Whence Air America?

[Epee_Pox]

From today's Washington Post:

Air America, the liberal talk network carried on WWRC-AM (1260), went from bad to nonexistent. After WWRC recorded a mere fraction of a rating point in the spring with syndicated shows from the likes of lefty talkers Al Franken, Janeane Garofalo and Stephanie Miller, Arbitron couldn't detect a measurable listenership for the station this time around.



What gives? I thought they were doing pretty well, last time I heard.

[esskreemr]

It's fairly easy to explain. Flat growth in some markets, more than solid growth in others. Seems to be a great deal of ratings cherry-picking by both sides.

Air America's reporting an increase in listeners from 1.3mil to 3.1mil in a year's space. If true, those are pretty significant numbers considering that most politically oriented talk radio shows see a consistent decrease during the election 'void'.

I'm surprised AA hasn't hit Jon Stewart up for a regular piece. Maybe they have and he said no.

http://www.airamericaradio.com/node/657

For the record, I've never listened to AA.

The Fall 2005 Arbitron ratings are out, I think. Guess they'll be another flurry of stats soon.

[Mr Epee]

[esskreemr]

Are you insinuating that I'm a commie because I don't listen to Air America?

[Mr Epee]

Originally Posted by esskreemr

Are you insinuating that I'm a commie because I don't listen to Air America?

I'm was insinuating that you are such a slacker that you aren't doing your part to support the proper left-wing coffee-house agenda.

(The caption is "Did you Volunteer")

Being forced to spell things out kinda screws up the insinuation part.

[esskreemr]

Originally Posted by Mr Epee

I'm was insinuating that you are such a slacker that you aren't doing your part to support the proper left-wing coffee-house agenda.

(The caption is "Did you Volunteer")

Being forced to spell things out kinda screws up the insinuation part.

Actually, I thought it was kind of funny. I can imagine Slim opening that up, seeing the finger pointing at him, and nearly bursting a blood vessel.

I REALLY don't like coffee, by the way.

[Slim]

Originally Posted by Epee_Pox

From today's Washington Post:

Air America, the liberal talk network carried on WWRC-AM (1260), went from bad to nonexistent. After WWRC recorded a mere fraction of a rating point in the spring with syndicated shows from the likes of lefty talkers Al Franken, Janeane Garofalo and Stephanie Miller, Arbitron couldn't detect a measurable listenership for the station this time around.



What gives? I thought they were doing pretty well, last time I heard.

The Boys Club demanded their money be returned.

[Mr Epee]

Originally Posted by esskreemr

Actually, I thought it was kind of funny. I can imagine Slim opening that up, seeing the finger pointing at him, and nearly bursting a blood vessel.

I REALLY don't like coffee, by the way.

Remember when that one guy, had that one putsh, in that one beer hall, that one day, in the spring?

That's the Righty version of the Coffeehouse.

[Slim]

Originally Posted by esskreemr

It's fairly easy to explain. Flat growth in some markets, more than solid growth in others. Seems to be a great deal of ratings cherry-picking by both sides.

Air America's reporting an increase in listeners from 1.3mil to 3.1mil in a year's space. If true, those are pretty significant numbers considering that most politically oriented talk radio shows see a consistent decrease during the election 'void'.

I'm surprised AA hasn't hit Jon Stewart up for a regular piece. Maybe they have and he said no.

http://www.airamericaradio.com/node/657

For the record, I've never listened to AA.

The Fall 2005 Arbitron ratings are out, I think. Guess they'll be another flurry of stats soon.

Even easier to explain. No one cared what they were saying. Turned out people arent as dumb as they had hoped.

For the record, I have listened to it in small doses. It was pathetic enough to almost feel bad for them. Well, not too bad. There is an interesting HBO documentary on the birth of AA. They were in trouble from the get go. Very entertaining. But not as entertaining as watching the Al Franken 2004 election results show on Sundance. Watching Al and company all crying as the results came in is a classic moment in cable television.

I'm gonna miss ya AA. Thanks for the good times. (sniff, sniff)

[Epee_Pox]

Originally Posted by esskreemr

Seems to be a great deal of ratings cherry-picking by both sides.

What huh? I haven't seen this reported anywhere except in a Washington Post article today, as the bottom paragraph in a piece that was mostly about how Howard Stern's been hemorrhaging listeners ever since he started spending all his time griping about his station and the FCC.


I just wondered how come their ratings were stinking so bad in that market. I'm surprised by the minimal numbers. [They're pretty consistently around a 1 or 1.2 share here in NYC (not the worst, but not very good, either) which is again pretty surprising.]

Any ideas?

[keith]

Originally Posted by Epee_Pox

Any ideas?

....liberals are comfortable with the whole concept of 'thinking for yourself'?

There are also the established stations like Pacifica.

[Larrison]

Originally Posted by esskreemr

It's fairly easy to explain. Flat growth in some markets, more than solid growth in others. Seems to be a great deal of ratings cherry-picking by both sides.

