 Contents - Front Page - Past Mailbags - Rant - Classifieds - Dave TV - Support DCRTV Edited by Dave Hughes. Send posts to dcrtv@dcrtv.com.  Put "MAILBAG" on the subject line. DCRTV can't take responsibility for message content, although we attempt to edit for taste and fairness. Each posting is solely the opinion of the person who wrote it. DCRTV cannot verify the factual accuracy or authorship of posts. If you see a message that's in poor taste or unfair to someone, contact us and it will be removed. Messages that don't deal with local media issues may not get posted. We can't forward messages to posters..... Support DCRTV and the world famous Mailbag! Just a few bucks a month is all we ask! Click here. Thanks: Carter, Marc, Tom, Lee, Marty, Greg, Oleg, Ken, Mark, Joe, Kelly, Laura, Doug, Diane, Chris.....LOTS MORE MEDIA COMMENTARY ON DCRTV'S FACEBOOK PAGE..... Latest messages listed first.....  \/ June 18 Messages \/ I understand Holly Morris went to a new grocer in DC claiming all of their items are local. However, I've since heard that there are indeed some commercial items in their like "Silk" milk and brand name orange juice to name a few. (6/18/13) Fox cornering the market on lesbians? Maybe in a world without Democratic operatives Hilary Rosen and Rachel Maddow, who is dating the woman who used to mow her lawn and is now mowing her lawn. Maybe you should worry a little bit more about the obvious molesters on America's Test Kitchen. Or Paula Poundstone of NPR, with her conviction. Stay away from physicist Lisa Randall, she's mine. - ZombieGertrudeStein (6/18/13) I bid a fond farewell to Lisa de Moraes, who is leaving the Washington Post. And now where will I get all my local TV news? I get a letter from a "Dave TV" fan. And I address criticism from WMAL biggie Bill Hess. And I take a look at the latest ratings trends for early June, including WKYS on top and a post-Jack Diamond slump for Mix 107.3. And more in today's "Dave TV"..... (6/18/13) [RE: Washington Post TV columnist Lisa de Moraes joins Deadline.com...] Good riddance. Worst TV columnist in American Newspaper history. Can't believe she ever got a job at the Post. (6/18/13) [RE Bert on Mix 107.3:] 24th? How many full power stations are there im the DC market these days? That has to be pretty near the bottom of the ol' barrell. Well done WRQX! (6/18/13) [RE Bert on Mix 107.3:] Wow, that's sad. Going to syndication has to be cheaper but is it that much cheaper? (6/18/13) [RE Bert on Mix 107.3:] You mean playing the same music as every other station with DJ's from Atlanta is not the secret to success? Who knew? (6/18/13) [RE DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: Signing off his WMAL show today, Chris Plante said he'd continue doing his show for just himself in the car on his drive to Fox News...] He should do that everyday. Keep it to himself, that is! (6/18/13) Looks like Lisa de Moraes found a job closer to home and her home court. I'm kinda surprised it's at Deadline. Though it is run more professionally now since Penske bought it, Nikki Finke is still explosive and I can't really imagine she and Moraes won't claw each other out or something -- even though they cover different beats. www.deadline.com (6/18/13) "Listen you ZombieDouche, it takes a dumbass to know one! DCRTV is probably the only reason that more people listen to the train wreck known as WMAL Radio, especially with all the free (but mostly negative) publicity they get from Dave and the Mailbag. So what's the big deal then?" - Wow, who raped you this morning? I have no probl3m with Dave talking about WMAL, it's a little obsessive but it's what he likes. But you're putting the cart before the horse, which a smaht puhson wouldn't have no truck with. - "I was listening to the BBC World Service via WYPR. In the 4:00 AM half hour (14:00 GMT) was a documentary on how radio is coping in the digital world." - "Like most states in the USA, Daylight-Saving Time (DST) is observed in Washington DC Time , where the time is shifted forward by 1 hour to Eastern Daylight Time (EDT); which is 4 hours behind Greenwich Mean Time (GMT-4)." - So no, 4 am here is NOT 1400 Zulu. So there's the guy Chicago was singing about; he REALLY doesn't know what time it is. - ZombieSethThomas (6/18/13) Dave- For clarification sake, what do you consider to be the “older listeners’ driving WMAL’s ratings? In the prime talk demo of Adults 35-64 – where the real money is among consumers – we ranked #11 this week, with “Mornings On The Mall” ranking #7. For the last full month, we ranked 9th overall, and have been Top Ten every month this year. The morning show has been showing great growth- starting 10th in January, 9th in February, 8th in March, and 7th in April and May. There’s always more work to do, but we’re clearly on target. Point is, when you cut off those “older listeners” beyond 65, we actually do even better! But we’re happy to have them, too. Thanks, Dave! -Bill (6/18/13) The Unsigned Corporate Suit wrote "... how about a DaveTV segment remembering the wired wanna-be’s of the past (?) ..." Here's a big one from 1985 that UCS missed in Monkey County. (3.5mb PDF file) DCMemories.com (6/18/13) The voice at the end of the 5th Dimension could be Rolly Ferrara/Tiger Bob Raleigh??? (6/18/13) The mystery photo? WPTX in Lexington Park? (6/18/13) Re: Fifth Dimension/Coke commercial....Definitely not Don Grove (Cosgrove) and I really don't think it's me. ...Johnny Dark (6/18/13) Posted asked, is there a vet of '60s radio present who can identify the announcer at the end of this Fifth Dimension spot? He's real boss! Not positive, but I remember the voice and delivery from years ago on the Big 60. I would say Johnny Dark. What do I win? Gary Michaels/retired (6/18/13) (Quote)Is there a vet of '60s radio present who can identify the announcer at the end of this Fifth Dimension spot? He's real boss!(Un-Quote) That is Don Grove, (WEAM) who last I spoke to him was on the Island of Guam and running the Island station by exciting a pet Ferrite to drive the generator. - Wilson Boulevard, Rosslyn (6/18/13) (SNIP) a girl on WNEW gave the time coming out of traffic as 8:33 and, when I tuned to WTOP, they were just giving the time as 8:31. I felt like I'd been given an extra two minutes of life!(UNSNIP) And you wasted it by bitching about it here. Seriously, find a hobby, dude. (6/18/13) Is there a vet of '60s radio present who can identify the announcer at the end of this Fifth Dimension spot? He's real boss! (mp3 file) DCMemories.com (6/18/13) "What the hell is wrong with Imus? His face is all puffy and bloated. He looks he could be a sister of Angela Lansbury" - Nothing is "wrong" with Imus. That's how he really looks. Its been confirmed, Imus is in fact a Lesbian who loves to go to Rodeo's that feature little boys! Fox seems to have a corner on media Lesbians what with Imus, Sarah Palin, Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly. Don't get me wrong, nothing wrong with being a Lesbian, but lets be "fair and balanced" about it. And all the simpletons say Fox is right-wing! My how the blogs and flames will roll. Lee Keyhole Mt. Pleasant (6/18/13) I think when UCS referred to "the basement of 1524 First Place N.E" in Monday's mailbag, he actually meant this structure at "5321". (6/18/13)  It's about time. When you hear that top of the hour tone on WTOP, it's not for real. I mean it is a real tone, but it is "late, late, late for an important date!" WTOP is on delay so the tone is way late, always. Perfectionists are pissed! Is WNEW on delay? Also, I, too, noticed WNEW and WTOP are not together on the time. Perfectionists are really pissed. But remember: "time, time time is on "my" side, yes it is." (6/18/13) REF: [I was watching TV news this morning involving the rape of a Midshipman at the Naval Academy] WJZ led its 6pm newscast with the story, using footage from its network affiliation, CBS, and the Sunday broadcast of 60 Minutes, that featured the female allegedly raped in what the network labelled as an "exclusive." They spent nearly 10 minutes on it! Fortunately, I was at the gym, which prevented me from dozing off. They even quoted a statement from Congresswoman Mikulski saying she has been fighting this issue of sexual harassment in the military for 25 years. Same 'ole blah blah blah. Maybe she, and the station, should give up on this he-said-she-said anchor-clanker crap and get on with issues and stories that matter. Wow, what a promo..."stories that matter, on the only station that matters!" Or, is that radio, not tv? Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to finish my workout. (6/18/13) It would appear WBAL radio went balls to the wall and pulled out all of their investigative resources to be on top of this story: www.wbal.com... Man-Loses-Suit-Over-Penile-Implant (6/18/13) Dave, While making my usual early in the morning commute to the MARC station this morning I was listening to the BBC World Service via WYPR. In the 4:00 AM half hour (14:00 GMT) was a documentary on how radio is coping in the digital world. You'll hear WTOP's Jim Farley interviewed as an example of how a station stays relevant. That BBC piece is pretty interesting listening for anyone who loves what radio was and could be again (apologoes to "Field of Dreams." You can hear the documentary here- www.bbc.co.uk... Thanks for your work, Dave! (6/18/13) (SNAP) ZombieWizard - blah-blah-blah-drivel....... ((SNIP) Comprehension, turdball, look it up, you lack it! Eff-you right back at cha asshole. And like I said, GET BACK TO YOUR CIVIL SERVICE JOB AND STOP SURFING THE INTERNET WASTING TAXPAYERS MONEY AND TIME! What an idiot! - Hung Whell - Mt. Shasta (6/18/13) From Tom Taylor Now: Bill Bailey will be remembered this Sunday afternoon at the Eberhard Center in Grand Rapids from 1-5pm. Several friends and former co-workers of the major-market jock and program director who died last week say things like “He was the best PD I ever had, and an incredible human being.” Last Thursday’s NOW Newsletter carried some career highlights – being the second “Bill Bailey” at WLS, Chicago, working at Detroit’s WDRQ, Washington DC’s WKYS and then-Xtra 104 WXTR, and most recently doing the sunrise shift at Grand State University’s WGVS/WGVU in Grand Rapids. Bailey died of a heart attack while playing in a station-sponsored golf tourney. (6/18/13) What the hell is wrong with Imus? His face is all puffy and bloated. He looks he could be a sister of Angela Lansbury. (6/18/13) I was watching TV news this morning about a story involving the rape of a Midshipman at the Naval Academy. In that story they used video from the Air Force Academy. Did the video editor just search for academy and pull up this video? Seemed a bit (a lot) in appropriate. (6/18/13) WKIK - I remember that building now. I won a birthday cake from there in 1986. I remember my Mom telling me to say that WKIK was my favorite radio station when they asked me. We never listened to it. I didn't even like country music back then. Good Times! Kevin from St. Mary's County. (6/18/13) Listen you ZombieDouche, it takes a dumbass to know one! DCRTV is probably the only reason that more people listen to the train wreck known as WMAL Radio, especially with all the free (but mostly negative) publicity they get from Dave and the Mailbag. So what's the big deal then? (6/18/13) Being the occasional insomniac that I am, I was surfing the late night radio dial when I came upon the Dallas-based Red Eye Radio on WMAL. Man, what a bunch of mindless right-wing drivel...no wonder these jokers got the graveyard shift and it's exactly where Chris Plante belongs. Cheap Limbaugh/Hannity clones at best. Nonetheless, these clowns make for a great lullaby except for the fact that lullabies are usually soft and gentle, of which Red Eye Radio is not! It still put me out like a candle, and for that I'm only slightly thankful. (6/18/13) Re: Morris Jones' makeup, he's obviously had some work done. And he obviously asked his plastic surgeon to make him look like Eddie Munster.. (6/18/13) Well, Virginia was the Old Dominion before the Klan, so no. - "Jesus, saying the "Wizards" name should be changed because its a "klan name" is as ignorant a comment as I've ever seen on DCRTV. So lets review for the slackers who take verbatim from DC sports talk radio: Grand Imperial Wizard- this is the leader of all KKK dens across the country. - Sorry, Cub Scouts have dens. I don't listen to sports talk radio, so eff you. So you're fine with armed Norwegians bringing their pistols into the locker room at the Verizon Center, where they're forbidden by DC law? AYAK? -ZombieWizard (6/18/13) "Two things about WNEW. Has anyone else noticed how often they are wrong when they give the time? It varies from host to host but, it seems like several of them give the time one or two minutes later than what it really is." - Does anybody really know what time it is? Does anybody care? - ZombieCaribouLodge (6/18/13) /\ June 18 Messages /\ \/ June 17 Messages \/ Two things about WNEW. Has anyone else noticed how often they are wrong when they give the time? It varies from host to host but, it seems like several of them give the time one or two minutes later than what it really is. Is that a ratings trick? The strangest one was the night that a girl on WNEW gave the time coming out of traffic as 8:33 and, when I tuned to WTOP, they were just giving the time as 8:31. I felt like I'd been given an extra two minutes of life! Oh, and WTOP matched my phone! The other thing they need to do on WNEW, well both stations, really, is learn to pronounce local names of places correctly. Do you really know people from Boh-wie, Ohl-ney or MacCleen? I know plenty of people from Boo-wie, Ahlney and MacLaine! Try to make us believe that youre glad youre hear. Youre working in WASHINGTON, people! (6/17/13) Regarding recent posters… Yes, I meant 1519 Connecticut Ave as the first home of Jenkins station W3XK. And, no, I’m not “Scott Carpenter”. My resume’ (if I needed one) would be far more interesting reading. Let’s just say that… I’ve had home reception of all the major analog TV systems at one time or another over the years. (Including the original HDTV, the old French 819i system) And, I've been televised on-air at one time or another in PAL, SECAM, and NTSC. Another hint… Antenna base I of 72.7A going into a Blaw-Knox design tower in the 1980’s. Serious question: Has anyone recently gone into the basement of 1524 First Place N.E. in D.C. to see if an “elephants graveyard” of DuMont TV equipment might still be awaiting discovery? (And, preservation…) For that matter, how about a DaveTV segment remembering the wired wanna-be’s of the past, like Arlington Cable Partners, Bell Atlantic Video Services, District Cablevision, Hauser Communications, Prime Cable, Media General Cable, Prestige Cable, Adelphia, Alexandria Cablevision, Warner-Amex, Jones, etc., not to forget the “mom and pop” system Gaithersburg used to have? -Unsigned Corporate Suit (6/17/13) No disrespect to Morris Jones, but who does his makeup? He looks like a zombie! (6/17/13) Jesus, saying the "Wizards" name should be changed because its a "klan name" is as ignorant a comment as I've ever seen on DCRTV. So lets review for the slackers who take verbatim from DC sports talk radio: Grand Imperial Wizard- this is the leader of all KKK dens across the country. Grand Magi - He serves as a sort of "vice-president". Grand Titan of the Dominion - Its GRAND IMPERIAL WIZARD, not Wizards turdball! So using your assinine logic the Orlando Magic should change its name because "its a Klan thang"?? Or the "Old Dominion" should be changed to something else because its a Klan job? If the posters get any dumber you'll going to have to call it "DC Sports Blog". Jeez the IQ levels have taken a nose dive with these moronic "Wizard" posts Dave. People whining about sports teams names have nothing better to do with their time and should get back to their civil service jobs and get the f%*& off the computers.- Adolf Hernipples - Landover (6/17/13) Hey sports fans, this is Dave's blog, not yours. If Dave wants to criticize WMAL or any other station, so be it. Now, because this is the Mailbag, I can safely say WMAL sucks and if you waste your time listening to 980 AM, then you deserve to hear a boring discussion of the Bullets' name, Wizards. My goodness, DC area radio is so embarrasing. A joke in the industry. WTOP is excellent. WNEW is doing fine although ratings would improve if the Cheap Broadcasting System (CBS) would give Sanchez, et al, promotion/advertising dollars. As for the stations playing music, can anyone honestly identify any personalities in DC area radio, who hits a grand slam home run every time the microphone is on? I doubt it. Dave, you are at bat. Swing batter, swing batter, swing batter! (6/17/13) Where to start? The me-me-me that is the Fat Drunk Baby podcast? Nah, those in the know know. 