Doubling the cost of radio to subsidize liberal talk

[smedge2006]

It isn't necessary to argue that localism and being something other than a satellite repeater is required by the public interest. Plain old private interest is ill-served by the depopulation and deprofessionalization of the airwaves. Not just employees but shareholders and lenders have been shafted. Plain old greed and filthy lucre will eventually dictate that the current state of affairs cannot continue. Unfortunately, because of the time it has taken for reality to breach radio's technological and economic moats, the clock may run out before the cavalry can arrive to save the medium from itself.

To the fellow who said rural areas can't support local radio, there are thousands of exceptions all over the country. Your defense of becoming a satellator reminds me of an old poem, which I'll alter for this discussion...

First they came for the overnighter, and I didn't care because I worked days.

Then they came for the news reporter, and I didn't care because I wasn't one. 

Then they came for the evening shift, and I didn't care because I worked middays.

Then they came for middays, and I didn't care because I worked afternoons.

Finally they came for me, and there was no one left to care -- on either side of the speaker.

[gr8oldies]

What I think we are getting into is the old argument that radio should not provide what audiences want, but what they should have instead. Which would be fine if the population did not have as many options to turn your programming off, high minded as it might be. Top 40 stations ran talk shows at 11pm. Would anyone argue that modern day CHRs should do likewise? As far as our local representatives being in charge of what's on the public airwaves, I don't know how you work that. The center of my city is solidly Democratic and the suburbs are solidly Republican. Which group gets their way?

So in the cae of KLove, you would argue that the audience that likes and supports that format should not have the option to listen to Contemporary Christian music on the radio, despite the fact that the local operators have no interest in doin the format locally.(I have friends who check the website every time they travel to find out where they can get it when they are away). The greater good is prersumably served if that audience loses that format and someone talks about potholes on that facility instead.

Rural areas certainly can and do support local radio (but even most of them use some satellite or syndicated programming). Bedroom communities, where there is no real division between city and suburb, generally can't. Very few people, for example, live, work, play and shop entirely within the confines of say, Englewood, Ohio or Danville, IN. People have moved there over the years because it's a nice place essentially within the metro area, not because they know the school's fight song by heart.

If government is presumably going to micromanage all local programming decision, decide who gets hired and fired, decise what music radio stations aree going to play, and what DJs are supposed to say on the air, I don't know how governmnet manages that. And is local in and of itself going to make people listen. There are those who argue that local is always good and syndicated is always bad, but I don't believe people who don't ave skin in the game (make the big bad coroprate owner hire me) care.

[smedge2006]

So in the cae of KLove, you would argue that the audience that likes and supports that format should not have the option to listen to Contemporary Christian music on the radio, despite the fact that the local operators have no interest in doin the format locally.(I have friends who check the website every time they travel to find out where they can get it when they are away).

I would argue that small audiences nationwide are better served by satellite radio, internet streaming and mobilephone apps. Radio that is licensed to serve a certain geographic confine is better off doing things that those technologies can't. Or just turning off the transmitter and turning in the license. Or selling for a buck. If the price is low enough, somebody who can put content on that transmitter will come in. And to return to the original topic, what about those small audiences in places like Ponce, Oklahoma and Dalhart, Texas that want to hear liberal talk radio? Surely they are as entitled to satellators as the K-Love fans.

[gr8oldies]

If someone wants to buy a satellator in a small town in Oklahoma and run liberal talk on it, I don't have an objection. K-Love's audience isn't top 10, but they certainly have a loyal audience. My original point was that if the station has listeners who are actually paying money out of their own pockets to keep the format on the air, I don;t see how it's not "Serving the public". The posters brought up pornography, etc. So the bottom line is, no one should have the ability to hear any national talent or format on terrestrial radio, period. You like ESPN Radio? better get used to listening to two guys at the local bar and not Dan Patrick. You would also say if that station can't afford two guys at the bar the signal should go off the air.

Makes me wonder, ar you folks really interested in listening to the "local, public interest programming" you say you want, or do you just figure somehow the government will make the big, bad corporate radio guy let you talk on their radio station?