time rather than long, uninterrupted segments. For talk talent in transition, podcasting provides the following instant benefits: The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … Proud to be selling talk radio By Al Herskovitz BRADENTON, Fla. –– For years now we have been seeing print ads with the following sub-head plastered over them: “As seen on TV!” These advertisers were indicating that they were proud of the fact that they advertised their products on television and that TV advertising validated what they were selling. It was and is a sensible concept since the very existence of the picture medium has so penetrated our lives. Well, lo and behold! There has been a rather prominent run of ads in a number of recent issues of USA Today for a weight loss product called EverCleanse that reads as follows: “As heard on national radio programs –– Rush Limbaugh, Dr. Laura Schlessinger, Glenn Beck, Jim Rome…” Some weeks ago the top executive of a company called Carbonite told business reporters of his strong belief in using talk radio. He listed some of the shows on which his company has been airing spots for the past year and revealed some impressive sales results. His interview received quite a bit of play in the print journals and sections that cover all of the media. Carbonite continues on the air this very day. The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … Radio threatened, enabled Analysis of the 2009 CES By Holland Cooke MCVAY MEDIA News/Talk Specialist LAS VEGAS –– If you read my piece in TALKERS last month, and you work on-air, you might think I go overboard urging hosts to make the caller the star…and that I’m tough on what I call Rush Limbaugh wanna-bes whose “I,” “I,” “I,” “Me,” “Me,” “Me” shtick talks at people. Think I’m overstating it to say that everyone has become his or her own program director? Think people will continue to be satisfied with media content that treats them as passive “audience?” See Yoostar.com, unveiled by Consumer Electronics Association CEO Gary Shapiro, in his Consumer Electronics Show opening presentation last month. Admittedly, I can only begin to convey what I witnessed in Vegas. And, yes, the recession was felt there. CES was slightly smaller than last year, when 140,000 perused a 35-football-field-size exhibit hall. This year, a mere 130,000 of us crowded into only 30 football fields of new stuff. In a still-falling economy, this industry’s health remains conspicuous. The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … Shocking news: The ABC Radio Networks do not exist! By Walter Sabo SABO MEDIA President NEW YORK –– This is easily the most useful and most mundane article you’ll ever read. The information could actually make your station more money right away and improve your relationship with the community. In the old days, companies had switchboards and one switchboard could reach every employee. In the old days, a radio property could not be sold sooner than three years after it was purchased to prevent using licenses in financial speculation schemes that would risk their ability to serve their communities. So the industry was stable and things like phone numbers were practically permanent. No, this is not about nostalgia, it’s about your customers reaching you. Call 411. Ask for the ABC Radio Networks in New York. You will get three numbers: 718-323-9859, no answer; 917-441-4368, no answer at all; and 646-456-7777, which is ABC, Inc.’s main number but since the sale of ABC Radio, it has no information about radio. Had you asked for John McConnell when he worked there, they would have had no clue. The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … Sports News Notes Radio executive Chris Berry leaves his president and general manager position at Citadel’s WMAL, Washington, DC and joins ESPN O&O KSPN, Los Angeles. ESPN SVP Jim Pastor says, “710 ESPN is incredibly fortunate to have someone with Chris’ broadcast experience to lead the way as we begin a new era for ESPN Radio in Los Angeles. He’s had success at every level and what he brings to this position will provide dividends for 710 ESPN listeners and partners alike.”