'Nuff said. - To the poster fascinated with the Wizards name, no, SFB, the name is bad because it's an obvious KKK reference; ironic given the teams make-up. Given some team members' behaviour they should change it back to Bullets. As for the Redskins, when are you Norwegians going to drop this? Back when they were a BOSTON team they were named after a group of WHITE colonists who disguised themselves as Indians (aboriginal inhabitants to you pissed-off lesbians) during the revolt against the British. Perhaps you've heard of it. The Amazing Randi appears in frame 2 of today's Mark Trail, but someone has cut off half his tie. - ZombieJamieGillis (6/17/13) "As I suspected, that article on WBAL.com about Kim Kardashian's baby was ripped off the AP entertainment wire. Maybe WBAL is using some sort of RSS bot in order to automatically tweet about stories that come from the AP wires." - That's what the AP is FOR, dumbass. Go back to spell-checking. - ZombieTaylorSwift (6/17/13) WPTX, 920 kHz in Lexington Park? KOF (6/17/13) God help us if WJLA gets into the grubby hands of Sinclair or Nexstar... ABC O&O all the way! (6/17/13) As I suspected, that article on WBAL.com about Kim Kardashian's baby was ripped off the AP entertainment wire. Maybe WBAL is using some sort of RSS bot in order to automatically tweet about stories that come from the AP wires. (6/17/13) Mystery station: Must be 97.7... way back when it was called WMDM. That it? (6/17/13) Dave's response: Close enough. The reveal - WKIK 1370 Leonardtown MD. Built 1952. Torn down 2004..... Mystery Station: 2nd owner acquired and sold license for 102.9 in California, MD. (6/17/13) Dave's response: This is kind of fun. Maybe we should make "Mystery Station Monday" a regular feature on DCRTV..... Mike Bradley did not lose his gig at WCEI, he left to go to WGMD to host a talk show at the beach. He still fills in on WCEI from time to time. (6/17/13) Any sense if Bert and the crew are broadcasting remotely or physically relocating to DC? I don’t think I’ve heard one promo along the lines of “meet Bert or xx at the County Fair”. Before Aly disappeared a few days ago, it didn’t seem like there was any in studio interaction beyond the first day they supposedly came to DC. (6/17/13) "a sad news day when WBAL radio am sends tweets about Kim Kardashian's baby...Guess I will check Entertainment Tonight's site for g8 summit news and Baltimore news." You were monitoring WBAL's Twitter feed for G8 summit news? Hmm...in case no one ever told you, Twitter isn't exactly the place to turn for economics news. Maybe you should go back to worrying about WBAL's typos. (6/17/13) Is that the old station that used to be in Leanordtown?? Can’t remember the calls. Had friend that worked there back in the late 60’s. (6/17/13) Dave's response: Getting warmer..... I don't see how Sinclair is able to buy up TV stations left and right. We know that the Baltimore-based company is spending money that it really doesn't have. Having been through a bankruptcy situation a few years ago... Sinclair may find itself in yet another bankruptcy situation in the near future, especially if they continue with their TV station buying spree. The FCC needs to put the brakes on Sinclair's buying spree... and also needs to put Sinclair (as well as Nexstar) on a forced diet. I'm still praying and hoping that WJLA will become an ABC O&O... and that Allbritton rejects Sinclair's bid/offer. Nobody wishes to see WJLA become another KRON. Rehashing an old story... NBC wanted its former San Francisco affiliate KRON for years. NBC fell short of acquiring ownership of KRON, because Young outbid NBC. NBC mandated Young operate KRON as a virtual NBC O&O, which Young rejected... NBC would later acquire KNTV, resulting in KRON losing its NBC affiliation... KRON went from being among NBC's strongest performing affiliates to becoming a shell of its former self. 2 weeks ago came news of Young's merger with Media General. Still keeping my fingers crossed that ABC will prevail, and be able to have a DC O&O station. Most (if not all) of the ABC O&O stations have top-rated local newscasts, and don't use standardized cookie-cutter graphics either... and could also picture WJLA attempting to dethrone top-rated WRC. I could picture WUSA keeping its CBS affiliation as well. (6/17/13) "Dave's response: Still further south....." Radio Reloj Havana? (6/17/13) The photo is of the old WISZ-am, a country station in the 60s and early 70s on 8th Avenue, across from a long-time Glen Burnie company, Maisel Brothers, a family-owned business that has supplied concrete and masonry materials to contractors since I was a kid growing up around there. I watched as a friend of mine, Bill Bondurant, played disc jockey, taking the Grand 'Ole Opry live feed on Saturday nights. Caught my attention enough to eventually lure me into the business. Thank God I got out! (6/17/13) Dave's response: Next hint - St. Mary's County. Torn down in 2004.... Any idea what’s up over on WCEI ? Mike (Bradley) Popovec was doing PM drive Friday, an Sat. am. Doesn’t seem that long ago he lost the drive-time shift. A look on their website doesn’t show anyone for that shift. Oh, and the Mystery Station. It sort of looks like one of the old “Adult Video Stores” on Rte 40 north of Baltimore. (6/17/13) Hello all, I have about a week left to fund this documentary and we have a long way to go. if you know anyone who would want to help, please let them know. I have a photog, interviewees and a great story. We just need your support. please check this out: www.kickstarter.com Thank you so much for checking this out. Frank (6/17/13) All the best to Dave Hovel as he leaves WXCY for his new gig in Florida. I've had the pleasure of knowing Dave since our days together at WAMD in the 80s. Nice guy and a genuine pro. Gary Helton, WHFC-FM, Bel Air, MD. (6/17/13) So funny. Corporate DC sport shows lining up with outrage over the 'Wizards' name. Meanwhile the elephant in the broadcasting room is the the name 'Redskins'. Really? You have a problem with the name Wizards but the name Redskins is ok? Holden and Danny did their corporate suckup today and got all outrageous about the 'Wizard' name. Corporate radio attacks on the name 'Wizards' serves two things. 1) It deflects heat from the name 'Redskins' problem. 2) Money conservative religious community have always been bent over the name ''Wizards' (OMG get over yourselves) and they need to demonstrate progress to the flock. It think the basketball name 'Wizards' is actually cool because it congers up Globetrotter ball handling imagery. The objection to the name 'Wizards' has always been a conservative religious problem which plays straight into radio/106.7 advertising. The surprise here is that H and Danny think were forced to bend over and trump up an obvious non-issue while chocking down the corporate whistle. Money is the real Wizard. (6/17/13) Ill take stab it 810 WYRE voice of the bay ...dave in glen burnie (6/17/13) Dave's response: Still further south..... "Not sure that is such a good business model." It makes money. (6/17/13) It's not a slow news day, but a sad news day when WBAL radio am sends tweets about Kim Kardashian's baby. Getting more and more ridiculous there. Guess I will check Entertainment Tonight's site for g8 summit news and Baltimore news. (6/17/13) Mystery Radio Station: By the way, that is a scrub pine growing on the roof of the Corp of Army Engineers (Onan) generator addition of the right. (6/17/13) The former WJRO? -Now (alas) WFBR.- (6/17/13) I had to chuckle when I read the posting about 98 Rock being the news leader on Hooper Avenue. The reason any elected official goes there is because they know they won't be asked a difficult question. If you had to be quizzed by Jayne Miller or Mickey, Amelia and Spiegel, who would you pick? I've heard those interviews on 98 Rock. They are nothing more than promotional suck-ups to those government leaders. And the reality is, they have virtually no news value to WBAL TV or radio or to any other news outlet. (6/17/13) Mystery station - WFBR in Glen Burnie? (6/17/13) Dave's response: Look further south..... Another Mystery Radio Station (6/17/13)  Dave's response: Gawd, what an ugly building! OK, I've been told the station's identity. Hint - it's on the Maryland side of the Potomac, probably closer to the Bay..... [Dave, what did WMAL do to you that causes you to rag on them 24/7?] I certainly don't speak for Dave but perhaps, like me, he is amazed how in a few short years the major AM station in our nation's capital could go from being a solid interesting radio station to a 24/7 mouth piece for the far/far/far right. One would think that given politics is the main business of the DC area the station would be the premier platform for an interesting - AND BALANCED - discussion of the important issues and challenges we collectively face. But no, for some unknown reason, it has decided to be the unfiltered/unthinking voice for the "Palin wing" of the Republican party (i.e. not small government, but no government and Obama is not an ineffective President, but an illegal alien who wants to destroy the very foundation of the republic). Not sure that is such a good business model. (6/17/13) Dave, what did WMAL do to you that causes you to rag on them 24/7? As webmaster of DCRTV.com, doesn't your bias against WMAL destroy any credibility you might otherwise have to operate an alleged media website? (6/17/13) Dave's response: I've been told that my constant bitching about WMAL actually makes it seem that the station is relevant. And actually a good thing for them, and proof that someone is listening. Maybe I should stop. Ha ha ha..... Just to show how inept Tribune and The Baltimore Sun is, they changed the coding of their website in such a way that you cannot access www.BaltimoreSun.com via a PowerPC Mac. So that means PowerMac & iMac G4 & G5 owners… BABYE! It also means my parents can no longer read the Sun online nor can anyone still using an older Mac. I know what someone will immediately say… "Just buy a new Intel Mac or PC" but if you're just using the machine to read the Sun and a few websites & to check email, what's the point of buying a new Mac or PC when otherwise the machine still works fine for what you do? Who would buy a new PC or Mac just to read The Baltimore Sun? Seriously. Now, being computer smart, I know a work around for this and that would be simply disabling Adobe Flash Player because that's the coding error on the Sun's site. It demands the latest version or crashes the browser, but doing that affects many other sites like YouTube, etc. So once again, I repeat, Who's going to go through all this trouble just to read The Baltimore Sun? Answer: NO ONE! They just won't read it anymore. By the way, The Washington Post, The NY Times and DCRTV work fine on these older machines, but NOT THE BALTIMORE SUN! IDIOTS! (6/17/13) Oh, and to add insult to injury, I checked The LA Times website, also a Tribune newspaper and The Chicago Tribune as well. Those sites also work on older iMacs, Powermac G4s & G5s, BUT NOT THE BALTIMORE SUN website. It crashes every single time. EPIC FAIL SUN! HAHA! (6/17/13) [RE Aly Jacobs leaving Mix 107.3:] She wasn't doing the traffic this a.m. (6/17/13) someone asked about Aly, I think this is the dead giveaway: alyjacobs.tumblr.com (6/17/13) Just saw an ad on WJLA's website that News Channel 8 will soon be on DirecTV? (6/17/13) Where is Danielle Sealock? Eun Yang and Melissa Mollet are doing the traffic. (6/17/13) I think I have it narrowed down to who Unsigned Corporate Suit might be. Based on a search of DCRTV posts, the cities he's claimed to have worked in and a travel timeline by reading some of his posts it may be Scott Carpenter (Patrick Bergen) who has the Canada - Southern California - DC stations on his resume. He's also at the Dept. of Energy the last time I looked, so he's still in the DC area. Or I'm totally wrong and it's still a mystery. (6/17/13) Two little items: (1.) UCS, I bellieve you mean to say 1519 Connecticut Avenue, where Charles Francis Jenkins had his lab for television experiments. The ground floor tenant is Kramerbooks. (2.)The Doug Bailey who died a few weeks ago should not be confused with the Doug Bailey who was associated with the old WBCC AM in Bethesda and had a pipe organ in his Rockville studios. The latter died a number of years ago. (6/17/13) /\ June 17 Messages /\ \/ June 16 Messages \/ OK...I have another nomination for the "That Was Pretty Shitty" award; this time, to WJZ, for its sudden switch from live coverage of this afternoon's Orioles-Red Sox telecast from Oriole Park at Camden Yards. Once Orioles outfielder Adam Jones made the final play that ended the game, the station went to commercials, then immediately to an in-progress show, "American Athlete, that featured an interview with a woman standing in front of a beach, discussing a topic no one had any idea about. It went on and on and on. There was no return to the stadium for a post-game show, where, typically, play-by-play announcer Gary Thorne and Jim Palmer would narrate game highlights and interview the winning pitcher, or some other player considered to be the best of the game. Not even a return to the broadcast, minus all of that, for a simple farewell giving the score of the game with an invitation to viewers to tune in for the next Orioles broadcast. WTF??????????? I switched over to MASN for the Jim Hunter/Rick Demsey snoozefest. And, while we're on the subjest of WJZ, what's up with the promos the station runs, "in your neighborhood, and "stay connected," where everyone passes this little plexiglass box with the call letters on it?? I don't get it. Worse than that silly line WBAL Radio runs, "the only station that matters." (6/16/13) Hey why isn’t Steve Cheveny not doing the morning anchor at chan. 7, haven’t watched the early morning show for a while but thought he moved from Chan 5 to anchor early and noon news. (6/16/13) Dave's response: I'm not sure of Steve's current status with Allbritton's WJLA since leaving Fox's WTTG. Quite obviously, his move to WJLA's morning news did not translate into any significant ratings gains..... When you feel that the mystery photo "contest" has run its course, you may run this alternate photo of WMJS (original calls WESM) that reveals the answer. (6/16/13)  Dave's response: Is that Dave Statter's Datsun? A few other clues about the mystery station photo (that probably WON'T help much). It was and still is broadcasting via Frequency Modulation, debuting in August 1971. The original call letters were moved to a station in a neighboring state for many years, but have now returned to the original state on a different station. It's greatest popularity was as a small, home-town broadcaster, but it was scooped-up by a major corporation and now merely simulcasts a more prominent station. For a while into the 1990s, the pre-recorded station ID announced "Broadcasting from the tall tower on Thunder Hill." (6/16/13) (6/16/13) More "Evening Star Television Center" nostalgia for a Sunday: Engineers had to get creative to convert the tall Ice Palace walls into TV studios. (6/16/13)  I have stolen from Don Geronimo (and therefore twice) the habit of saying "Norwegian" when another more accurate word would be inappropriate. It's great fun, and I encourage others to do it. "Norwegian please!" "You my Norwegian!" "Norwegians With Attitude" - Can a Norwegian get a meme? - ZombieWoof (6/16/13) (SNAP)" WEZR, the original 106.7 in Fairfax"(SNIP) And before it was WEZR it was WPRW in Manasas. Art Kellar bought it from WPRW and at first thought he would put WEEL (his other property at the time) on it, but came up with the "EZ format, which he used on all his FM's from that point forward. - Pearson Person - Woodbridge (6/16/13) How the hell could Larry Michael, that shill, get an award for anything? The only thing funnier would be Jim Hunter for the Orioles getting one! LMAO (6/16/13) Another few more clues about the radio station mystery photo that was posted earlier. Since it was first established. the station in question has only had four owners. The first, also owned a Northern Virginia engineering consulting firm. The second one, is a member of the Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia. In the early 50s, he was a staff announcer at WIP, along with the late John Facenda, who later became the legendary voice of NFL Films. He'll celebrate a birthday this Wednesday and turns 85. He owned the station until a new owner switched the station to Spanish, a little over a decade ago. The latest owner switched the format to Sports. (these new clues will probably give it away, but maybe not) (6/16/13) How much did Larry Michael pay someone for that award? He is so bad. Also bad, the stench on the 630 AM frequency. How does a company continue such garbage dirtying the air of our nation's capital? Shouldn't the EPA investigators investigate? (6/16/13) Congratulations to all those at WUSA9 that won the 11 Emmy's. Now, they have more Emmy's than viewers. (6/16/13) Of the three stations on Hooper Avenue in Baltimore the only one that covers local breaking news is 98 Rock. I have heard the Baltimore mayor and fire chief on that station plenty of times on hot issues. The WBALs have to borrow their audio, yet they call themselves the news people. (6/16/13) (regarding Dave's response) “Easy listening WEZR, the original 106.7 in Fairfax?” That’s a bit too far West, but among its many formats, it was Easy Listening in its early days. Here’s a hint: In ‘73, before it switched to Easy Listening, it was Middle of the Road and the station referred to itself as ‘Sunshine Stereo.” (6/16/13) Here's a mystery photo of the original location of a radio station that's been in the region for over 40 years. It was the starting point or an early stop for several DCRTV Mailbaggers. Extra points if you know the original call letters. (6/16/13)  Dave's response: Easy listening WEZR, the original 106.7 in Fairfax? Meteorologist or weathercaster - WHO CARES? As long as they keep hyping it to high heaven, I'll keep tuning these clowns out. (6/16/13) Did you know that Governor O'Malley was a meteorologist? Well of course not and he doesn't say he is. Well did you know that Tony Pagnotti is a meteorologist? Well that's what Fox45 says...but he is the only one on the Fox45 web page that has no credentials to make that claim. What's up with that? Bob Turk and Marty Bass aren't meteorologists either but WJZ doesn't claim they are. They're weathercasters. And from what I see and read that's all that Pagnotti is, so why claim he has the scientific credentials needed to be called a meteorologist. (6/16/13) Just channel surfing this morning. WBAL TV not late breaking this morning but FOX45 was. Three alarm fire in Baltimore MISSED by channel 11, search for missing kayaker MISSED by channel 11. Fox45 live on fire scene and they had video of Saturday night search for kayaker who was missing. (6/16/13) What happened to posting Capital Emmy award winners? No list of winners as in the past as they were announced. Very disappointing. Did moving to Baltimore impact their coverage? At least some individuals posted pictures on FB. Come on NATAS get with the times. All of us couldn't attend. (6/16/13) Dave Marash - What did you think of him? I am 99% sure I saw him eating a restaurant in NM last week? Do you know what he is doing? Was it him? (6/16/13) IS Aly also gone from Mix 107.3? I grew to love her. She was entiled girl who was so bethesda. But so sweet. Now I think she is gone. (6/16/13) /\ June 16 Messages /\ \/ June 15 Messages \/ Dave, your bumper sticker collection seems to be missing a classic: The “Musicradio” WPGC sticker that the “WPGC Money Girls” were looking for in AM and PM drive. Alas, after all my many moves, I don’t think I have one anymore, either. Other bumper sticker memories… When I moved back to the D.C. area from Ottawa, I think the CFRA 58 “Winsticker” on my Pontiac got as many looks as when people saw the name Laurentian on the fender, instead of Bonneville, Catalina, etc. The distribution tie-in was with a popular chain of BBQ restaurants in the region, Les Roitesseries St. Hubert. It was a strange match as the Montreal-based restaurant chain served Quebecois BBQ chicken, and CFRA was still locally owned and operated, and very much an English language Top-40 operation, although not as hard as CFGO (CKPM when I first moved