Re: Clear Channel, consolidation, etc.

[Aaron Read <aread@speakeasy.net>]

At 10:03 PM 10/19/2003, Scott Fybush wrote:
>As for the thousands of lesser signals, I can say this about Clear Channel 
>from personal observation: they sink engineering resources into many of 
>their AM properties in a way that Ma and Pa never could. It's exceedingly 
>rare to find a CC AM station with unlistenable audio quality, a corroded 
>ground system, a missed legal ID or day power/pattern after dark - and 
>when someone DOES screw up, an e-mail to the engineering bosses in 
>Kentucky gets it fixed immediately. There are a lot of other stations and 
>groups about which that can't be said.

Scott's got a point here....I know the engineering guys at WXKS (AM and FM) 
personally and they take great pride in keeping those stations in the best 
shape they can, as well as all the other CC properties in and around 
Boston.  When WXKS(AM) had a day/night problem recently - as realized on 
this list - they checked it out and fixed it post-haste.

CC also has a mantra about spectrum efficiency as well...despite their 
somewhat heavy-handed legal/political maneuvers regarding the WUNR site in 
Newton, from an engineering standpoint they consolidation of WKOX, WRCA and 
WUNR (and the significant power increases) makes a lot of sense...it will 
allow for much better coverage of more listeners, thus making the stations 
more valuable both in both monetary and non-monetary senses.   With all 
three of those stations running leased-time ethnic/foreign-language 
programming (and I'd imagine that won't change - it's profitable on both 
sides) I can't see how that isn't a good thing (ignoring any complaints 
from the Oak Hill residents...I won't get into that rant here).


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Aaron "Bishop" Read             aread@speakeasy.net
FriedBagels Consulting          AOL-IM: readaaron
http://www.friedbagels.com      Boston, MA