…..ESPN Radio makes O&O WMVP, Chicago national sales manager Greg Sunkel director of national sales for the company’s five stations. Sunkel will work with the station NSMs and ABC Regional Sports & Entertainment Sales to bring marketing opportunities to their clients. ESPN Radio SVP and regional radio manager Tim McCarthy tells TALKERS magazine, “Greg is highly regarded within ESPN Radio sales and with our client base. We’re delighted to be represented by ABC regional sales, who also speak to clients on behalf of ABC Television’s O&O’s. ABC’s relationship with McGavern Guild Media provides exceptional support on the agency side. This client-focused marketing effort is unlike anything else being offered to radio clients and Greg is ideally suited to lead it.” The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … TALKERS magazine Inaugural Radio Row services 40 broadcasters By Ellen Ratner TALK RADIO NEWS SERVICE Bureau Chief WASHINGTON –– TALKERS magazine and its sister company, Talk Radio News Service, held their third Inaugural Radio Row at the Liaison Hotel in the shadow of the Capitol. The event took place January 19-21 with more than 40 radio programs, stations, syndicators and networks participating. Planning took months with Kandy Stroud and a band of 30 volunteers booking at the beginning of November. Kandy’s volunteers (many of them Capitol Hill press secretaries) had the challenging job of escorting guests to radio broadcasting positions in three rooms spread out over two floors. The Talk Radio News Service staff received a bit of extra help from co-sponsor Comrex’s Chris Crump and the bright students of the University of New Mexico’s journalism intern program. The booking of guests for this event was much more difficult than average radio rows (as if there is such a thing) because anyone who was potentially serving in the Obama Administration was not allowed to be interviewed. It has long been against the policy of incoming presidents to have staffers-to-be blabbing to the media. Although hosts on the Democratic side of the fence dominated this radio row, there were plenty of middle-of-the-road and conservative hosts as well, including Jack Rice who hosted for WCCO, Minneapolis and KOGO, San Diego; Blanquita Cullum for WOAI, San Antonio; Dom Giordano for WPHT, Philadelphia and George Russell for WSMN, Nashua, New Hampshire. The radio row had an international flavor as well with two competing stations coming from the Bahamas — GEMS and ZNS — and News Talk Ireland broadcasting for hours at a time. WHTB, Fall River, Massachusetts broadcasts in Portuguese but managed to snag its Congressman, Barney Frank. He stated that the radio row was the most constructive initiative in its 20 years of broadcasting. This radio row had several firsts… The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … TALKERS magazine visits the Voice of Tibet By Ellen Ratner TALK RADIO NEWS SERVICE Bureau Chief DHARAMSHALA, India –– There is huge interest all around the world in American talk radio as evidenced by the number of stories about the medium’s U.S. activities published in foreign newspapers and discussed on radio and television internationally. During the past 19 years, TALKERS magazine has shown ongoing increases in its worldwide circulation, extending surprisingly beyond the expected readerships a leading American media trade magazine would have in the U.K., Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Hong Kong. We are now being read by the communications industries in Japan, China, Russia, Germany, France, the Middle East and India, among others. In its growing coverage of radio around the world (or as Michael Harrison describes it –– Market Earth), TALKERS magazine paid a visit to His Holiness, The Dalai Lama and to the radio studios of Voice of Tibet in Dharamshala, India, which is housed in the offices of the Tibet Government in Exile. There we found that the people we met are every bit as interested in what is happening in the American talk radio business as we are curious about them. The enthusiasm displayed by the Dalai Lama reading TALKERS on the front cover was quite sincere and accurate. The Voice of Tibet is supported by three Norwegian NGO’s ( non-government organizations): The Norwegian Human Rights House, The Norwegian Tibet Committee and Worldview Rights. On the air since 1996, the Voice of Tibet broadcasts one program per day in Tibetan and in Mandarin Chinese repeating throughout the day seven days a week with fresh programming daily. Files are sent from Dharamshala to Norway in an MP3 format using Cool Edit and then FTP’d. The final edit takes place in Norway and broadcasts directly from there. In response to its desperate need for more digital broadcast recorders, TALKERS magazine is donating them to Voice of Tibet. The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … The producer’s role in sports talk radio By Richard Neer NEW YORK –– While talking with a friend recently, he marveled at how TV play-by-play guys seem to know everything, including activity in games other than the one they are broadcasting. My friend comes from a radio background and was somewhat unfamiliar with the way producers work in television. Throughout most of my radio