Re: WTAG coverage of Fire

[mwaters@mail.wesleyan.edu (Martin J. Waters)]

>Michael D. Malone wrote:
>In regards to WTAG's coverage of the fire.  They dropped the ball big time
>on the evening of the 3rd.  I could see the fire from my home base, and
>turned them on to see what they had.  In a word nothing...An Icecats game.
>About 9:00 PM, I called WTAG and asked the guy running the board why WTAG
>had no coverage.  He seemed completely unaware of the fire and even more so
>unconcerned, even after I told him it looked like at least 2 firefighters
>were dead and others were missing.  His reply "I just work here".
<snip>
>Also on Thursday while the coverage during the Memorial was well done, WTAG
>was very quick to go to Rush Limbaugh and subsequently Dr. Laura after the
>service, this while (out of towners)  WBZ continued coverage, and WTKK
>opened the phones to people to talk about the Memorial.  WTAG did open up
>the phones several hours later during the Jordan Levy show, but that gap
>IMHO was a major error in programming...

        But WTAG was real quick to come up with liners touting their
coverage--at least by the next Monday. Someone else wrote that maybe
stations are so locked in contractually to syndicated shows like Limbaugh.,
etc., that they can't pre-empt them. That's rubbish. First, I don't believe
that is the case. But, mainly, you pre-empt and let Limbaugh sue you if he
wants. Dare him to sue you or try to change affiliates because of what you
did. He won't. Imagine that bad PR! The real issue is what someone else
posted--these pitiful places don't want to miss 50 cents in revenue. The
owner's quarterly profits might dip from a 60 percent margin to 59.99999
instead of going up, which is always the demand from far away.
        There's a very thin line now of radio stations that have any clue
about news/community service/public affairs. And remember, that's supposed
to be WTAG's niche, their way of making the almighty dollar. But they're so
clueless and operated in such a cheapshit manner that they can't actually
do the job when a truly community-shattering disaster strikes. *Of course*
there was no newsperson on duty at 9 p.m. (who ever heard of such a
thing!). But what about at 4 p.m. that day when the fire started, or 5 or
6, when the firefighters already were missing?) This thread is the kind of
thing that makes you sad about all the pollution created to generate all
the electricity that is wasted having all these thousands of worthless
radio stations on the air.

>
>and finally Charter's (formerly Greater Media's) cable channel 3 in
>Worcester did worse.
<snip>
> they will run an infomercial
>for a period of time, it will end and then they will run part of the
>Memorial then dump out of it to go to the next infomercial...

        Are you saying they are using the tape of the memorial service now
as filler between ads? That's just about the most disgusting thing,
broadcast-related or not, I've heard in a long time. The firefighters and
community leaders in Worcester should demand that they stop, if they're
still doing it. And demand that they apologize and make a serious donation
to the fund for the firefighters' families.