Lying Liar doing well in Prov.? Uh...

[raccoonradio]

Air America put an ad on a radio trade website talking about the great ratings Al Franken was getting in Providence, RI--3 times as high as before.

Guess what: he is no longer on that station (WHJJ). They just dropped him because of LOW RATINGS (and did the same to Jerry Springer).



According to the WHJJ website:
10:00am-1pm
The Helen Glover Show

1pm-3pm
The Howie Barte Show  

______________
I am the REAL raccoonradio (2 c's). Accept
no substitutes!

[JohnnyMorganWXJX]

> Air America put an ad on a radio trade website talking about
> the great ratings Al Franken was getting in Providence,
> RI--3 times as high as before.
>
> Guess what: he is no longer on that station (WHJJ). They
> just dropped him because of LOW RATINGS (and did the same to
> Jerry Springer).
>
>
>
> According to the WHJJ website:
> 10:00am-1pm
> The Helen Glover Show
>
> 1pm-3pm
> The Howie Barte Show
>

Interesting.

Either AAR is fibbing (possible), or WHJJ made the move before the book came out (equally possible).  If B, dumb move in retrospect, but many stations have done such things (dump a host--or format--before a really good book).

[bierkenstock]

On what website did this ad appear (and when)?

The ad mentions adults 25 to 54 up 325%.  The only numbers Arbitron makes public are 12+ Average Quarter Hour Share numbers.  The ad does not specify whether the increase is in share or cume.  Since those numbers are not public in any case, you have no basis for saying the ad is a lie.

They dropped Franken and Springer "because of LOW RATINGS:" Is that your conclusion or can you site a quotation from WHJJ or Clear Channel management for this decision?  Note the station was mostly local talk radio before it picked up Springer and Franken.  Two of the station's three local hosts are liberal.  A case can be made that the station replaced SYNDICATED TALK with LOCAL TALK.  


> Air America put an ad on a radio trade website talking about
> the great ratings Al Franken was getting in Providence,
> RI--3 times as high as before.
>
> Guess what: he is no longer on that station (WHJJ). They
> just dropped him because of LOW RATINGS (and did the same to
> Jerry Springer).
>
>

[morescrapple]

> On what website did this ad appear (and when)?
>
> The ad mentions adults 25 to 54 up 325%.  The only numbers
> Arbitron makes public are 12+ Average Quarter Hour Share
> numbers.  The ad does not specify whether the increase is in
> share or cume.  Since those numbers are not public in any
> case, you have no basis for saying the ad is a lie.
>
> They dropped Franken and Springer "because of LOW RATINGS:"
> Is that your conclusion or can you site a quotation from
> WHJJ or Clear Channel management for this decision?  Note
> the station was mostly local talk radio before it picked up
> Springer and Franken.  Two of the station's three local
> hosts are liberal.  A case can be made that the station
> replaced SYNDICATED TALK with LOCAL TALK.  
>

widely reported in several places, WHJJ manager told Providence paper it was low ratings. Look it up.

>
> > Air America put an ad on a radio trade website talking
> about
> > the great ratings Al Franken was getting in Providence,
> > RI--3 times as high as before.
> >
> > Guess what: he is no longer on that station (WHJJ). They
> > just dropped him because of LOW RATINGS (and did the same
> to
> > Jerry Springer).
> >
> >
>

[clichemoth]

> > Air America put an ad on a radio trade website talking
> about
> > the great ratings Al Franken was getting in Providence,
> > RI--3 times as high as before.
> >
> > Guess what: he is no longer on that station (WHJJ). They
> > just dropped him because of LOW RATINGS (and did the same
> to
> > Jerry Springer).
> >
> >
> >
> > According to the WHJJ website:
> > 10:00am-1pm
> > The Helen Glover Show
> >
> > 1pm-3pm
> > The Howie Barte Show
> >
>
> Interesting.
>
> Either AAR is fibbing (possible), or WHJJ made the move
> before the book came out (equally possible).  If B, dumb
> move in retrospect, but many stations have done such things
> (dump a host--or format--before a really good book).
>

Maybe the point of the ad is "Hey, all you other Providence stations, pick up Al and Jerry before someone else does!  Look how they did as filler on a station that was eventually going local anyway!"

Anyway, percentages don't mean much.  0.1 is infinity% higher than 0.0.

[raccoonradio]

The site was Radio Equalizer blog (on Oct. 6) and the ad came from
Inside Radio.
WHJJ's PD said "basically the Air America experiment is over", and that AAR
did not live up to expectations, so Glover replaced Springer. The PD
added that the Franken slot would soon be changing as well. It now has.
They still run Randi Rhodes, but also Imus and local talker
Arlene Violet. (In fact they're local from 10 am to 6 pm)

"Without noting the show's already been cancelled there, it brags about supposed ratings growth at Providence's WHJJ-AM. As previously reported here, station management indicated to the media that Air America was a disaster in Rhode Island."--Radio Eq.

> widely reported in several places, WHJJ manager told
> Providence paper it was low ratings. Look it up.

[raccoonradio]

I'm surprised WHJJ doesn't pick up Sean Hannity, who is the second highest
rated talker in the nation. Do they want to throw on liberal hosts or
would they prefer to make money with conservative ones? I haven't
heard Glover or Barte so I don't know where they stand idealogically
(have heard Glover is to the right, though)

Unless WPRO is online to pick up Hannity. He can be heard via WTKK
in Boston though.