career, any research supporting the program has been done by yours truly. I always assumed that television hosts also come up with their own questions, do their own digging and are responsible for all content. I was taken aback when my television producer wife prepared reams of information (including a list of suggested questions) for an interview program. She explained that the host doesn’t do much of this on his own and it is her job to see that he is fully prepared. Good talent, she explained, refines her legwork and makes it his own, distilling pages of material down to what fits his personality. Not-so-good hosts merely parrot the suggested questions, sometimes to the point of being instructed what the next query should be via the IFB. By and large, radio producers handle things differently. Some will assume that the host knows everything about everything and will pop someone on the air (whether the host is prepared or not). At the other extreme are producers who constantly chatter about what to ask next, leaving the host feeling like a mindless puppet. The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … The TALKERS magazine interview Westwood One talk show host Dennis Miller TALKERS magazine publisher Michael Harrison recently caught up with Westwood One syndicated radio talk star Dennis Miller. What began as an informal chat evolved into this month’s TALKERS magazine interview. TALKERS: Dennis, congratulations on celebrating your second anniversary as a radio talk show host. DM: I think we still have a couple months. March 28th is our second anniversary. I think we’re doing okay, though. TALKERS: Has it been a long two years or a short two years? How would you describe it? DM: Short! TALKERS: So, you’re having a good time… DM: Yeah, yeah. It’s a blast. It’s the same stuff I used to tell a shrink for $200 an hour. I get paid for it now. The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … View of war from a media mezzanine By Kevin Casey TALKERS MAGAZINE Managing Editor SDEROT, Israel –– TALKERS magazine publisher Michael Harrison and Air America host Lionel traveled on a talk media fact-finding mission to the Middle East in January when Israel retaliated against eight years of Hamas rockets targeting its border city of Sderot. The two witnessed the bombing of Gaza City, visited Israeli homes destroyed by shelling along the border and were caught in a rocket attack in Ashkelon during which they had to flee through the streets to a civil defense bomb shelter for cover with the local citizenry. They met with top Israeli government and military leaders, spoke with journalists (including Palestinian) visited a border hospital where Israelis and Palestinians are treated side by side and observed municipal operations from command headquarters in an underground bunker in Ashkelon. Both men broadcasted their observations back to U.S. talk radio including Lionel’s program on Air America; Westwood One’s Lars Larson Show; “A Touch of Grey” on WABC, New York and KRLA, Los Angeles; and Doug Stephan’s “Good Day” and “Talk Radio Countdown Show” syndicated shows. Michael Harrison later reported his experience and findings on Westwood One’s Jim Bohannon Show; Fox News Radio’s Alan Colmes Show; Tom Tradeup’s KSKY, Dallas morning program; and hundreds of affiliates served by the Talk Radio News Service. The trip was sponsored by America’s Voices in Israel. For remarkable photos and video coverage of this compelling journey please visit the media station Podjockey at www.podjockey.com. The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine. … When in Rome…have a take and don’t suck By Dan Sileo WDAE, TAMPA Talk Show Host TAMPA –– One of the reasons that local sports talk radio shows seem to gather better ratings and generate more revenue than the nationally syndicated ones do (for the most part) is they are not afraid to offend anyone with sharp, critical opinions. A glaring exception to this rule is Jim Rome. Through the combination of talent and hard work, Rome has built what is in my opinion the best national sports talk radio program in America. Compared to his show, most of the rest of what the networks and syndicators are putting out is just “filler” radio. The national suppliers would be smart to follow Rome’s lead and encourage their hosts to have what he calls “takes” — strong thoughts about controversial issues in sports! The entire story appears in the February 2009 print edition of TALKERS magazine.

The preceding text was a collection of excerpts from all of the articles featured in this month’s issue of TALKERS magazine. If you wish to read the complete story – you may subscribe to the publication by clicking here.