1200 stunting as Gaffe 1200

[Bob DeMattia]

I'll second Dan's impression and add a little more.  I could
take about fifteen minutes of Matty1200, then I had enough.

(1) I think a certain part of seeing a comedy act is, well,
    seeing it.   It's not the same listening to it on
    low-bandwidth crackly static-filled AM radio.

(2) A large group of people listen to news everyday and this
    might explain why they listen to talk/news radio.  I
    don't know anyone that watches/listens to/follows
    comedy everyday; but maybe that's just me.

(3) While listening to news/talk, the issues are current and
    changing.  Listening to previously recorded comedy
    routines would seem to get stale.  (Why doesn't music
    get stale?).  Music doesn't require as much attention
    as listening to talk.  While some songs may stand out,
    other songs are just background (especially on WHBA).


If this works, more power to them.  I don't see it doing
any better than what they had in Talk1200, which was
about even or maybe a little better ratings-wise than the
Spanish format.  It seems like they should have at least
1200 run out through the election while a few more people
might be following politics.

-Bob



On Mon, Aug 13, 2012 at 3:59 PM, Dan.Strassberg <dan.strassberg@att.net>wrote:

> I wonder how well CCU has tested (focus groups, etc) THIS incarnation of
> 24/7 comedy. At my age, nobody in the biz is going to listen to me, but I
> believe that what I've heard so far on Comedy 1200 has several problems:
> Virtually all of the cuts are by male comedians and a very high percentage
> of the male comedians are white. For sure, we need more female voices and
> ethnic minorities. And they ought to slow down--a lot! After 20 minutes, I
> feel as if I've been listening for eight hours. If TSL is important (and
> supposedly, it is), why make the listener feel as though he has been
> listening all day after only 20 minutes or so?
>
> Also, I assume that the total absence of music is a royalty thing. Some
> comedy music (Tom Lehrer, for example) would be very welcome--at least to
> these ears. Also, I've heard nothing from the Goon Shows.
>
> -----
> Dan Strassberg
> e-fax 707-215-6367
>   ----- Original Message -----
>   From: Scott Fybush
>   To: boston-radio-interest@lists.BostonRadio.org
>   Sent: Monday, August 13, 2012 2:29 PM
>   Subject: Re: 1200 stunting as Gaffe 1200
>
>
>   On 8/13/2012 1:01 PM, Donna Halper wrote:
>   > Not trying to be a killjoy here, but comedy as a format has a noble
>   > history of being tried and then failing miserably in the ratings.
> People
>   > like a particular comedy routine or even a live show at a club, but a
>   > steady diet of comedy has no history of being successful.  (Plus, some
>   > of the funniest club routines use language you can't use on radio.)  I
>   > love Matty, but I wonder if this too isn't a placeholder for something
>   > else down the line.
>
>   Times have changed. Many of those previous attempts were at standalone
>   stations (cf. WJOK, WRCA), and it's quite true that comedy on its own
>   couldn't sustain an independent station, even a small AM one.
>
>   The guys behind the "Comedy 24/7" service that's running on 1200 came
>   along at the right time, though: they're pitching their service to the
>   number-six signal in any given cluster. If you've already got three FMs
>   carrying mass-appeal music formats and a bigger AM doing news-talk and
>   maybe another AM doing sports, what else are you going to do with that
>   throwaway signal at the bottom of the pile?
>
>   Where it's been tried so far, especially on HD2/translator combos in
>   Kansas City and Austin, the comedy format has turned out to be a nice
>   bonus addition to a cluster programming strategy. It attracts younger
>   listeners who wouldn't ever hit that "number-six station" if it were
>   carrying more satellite-fed third-tier talk or sports or standards, and
>   at least in KC it came out of the box with something like a 2.5
>   share...on a TRANSLATOR!
>
>   Comedy 1200 isn't going to be the next Kiss 108, but I have a hunch it
>   will do better for CC, sales-wise, than "Fox Sports 1200" would do.
>