there), CKOY, or CKBY-FM, the sole rock FM in the region. On another move back to the region, my DeVille discreetly had a “KRLA 1110- The Heart and Soul of Rock and Roll” on the rear bumper. –Unsigned Corporate Suit. (6/15/13) In my opinion, former Oklahoma congressman Ernest Istook was a great guest host on WMAL's Saturday afternoon talk show. Better than Dan Bongino, since Istook isn't using the air time as a political vehicle. I actually felt that I was listening to an intelligent conversation about the current situation in this country with the obvious conservative slant, but that didn't bother me at all. (6/15/13) RE: 4455 Conn Ave. being demolished ...I don't know what I'm more upset about, the loss of a truly historic location that housed WMAL-TV in it's heyday, or the tearing down of the Shanghai Garden, which after the loss of the Yenching Palace for a stinking Walgreens was the next best place for really good Chinese food in that neighborhood. I remember the WMAL-TV studios at Van Ness Square because it was the first place I ever did anything on television back in 1971. As a 12 year old I went down there to tape a "Kid's Editorial" segment after school. I don't remember what the editorial was about, but it was cool to be chosen & then see it air later on the news and throughout the day until the next afternoon. There have been a number of groups on Facebook that have popped up recently celebrating everything from old music surveys & internal memos to studio shots & airchecks...much like Dave's DCRTVPlus content. There is one devoted to all of us who touched down at 4100 Nebraska Avenue for more than a cup of coffee. I've included a shot of the "NewsCenter4" set circa 1975 for your weekend memory jogger. (6/15/13)  When Tom Gauger referred to "the old Chevy Chase Ice Palace and later the Evening Star Television Center", I'm guessing he hadn't heard that the historical site will soon get a visit from the wrecking ball. www.ForestHillsConnection.com (6/15/13)  WJLA provides a live stream of its doppler radar on their website at www.wjla.com/weather/radar. Even though you can't watch it in HD, I think it's still worth checking it out. (6/15/13) On the “lightning bolts” railing on Connecticut Ave, how about 1319 Connecticut, which was the first home of Jenkins’ “Radiomovies” experiments on W3XK down around 2.0-4.5 m/cs? -Unsigned Corporate Suit (6/15/13) I see WUSA has removed the high def, real time weather radar screen from Verizon FiOS. Anyone know why? The one in its place is not worth looking at. Same for websites of theirs, WBAL and other local channels. Why is the resolution so crappy? I get much better detail from smartphone apps and they keep working when the power goes out. I have not found a website to get high definition local radar sweeps on a desktop of laptop computer. Suggestions welcome. (6/15/13) Dave's response: Several months ago, WUSA stopped running the weather radar screen fulltime for a variety of screens, which do include local and regional weather radar. I do miss having a channel with uninterrupted weather radar, but you can find that on a bunch of local news websites, including the WaPo's Capital Weather Weanies pages..... I bid a final farewell to the local news Examiner. Plus, memories of Frank Mankiewicz, once head of NPR, who I met back in my JMU college days. Also, again why does Paul Farhi do a Washington Post write-up on a story that Erik Wemple first covered? Is Betsy Rothstein being eased out at Fishbowl DC? And, some local radio bumper sticker memories of WKCW, WDCU, WHUR, WMMJ, WMAR, WCBM, KIX106, WZYQ, Q107, WMOD, WMZQ, Hammerjacks, and more. And a Tower Records bag and the "World Of Don And Mike" CD-ROM. In today's "Dave TV"..... (6/15/13) Here’s a nice video tribute to radio veteran Bill Bailey, who died on Wednesday. He was an amazing talent and a stellar human being. (6/15/13) "This railing led to the entrance of a company on Connecticut Ave NW… maybe in the 4400 block across from the old Chevy Chase Ice Palace and later the Evening Star Television Center. Can you identify it location of the railing? What company did it lead to? We’re mystified. Tom Gauger" - I'm mystified as to why you don't just use Google Street View to find the two buildings in the picture or just take a walk on Connecticut Avenue. How much will you pay for the information? - ZombieWoof (6/15/13) Thanks Dave. I am not employed in the media but like you I have always had a thing for radio. I really enjoy your columns and videos and am looking forward to listening to the old jingles and air checks. I am a baby boomer here in the area since 1967 so I cannot get enough of wpgc, weam, wrc. wash, whfs etc nostalgia. Thanks a lot. The one thing I really miss is an "all night" guy like WMAL had who played a bit of jazz, talked a bit, and had cut ins from a police and fire chaser. Great radio!!!!!! Bob (6/15/13) Dave's response: Enjoy this memory of WMAL overnights with Bill Mayhugh..... Following up on the post from Ed Jones of Bel Air, I recognize Bob Duckman, Johnny Dark, Cathy Whiteside and Tom Kelly in the WIBG photo. Perhaps Steve Allan can tell us who’s who in it. Roddy Freeman (6/15/13) Dave's response: WIBG? One of my favorite stations growing up as a kid in the Philadelphia area. 990 AM, top 40 "Wibbage"..... /\ June 15 Messages /\ \/ June 14 Messages \/ Was Dukes right today that CBS did not pay people on time today? Will Lurch need a line of credit from Bonefish? 570 kept losing the US Open Feed and switching to the 890 feed. The last Rally the Hoard on the BOAD Network has hot its stride with the addition of Bruce. The show was gold, Jerry. OOBBEE (6/14/13) [RE: WMAL's streaming] For a couple of months, there occasionally have been several minutes of silence during commercial breaks, where the streaming computer is supposed to overlay commercials for the streaming audience. A couple of times shortly after this pattern started, I noticed PSAs randomly inserted during programming. Haven't noticed this recently, but I don't listen much. Silence is much preferable to the typical streaming audience commercial, which generally consists of an announcer endlessly repeating an 800 number. Having listened to streamed stations for many years, I do have to compliment first Citadel and now Cumulus for being best in breed in streaming, certainly much better than the old Clear Channel experience and the lowest of the low, CBS. (6/14/13) This railing led to the entrance of a company on Connecticut Ave NW… maybe in the 4400 block across from the old Chevy Chase Ice Palace and later the Evening Star Television Center. Can you identify it location of the railing? What company did it lead to? We’re mystified. Tom Gauger (6/14/13)  Zombie I could turn off the amp and avoid the TV channels but my wife refused to let me tear up the toaster and I'm sure there would be consequences over the lightpost. Fortunately I could stay away from that but I'm sure it bugged the dope dealers....or maybe they were selling hillbilly heroin....Yeah there's a joke to be made here too but I'd once again be pissing off the majority of this pseudo Southern county in making it. I loathe how WXCY further muddies the waters of the misunderstood Mason Dixon line. Maryland was a Union state and is no more south than Delaware which is basically a Philly suburb. Sorry,it's one of my pet peeves other than hfs.....Ford pick'emups,Rebel(traitor) flags and John Deere lawn ornaments.... Dubbya ekksseeewaaaaaaaahhhhh yepper ole buddy put'er on yer rayjo n letter eat! Donnie (6/14/13) Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to defend WTOP for all their hype and stormgasms. I was just playing devil's advocate here, but I agree with you that WTOP has put itself into the naughty corner once again. (6/14/13) [RE: WBAL's weather coverage during the US Open] WRC did the same thing. When they suddenly decided to rejoin the network, NBC was about to go into a local commercial break, which no one at WRC seemed to realize. We saw a static slide for probably a full minute. Having lived in true tornado country, I can understand the importance of local broadcasters interrupting programming for a tornado. But after the local weatherman has spent 60 seconds outlining the expected path of the tornado, any tv station should go back to programming and run a crawl. All radio stations can repeat the tornado warning every 3-5 minutes and maintain the format otherwise (and earn the appreciation of all listeners). (6/14/13) re: "Was all the hype worth it? I'm still pondering that question with all the storm damage reports coming in..." That implies that the more damage there is, the more pre-storm hype is needed. That makes no sense. And 'TOP's usual response -- that lives and property are in some way protected by the station going insane about storms, is absolute bullshit. I'll grant you it pumps up their ratings, but panicking listeners to earn a nickel is a sick form of prostitution. (6/14/13) I've also been listening to WMAL's live stream on iHeartRadio and they keep playing commercials and PSAs over parts of their shows. Some help, please? (6/14/13) Dave's response: Huh? That sounds like an improvement. I'll have to start listening to WMAL on the web..... "Another quick point. CBS or ABC could buy 7 or 50 without an FCC issue since neither own stations in the Washington market."---CBS would be wise to invest in WJLA...they've already gone beyond all out on WNEW. If they want a STAMP on DC they need a TV station or WNEW will continue to flounder. (6/14/13) [RE yesterday's storm coverage:] Was all the hype worth it? I'm still pondering that question with all the storm damage reports coming in... and we shall see what the National Weather Service has to say with their storm survey: www.weather.com (6/14/13) RIP The Examiner as we knew it... you will be missed by those who appreciated the great local news coverage like I do. (6/14/13) Doesn't appear that anyone at WMAL listens to their webcast. For days PSA's have been stepping all over the programs. (6/14/13) RE: the person talking about station buying… You're missing a simple point. SINCLAIR has more willingness to buy than these other companies, good or bad, and few of the other companies you mentioned are in a buying mode like Sinclair. Now CBS and ABC would both like WJLA 7 or even CW 50, but it appears those stations are being sold in a group only, so that requires other aftermarket deals and analysis to see if it's worth the cost to buy the entire Tribune or Albritton group stations, many of which are in small markets neither CBS or ABC wants to own a station in. Sinclair is the most likely to buy an entire group. If WJLA 7 were up for sale alone, things would be far different. -- BaltoMedia.Net PS: I have the internet back. Look out world! LOL (6/14/13) Another quick point. CBS or ABC could buy 7 or 50 without an FCC issue since neither own stations in the Washington market. (6/14/13) I would like to suggest a new "That Was Pretty Shitty" award for the Chesapeake AP Broadcasters Association, and I would like to officially nominate WBAL-TV to receive it, for dumping live weather coverage in the middle of Thursday's storms that tore through the Baltimore metropolitan area so they could re-join, get this, the U.S. Open!!!! WTF????? Kata Amara anchored off camera with chief meterologist Tom Tasselmyer as viewers watched a map full of red images, "rotations," warnings, and watches; then live traffic cams, before sending it up to Captain Roy for an aerial shot of the darkened sky. I thought I was going to have to send Kate a Lynchburg Lemonade to calm her down a little, especially after she had to correct Tom's suggestion for people in vehicles on the path of a tornado to hop out and lay in the nearest ditch. She contradicted him with what she referred to as an American Red Cross tip to remain IN the vehicle, doors locked, securely fastened in safety belts, and to NEVER exit the vehicle in those circumstances. A little embarassing, to say the least. Then, as she pushed, not walked, but hurriedly pushed Tom through a rapid-fire series of questions regarding all the watches and warnings for status, she then suddenly thanked everyone for watching, and immediately sent it back to NBC to watch, of all things, a (3 hour) weather delayed U.S. Open golf game. You would think, in the midst of all the watches and warnings, viewers would have been warned that they were about to be dumped. Oh well...maybe she or Tom had to go take one. (6/14/13) (SNAP)"Good Morning Dave, I run a residential plumbing and HVAC company in Fairfax, WAVA is wanting us to advertise with them"(SNIP) WAVA is a niche broadcaster. Just about all the Salem properties are focused on the Christian consumers. THEY LISTEN because they want that kind of programming. I'd advise this business owner to make a modest investment and track it, to see what his results are. Ask new customers, "did you hear about us on WAVA?" Consider too, doing some "Institutional" ad buys where you embed your company's HVAC name over a long time, so consumers think of him first, when their A/C or Heater breaks, or they need a new system. Buy a package that gives him morning drive, mid-day, afternoon drive and evening spots. DO NOT DO THE COMMERCIALS YOURSELF. Have a professional do them. While WAVA may not have big numbers, they do have a committed group of listeners who seek out that type of specific programming. Its worth at least a modest investment to see if it works. I do not work for WAVA nor have any financial connections. Just answering your question. - Ken Sweet - Arlington (6/14/13) Hello, Fellow Posters. I have to get in on the Oldies 100 20th anniversary of their launch on the Facebook page. I see Tom Kelly (TK), Johnny Dark, Bonnie Phillips, Al Santos (one of my favorite Oldies 100 personalities), Kathy Whiteside, Scooter McGruder? I’m not sure of the other personalities, but Oldies 100 was a great station. I was saddened when they changed formats back in ’06, but I still listen to BIG 100 from time to time. Ed Jones, Bel Air MD (6/14/13) " RE: WXCY Null- maybe Baltimore can't get it but everywhere ELSE you can get it on a goddamn TOASTER, a Peavey Amp, a lightpost and in the past alot of over the air TV channels. If you're in Havre de Grace city (yes it's a city) limits WXCY squashes just about anything but WIYY,WPOC or WSTW." I get WMAL on my computer speakers when the computer is turned off and the speakers are still powered up. I know there's a joke to be made here, but the sound does go away when I turn the speakers off. I assume it would have to be the AM signal. - ZombieWoof (6/14/13) CLIP: “The daily Examiner says goodbye to its readers in its Friday edition, at washingtonexaminer.com.....” It said goodbye to its readers? Couldn’t it have taken both readers to lunch, at least? Sincerely, TMU. (6/14/13) Dave's response: Righty tab does belly flop in DC news market. Too bad..... seeing wusa channel 9's dave owens doing news stories lately. Another example of the death of the local news sports segment right (6/14/13) [RE yesterday's storm coverage:] News 4 had their chopper get really close to some water and called the resulting propwash a "waterspout" (6/14/13) [RE yesterday's storm coverage:] WUSA is providing viewers with a fabulous shot of a bone dry MD 301 north of Waldorf. Action packed! (6/14/13) Thanks for your piece on WDCN 87.7 FM yesterday. I think we were confused about how a Channel 6 TV Station can operate as an FM station when it is licensed as an LPTV Station. They have good Arbitron ratings as an FM radio station. The owners of the LPTV Station are leasing the station to a Spanish Group. A broadcast engineer explained that the LPTV stations must give up their analog frequency next year and go to their digital frequency. When this happens the WDCN frequency 87.7 FM will go away. (6/14/13) 100,000 people lost power after the storms yesterday. The National Weather Service is now working to confirm 2, possibly 3 tornados. One inch diameter hail fell in parts of the area. Hundreds of trees toppled, many on houses and cars with people in them. A child killed in Virginia, a woman hit by lightning in Maryland and property damage that will probably be in the millions when it is all counted. And yet we saw a woman on TV who house was badly damaged by one of those tornados and she and her 3 children had NO idea about the storms until she saw “circular clouds” and a huge tree lifted into the air. If you think local TV and radio were doing “weather hype” you might possibly be an idiot and a danger to your own self. (6/14/13) Dave's response: They were all probably listening to Hot 99.5 when the storms approached..... Good Morning Dave, I run a residential plumbing and HVAC company in Fairfax, WAVA is wanting us to advertise with them. I looked at your site for the ratings and they don’t even show up anymore. Does that mean they have less than a certain amount of listeners? I’ve attached their proposal to get your opinion on if it is a good deal or not. I hope you feel comfortable looking at it, if not I understand, but any input would be greatly appreciated. Their pitch is that we would be their only plumbing/HVAC contractor on the site, and he boasts their streaming audience is 88K during the day, and they would give us ad on their website. (6/14/13) Dave's response: I'm really not an expert in the radio ad buying business. Sure, WAVA's overall ratings are kind of low. But, you may find that their "target demo" is good for your business. Look at Hubbard's WFED, Federal News Radio. It gets lower ratings than WAVA does, but is a great vehicle for advertisers looking to reach a certain, very specific audience..... Radio storm coverage--traffic--Baltimore tv stations spent time showing traffic cameras, which, if could be seen in cars, would have been very helpful. So the next best thing would have been accurate and complete traffic reports on the radio where listeners could get the "picture" of what was happening. And the place for that in Baltimore should have been WBAL. Unfortunately the traffic "reporter" failed. And like a previous poster said she has been doing the station more harm than good. (6/14/13) WTOP's hype-filled storm coverage makes for great background noise and nothing more. Thanks for keeping me company while you guys keep having storm-gasms! (6/14/13) The comment about the WBAL traffic reporter reading an outdated weather forecast during the tornado coverage: that's not an issue of format. It's an issue of a lazy traffic reporter who doesn't pay attention and doesn't care. Any good traffic reporter would be engrossed in the coverage and would be working very hard to make