Re: Easy listening

[Garrett Wollman <wollman>]

<<On Tue, 28 Apr 1998 08:38:29 EDT, MikeHemeon <MikeHemeon@aol.com> said:

> Radio is a business and most radio station groups today are owned by
> stockholders and that is why they invested to begin with.

We should recognize, however, that the conditions in the market are
such that investors will rarely tolerate only making money---they
demand that their investments make a LOT of money, much more than
media properties have historically made.  (The publishing industry
suffers from the same problem.)

Steve Hicks tells his investors that he can deliver them 8% more on
his radio properties than normal accounting practice suggests.  Ten
years ago, in a very different media environment, just making 8% TOTAL
was considered a very good return for a radio station.  (Publishers,
meanwhile, have historically returned about 4% until Bertelsmann and
Murdoch bought them all.)

- -GAWollman

- --
Garrett A. Wollman   | O Siem / We are all family / O Siem / We're all the same
wollman@lcs.mit.edu  | O Siem / The fires of freedom 
Opinions not those of| Dance in the burning flame
MIT, LCS, CRS, or NSA|                     - Susan Aglukark and Chad Irschick

------------------------------