XM gets "sirius"

[Dan Strassberg]

Joe: Your condescending, cock-sure tone is just PERFECT for your message,
but what you wrote is simply not true. With 13,000+ radio signals in this
country, the market is HIGHLY fragmented, except in small markets where few
signals are audible. It is NOT at all OBVIOUS that the most profitable
strategy for all stations in medium and large markets is to cater to the
lowest common denominator. The proof is that in many medium and large
markets "narrowcasting" to ethnic minorities yields owners of secondary
signals (and in some cases MAJOR signals, such as WIND Chicago, WADO New
York, and KHJ Los Angeles) much greater profits than are possible by
attempting to split the majority audience with four or five competitors. The
whole radio landscape is filled with stations that target narrow segments.
News, issue-oriented talk, and sports talk, are only a few of the niches
that don't cater to the largest segments. The reason that broadcasters are
such copycats is that, as a group, they are greedy and stupid (which DOES
NOT mean that there are no exceptions). So much erroneous "conventional
wisdom" floats around the industry that nearly everybody believes it. And so
we have a herd of sheep (with the intelligence of sheep) making format
decisions--and what looks to me to be no chance of reversing the trend.

--
Dan Strassberg, dan.strassberg@att.net
eFax 707-215-6367

----- Original Message -----
From: Joseph Pappalardo <joepappalardo2001@yahoo.com>
To: Dan Strassberg <dan.strassberg@att.net>
Cc: <boston-radio-interest@rolinin.BostonRadio.org>
Sent: Monday, December 29, 2003 11:42 AM
Subject: Re: XM gets "sirius"


>
> > How can anything EXCEPT the least-common-denominator be acceptable when
> > radio "professionals" on this list, who darned well ought to know
better,
> > INSISTED that WBOQ's format change HAD to indicate that the station was
> not
> > making money under its old format and INSISTED that the old format was
> Adult
> > Standards (which it wasn't)? Apparently their small minds couldn't grasp
> the
> > concept of variants on that format--at least not on terrestrial
commercial
> > radio. If the people here--whose IQs must average 30 points more than
> those
> > of agency time buyers--can't deal with the possibility of terrestrial
> > commercial stations carrying anything besides cookie-cutter formats, how
> can
> > there be any hope that we will ever hear anything else?
>
> Here's my take....
>
> Radio is BROADcasting...MASS appeal...to get as MANY listeners to listen
as
> possible....to get them to listen as LONG as possible.
>
> That's how stations make money.  ...more people...and....longer they
listen.
>
> That's what substantiates an owner parking his assets in a radio
> station...instead of in the bank.
>
> So, the so-called, "lowest common denominator" is a sarcastic way of
noting
> that radio is doing it's job.
>
> Some of the most complained about stations (WCRB) are highly
sucessful...and
> brought more listeners to the station than at any other time since it's
> inception.
>
> People complain about the short playlists.  (Gee, let's remove some of
these
> very popular records and replace them with less popular records.)
>
> "Gee, let's play Dan's favorite classical pieces and have a lot less
> listeners!  Gee there's an idea!"
>
> Radio isn't an IPOD, or CD burning...it's not your personal music station.
> It's part of a show...when you are at a concert, the band will play some
> songs you like, some you don't...but you understand that there are 30,000
> other people at the stadium.   People have forgotten that's what radio
does,
> broadcast to a stadium at all times.
>
> HOWEVER, there IS one point that is valid.  Time Spent Listening (TSL)
seems
> to be going down slowly nationwide year after year.  I think radio is
> becoming MORE trivial by the minute because it is so focused on itself,
its
> revenues
> and its profits.  "Listener focus" at the top....is history.  The whole
> notion of connecting  with intensity to listeners one at a time is
regarded
> is an anachronism.  Not a pretty picture.
>
> $.02
>
> ...back to lurking mode.
>
> JP
>