sure the traffic and weather information were BOTH up to date. After all, you can get the latest from the wire and from any numbers of NWS sources. But anyone who has listened to that station long enough already knows how little she contributes to the product. She does the station more harm than good with her random, focus-lacking traffic reports filled with worthless information and mispronounced road names. (6/14/13) /\ June 14 Messages /\ \/ June 13 Messages \/ In the midst of the tornado story on WBAL the anchors call for a traffic report. Then the traffic woman reads an outdated weather forecast. In situations like this the traffic person should never never never read the weather forecast. Break format for goodness sake. (6/13/13) Late afternoon yesterday I listened to our friends at WTOP interview some national meteorologist who said very clearly that the worst of the day's storms would get no further than Ohio, WV and far western Maryland. When they were done with him, they warned listeners that the bad storms would definitely hit the DC area. All-Panic-Weather, All the Time. (6/13/13) [RE DCRTV's Facebook page: The 20th anniversary of the launch of DC oldies outlet WBIG, "Oldies 100." Can you name them?] And because it's a small world, I also briefly worked with Kevin Fennessy at the station where I would meet Claire Meyerhoff—WTRG 100.3—which was by then programmed by Neal Mirsky and soon to be programmed by the late Doug Wilson as Oldies 100, and where Kathy Whiteside would do tracking when it became a CC station and where, in its early WTRG days, we too briefly enjoyed the talents of Mark Patrick, whose son is now pitching with the Nats, to bring it all back to the DC area. (6/13/13) [RE DCRTV's Facebook page: The 20th anniversary of the launch of DC oldies outlet WBIG, "Oldies 100." Can you name them?] I worked there for a bit and so did Rebekah Radisch and Holland Cooke and Ira Mellman. (6/13/13) RE: Throwing suitcases- Thank you for the explanation. It's as obscure and silly as I thought it may be. RE: WXCY Null- maybe Baltimore can't get it but everywhere ELSE you can get it on a goddamn TOASTER, a Peavey Amp, a lightpost and in the past alot of over the air TV channels. If you're in Havre de Grace city (yes it's a city) limits WXCY squashes just about anything but WIYY,WPOC or WSTW. When it was WHDG ,a Rock station, it certainly didn't have that punch! Funny how alot of Country stations get away with overloading the airwaves when other formats don't. Donnie (6/13/13) The news of Gannett acquiring Belo seems to have taken me by surprise... and it comes right on the heels of last week's Media General-Young merger. A pattern that I've taken notice of... Atlanta and Charlotte will each have Cox owned ABC stations (WSB and WSOC), as well as will each have Gannett owned NBC stations (WXIA and WCNC... Belo being the current owner of WCNC, until the FCC green-lights the Gannett-Belo deal), and will each have Fox O&O stations (WAGA and WJZY... Fox recently acquired WJZY and My-Network-TV station WMYT from Capitol... Bahakel owned WCCB will be losing Fox affiliation after 27 years at the end of this month, and is picking up CW affiliation on July 1). Phoenix: Gannett is likely to operate KTVK and KASW via the SSA/JSA, and keep ownership of its NBC station KPNX. Another thing I could picture... Scripps acquiring KTVK and keeping KNXV... ABC moving back to KTVK and KNXV as an Independent station... KASW being sold to Meredith (owner of CBS station KPHO). St. Louis: Gannett is likely to keep ownership of NBC station KSDK, with KMOV likely to be sold to different owner. Not sure if CBS would be interested in re-acquiring its former O&O station, or if other companies (like Cox, Lin, or Raycom) could and might be eyeing the CBS station. Local TV has yet to find new owner for its Fox station KTVI. Another thing about the St. Louis market... ABC, IMO, deserves better than KDNL. I could picture ABC affiliating with KPLR, if KTVI remains a Fox station... or KTVI regaining ABC affiliation, which could open the door for KPLR to hitch up with Fox... KDNL getting CW affiliation. ABC being on a station that viewers would be more familiar with, and with a functioning news department. As for DC market... I still picture WJLA becoming an ABC O&O station. I certainly hope that Sinclair and Nexstar don't get their hands on any of the remaining Allbritton stations. Also hope that Sinclair and Nexstar doesn't get their hands on the Local TV owned stations either. I still picture Meredith wanting WHO Des Moines as a flagship station... and I could picture Cox wanting KFOR Oklahoma City. Of the soon-to-be former Belo owned stations... I assume they'll likely be seeing Gannett's This Is Home campaign. Not sure if WFAA and KHOU will be able to keep its Spirit Of Texas campaigns... and not sure if WWL will be able to keep its Spirit Of Louisiana campaign either. (6/13/13) [RE DCRTV's Facebook page: The 20th anniversary of the launch of DC oldies outlet WBIG, "Oldies 100." Can you name them?] Wish I was there for the reunion. I interned there some 15 years ago (6/13/13) [RE DCRTV's Facebook page: The 20th anniversary of the launch of DC oldies outlet WBIG, "Oldies 100." Can you name them?] I believe I recognize Johnny Dark. (6/13/13) [RE DCRTV's Facebook page: The 20th anniversary of the launch of DC oldies outlet WBIG, "Oldies 100." Can you name them?] I see Dave Adler, Goldie, Bonnie Phillips, Ira Melman, Kathy Whiteside, Bob Karson, Brendan Hurley, Catherine Meloy, Steve Allen (6/13/13) [RE DCRTV's Facebook page: The 20th anniversary of the launch of DC oldies outlet WBIG, "Oldies 100." Can you name them?] Al Santos in the back ... (6/13/13) [RE DCRTV's Facebook page: The 20th anniversary of the launch of DC oldies outlet WBIG, "Oldies 100." Can you name them?] Is that Marilyn Thompson? (6/13/13) Dave- Your mailbag poster critical of our storm coverage today is factually wrong. WMAL offered team coverage of the storms, including multiple live break-ins during Sean Hannity’s show. We most certainly had the “public interest” in mind as we covered the storms today. -Bill (6/13/13) Did anyone really get a torrential rain and high winds as predicted by our illustrious local weather people?. If so, I apologize for the sarcasm, but I'm in D.C. and got about 5 minutes of a hard rain and then the sun came back out. (6/13/13) Hey Dave, Tornado warnings in Virginia, MOCO and now PG County, severe storm warnings and so on. WTOP is right on top of things with continuous coverage and on-scene reports from local observers. But what is “local” WMAL doing?? No breaks from Rush’s or Sean’s shows for updates, only at the half-hour news breaks; highly irresponsible of them to not pull the plug on the network feed and go continuous live and local coverage considering the power of their signal. Too bad they cannot use their broadcast license in the public’s best interest. Stay safe out there!! (6/13/13) OH......MY.....GAAAWWWWWDDD! WTOP was right! It's raining! It's raining and it's cloudy!!! We're all going to die! WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!!! ....oh, wait....wait a minute....it stopped. The sun's coming out. (6/13/13) Gannett owning 7 and 9 would not work. In the case ofa dupoly ionly one of the stations can be in the top four for the market. (6/13/13) Hey Dave just wanted to congratulate It's Academic on it's new achievement and wish all of those still involved the best of luck. BTW, my Dad Mac has a birthday this Saturday it's his 87th. Don't tell him I told you...He will be watching for sure. thanks as always Mark McGarry..... (6/13/13) Last weekend, we got together to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the launch of Oldies 100. It was a great ride and an incredible group of people. We weren't co-workers, we were family and I'm proud and blessed to have worked with this motley crew. Steve Allan (6/13/13)  The MidAtlantic, as it turns out, will not be destroyed this afternoon by basketball-size hail, trillions of lightning strikes, massive tornadoes and flooding of biblical proportion...and ain't it a hoot how we spent the last 36 hours swearing it would? Yuk-yuk-yuk! Now, 25 seconds of sports coverage, and then we'll be back to warn you about the INCREDIBLE DANGER FROM SUNLIGHT AND MILD TEMPERATURES. --WTOP (6/13/13) The Belo thing caught my eye because they were one of the companies rumored to buy albritton. guess not. the move also probably takes Gannett out of the equasion not only in DC but also in some ot the other markets where Albritton has stations. jusy saying... (6/13/13) Dave's response: Maybe Gannett/Belo could still be a suitor for Allbritton? Fox has two TVers in the DC market - 5 and 20. Maybe Gannett could own both 7 and 9. Hmmm..... [RE WMAL:] although part of why Bongino is on is to promote his campaign for office in Md., or he uses it for that purpose, and then faults those with whom he disagrees for acting motivated by political gain (6/13/13) I am totally convinced that most of the people that complain and such don't have a clue as to how a radio station operates. Case in point WXCY located physically in the Baltimore metro. Have you seen their coverage map? radio-locator.com... Shut up already! Their signal has a null toward the city of Baltimore. The town itself won't even get a city grade signal. Anyone working in an office building using clock radios aren't gonna be able to pick up their signal very well (ever think of that?). So in order to make money you have to gear your programming to the next nearby area. One that can pick up your city grade signal. That would be the Wilmington suburbs. It's not that they intentionally ignore Baltimore, they know the bulk of that signal isn't gonna cover that market very well. (6/13/13) I heard a rumor a few minutes ago that Rupert Murdoch filed for divorce from wife Wendi this morning in a New York court. Any truth? (6/13/13) Donnie, A couple of weeks ago (right about the time he went on the wagon—you do the math) Mike commented on a podcast that the night before he had been over-served and when he came home he tossed a suitcase that was in his way in the entrance at his house. I remember the exact circumstances, but this is what the TMOS haters (yet apparently constant listeners) have been fixated on. (6/13/13) The best post of the week. (SNAP)"Okayokayokay, quickquickquick... if you love radio, I mean if you REALLY LOVE radio, and you think it still stands a shot at greatness in this digital age, you absolutely have to read this now: www.allaccess.com "(SNIP) Absolutely spot on. The implosion of the Corporate Conglomerates (Group owners) can't come fast enough. Radio has the potential for a lot more than 10% of the available advertising revenue. But.........you've got to give listeners something they want to tune in to and listen to. These bullshit, focus group approved playlist-fits-all-voice-over stations aren't worth the airspace they take up. Why bother? No wonder radio can only garner 10% of the revenue. That and sleazey sales people don't help. I welcome the day I read that the Clear Channels et al;, have imploded from the high interest rates they stuck themselves with, and are having a "Fire sale" of their assets. What part of "local ownership" did the FCC miss? - I.C. Red - Kalorama (6/13/13) Okayokayokay, quickquickquick... if you love radio, I mean if you REALLY LOVE radio, and you think it still stands a shot at greatness in this digital age, you absolutely have to read this now: www.allaccess.com (6/13/13) I agree with Dave that Dan Bongino makes for a great fill-in host on WMAL... are you taking notes Mr. Plante? (6/13/13) Dave's response: It's intelligent talk without the all emotional bluster. Bongino reminds me a lot of the late great Ron Smith on WBAL. Oh, I think Chris Plante is away on one of those cruises in someplace like Syria or Iran..... Too much storm hype in DC area media? Also, McLean-based Gannett buys Belo and gets a lot bigger. Plus, I take an in-depth look at Spanish language radio in the DC market, including the battle between El Zol and La Nueva. Should Cumulus put La Nueva on 105.9? Should Metro Radio put WKDV on 97.5? And more in today's "Dave TV"..... (6/13/13) This morning, DC news anchors were in full hype mode. Toss to weather. Meteorologists go on to say storms are not severe. (6/13/13) Without all these weather apparently, super duper live 4d Doppler, and red alert days how would we get overhyped? (6/13/13) [RE DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: Severe Weather Hype Day.... Stay home from school or your job and watch local weathercasts predicting doom!] Oh no, the humanity! That's why our local weather gods invented weather apps for your mobile devices so you can always check that radar while you're away from the magic box. (6/13/13) Funny you mention WXCY and Harford County. I had the station on this morning and I am sure I heard an EAS go off for a flood warning for Baltimore and harford County. It went on a long time and then I heard the jocks re mention the warning. Don't know Dave or anyone at the station, but I did hear that this am. (6/13/13) MTP sr exec producer Betsy Fischer Martin shares memories of Tim Russert, who died 5 years ago today: presspass.nbcnews.com.. (6/13/13) The retired Eugene, Oregon meteorologist trashing Sinclair Broadcast Group and the FCC doesn't surprise me. The point of his I would have to agree with... The FCC is very quick to make a big stink about indecency (7 dirty words and wardrobe malfunctions), regardless if it was accidental or intentional... The FCC seems to be okay with TV station owners turning local TV into a monopoly. As for the comparison being made between Sinclair and Fox News... that would depend on who you ask. I don't watch Fox News, and neither do I watch MSNBC and CNN... I can't afford cable/satellite TV subscription. The American mainstream media tends to be more opinion-driven. American talk radio tends to be liked by some, and hated by others. I wouldn't dare watch Al Jazeera, even if my life depended on it. I do find foreign English language news organizations, like the BBC (Great Britain), DW-TV (Germany), and NHK (Japan) to be very informative... I've seen BBC, DW, and NHK newscasts carried on certain PBS stations. PBS seems to be the only informative American news organization, but to a certain extent. PBS NewsHour used to be very good back in the day... back when it was co-anchored by Robert MacNiel and Jim Lehrer. Judy Woodruff is a well-liked and well-respected journalist. A lot of the old-school journalists are sticklers for accuracy... as well as being about doing what is right, and not what is politically correct... and having the gumption to tackle relevant stories that could and might otherwise be considered taboo by a certain group. (6/13/13) I see you noted the imminent departure of Dave Hovel from WXCY. Minor rant: I would take exception with the statement that they serve the Baltimore market. If you've ever listened to the station, it's glaringly apparent that they all but ignore the Baltimore market despite being physically located in it, and are focused almost exclusively across the river and up I-95. Otherwise, why begin all their traffic reports with the Wilmington traffic, sliding down through Cecil County into Harford County and only mentioning the Baltimore traffic if there's a major catastrophe in progress? And more importantly, why ignore severe weather alerts for Harford County -- which I have heard them do numerous times -- and only mention severe weather warnings if they affect the Wilmington market? When it comes to those aspects of station programming that define a station's market (you'd hardly expect a Baltimore station to run, say, Philadelphia traffic), it's obvious they have no concern for the Baltimore market -- and except for their advertising, not much concern even for their home county. I ran into a representative from Delmarva Broadcasting at a job fair a year or so ago. I asked him about the station's obvious Wilmington-centric bias. He pretended not to understand the question, even after having it explained and illustrated to him. Despite being located in the Baltimore market, WXCY ignores the Baltimore market. (6/13/13) /\ June 13 Messages /\ \/ June 12 Messages \/ Zurawik slams the NewsHour for a lack of original reporting while he copies and pastes other articles to make his point. What a hypocrite. (6/12/13) I sense you're not keen on the Washington Post. Here's another log to throw on the fire: Here on the Eastern Shore, they outsource distribution and delivery to the Sun. That's right, kind of like the U.S. relying on Russia to get us up to the Space Station. Jeff, Easton, Md. (6/12/13) I like Brian and Larry, but listening to John Bolton take them apart this morning was great radio. We have good debates on the Right. (6/12/13) NewsHour is a PBS product and has nothing to do with NPR. WAMU does not air it. WETA does because they co-produce it. I think there are 12 NPR-member stations that carry NewsHour. NPR would cancel a program with that distribution number. (6/12/13) I've just heard that Bill Bailey has died. He was my program director in the 80s at KLSI-FM in Kansas City and later, in the 90s, at WIZF-FM in Cincinnati. Best P.D. I ever worked with or for! In the 70s, he was at WRC-AM/WKYS-FM and later, at Oldies WXTR-FM in Waldorf. Whatever might've been wrong with radio in the past 30 years, Bailey definitely wasn't it! R.I.P. Bill. Scott Marinoff, San Diego. www.woodradio.com (6/12/13) [RE DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: The DC weather hypesters are gearing up for "DERECHO II" tomorrow...] Shawn Anderson of WTOP did not hesitate to drop the "D" word, even minutes after Doomsday Doug Hill downplayed the likilhood of this event becoming the "D" to Shawn and Hillary. For that Shawn deserves a Nucklehead in the News nomination. (6/12/13) I ride MetroBus to work many weekdays I guess that it’s not surprising that the guy who distributed the Washington Examiner is no longer at the station. Despite what anyone may think of the Examiner‘s political point- of- view, the paper is (or so to be was) a good read. I will miss it. I guess the last issue of the printed Examiner is Friday; that’s if you can find it. (6/12/13) New buzz words for local weather people to scare the bejebus outta folks is ''I AM CONCERNED.'' Shouldn't that be followed by dramatic music? BOM BOM BOM! Every newscast at 5 is slap happy nutty with this killer storm. (6/12/13) [RE Former Oregon TVer attacks Baltimore's Sinclair:] Ayers Radio and television is much better when outlets are owned by different media companies. We have been fortunate in DC area with the 4 major networks separately owned. Let's see what happens to Ch 7. (6/12/13) "Cheryl Simone of WNEW now the midday co-anchor? Guess temper tantrums and diva-like behavior really does get rewarded in news radio, or at least at WNEW." -- RE: Is that official? She doesn't sound like a DIVA on the air.....I've heard her on nights before. She has a painfully slow delivery on the air. That will be one slow mid-day news hour on 99.1; Wasn't a big Jenny Glick fan but she had good energy. (6/12/13) Another week of PPM numbers and another week that The Sports Junkies didn't crack the top three with Men 25-54. This week The Sports Junkies finished in 9th place. The top three were: WWDC, WTOP and WAMU. Maybe next week Jasaon, JP, Cakes and EB. But, I doubt it. (6/12/13) Cheryl Simone of WNEW now the midday co-anchor? Guess temper tantrums and diva-like behavior really does get rewarded in news radio, or at least at WNEW. (6/12/13) SNIP(AGAIN?)