Admirable that they're doing local content though if they need a syndie
host or two, Hannity and a couple others not heard in RI are possibilities.

A 325 per cent increase--so they went from 0.100 to 0.325?

[gr8oldies]

Interesting-Darryl Parks, VP Ops of CC Cincinnati who also works with other CC properties, and does a weekend talk show on WLW, mentioned on his show that randi Rhodes wasn't long for the Providence station..especially after her producer caaled parks a liar over the WCKY transmitter fire situation. You might think twice before p**ing off the guy who can remove you pretty instantaneously.

[Phillip Dampier]

> The site was Radio Equalizer blog (on Oct. 6) and the ad
> came from Inside Radio.

Of course it did.  Here we go again - people confusing the highly obsessed and unemployed Radio Unequalizer with actual fact-based reporting.  When it comes to Brian Baloney and AAR, lying has a case for a restraining order.

> WHJJ's PD said "basically the Air America experiment is
> over", and that AAR
> did not live up to expectations, so Glover replaced
> Springer. The PD
> added that the Franken slot would soon be changing as well.
> It now has.
> They still run Randi Rhodes, but also Imus and local talker
> Arlene Violet. (In fact they're local from 10 am to 6 pm)

OK, so the experiment is not actually over if Rhodes is still on the lineup.  But that doesn't make AAR's ad copy false either.  Station execs can change lineup for whatever reason they want.  If a station slightly increases ratings, that doesn't mean it can't still drop a format.

But that isn't what readers to the Unequalizer got.  Instead, readers are told, "As previously reported here, station management indicated to the media that Air America was a disaster in Rhode Island."  Oh really?  Show me where anyone in the business down there called the format a disaster in RI other than this nobody?  Embellishment is the only thing consistent about his blog rantings.

In another break from reality, the Unequalizer tells us that the Rhodes vs. Parshall debate on C-SPAN had Randi Rhodes doing a Courtney Love impersonation and, my favorite, attacking Rhodes for guessing at her audience numbers which Baloney dismissed with his super duper secret ratings counting formula while at the same time telling us that Parshall's claim sounds "about right" based on random assumptions of listeners to Salem Witch Trial Network stations with no numbers at all.  If a Salem station had no listeners in a forest, would it make a sound?  In this guy's world, it would and would also be number one.

Pointedly missing from that particular article was the glaring fact break over Parshall flubbing the Sensenbrenner question and the labor law override the Administration managed post-Katrina.  Imagine that.

Your entire argument gets summary judgment and dismissal when you rely on fictional news sources to back it up.

[bierkenstock]

Radio Equalizer is a political blog published by a conservative former talk show host - not an industry trade publication. As such it publishes opinions, not news.

If you had read the Providence Journal articles, you would have seen that WHJJ replaced SYNDICATED progressive talk programming with LOCAL progressive talk programming.  That WHJJ had been local before AAR (when a popular host left) and their competition remained local.  That Providence is a market in which talk radio remains a local medium.

2/20/2005

WPRO program director David Berenstein said,
"I don't see the relevance of Air America for the people of Rhode Island.
"Rhode Island radio listeners want to hear -- and speak -- about local issues.
"I can get national news from a lot of different places. What I can't get is a discussion of the possibility of casinos coming to Rhode Island.
"When you run syndicated shows against local, you're crazy.  Local is what makes talk radio work."
WPRO had local talk programming against WHJJ.  

2/23/05

Local liberal gets Franken's spot on HJJ

It's goodbye Al Franken, hello Howie Barte on WHJJ-AM.

Who?

Barte, a retired air traffic controller living in Burrillville, takes over the 1 to 3 p.m. shift on WHJJ (920 AM), the slot previously occupied by syndicated host Al Franken.

He'll start Monday.

Barte, 57, said he owes his radio job to long-time WHJJ host Arlene Violet. He started on Violet's "Wednesday night fights" segment, a debate between a liberal and a conservative. Barte was the liberal.

Then he started substituting for Violet when she went on vacations.

When WHJJ decided to drop syndicated programming from Air America and concentrate on local talk hosts, Barte was chosen for the early-afternoon slot, which leads into Violet's 3 p.m. show.

"He's a guy who gets talk radio," said WHJJ program director Bill George. "He's a great communicator, he understands southern New England, he's got a great sense of humor."

2/10/2005

Bill George, program director for WHJJ, said the Air America experiment is essentially over.

"We tried to do something big and different," he said. "Needless to say, we were not pleased with the results . . . we are now committed to live and local talk."

Notice: George did not mention RATINGS (not here and not anywhere in any of the Providence Journal Articles about WHJJ and AAR).

> The site was Radio Equalizer blog (on Oct. 6) and the ad
> came from
> Inside Radio.
> WHJJ's PD said "basically the Air America experiment is
> over", and that AAR
> did not live up to expectations, so Glover replaced
> Springer. The PD
> added that the Franken slot would soon be changing as well.
> It now has.
> They still run Randi Rhodes, but also Imus and local talker
> Arlene Violet. (In fact they're local from 10 am to 6 pm)
>
> "Without noting the show's already been cancelled there, it
> brags about supposed ratings growth at Providence's WHJJ-AM.
> As previously reported here, station management indicated to
> the media that Air America was a disaster in Rhode
> Island."--Radio Eq.
>
> > widely reported in several places, WHJJ manager told
> > Providence paper it was low ratings. Look it up.
>