Air America's reporting an increase in listeners from 1.3mil to 3.1mil in a year's space. If true, those are pretty significant numbers considering that most politically oriented talk radio shows see a consistent decrease during the election 'void'. [ ... ]

The growth in listeners is due to two primary facts --

First, that their market base went from something like 24 stations to around 70 in that year. So you'd expect their listeners to go up by about that much, just assuming each station had X listeners and now there are 70/24 X listeners.

Secondly, as the "new" station in each market, and that the chain has intentionally tried to market itself as a "controversial" station, you get an initial inrush of listener who are willing to listen to the "new" station. The critical next step however, is holding onto those new listeners and continuing to pull more. I haven't seen any Arbitron data that they are succeeding or failing in this.

From what I understand, in a couple of urban markets they are doing OK. In others they are flopping. But without numbers I'm not going to hazard a prediction -- the DC data would be troubling however, if this was matched in other markets.

From a personal perspective, I've listened to their affliate here in SoCal, and didn't like the show. Very negative, and not as off-the-wall entertaining as Pacifica radio's even more "progressive" slant on the news.

[esskreemr]

Sounds reasonable to me. The reason could simply be because AAR sucks. Gthey need a star and haven't been able to field a home-run hitter quite yet.

Still, their ratings are up in many metro areas, so they could lose audience in smaller listening areas but still see an overall increase.

[Slim]

Originally Posted by esskreemr

Actually, I thought it was kind of funny. I can imagine Slim opening that up, seeing the finger pointing at him, and nearly bursting a blood vessel.

I REALLY don't like coffee, by the way.

Nope. Sorry. Good chuckle though.

[Mr Epee]

Why would anyone listen to Air America, when we already have NPR and PBS?

[Slim]

Originally Posted by Mr Epee

Why would anyone listen to Air America, when we already have NPR and PBS?

And who can forget the new Al Gore channel. I think it stole all 17 AA listeners.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051007/tv_nm/media_gore_dc


I want my GoreTV!

[Epee_Pox]

I sorta like the idea behind Gore's cable network ("Current"). Not really a political forum, more of a nationwide version of public access cable, where you can upload short-format segments you've produced, for people to vote on. Wasn't there something like this in Canada?

[Larrison]

Originally Posted by esskreemr

Sounds reasonable to me. The reason could simply be because AAR sucks. Gthey need a star and haven't been able to field a home-run hitter quite yet.

Still, their ratings are up in many metro areas, so they could lose audience in smaller listening areas but still see an overall increase.

I don't know -- just for grins, I went and looked up their Affliates in Los Angeles and San Francisco and their current ratings from http://www.radioandrecords.com/

Their ratings in these 2 markets (2 of the biggest in the US are mediocre and not showing dramatic growth over the last 6 months or so..)

In LA, they broadcast on KTLK, which has a .9 share in the last rating. Now, the station has tripled its share (.3 to .9) but that was due to the format change I believe (see my previous comment), but their growth beyond that seems pretty small .8 to .9, in the last quarter. They are 4th out of 4 in talk stations, with the highest station having a share of 4.0, up from 3.9.

In the SF area, they broadcast on KQKE, which has a 1.2 share. That station looks like it dropped in share when it did the market change (!!), from 1.9 down to around 1.0, but has since recovered a bit and is steady at 1.2 In their genre, they are 3rd out of three, and most notably, holding share while others drop. (It should be noted the leader in that genre has a share rating of 3.0, compared to their 1.2, although that is down from 3.5 -- the market share for talk has not gone from the market leader to KQKE).

And getting back to the topic of "What is next for Air America..." as an interesting note I ran across this article while doing a quick google search on Air America. This article claims that Air America's founders are going to spinning up a new "Nova M" network, whose ownership will be entwined with Air America's in order to go after more of the rural small markets. (Note: this is from a blog/new site, and should be accepted with a large grain of salt as it seems to be written from a specific ideological position.) The Nova M website advertising participation in a private placement (!!) is at http://www.novamradio.com/getinvolved.html. [As a side note, I did not believe such public solicitations were legal for private placements.... You can do such for a public offering, but not for a private placement...]

[Slim]

Originally Posted by Epee_Pox

I sorta like the idea behind Gore's cable network ("Current"). Not really a political forum, more of a nationwide version of public access cable, where you can upload short-format segments you've produced, for people to vote on. Wasn't there something like this in Canada?

Except, they choose what airs and what doesnt. There is really nothing public about it. It's potentially brilliant though. Think of this:

"You young folks create and produce the content, and we'll air it if it's good! Now, go out and create!"

Then they get the nieve kids to sign over the rights to the ideas before they can be aired. "We love it, and we want to air it! Just sign here and all your friends will see your videos. Isnt it cool!?"

They dont have to pay for production, or talent, and if it's a hit, stand to make some serious $ from licensing the rights.

I'd give it a watch if I could get it. Although, it might cut into my 10 hrs of daily FoxNews and Rush Limbaugh viewing.

EDIT: Yep, as I suspected. Not nothing, but close to it.

http://www.current.tv/studio/resources/license

[Slim]

Originally Posted by Larrison

I don't know -- just for grins, I went and looked up their Affliates in Los Angeles and San Francisco and their current ratings from http://www.rad