Re: the latest article about Clear Channel

[SteveOrdinetz <steveord@bit-net.com>]

  Mike Thomas wrote:

>  Sure, Clear Channel was one of the first to start rolling out heavily 
> automated stations, but even if consolidation never happened, 
> voicetracking would have eventually worked it's way down to the local mom 
> and pop owned stations.   Talk stations have largely been automated for 
> many years, but why is it that when music stations finally got the 
> ability to automate efficiantly that radio suddenly got tagged as no 
> longer "being local?"


It seems to me that the mom & pop outfits led the way towards automation 
and voicetracking, and the big companies followed.  The cluster of stations 
I work for went with voicetracking in '94 & '95 and they were locally owned 
at the time.  Look at the stations that were automated and/or running 
satellite fare in the 80s...they weren't the corporate-owned stations, they 
were the small ones.

I find it somewhat ironic when people criticize radio for being generic and 
non-local, and then extoll the virtues of Sirius or XM.  They're pretty 
bland & generic and certainly not local!

Clear Channel makes a nice easy target, much as Microsoft or Martha Stewart 
do...it's more their arrogance that made enemies than what they're 
doing...as Mike noted in a previous post, other companies (ABC, 
Infinity/Viacom, Cumulus, etc) are eliminating jobs and cutting back every 
bit as much as CC is, they're just a bit lower-key about it.