- Dave, I like the way you dance around confidentiality by using only first names. I'm cool with that)END-2ND SNIP-(Chris Gordon and Tom Kierein)END-First names??????? Ummmmmm, don’t think so. (James Ashby!!!!) LOL-Hey mailbaggers don’t you think it’s time to get back to broadcasting topics and get Dave to climb out of the sandbox? (6/12/13) OK no answer on the suitcases thing. Funny though...it reminds me of the old luggage commercial with the gorilla throwing the suitcase around the cage which brings this post to a true radio related point...the audio from that commercial was the sound clip for "Gorilla Theater" on WMMR hosted by,I believe, Michael Tearson. And so my involvement,if not curiosity, in this nonsensical series of outbursts on Mailbag comes to an untimely halt. Donnie (name not generated by Dave) (6/12/13) Add to the PPV undercard Nestor vs. Jen Royle for the Intergender Wrestling Championship, which I believe has gone vacant since the days of Andy Kaufman. Oh…and what Mike L said…best of luck to Dave Hovel. It’s a huge loss for WXCY, and the NE MD/DEL area. (6/12/13) I am getting very tired of all the news awards. How about sharing those awards with the long suffering news makers who reporters interview who make the awards possible. Newsrooms probably spend a lot of time and money producing and entering award contests and yet they should be focused on content, productivity, board work, clean web pages, meaningful and current social media pages and so on. Also how about saving entry fees and giving employees raises every once in a while. (6/12/13) Given that the Nationals were picked by many baseball experts to reach the World Series (if not win it) this season, the fact that they’re below .500 in mid-June is a huge local sports story. I’ve heard it said that failure and underachievement move the needle on sports talk radio more so than success and winning do, so the Holden & Danny show (on 106.7 the Fan) would be making a mistake by cutting back on amount of attention paid to the Nats. While WJFK does a better job overall covering baseball than ESPN 980, the latter’s program director Chuck Sapienza deserves credit for taking active steps (most notably regularly scheduled appearances by baseball, basketball and hockey insiders on various talk shows) to make it a less Redskins-centric station than was the case a few years ago. Speaking of 980, a remark by Steve Czaban (on Sports Reporters earlier this week) shouldn’t be allowed to pass without reaction. The topic in question was the case of a U. of Alabama fan convicted of damaging trees on the Auburn University campus, and Czaban stated that he’d like to see him ‘hanging from a tree’ (also appearing to advocate the death penalty for a protester who disrupted the recently concluded French Open tennis tournament). I’m not saying that Czaban should be suspended as he was six months ago after offensive remarks about a transgender athlete, but if he took the time to study up on the origins and historical context of a song called “Strange Fruit” (written by Abel Meeropol and famously performed by jazz legend Billie Holliday) he’d perhaps come to realize why that tree reference was inappropriate (even given the fact that the tree poisoning Crimson Tide fan isn’t African American). More generally, in this post-Newtown era of mounting concern over the level of violence in our culture and the failure of elected officials to effectively address it, those on the public airwaves need to be especially careful to avoid calling for anyone to be killed or maimed (even in jest) – particularly on sports talk radio which attracts listeners from both sides of the political aisle including supporters and opponents of capital punishment. Mike, Fairfax (6/12/13) I haven't seen a post in the DCRTV Mailbag by Al McGilvray lately. Every Summer, I can count on Al to remind us of the pioneering work in TV by C. Francis Jenkins. One of the best explanations I've ever read about how Jenkins' "RadioMovies" worked is this PDF article from a 1971 TV Guide that is free to download: DCMemories.com (6/12/13) "The Washington Post unveils 'Sponsored Views,' an online advertising feature that allows organizations to post commentary related to or in response to content from the Post's Opinion section." Wow, that's REALLY bad. I'm not one of those who have piled on the Post for its increasingly sloppy editing, staff cuts, reduced service, etc. But, converting the opinion pieces into, essentially, paid ads is asking for trouble. Will it give space to wacko fringe groups? Will its opinion pieces be crafted to induce more paid responses? Will the Post let paid editorials include misleading or even factually incorrect pieces to be posted simply because they were paid for? The only hope for the Post is that the Graham family will sell it, maybe to someone like Warren Buffett, who wants to run a newspaper, rather than to squeeze every last penny out of a dying brand name. Sad. (6/12/13) [From DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: "You shouldn't have to pay for news." Via a WTOP promo today, obviously a dig at the WaPo's new website paywall......] what do you call getting a print subscription then? (6/12/13) [From DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: You can now buy space on the WaPo's editorial pages to respond to a column or editorial...] Money money money. (6/12/13) National Murrow awards have been announced. DC and Baltimore stations missing from the list: rtdna.org (6/12/13) Dave's response: Ugh. Too many news awards. I've been covering DC, Baltimore, and Northeastern media news for 16 years and I've never won a fucking award. Ha ha ha. OK, wait, the Baltimore City Paper did give DCRTV a "best media news website" honor in 2003..... [RE DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: The DC weather hypesters are gearing up for "DERECHO II" tomorrow...] That link you posted is to the Weather Channel... I've been monitoring our local TV weather guys today and I felt that they kept the hype to a respectable minimum, although some did sound slightly worried about tomorrow's severe weather chances... especially Tucker Barnes at FOX 5. (6/12/13) RE: DAVE HOVEL - Dave was one of the original DJ's when WXCY signed on the air. If my memory is correct he did mid-day's back then. I've known Dave for a long time, actually went to college with him, and he is a great guy who lives radio. I've recently talked with him and the opportunity in Florida was a wonderful chance to expand his professional career. 24 Years is a long time at one station and the listeners will feel his loss on the air and behind the scenes. Good luck Dave in your new warmer location. Mike L. (6/12/13) Great photo shot from WBAL's Donna Hamilton while in NYC. Notice the TV/radio transmitter being installed at the top. I understand some contracts have been signed in NYC to move the main transmitters from Empire to the Freedom Tower. (6/12/13)  May ratings analysis via All Access: It has been apparent for quite some time that the appetite for News and Talk programming in our NATION’S CAPITOL has been rather robust. This was the 11th time in the last 12 surveys that some form of News programming topped the charts. However, this time the roles were reversed as HUBBARD News WTOP returned to the top spot for the first time since AUGUST by ending a two-book slide (7.9-8.2). Last month, AMERICAN UNIVERSITY N/T WAMU was flirting with the 10-share range but, instead, deposited its lowest number since the HOLIDAY book (9.7-8.1) to drop back to #2. CCM+E Top 40/M WIHT (HOT) was on fire as it scored its best book since NOVEMBER (6.5-7.0) to remain at #3 for the fourth book in a row. Cluster sister CCM+E AC WASH rebounded rather strongly (4.9-5.8) to jump from #6 to #4. HOWARD UNIVERSITY Urban AC WHUR ended a seven-book slide (5.2-5.3) to remain entrenched at #5. RADIO ONE Urban AC WMMJ (MAJIC) responded to its best book in over a year with something less than that (5.3-4.8) to drop from #4 to #6. The changing of the guard continued 25-54 as WIHT returned to the top spot by posting its best number since DECEMBER. This was the ninth time in the last 14 surveys that the station has been #1 in this demo. WAMU scored its lowest total since things were all holly-jolly and slipped to #2. WTOP was down for the third straight book but held on at #3. WASH ended its four-book post-HOLIDAY malaise and moved up from #6 to #4. This displaced WHUR, which fell to #5 even though its ratings did not change. Keep an eye on CCM+E Alternative WWDC (DC101), which posted its best number in over a year to climb from #9 into a tie at #6. Order was maintained in the 18-34 universe as WIHT remained at #1 for the second straight month, maintaining a comfortable lead over #2 RADIO ONE Urban WKYS (KISS). These two stations are far and away the market leaders in this demo. WWDC posted its best book since JANUARY to remain a distant #3. CBS RADIO Top 40/R WPGC was off slightly but remained at #4. WASH and cluster mate CCM+E Country WMZQ were tied at #5 last month but WASH now owns the position while its boot-scootin’ brother fell to #6. News programming is not as important for this demo as WTOP was tied at #10 and WAMU sat at #12. In the 18-49 world, WIHT was #1 for the fifth straight survey after scoring its best book since NOVEMBER. WKYS bounced back from a down book to remain at #2 while WWDC took over sole possession of #3 with its best performance in over a year. WASH halted a slide to jump from #6 to #4 while WAMU fell from a tie at #3 to #5 despite an unchanged number. WTOP also fell out of that tie at #3 but landed, instead, at #7 with its lowest total since DANCER was prancing (or PRANCER was dancing). (6/12/13) Per DCRTV Dave: "Another possible pay-per-view event" On the undercard will be: Everyone Who Has Ever Worked At CBS Baltimore vs. "Detestable-Dynamite" Dave Labrozzi and "Bombastic-Bottom-Line" Bob Phillips in a Mega-Tag-Team no-holds-barred cage match! (6/12/13) [RE DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: Are they tweaking WMAL's morning show from a propaganda "Drudge On The Radio" approach to a more respectable news & righty info show? Hmmm...] That site you call *propaganda* and infer as lacking respect has revolutionized news aggregation and made Drudge $MMs. Go figure. (6/12/13) Chris Gordon and Tom Kierein? I never would have guessed.DG (6/12/13) fans of D.C. radio might like this: Issues with The Mike O'Meara Show 2013. sadlylackingradio.podbean.com (6/12/13) Regarding Tom & Chris - They're a blight on the Mailbag. Are either of them currently on the air anywhere within 100 miles of DC or Baltimore, or have they ever been? This Gruesome Twosome really needs to take their stupid sword fight somewhere else. Their incessant weenie wagging is getting mighty tiresome. (6/12/13) Tom Taylor on the latest Baltimore radio ratings: Orioles baseball helps Hearst-owned news/talk WBAL (2.9-4.1-4.0) – which has grown its cume since March from 170,000 to about 290,000... (6/12/13) Coming soon to DaveTV, a pay-per-view event. OOOBEEE vs. Zombie Wolf. Place TBD. The money raised (if any) will supprt DCRTV. Dave, do you have a camera to do remotes? The referee will be Mark Trail. (6/12/13) Dave's response: Hey, it's Tom and Chris. It's time to unmask these two crazed wizards of local media. Another possible pay-per-view event - Paul Bicknell VS James Ashby. Or Pat Murphy VS Commander Bunny. Or maybe me VS Betsy Rothstein. And she'd probably win..... I just want to ask: What's with this "throwing suitcases" thing? Can I find it way down in the Mailbag posts or is it some inside joke? Donnie (6/12/13) Hi Chris....OOBBEE (Tom) Not hiding. (6/12/13) /\ June 12 Messages /\ \/ June 11 Messages \/ What happened to Glenn Hollis' love songs and dedications program on the internet? I have not heard his voice on there lately - it's only music. MLB4 (6/11/13) I would like to thank the earlier posters regarding WHUR. There were those at the university who wanted to sell it in the seller’s market that was much of the 1990’s. It would’ve gotten a helluva price back then. Not so now. It would still make some eyeballs pop, though. But not like back in the day. Problem is, WHUR is the only revenue center Howard University likely has. That’s why if there’s a decision to “market” the station (which is legally different from an outright decision to sell), I would expect an LMA deal with Radio One. Such a deal (if properly structured) would reduce (if not eliminate) the university’s expenses of running the station while keeping the incoming cash about stable. The advantage here is that the net income would go up even with sharing the revenue with Radio One. Plus, the university retains ownership, with control reverting back to it at the end of the deal… if even one party so decides. Think of it as a reverse mortgage with ERP. The only problem with this is, and I’ll admit that I’m not familiar with either D.C. fiduciary law, or with the governance structure of Howard University, both of which come into play here, which means unexpected things could happen. For example, if the law or governance structure requires a “highest bidder” sale situation, then it’ll be a “wild west” bidding shoot-out, likely between CBS and Red Zebra at the end. I see Salem bailing at the $200 million mark which is where the serious bids for WHUR will start. However, I don’t see a noticeable format change for WHUR coming unless Red Zebra buys it. While never spectacular, the station has always been a stable biller. I would also expect the calls to stay, at least in homage to the university. In other words, whether it’s sold outright or LMA’ed, any changes at WHUR would likely be unnoticed by either the audience or client base. So, it’s not likely to become all news, Christian Contemporary, oldies, or “WHFS 3.0”. –Unsigned Corporate Suit (6/11/13) Dave, I meant to tell you last week that Amelia Segal of Frederick is doing quite well at NBC4. I spoke with a news editor friend there who confirmed it. She’s a rising star, they say. (6/11/13) ZW – Mess with me, and I will get you. Just stay away from me. “Quick stop at the massage parlor?” Nothing to do with Mike. Meet me somewhere tonight. Come on Big boy…. Dave can give you my e mail. If not, I have ways of finding people. OOBBEE (6/11/13) Dave's response: Tom, this is Chris. Chris, say hello to Tom..... "In Alexandria, popular WPGC deejay Jack Alix used The Doors as a draw for his 'Flower Power Hour'.” Jim Morrison’s Not So Happy Homecoming, blogs.weta.org. Linked from The Night Jim Morrison Returned to Alexandria, delray.patch.com ~~ Blair in Alexandria (6/11/13) [RE DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: Cuts at "PBS NewsHour" which is produced at WETA...] PBS must be having a ''pledge drive'' because I see nothing but shitty show marathons that no one wants to watch (6/11/13) [RE DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: Cuts at "PBS NewsHour" which is produced at WETA...] These stupid PBS stations want us to make pledges but they pre-empt our favorite shows (not that I have any) and show a lot of crap no one watches. (6/11/13) [RE Ed Hotaling:] Was one of my clients back in the 90’s when I worked with Craig Shirley & Associates in the Conservative Old Towne Ghetto: www.nytimes.com... Huge DC-TV history as well national: great guy. Glad one of your baggers caught it... (6/11/13) I believe that WMAL has a good local news department keeping in mind that they operate on a skeleton crew, maybe better than WBAL? I didn't mind ABC 7's severe weather cut-ins with Doug Hill, and I think they were also streamed live on WJLA's website. You can also watch a live feed of their "Super Doppler Radar" on the WJLA weather page when they aren't doing live storm coverage, so that was pretty useful when tracking these storms online. (6/11/13) Cannot recall AM Drive on Mix ever being this low as in week (weak) 4 (6/11/13) ZW, you are such a pussy. And, your IQ matches the diameter of your little brain. You obviously did not properly read my post. Obsessions with pictures….and TMOS There were 130 people that signed up on the face book page three days out with weather still an issue. And, 60 more clicked maybe. I know ten personally that only got a shirt and went to Jimmy’s. It is all about your jealous rage against TMOS. You have never been relevant anywhere other than being hated on this mailbag. That is all you got going in your life; a mail bag, you douche bag. I have told you before: Anytime, anywhere, and rules. Let me know. Ball is in your court. OOBBEE (6/11/13) Some viewers get all upset when Channel 7/WJLA plops a Doug Hill severe weather update right smack dab in the middle of a key part of ABC's "The Bachelorette" on Monday evening. Also, I take a look at trends in the latest DC radio ratings, and find surprisingly little change. But CBS does get one of its four major FMers into the "top 10" for May via 94.7 Fresh FM. In today's "Dave TV"..... (6/11/13) Dave, I know you've mentioned Ed Hotaling previously but his obit in today's NYTimes is very good.