You have no clue as to what I do or don't understand Gleason. For you to pontificate that you know more about the LF San Diego cluster than I do is pure arrogance. I have followed closely what has happened to my former cluster over the past five years and know way more about it than you do. You also self rightiously assume I don't understand the business and long for the days of yesteryear. What an idiot you are. My comment of what LF has done to what JP left them with was more in reference to the past few years than to the past few days. You get on here and blowhard your way through your own personal bullshit like you know everything and no one else possesses your magnificence.
Once again, try to offer a little concern for the 15 people now on the street and stop self agrandizing what you've done in your career. We don't care what you've done.
Again: LF held out without major reductions much longer than the vast majority of groups. Of course, it could be rationalized that they were seeking a buyer for a non-core business and did not want to disrupt the business model but when it was obvious that neither prices nor the economy were recovering, they did what was necessary to adapt to a new reality.
I don't know anyone in radio who does not have great empathy for everyone who was let go across the business. It's a situation for concern on many levels, beginning with the personal level of the lives that have been disrupted and extending to the effect this will have on the future of the industry and the jobs of everyone who may still be employed.
But you continue to write things that indicate that you think something different has happened at LF. There is nothing really different... except that they waited longer than most to adjust to reality.
Look at the top 50 markets. Name a surviving smooth jazz station. A few managed to transition to some kind of AC. Most changed format, some with success, some with bad results. LF stuck with SJ, and we can debate whether they should have changed earlier... but the fact is that the PPM killled the format, not LF.
And, again, the economy and radio's issues have reduced market billings in San Diego by over a third. That means less money for sellers, support staff, talent, and everyone else. The economy is not LF's fault, either... and it's hard for anyone who fell victim to the shrinking of the radio revenue pool... but you just can't blame LF for any of that.
You keep circling back to the 15 people let go this month. The same thing has happened at every level in radio, so saying that this is about a failure to empathize with the most recent group of people who were laid off really means that it is you who does not feel for the thousands let go across the industry... perhaps 15,000 to 20,000 persons in the last 5 years.
On the personal level, I never said "I know more about the LF cluster" so that statement is untrue. What I do know is that the PPM killed Smooth Jazz everywhere, SD market billings are off over a third, and radio everywhere is changing due to the economy and new media. When JP sold, radio was at its peak; just as a $400 million station in LA sold for $130 recently, the value of stations, based on billing and revenue potential, has declined.
I don't think LF could have done anything significantly different that would have changed the reality that forced your friends and former coworkers to be let go.
