RE: WMEX NOT going all business--YET

["Paul Hopfgarten" <hopfgapr@sprynet.com>]

Just so you know...I was only repeating what Marjorie herself had said
today. I had no 'inside' info

-Paul Hopfgarten
-Derry NH

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-boston-radio-interest@bostonradio.org
> [mailto:owner-boston-radio-interest@bostonradio.org]On Behalf Of
> dan.strassberg@att.net
> Sent: Friday, December 01, 2000 6:53 PM
> To: boston-radio-interest@bostonradio.org
> Cc: scott@fybush.com
> Subject: WMEX NOT going all business--YET
>
>
> It's 6:30 PM on Friday 12/1 and Upton Bell has just
> concluded his show. I was listening via the Web, of
> course, so I don't know whether the _station_ signed off
> when it legally should have--15 minutes earlier. The
> program ended at 6:30 with the full signoff/ownership
> statement that WMEX uses at the end of its broadcast
> day. In December, the broadcast day should not extend
> beyond 6:15 PM.
>
> _However_ contrary to the statement that Marjorie
> Clapprood apparently made during her program today, WMEX
> is NOT going all business--at least, not yet. Bell ended
> his show by saying that Marjorie had resigned and that
> he (Bell) would be taking over her 10:00 AM to noon
> slot. I suspect that Gene Burns' contract has a few more
> months to run (my guess is until early February, a year
> after WMEX boosted its power and signed on with its
> news/talk format). I doubt that Langer wants to pay
> Burns for not appearing on the air, so the news/talk is
> likely to continue in some form as long as Burns must be
> paid. Moreover, Langer may also feel that, by the end of
> January, he has a chance of concluding a deal with a
> buyer and having the station under LMA with the buyer
> pending FCC approval.
>
> Since November 1, when local sunset moved back to 4:30,
> the entirety of Bell's program has been inaudible over
> the air, except in the immediate vicinity of WMEX's
> transmitter on Mt Wayte Ave in Framingham. So Bell's
> program has been, for all practical purposes, an
> Internet-only show. Now the program will again be
> audible over the air to a wide audience. I assume that
> WMEX will fill out the part of its broadcast day after
> the 5:00 PM end of Burns' program with recorded best-of
> shows. Even the huckters who broker time on weekends to
> sell vitamins and herbal nostrums seem unwilling to buy
> time during the period when the station can really be
> heard only via the Internet.
>