--HC... www.nytimes.com (6/11/13) Maryland GOP figure Dan Bongino fills in for Chris Plante today.... lots of babbling about Libertarians, polluters, government surveillance, food stamps, pre-existing health conditions, higher health premiums, and Edward Snowden (the NSA whistle-blower). I actually thought some intelligent conversation came of this, by WMAL's standards, of course! That being said, more cuckoos from DC and Maryland are calling into the show... especially those with broken English. At least the Virginia righties don't have a chokehold on the show... On a lighter note, I really like the show's bumper music. Very 80s-like. Not a bad job Mr. Bongino... not bad at all! (6/11/13) RE: [With all the complaints about the lack of local news coverage in Baltimore, especially at the once-dominant local news station WBAL radio AM, I find that the places to go are both Fox 45 and Channel 2.] Yeah, right. Let's go to Fox 45 on the next Rosedale train wreck so we can watch an uninterrupted episode of Ozzie and Harriet. Now, the poster may be onto something with Channel 2, particularly during severe storms. I am sensing a connection between the station's reputation for being in the basement with viewers, and its pleas with viewers to head for the basement during tornado threats. (6/11/13) Maybe I'm missing something? I see that WMAR 2 reporter Sherrie Johnson has clicked LIKE on a station Facebook story about a little Cecil County girl found dead. What's to like!? Bad enough several other idiots clicked like, but a station reporter? What is she thinking? Is she thinking? (6/11/13) FOX5's traffic report was actually bearable this morning with Jeff Newman. And although I'm sure Julie Wright's a nice person and was probably brought in for her high energy, I have NOT missed her cackling, giddiness, flirting, sarcasm and other silliness these past two days. (6/11/13) Is it my imagination, or has WTOP's website gotten worse over the years? I see Virginia stories listed under Maryland and Maryland stories listed under Virginia. Headlines are inaccurate. Most of the items are either from AP or from press releases with very little reporting. It appears no one reads the articles prior to posting on the website. Another question - was WTOP's purchase by Hubbard from Bonneville a good thing or bad thing for (a) the listeners, (b) the employees, and (c) the station itself? (6/11/13) Dave's response: I see the same thing on local TV station websites and sometimes at washingtonpost.com. I kinda wonder whether real humans are producing the news items and page updates or some sort of automated "bot" system..... With all the complaints about the lack of local news coverage in Baltimore, especially at the once dominant local news station WBAL radio AM, I find that the places to go are both Fox 45 and Channel 2. Those stations have long been low rated and under appreciated, but recently they have broken stories, have reporters on the street and their websites and social media pages are constantly updated all day and night with real news and information. WBAL radio is so far behind now that it would take some real know how to play catch up. (6/11/13) I haven't yet heard anything out of WHUR about the station being on the chopping block at this time. It has been strongly considered in the past, but powerful friends of the station high-up in the university lobbied heavily to keep the station. While the university could certainly get a decent one-time payout if they sold the station, WHUR is one of the only, if not THE only, profit center at Howard. There have been times when Howard has fallen short of projected income and leaned heavily on WHUR to make up that income for the university. It was either during the start of the 98/99 or the 99/2000 school year that the university admissions department had committed some major screw-up and couldn't admit a significant number of incoming freshmen. The university called on WHUR to increase it's income by some decent percentage (I don't recall the number) without laying off any personnel. The station did it. So the question with WHUR is short-term vs. long-term income. (6/11/13) All this talk about Hannity and HHS website. I will try to explain it to you so you understand it. Teenage girls get information from all sources – teachers and counselors, religious entities, girlfriends, television, internet, and the most scary source, their boyfriends, or most likely, boys who happen to be somewhat of a friend. Hannnity “shocked” at what he heard about the HHS website proves one or two things: He is out of touch with anyone under 50, and/or he is pandering to the crowd who watches John Wayne movies and thinks Rich Little is a edgy comic genius. One out of three women will be raped or beaten in her lifetime. Teen pregnancy rates are declining slightly, but the number of single mothers post teenage years is on the rise. And believe it or not, most parents are not smart enough to give the girls the facts. If the schools do not teach the facts, and the HHS does not present the facts, they will get the information from the other sources who are just as mis-informed as they are. So from what I understand, you want it taught at home. Let me ask you a question. When the mother or father drives the daughter to her first gynecologist exam, is the daughter told “don’t you dare ask any questions – you come to me for that”? (6/11/13) A bunch of us Evening Star Broadcasting Company old timers are planning a major reunion sometime later this year. For now I’m hoping to get in contact with anyone who has “WMAL” in their resume. That includes WMAL-AM, WMAL-FM (and WRQX) and WMAL-TV. If you are already on a contact list maintained by Dave Sproul, Jerry Minor or Janice Ockershausen you’re already covered. But if not, please get in touch with me at wmal.radio.tv@comcast.net. We’re looking for ALL WMALers, including those in Sales, Accounting, Engineering, Interns, Secretaries, Switchboard Operators and on-air types. Thanks! Tom Gauger (6/11/13) Re: “the best of Chris Plante”. WMAL should run a show from about a year ago. Any show from that time period would be ok. We all can see just how wrong he turned out to be. (6/11/13) With speculation in the DCRTV Mailbag about WETA being a possible suitor for Channel 32, let's not forget that they originally held the CP for that frequency in 1968. (6/11/13)  Show the Washington Post obituaries to your 4th grader today and watch them struggle not to laugh out loud. Why? Because among the dearly departed are a Dick and Cherry. (6/11/13) (SNAP)" the winners deserve to be recognized and not ridiculed or otherwise mocked by this or anywhere else"(SNIP) While I agree with the premise, that the AP Winners deserve their due........It should be troubling to everyone that an organization (a business if you will) that functions under the 1st Amendment (Freedom of Press)(yes there are other freedoms under that Amendment but this is the one AP operates under) would be telling someone else not to use it to express their opinion of AP's awards program! Much like the Republican controlled Congress complaining about Obama's "judge appointments" but didn't do the same about George Bush's judge appointments. DCRTV is a lot of things to a lot of people but one thing it most definitely is: FREE SPEECH! As with all freedoms, you don't have to appreciate it, but don't try to take someone else's away, while you do the exact same thing. This post shows a troubling lack of both understanding and appreciation of what the 1st Amendment means and how it operates. Possibly AP can add a "Free Speech Award" to the program and award it to those AP thinks is "ridiculing or mocking" them? Ophelia Mabutts - Delmarva (6/11/13) Hey Dave the founder of "The Hotline", what was once the Bible of politics & campaigns, a man who went from running campaigns to tracking campaigns, a guy who would treat staffers & friends to Orioles games at Camden Yards even when the O's sucked, an original, visionary of contemporary political reporting, one hell of a handsome man, the great, now late, Doug Bailey: www.nationaljournal.com (6/11/13) ZW, I would justify a response but we are all not reading your e mails anymore.......LOL. There were 175-200 people who signed up. I know this. I went up early at 800 am to get my T shirt. I did not ride. But, I registered and bought raffle tickets. A cool T shirt and buffet at Jimmy's for $20???? A no brainer. I don't know how many people who did that too. When I left at 800 am there was about 60-80 bikes there. And, there were also at least 30 volunteers at Patriot and others at the stops along the ride. I saw more coming down 50 as I drove to the beltway to get to Baltimore. It did not start until 1000 and should have been done around noon. I did not get to Jimmy’s until 330. People were leaving in droves. There were still at least 50-60 bikes parked around jimmy's. Why do you stalk on Facebook??? Obsessively listen and then complain here?? As Larry once said, “Why do ya care????”. Are you going to buy Raw and complain about those? OOBBEE (6/11/13) /\ June 11 Messages /\ \/ June 10 Messages \/ RE: [I damn near drove off the road just now on account of hearing WBAL's Bill Vankoe doing a commercial for Sleep Number.] He and Durian have been putting us to sleep for years with their sleep number: 1090AM. (6/10/13) Some friendly advice for Mr. Sapienza at 980. Rather than bash your opponent who has consistently beaten you - even when the Redskins are in session- think about ways to make your station better, ways to find more listeners, ways to show people why they should listen to you, not why they should not listen to 106.7. the sad fact is that WJFK consistently cleans your clock. Besides Redskins PBP the only show that moves your needle is Mr. Tony and with him going on hiatus soon your July and august numbers will be anemic - especially if the Nats get hot. You can offer all the Nats coverage you want but if people aren't buying what you're selling (meaning your show hosts and their presentation) then content really doesn't matter. You can scream that you have more Nats coverage than they do but people won't believe you because they have the games. You see, its the same issue they have when you are running the Skins. Work on making your product better and you have a chance but playing the "I know you are but what am I" game is not going to win the war. This isn't like producing a show and getting guests. Being a PD is much bigger than that...but since this is the first time you've done this you probably haven't learned that yet. (6/10/13) Regarding the comments about the Chesapeake AP awards, they are very competitive among broadcasters in Maryland, D.C., and Delaware and are judged by broadcasters in other states. The entries require not only the actual, unaltered recordings of the broadcast stories, but can be accompanied by written entries as well. The work done by the winners deserve to be recognized and not ridiculed or otherwise mocked by this or anywhere else. The Chesapeake AP Broadcasters Association also serves as a link with the management of the local Mid-Atlantic bureau of the Associated Press to ensure listeners and viewers of Associated Press members get what they are paying for. Congratulations to all the winners. Job well done. (6/10/13) Re: Duffy Dyer retiring, isn't he the one on FOX5 who has a commentary segment? I was a little surprised he was speaking up on certain subjects considering his position. But I guess he felt that since he was retiring, he could say what the heck he wanted. (6/10/13) RE:DAVE HOVEL WXCY PD-Dave Hovel was offered an fantastic opportunity in Florida, one he could not turn down. It was his decision to leave the station and a very hard one after 24 years. Dave is a very talented DJ and the opportunity in Florida is a step up for him. He will be very difficult to replace. (6/10/13) I damn near drove off the road just now on account of hearing WBAL's Bill Vankoe doing a commercial for Sleep Number. Dave Duruan he is not. And on a side note, since when do news reporters or anchors voice commercials or endorse products. The person responsible for approving that should have their ass handed to them. It's unethical. (6/10/13) RE:[From DCRTV's Job Ads:] PROGRAM/OPS DIRECTOR – WXCY FM - As rare as a Bigfoot sighting; WXCY FM, Wilmington/Baltimore for the first time in 24 years has an opening for the position of Program/OPS Director. – With this in mind, what happened to PD/OM Dave Hovel? Did he move on or was he moved out? (6/10/13) With WXCY looking for a PD, does that mean Dave Hovel is out? Pretty sure Dave was with the station since day one. Nice guy. Hoping for the best for him. (6/10/13) Hi Dave. Regarding the AP awards handed out over the weekend, the Best of Show award for radio went to WDEL-AM’s Amy Cherry – besting all the winners from DC and Baltimore. We’re quite proud of her. WDEL also won 14 awards – the most of any station in the region. - Chris Carl, WDEL Dir. of News & Programming (6/10/13) SNIP-( USUALLY happens is the kid does everything possible to avoid having an awkward conversation with either the hairless mom or the pervert dad.-END-Well, well, we now know what type of relationship you had with your parents. SORRY! Didn’t mean to tread on your sensitivities.-You see, I do agree most teens avoid conversations pertaining to sex, but the ones that have good parenting aren’t afraid to ask if they truly need answers and that goes in all directions from car repairs to cutting lawns. BTW, did you type this latest post single handed???? Ta-Ta! (6/10/13) As an avid radio listener with more than 60 years experience tuning in, all I can say about the Chesapeake AP Broadcasters Association and its back-slapping, self-serving supply of so-called journalistic awards, is who cares besides the people who receive them??? I will say, however, the plaques have saved stations a ton money over the years, hiding cracks and eliminating the need to paint newsrooms. (6/10/13) [From DCRTV's Job Ads:] PROGRAM/OPS DIRECTOR – WXCY FM - As rare as a Bigfoot sighting; WXCY FM, Wilmington/Baltimore for the first time in 24 years has an opening for the position of Program/OPS Director. We are the Country Music leader in the market and are looking for the right person who knows what that means and what it takes to keep us growing. This is a unique opportunity for the person with proven success managing great local radio programming, and substantial on-air experience. Position includes an on air shift. Understanding the country format and audience in addition to understanding digital and alternative media platforms is critical. Send resume, air check, and references to General Manager, WXCY, P.O. Box 269, Havre de Grace, Maryland, 21078 or email: pd@wxcyfm.com. Owned locally by Delmarva Broadcasting Company an Equal Opportunity Employer (6/10/13) I don't get the never ending and over the top fascination from traffic reporters with every little incident. It's not so much the ones in TV, but more the radio people. Drivers have been getting around for decades if there's a detour or accident. Do these traffic people think tweeting about insignificant mishaps are worthwhile? WBAL even takes it so far as to do an hourly web update. Shouldn't the web be used for real things, like current news, esp on the local front? But that might make too much sense. Little head scratching here as to why Baltimore now turns to DC stations for news. I can see major accidents and detours, but traffic stuff that's scheduled? Signs are posted folks. Tweeting, face booking and web updating from traffic reporters is getting out of control. (6/10/13) It looks like the slipping WBAL has lost another step and broken another ethical rule. Found this story posted as a "news" story on the station's website. They should be ashamed of what they've become! wbal.com (6/10/13) ESPN 980 PD takes shots at 106.7. If you ask me, Roughier’s comments are being twisted by Sapienza, but a good old fashioned mud wrestling match between the sports stations would be fun……. www.facebook.com/espnradio980.com (6/10/13) [RE DCRTV's Facebook page: The last days of the local news daily editions of the Washington Examiner. The paper stopped delivering any copies to my area of Northern Virginia weeks ago, including area Safeways. Ho hum!] I will only miss the daily crossword; it was a good puzzle. (6/10/13) [RE DCRTV's Facebook page: The last days of the local news daily editions of the Washington Examiner. The paper stopped delivering any copies to my area of Northern Virginia weeks ago, including area Safeways. Ho hum!] Do are they going to online only then? (6/1013) Dave's response: They'll be a political online news org like Politico with one weekly print edition that you'll only find in downtown DC and on Capitol Hill..... [RE DCRTV's Facebook page: The last days of the local news daily editions of the Washington Examiner. The paper stopped delivering any copies to my area of Northern Virginia weeks ago, including area Safeways. Ho hum!] Dave, what kind of circulation did the paper have? Any idea? (6/10/13) Dave's response: No idea. Prob 50,000 on the high end. But the paper frequently wasn't delivered everyday to all distribution points, like in my neighborhood..... [RE DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: Dumb WMAL runs "best of" Chris Plante today. Didn't know that category existed for him. No fill-in host to talk about breaking NSA stuff?!?!] Time for them to switch to oldies radio. (6/10/13) If CBS is truly going to all spoken word stations then maybe they'll release the choke hold on heritage music stations and calls that have been mangled since thier corporate takeovers. Nearly every market has lost a longtime music station to schizophrenic format mashups and DJs reduced to voice tracks and bland playlist monitors. Donnie (6/10/13) Besides WHUR? Would WHUT TV also be on the market,or would that go directly back to PBS? Ted (6/10/13) Dave's response: If Howard U decided to sell Channel 32/WHUT, I'd think that both WETA and Maryland Public Television would be interested in it. It wouldn't "go back" to PBS since PBS doesn't own stations. WHUT could get bought by any number of non-comm TV entities, including some religious ones. Heck, maybe even DC-based C-SPAN. In any case, with a non-comm license, it would not fetch the huge price that commercial WHUR radio could potentially get..... WOCQ (OC104) IN OCEAN CITY/SALISBURY, MD. HAD THEIR ANNUAL SCION OC CAR & TRUCK SHOW THIS PAST WEEKEND WITH RECORD ATTENDANCE IN OCEAN CITY! FAT JOE PERFORMED LIVE! (attached are pics of Bill Baker & Kandie B with Fat Joe & Bill Baker & Dee-lite with Fat Joe) (6/10/13)   The Chesapeake AP Broadcasters Association presented lots of reporting awards at their annual meeting in Ocean City this past weekend. Often overlooked however is the presentation of the associations annual scholarship to a broadcast journalism student. This year's winner is Lauren LiBetti, now an intern at WDEL radio in Wilmington Delaware. www.facebook.com (6/10/13) [RE WNEW:] Best News Ever! Yay!! (6/10/13) /\ June 10 Messages /\ \/ June 9 Messages \/ Is it possible that CBS Radio just wants a flag in DC with the All News format....? They seem oftly giddy about winning these awards, BTW