Call Letter Consideration

[FreddyE1977]

Almost as bad as some of the calls are some of the consolidated market names.

Gotta have a pretty nimble tongue to work in mid-Michigan.

"WIOG, FM-102, Baycitysaginawmidlandflint".

"WNEM, TV-5, Baycitysaginawmidlandflint"

etc.

To say nothing of Jacksonlansingbattlecreekkalamazoo.

[TheRob]

I figured the difficulty of the "W" was the reason many stations in the east referred to themselves by the last three letters, like 'MMR or 'YSP in Philadelphia.

We had a KZZC at one point, and now we have a KCZZ on the AM dial.

My college station was KJHK. I often paused in between, saying K-J... H-K Lawrence.

I'm glad we don't have any stations licensed to Osawatomie or Oskaloosa. 

[jfrancispastirchak]

The Pittsburgh PA market had (has?) a station with the calls WWSW.  Sounds tough to say, but on my frequent visits there back in the 60s, their announcers handled those letters very crisply.  Even sounded like they were having fun with it!

[DavidEduardo]

I figured the difficulty of the "W" was the reason many stations in the east referred to themselves by the last three letters, like 'MMR or 'YSP in Philadelphia.

More likely is that we found that everyone had a "W" so it was not unique. The other three letters were.

[Bongwater]

I figured the difficulty of the "W" was the reason many stations in the east referred to themselves by the last three letters, like 'MMR or 'YSP in Philadelphia.

More likely is that we found that everyone had a "W" so it was not unique. The other three letters were.

It's actually not hard to say "Double-you-Double-you-Ess-Double-you"

But make it a part of the station moniker of a FAST paced CHR radio station and start those letters with a "Kay" and there's GONNA be trouble .......

[jfrancispastirchak]

In the same market, Pittsburgh's trailblazing KDKA announcers have always had a cake walk with those calls...

[FreddyE1977]

1250 AM in Bay City, Michigan used to be WXOX.
Half the time it sounded as if their announcer were about to
cough up a hairball.

[landtuna]

Back in the U.S. Navy of the 60's ships were given several different calls.  In my ship's case we had:

NBIG - the "official" call sign.  This was not used in voice or TTY communication but was used in morse code and semaphore.

"Stale Vessel" - the "voice" (tactical, ship-to-ship) call sign.  Used only in voice communication usually by bridge personnel. 

The captain objected to the initial voice call and got it changed to "Stage Door". 

With all the branding going on now and digital readouts on virtually all radios it seems kind of silly to require stations to identify themselves by calls any longer.  We use frequencies to find the stations and brands to identify their formats.  Calls seem so 20th century.

[KeithE4]

With all the branding going on now and digital readouts on virtually all radios it seems kind of silly to require stations to identify themselves by calls any longer.  We use frequencies to find the stations and brands to identify their formats.  Calls seem so 20th century.

I can't think of any reason to continuing them other than that it's an FCC requirement.  Even those stations that use callsigns as their branding, such as WGN, could continue to identify themselves that way, even if said call letters are no longer assigned by the FCC.

[DavidEduardo]

I can't think of any reason to continuing them other than that it's an FCC requirement.  Even those stations that use callsigns as their branding, such as WGN, could continue to identify themselves that way, even if said call letters are no longer assigned by the FCC.

The main reason for continuing to have call letters is to uniquely identify a station. Arbitron, and thus advertisers who use ratings, identify stations by calls.

Whether used on the air or not, calls are a fairly secure method of telling stations apart for the buying process.