Don't know anyone heard, Jon Doughman reporting from the shore this morning (Sunday) and it was essentially just bragging about how they were winning awards. Found that a little bit over the top. They don't get ratings, they don't get revenue, they haven't had much traction. Now maybe that will all change with time. But they seem terribly committed to the format for having such little success, aside from the recent awards. I think regardless of the ratings WNEW is here to stay. You hear a lot of about them on the web for having such little traction in the market. CBS Radio is also going towards all spoken word, they have sports stations popping up all over the country and I think in DC news seems justified on the corporate level. I wish them all the luck and congrats on the awards. I love having the opportunity to flip back and forth with WTOP for two great All Newsers. (6/9/13) Hi Dave, The Chesapeake Associated Press Broadcasters Association held its annual convention this weekend in Ocean City. And many news organizations were honored at the awards banquet last night. WAMU and WTOP walked out with a truckload of plaques for best feature, best documentary, best sportscast, best commentary, and the like. It was, however, WNEW that won one of the biggest awards of the night. We were recognized as Outstanding News Operation. WDEL in Delaware won the other big one – Best in Show that went to their reporter Amy Cherry. Earlier in the day, we also picked up the Edward R. Murrow award we won for continuing coverage of the Derecho last summer. I should also note WNEW had quite a contingent at the awards banquet last night. We outnumbered WTOP by 2 to 1. I’ve attached a group picture of the WNEW attendees as well as a short iPhone video of the moment WNEW was called up to accept the award. Here is a list of names of the people in the photo: From bottom up: Cheryl Simone, midday co-anchor... Stacy Lyn, afternoon co-anchor... Bill Rehkopf, former morning co-anchor... Amy Morris, morning co-anchor... Robert Sanchez, Program Director (holding up the Murrow).... John Domen, reporter (holding up the AP Outstanding News Operation award)... Jamie Blanco, morning news manager... Gregg Micklos, News Director... Judlyne Lilly, evening co-anchor... Nathan Hager, morning co-anchor... Jared Ruderman, Assistant News Director... Chas Henry, mid-day co-anchor... Ruben Gomez, morning news operations manager... (6/9/13)  Now before anyone shuns Boston Medical Group in favor of speculating on a sale of WHUR-FM, let’s talk reality. First, let’s consider what terms may have been in the transfer agreement between Post-Newsweek Stations, Capital Area Inc. (as I recall WaPo’s local broadcasting arm being at the time). If the Post has a contractual “right of first refusal” in the event of a sale by Howard University, then things could become really interesting. Remember that the only thing “liberal” about the Post back then was its editorial slant. In the 1970’s, the business side was very conservatively run. Remember the episode with the pressmen? The Post knew it was donating an asset with potentially considerable future commercial value. I’m sure they have their lawyers looking at this. Second, consider that while the sale of WHUR would bring in a considerable amount of immediate cash, it would not fix any intrinsically systemic problems. And, once sold, the station would bring in no further revenue. Also, because the buyer of first choice doesn’t have the necessary cash readily available (nor could easily swing the necessary debt), I would expect WHUR to be LMA’ed to… Radio One! They’d much rather deal with Radio One than with “the devil”. And, that brings up the third point… if WHUR were to be sold, who would buy? Because fiduciary law requires the trustees to seek the best return on an asset, most of the players Dave mentions would be in play to varying degrees. However, I would take Cumulus off that list. They’re still suffering from the constipation of buying Citadel. As for Hubbard, if they could swing the credit, they would be interested. However, they are still swallowing the debt from buying Bonneville’s east of the Rockies castoffs. But, 96.3 would represent enough of an opportunity to swing the debt. Red Zebra would be a likely suitor. Dan Snyder has the cash and credit to make the buy happen. However, if he bought 96.3, expect him to sell much of Red Zebra’s junk. Likewise, CBS has the cash and credit to make a buy happen. Whether they would be willing to outbid Snyder (or vice-versa) is a good question. There’s also someone else who has the cash and credit to make a buy of 96.3 happen and wants it: Salem. Salem wants another D.C. FM to showcase its “Fish” Contemporary Christian format. They want it so bad that they would willingly sell off something of lesser importance to get the cash if necessary. My money would be on either an LMA with Radio One, or them taking on a hellacious debt load to buy it. If WHUR goes on the market while WJLA is still in play, it would be a rare event of two “quality” (considering the D.C. market) properties being up for sale at the same time. –Unsigned Corporate Suit (6/9/13) RE: “Mike O’Meara’s Ride for the Warriors was a “smash hit”? Why, did they raise TWO dollars”….If he did, that is two more dollars then you raised yesterday for the children of special ops heroes. What did you do yesterday? Oh yeah, hide behind a computer screen. He had a couple hundred riders. Minimum raised right there is about $5000. That is before raffles, donations, etc. When was the last time 200 people gathered for you? TMU, tell me about your ratings or downloads. I knew one A-hole in the filth of the internet would say something negative about a nice charity event when I wrote that post. I just waited to see who it would be. Enjoy hell. OOBBEE (6/9/13) RE: [Baltimore radio "veteran" Michael Filippelli] Really? Hmm...never heard of him and I have lived here all my life. I did hear him recently filling in on WCBM. Sounded pretty good. (6/9/13) I'm wondering what if the true intention of the Post paywall is to increase print subscribers. I pay around $6.50 per month for the print edition and it looks like they are going to charge $10/month for the internet content. I also heard that if you are a print subscriber, you'll get the internet content for free. So what is the intent? Drive customers to print? Any thoughts? (6/9/13) Dave's response: The Post is trying to develop a balancing act that will produce the most revenue - put up a paywall that will permit enough free traffic so as to not hurt website ad revenue. Ultimately, print will still decline. That form of delivery will continue to suck up costs for printing and shipping of the physical product, including labor. Ultimately, the Post will become a giant subscription-based national news website that will be produced by as few costly human beings as possible..... As heard on WTOP during the Sunday 1 p.m. CBS hourly newscast, a report about the weekend movies had audio underneath the announcer, and in that audio were bursts of EAS activation data. Guess some movie trailer has the EAS bursts as attention getters and a CBS production flunky thought they should be aired as background, not knowing that's against the rules. Hope they activated some audio chain overrides. (6/9/13) I saw a post on Facebook by Cynee Simpson's uncle Donnie Simpson confirming that she will be joining WAGA in Atlanta as an evening anchor. As per his post, Cynee said that was her dream job. Hmmm. What are the chances she said the same thing when joining WJLA? (6/9/13) I must be missing something I do not understand why any company would buy WHUR-FM and then flip the format when it gets very good ratings and most important it bills very well. It was tied as the 3rd highest billing station why do something dumb and flip it? (6/9/13) WUSA has replaced their 1:30am rebroadcast of its 11pm news with a viral video show called "Right This Minute". It took me a week to notice the difference. (6/9/13) Hey, Yasko: there not their...reflects poorly on Towson U. (6/9/13) Most folks in our industry know by now that contests and try outs really are a waste of time. Even applying no longer is sensible. The jobs are going to those already in house or friends of the pd, gm or other manager or employee. They are only posted on HR boards because they have to be. (6/9/13) Mike O’Meara’s Ride for the Warriors was a “smash hit”? Why, did they raise TWO dollars this year with FOUR people showing up? What sound does the end of a career make? Tune into Mike O’Meara’s failcast, and find out. Sincerely, TMU. (6/9/13) That article in the post on Howard University is quite telling. Something tells me that contest seeking an afternoon drive personality will "quietly" go away. All WHUR has been doing is saving on payroll and wasting everyone's time trying out for that shift. I once worked for a station that did the same contest for a mid day jock. The contest was in and out in one month. I figured WHUR would do the same thing. It's now obvious they are just trying to keep the wolf from the front door. (6/9/13) I look at a "Date Lab" correction at the paywall-crazy Washington Post. And, how to avoid the upcoming paywall at the Post without subscribing to the newspaper. More ranting about the Baltimore Sun's David Zurawik. Plus, I speculate about who might be interested in WHUR if Howard University decides to sell it. In today's "Dave TV"..... (6/9/13) "..... I wish we had an all news station here in the Albuquerque area."..yeah that would be nice but the reality is that Albuquerque, despite its growth and being a popular "young and hip" town which BTW one can thank movie star Seth Rogen for that, well it is that Albuquerque is still a bit too small to support a 24/7 WTOP/WNEW type of all news station. Dittos with El Paso and Salt Lake City as well. Denver had "all news..all the time" KDEN-AM about 20-25 years ago but it bombed not because that market was too small for all news radio but because the signal of KDEN was quite poor and also the Denver AM dial of the time were full of popular voices such as Rick Barber ( KOA,) Hal & Charlie, Chet Sisk and Murphy Houston ( KHOW ), Danny Davis and Austin Wiggins ( KRZN ) ..hell I think even the great KIMN 95 and country KLZ-AM 560 were still around at the time. Just too much direct/indirectly LOCAL &LIVE competition on the Denver AM radio dial back then for KDEN to survive but it was great while it lasted. Nah unfortunately the closest city to Albuquerque to being able to support a 24/7 all news station would have to be Phoenix and frankly I am shocked that they don't already have one. (6/9/13) Please don't make me LOL at journalists bragging about winning AP awards. Its the same as winning a high school newspaper award. Best thing any news operation can cut from its budget in this day and age is the AP. (6/9/13) Channel 7 sends tweet apologizing for previous distasteful tweet re. Fragers Hardware. Saying "get it while its hot" regarding the store selling items that did not burn is about as ridiculous as it gets. Good of the station to apologize. (6/9/13) The TMOS Ride for the Warriors was a smash hit today raising money for the Special Op’s family’s educational needs. Of course, Jimmy put out a great spread in Herndon to put icing on the cake. My BOAD wish of the week? Make Bobby and Zohan do a weekly show together, no audience. Uncomfortable Gold, Jerry. Gary Williams, John Feinstein, Chris Knocke, Davey Johnson, and Bob Ryan are the best interviews on sports radio in this town. Dukes should get a shot at Feinstein every once in a while. OOBBEE (6/9/13) /\ June 9 Messages /\ \/ June 8 Messages \/ [Just saw Steve Chenevey on NewsChannel 8 this evening. He had the unfortunate luck to be in a segment near Devon Lucie, who I believe was a mime in a previous life. He makes these rapid, unsettled, robotic moves that give the impressillon he's synthesized animation rather than a real weather person. Maybe he has a palsy or a syndrome of some kind.] I was wondering how long it would take for this to appear here. You'd think he'd improve over time but his on-air presence is more awkward than ever. The feeling of uneasiness permeates every segment, he looks really uncomfortable. His inability to articulate even the most basic elements of a weathercast, weird hand gestures, constant stumbling, and long pauses make the News Channel 8 midday experience pretty painful. (6/8/13) Re: WTMD. First of all, wish them luck on their own and happy that they have new digs. Although they look like a cross between a college radio station and WHFS in its heyday, a cursory search of Ask.com (please have some dignity and do not Google) has the following first link available: "Help WTMD Maintain Our Federal Funding." Maintain? The federal government is furloughing medical staff at Walter Reed. President's Obambi's helicopter flying back from the Naval Academy graduation replaced the time honored fly over of Navy jets , supposedly due to "furloughing". The American people can't get a ten cent tour of The White House (I know: big deal, but these men and women graduating will become our future warriors and we need them pumped up). I am certain that other DCRTV Mailbaggers can cite other "furlough" cuts for things that matter. More people are receiving federal SNAP (aka "food stamps") since its inception decades ago as a way of feeding people and moving American made & grown surplus food (originally, people receiving food stamps could only use them for certain foods). Somehow WTMD maintaining their "federal funding" needs to be regulated to the back, back burner. Besides, why should taxpayers subsidize guys who have bigger ears than Obambi: www.wtmd.org (6/8/13) So if I cough up the cash for the Washington Post's paywall, will I be getting a version of the paper that's actually been proofed? Latest example of WaPo editors either being high, stupid or just not doing their jobs: the number "22th" in the large graphic above the fold on today's sports page. Amateur, amateur, amateur. (6/8/13) Dave, I thought your visitors might be interested in a walking tour video of the New WTMD broadcast facility. We're very excited about the station's future and our ability to connect even more artists with audiences. We're slowly moving because their is a significant construction project happening in our building and we're just plain anxious to move in. We'll be doing our first fund drive from the new space and folks are welcome volunteer for a couple of hours to get a preview of the new place. Cheers, Steve Yasko General Manager. (6/8/13) (SNAP)"If I've said it once I've said it a thousand times, TV and radio people don't know their broadcast region nor their audience"(END-SNAP) Sane people realize that when they are talking to themselves, they're talking to the WRONG PERSON! Stereotyping is the last bastion of mentally weak, low IQ people. Not ALL "TV and radio people don't know their broadcast region nor their audience". Only SOME, don't know. By painting with such a broad stroke, you only qualify that you are the one who isn't very bright and too lazy to make an simple analysis. Every region of the country has odd pronunciations. For someone who works in "radio and TV" to move to an area and learn all the colloquialisms before going on the air is an unrealistic expectation for a listener and News Management. One can only wonder how the poster would "lead by example" on the air, should they move to Arizona, New Mexico or any of the Western states that have many odd and unusual pronunciations of area's towns and cities? At WRC in the 60's (when it was a GIANT in the industry) a young news reader on the radio said "AD-JOOOOO-INT General" instead of Adjutant General. No one had a hissy fit, no one pointed fingers, no one laughed. The pronunciation was corrected and the embarrassed news reader never did it again. IT HAPPENS. Get the fuck over it and stop making an ass of yourself! There is no perfection in media, no perfection in life! DEAL WITH IT! - Les Nessman -WKRP (6/8/13) It would make so much sense for Fox 45 to hire Mike Masco from channel 2 to do weather. He is a true meteorologist, nice looking with an easy voice to listen to. Megan Gilland would be a good choice for an anchor to replace Marianne Bannister. They must get rid of her and Tony Pagnotti and the sooner the better. Those two together are almost as bad as the two women on WBAL on weekend mornings. (6/8/13) Just saw Steve Chenevey on NewsChannel 8 this evening. He had the unfortunate luck to be in a segment near Devon Lucie, who I believe was a mime in a previous life. He makes these rapid, unsettled, robotic moves that give the impression he's synthesized animation rather than a real weather person. Maybe he has a palsy or a syndrome of some kind. (6/8/13) [RE: "If I've said it once I've said it a thousand times, TV and radio people don't know their broadcast region nor their audience. They are too lazy to even try to learn. I don't expect much of anything from WNEW, but what's WBAL radio am's excuse? "--- Few posts I've seen about WNEW and WBAL are the perfect example of people SEARCHING and YEARNING for an excuse for people to hate on the media. Because an anchor mentions Tim Hortons are participating in donut day....somehow means they don't know the region? Are you F***ing kidding me? If they mention an attack in Afghanistan will you rip them for that too? And for you backseat drivers that are constantly WHINING about language and how stories are written....then go apply for a job at a station to make it better or call the station and complain. But oh yeah, that's right, it's easier to write to a blog. WNEW has signal problems and they need a tighter style. Other than that, they do GREAT work. Stories I hear from a cozy studio on WTOP, I hear out on the streets on WNEW. WBAL is slipping, but in general, they do a decent job. I'm amazed at how people whine about local coverage. There are places in this country, that have ZERO local radio stations and ZERO local newspapers. Quit your bitching...] This post is so true! I could not have said it better myself. Recently, WNEW has shown a slow but steady rise in its ratings, according to the Arbitron ratings that Dave posts here on a regular basis. I listened to them for about a half hour this afternoon and about the same amount of time to WTOP, WNEW had better coverage of the traffic issues and other problems caused by the heavy rooms. WTOP. while always having good coverage was not nearly as thorough or as timely as the coverage on 99.1. 99.1 is sounding very good. much like WINS in NYC. I wish we had an all news station here in the Albuquerque area. (6/8/13) /\ June 8 Messages /\ \/ June 7 Messages \/ So, a WJLA anchor saw a naked man in the stairwell and said nothing to anyone???!!!..What happened to adhering to the slogan "see something, say something" ? Sounds like she's seen him there before and thought it was normal..Uh, NOT...What the heck was she thinking?..And also regarding WJLA and Cynee Simpson's leaving, are there any videos that show the name of where she's going being beeped out?..I want to say, and I could be wrong, that when Steve Chenevey left FOX5, it was mentioned on air where he was going..And by the way, anyone seen him lately?. I know he was moved off the anchor desk and supposedly put out in the field. (6/7/13) "If I've said it once I've said it a thousand times, TV and radio people don't know their broadcast region nor their audience. They are too lazy to even try to learn. I don't expect much of anything from WNEW, but what's WBAL radio am's excuse? "--- Few posts I've seen about WNEW and WBAL are the perfect example of people SEARCHING and YEARNING for an excuse for people to hate on the media. Because an anchor mentions Tim Hortons are participating in donut day....somehow means they don't know the region? Are you F***ing kidding me? If they mention an attack in Afghanistan will you rip them for that too? And for you backseat drivers that are constantly WHINING about language and how stories are written....then go apply for a job at a station to make it better or call the station and complain. But oh yeah, that's right, it's easier to write to a blog. WNEW has signal problems and they need a tighter style. Other than that, they do GREAT work. Stories I hear from a cozy studio on WTOP, I hear out on the streets on WNEW. WBAL is slipping, but in general, they do a decent job. I'm amazed at how people whine about local coverage. There are places in this country, that have ZERO local radio stations and ZERO local newspapers. Quit your bitching. (6/7/13) (And just the other day, I heard Jamie Coughlin from the National Press Club on local gun rights activist Dick Heller…Did WTOP cover it? Can't tell... but the story's not on wtop.com.) You are missing the point. WMAL can’t replicate WTOP with far fewer resources. But they can carve out a niche as a news/talker that has some good local news as part of the mix. That’s what Bill Hess seems to be doing. (6/7/13) "just the other day, I heard Jamie Coughlin from the National Press Club on local gun rights activist Dick Heller (of SCOTUS fame) giving it to the press "in their own house." Did WTOP cover it? Can't tell... but the story's not on wtop.com." If this is supposed to show that WMAL is out there "covering the news," let me take a second and catch my breath from a bout of hysterical laughing. Heller's case is years old at this point. Not news. He has no "story" today - but sending someone to National Press Liquors (the reason why that building is there) to cover Heller's blathering is perfect pandering to the low-information-voter constituency that WMAL feeds its droppings to. (6/7/13) Oh LORD, just let the WJLA staffers say where she is going for God's sake. She's not going to any competiting station here in town. It's WAGA, Fox in Atlanta! Low class move by Allbritton and company, but par for the course. (6/7/13) If I've said it once I've said it a thousand times, TV and radio people don't know their broadcast region nor their audience. They are too lazy to even try to learn. I don't expect much of anything from WNEW, but what's WBAL radio am's excuse? Not that long ago that little newsroom was full of reporters who were born and raised in town and knew the back story and history of every story like it was nobody's business. Clearly from the early morning until night especially the folks are transplants devoid of any local connection. Wrong neighborhoods given, mispronounced names etc. No wonder WTOP has advanced into the Baltimore radio news market recently. I don't know where the true local reporters went off to, but if WBAL mgt had any smarts they would woo them back (6/7/13) [RE DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: WMAL newscast: Cuccinelli aims to "put a little daylight" between himself and EW Jackson, despite the two being "homogeneous" last week...] Careful now, Dave....the average WMAL listener probably does not understand what "homogeneous" means... but you can sure bet your bottom dollar that they are going to get themselves all worked up over the fact that they heard the word "homo" in the middle there! (6/7/13) Aly gone from MIX? The page is gone. (6/7/13) Dave's response: A WRQX source tells me that she has been out sick the last three days. The morning show's co-producer, Spanky, is covering for her. The station did take both of Bert show's DC producers off the web because they have "limited on air roles"..... Just a couple things to clear up the record, re: WMAL... The entity that owns the transmitter location in Bethesda is Cumulus, not Disney. The "DC Radio Assets LLC" holding company was among the ABC assets spun off to Citadel in 2007, and absorbed by Cumulus in 2011. As far as WMAL's "small, but frisky" news department goes, take a listen any given day and you'll hear what Hess means. They have two street reporters who tell nitty, gritty stories. Martin DeCaro covers transit as well as any reporter in town. And just the other day, I heard Jamie Coughlin from the National Press Club on local gun rights activist Dick Heller (of SCOTUS fame) giving it to the press "in their own house." Did WTOP cover it? Can't tell... but the story's not on wtop.com. (6/7/13) Hi Dave! Regarding my comments at Talkers yesterday, whatever 'cuts' were made at WMAL News preceded Cumulus. The company thankfully has been supportive of our efforts to expand local news coverage. I'd appreciate a correction on that part of your story. Thanks much. Hope you're well! -Bill (6/7/13) Cynee and Bill Lord at farewell for Cynee  I sent a second photo that had a few people in it w/OUT Lord (6/7/13)  John Feinstein mentioned on his radio show yesterday that Ed Hotaling was the journalist at Channel 4 who interviewed Jimmy 'The Greek' Snyder in D.C. in 1988 when Snyder made controversial comments about African-Americans and slavery that led to the end of The Greek's career on The NFL Today on CBS. (6/7/13) [RE Cynne Simpson leaving WJLA:] They had videos saying a goodbye and WJLA couldn't be bothered to edit out where she's going so they beeped it instead. WOW. How low rent and unprofessional can you get. (6/7/13) I accidentally turned on WNEW 99.1 around 9:25am this morning. They announced that today is National Donut Day. Mentioning that you could get free Donuts at participating Dunkin' Donuts and Tim Hortons. I can't find any Tim Hortons in the metro area including Winchester, VA, Richmond, VA, and Fredericksburg, VA areas. I think that the nearest is in Aberdeen, MD (which I definitely don't consider the metro area. Do any of the reporters or anchors actually live in the area or care about this area? (6/7/13) On WJLA's morning newscast, they were saying goodbye to Cynne Simpson. However, they would not say where she is going and beeped it out when people said it goodbye video. (6/7/13) You don't become an FM station by changing transmitters. I really gave up on WMAL when they moved to FM and didn't change ANYTHING. If Bill Hess is a great PD, then it's obvious he has no power. Ed Graham (6/7/13) Anyone heard who is getting the Ted Yates award this year? (6/7/13) Anyone know where the DC Bureau of the Voice of Russia is located? Heard locally on 1390 and on WTOP HD2. (6/7/13) Dave's response: The basement of Chris Plante's place? Oh, nevermind..... (Bill Hess' efforts will be futile. WTOP/WAMU have DCs news market cornered!) I agree with your second statement. There’s no room for a 3rd News station on the dial in DC. But Bill Hess isn’t trying to make WMAL a News station. He is trying to make it a better News/Talk station with local news as just one element. He’s a smart guy. I do not underestimate him. (6/7/13) It has been a while since I checked in with The Sports Junkies ratings. They frequently talk about how they get a "silly" bonus for being Top 3 in Men 25-54. (A big silly if they are #1) It has been years, years since that has happened. Here is where they stand based on the ratings that came out this week. #1 WWDC (9.0)... #2 WAMU (8.2)... #3 WTOP (7.8)... #4 WMMJ (6.2)... #5 WKYS (5.4)... #6 WIHT (5.2)... #7 WHUR (5.1)... #8 WDCN & WJFK (4.1)... Dagger! Tied for 8th place with WDCN. Congratulations to JP, EB, Cakes and Lurch. Still setting the world on fire. The only good news for The Sports Junkies is that Lavar Arrington and Chad Dukes have a 3.8 in afternoon drive which puts them in 9th place. Neither show is very "money" right now. (6/7/13) Dave's response: Spanish WDCN would get killer ratings if it was on a strong signal, not the weakish TV audio carrier of 87.7. Cumulus would be smart to make a deal and put WDCN on 105.9, making WMAL AM only again. Back when WMAL was AM only it actually got better ratings than it does now on AM and FM. And Cumulus would then have a third sellable signal for the DC market. And with the WDCN deal, then Cumulus could get temporary control of 87.7 and maybe do something cool with it, like a AAAer. Hey, it's all about the money, honey..... Melanie took a good look before stepping over the guy and concluded he doesn't work at Ch. 7 (6/7/13) Dave's response: Hey, I remember years ago walking past the Rosslyn McDonalds and seeing an obviously homeless man sitting there wearing ripped pants with his ding-dong hanging out. You just kind of grimmace and keep walking..... Bill Hess' efforts will be futile. WTOP/WAMU have DCs news market cornered! Ppl go 2 WMAL to vent, not 2 b informed! (6/7/13) Here's WMAL PD Bill Hess. At the Talkers NY 2013 convention during a panel discussion... (6/7/13) Dave's response: Hess calls the WMAL news department "small but frisky." Hmmm..... Looks like Melanie Hastings was just stepping over her old side kick Nathan Roberts. Bob, Southeast (6/7/13) UCS, I'm still confused, but ready to be instructed. Where does it say anything about Disney or ABC in the Montgomery County land records for the WMAL-AM site? (6/7/13) The story of Media General merging with Young sort of caught me by surprise. I'm aware that this new merger will be under the Media General name, and headquarters being housed in Richmond. I still picture Media General eyeing ownership of CBS affiliate WTVR Richmond, which Local TV is looking to sell. I certainly hope that Sinclair (and Nexstar) doesn't get their hands on stations that Local TV and Allbritton are looking to sell ownership. It remains to be seen if the FCC will go through with allowing Sinclair to acquire the Fisher stations, or if the FCC is willing to put the brakes on Sinclair's TV station buying spree. Of the Local TV owned stations... I still picture Meredith acquiring WHO Des Moines as a flagship, and maybe wanting WITI Milwaukee and WJW Cleveland... Cox getting Oklahoma City. Of the Allbritton stations... I assume that ABC will most likely get WJLA to become DC O&O. Not sure if ABC's DC news bureau is large enough to house WJLA news and station operations... that could be if ABC wants WJLA housed in DC. Also not sure what may eventually become of local cable TVer News Channel 8. If Allbritton gets to keep the Rosslyn broadcast facility... I could picture Robert Allbritton looking to expand Politico's presence in the direction of future cable/satellite network... it be branded as Politico TV or either Politico Channel or Politico Network. That could be an idea. Change.org and Wethepeople.gov petitions... www.change.org and petitions.whitehouse.org. Both petitions were created in hopes of forcing the FCC to stop the Sinclair buying spree, and TV station ownership rules being reviewed. Viewers can also write and/or e-mail their grievances to the FCC. With this Media General-Young merger... not sure if it could be fueling new speculation about ownership of San Francisco station KRON. KRON being NBC's long-time (and strongest performing) affiliate until December 2001... NBC moved affiliation to KNTV in January 2002. I could picture Comcast-NBC having renewed interest in acquiring ownership of KRON. KRON regaining NBC network affiliation... NBC keeping KNTV for Telemundo affiliation... NBC selling ownership of KSTS, and it get Mundo-Fox affiliation... and either KICU or KOFY getting MNT (My-Network TV) affiliation. That's another thought. (6/7/13) /\ June 7 Messages /\ \/ June 6 Messages \/ Since perspiring minds like to know about these things, 500 South Buena Vista Street in Burbank is the HQ of The Walt Disney Co, which is the holding company for the Disney empire and its properties, physical, intellectual, and creative. Ryan Innovative Solutions is a well-known corporate tax management and representation firm. The address shown is that of their local office for the D.C. region. As for the decline in value on the WMAL-AM XMTR site, this reflects the loss of conversion value from “industrial” zoning (the usual category for a transmitter site) to, in the case of WMAL-AM, residential. I say that because I can’t think of another possible re-use for the place. I guess the residential market in southern Montgomery County hasn’t yet recovered. Shifting gears a bit, the Media General/New Young Broadcasting deal is interesting. While it’s mostly “a stock deal”, there’s the matter of the $50 million cash contribution to the Media General pension fund. Not to mention the refinancing of debt from the old Media General and “New Young Broadcasting”. (New Young had much less debt…) It’s “new” because of Young Broadcasting’s bankruptcy, which landed it into the hands of bankers (Wachovia and Credit Suisse, IIRC), and was then taken private. (Buying KRON-TV in 2000 was a bit much for them to handle.) This will be an interesting match because Media General has an award-winning journalism tradition going back >150 years and Young’s history is out of the old Adam Young broadcast rep firm, IIRC. OK, so Young reminds me of Sinclair. Both J. Stewart Bryan and his father, D. Tennant Bryan, were journalists, writers, and reporters, before assuming greater business responsibility in the old Richmond Newspapers, Inc., which became Media General. I know some knock family-owned firms in this business. But, believe me, while there are exceptions, most require the next generation to prove they can handle the responsibility before they’re entrusted with it. As for the TV stations in the “new Media General”… With the exception of KRON, most of the stations are medium market or lower. Media General stations are typically well-run with a strong news brand. Media General has centralized Master Control with NBC stations controlled from WCMH in Columbus and the CBS stations from WSPA in Spartanburg. Part of the “synergies” will likely be Young’s single NBC station and the CBS stations having master control from an expanded Media General structure. Conversely, given that the old Media General had only one ABC station, I would expect the existing Media General master control architecture to be used to create a hub for the ABC stations. My bet is that it would be at Young’s WKRN in Nashville. “Synergies” is a synonym for job eliminations. The other part that now becomes interesting is what happens with the stations that many (including yours truly) expected the old Media General to buy? And, who will the next merger suitors/partners be? Raycom is well-run, profitable, with a fair balance sheet… -Unsigned Corporate Suit (6/6/13) Why is Jacqui Jeras getting second billing on WJLA's weather page after Doug where Bob Ryan used to be? Does this mean she'll be doing the 11:00 pm forecasts that Bob used to do and maybe we'll get Adam Caskey back his old Good Morning Washington slot back in the studio where he belongs? (6/6/13) Melaine Hastings must be used to naked men laying around her. Her reaction to the nude man is bizarre. (6/6/13) (Naked Man Seen at 7) I guess Robert Allbritton was out on the town last night and drank one too many....poor guy. (6/6/13) Sinclair's takeover of Fisher being felt... this from Eugene, Oregon: www.registerguard.com (6/6/13) Re: [Dammit, the Gamut - What’s with 820 AM? They’re off the air!] We had to fix a broken antenna relay at the 820 transmitter today. We got the station back on the air at 3 PM - my apologies for the inconvenience. Thanks for listening to The Gamut! - Dave Kolesar (Senior Broadcast Engineer, WTOP/WFED/"The Gamut") (6/6/13) Hey Dave, you had a note on your Boston page on 4/25 which actually has a DC/Baltimore angle as well. Bob Socci who was hired to do the radio play-by-play for he New England Patriots has for many years been the play-by-play radio voice of the Naval Academy Midshipmen Football Team. His signature call, "Touchdown Navy!", is great. Here's hoping that he somehow can pull a Jack Fleming and do the Navy games on Saturday and the Patriots on Sundays. I know that isn't realistic but one can always hope. Good luck Bob. We'll miss you. As an aside, his new partner on the Patriots games, Scott Zolak, is a former University of Maryland QB. Tom in Wheaton (6/6/13) Back in 2008, the recorded owner of WMAL's 7115 GREENTREE RD xmtr site was identified in the DCRTV Mailbag as DC RADIO ASSETS LLC with a mailing address of 500 S BUENA VISTA STREET, BURBANK CA 91521-0001. Today, the owning entity remains the same, but the mailing address has changed to "C/O RYAN INNOV SOLUTIONS, 2111 WILSON BLVD STE 300, ARLINGTON VA 22201-3001". Perhaps more interesting is that the total value as of 01/01/2007 was $45,332,720. (Land: $44,898,000 ... Improvements: $434,720) That's fallen dramatically and as of 01/01/2013, the total value is now $35,764,300. (Land: $35,497,400 ... Improvements: $266,900). I guess, what's a difference of 10 million dollars matter when you're The Mouse? (6/6/13) Dave: "Naked Man Seen At 7..." My, how far Buzz Burbank has fallen. Keeping a good thought for you, Buzz! (6/6/13) Dammit, the Gamut - What’s with 820 AM? They’re off the air! (6/6/13) SNIP-( Sean's age sees anything related to teenage and preteen girls and educating them on their their bodies and reproductive health, the first thing Sean thinks of and starts talking about is thousands of 11 and 12 year old girls having sex?)END-Sean is not hyper about teens having sex, he’s hyper about girls 11-12-13 going to a website that refers to “mutual masturbation” gay/lesbian sex….etc. I don’t know about you, but I have a daughter and I’d much rather have her learning about these topics at home where I was taught, my wife was taught, my Mom was taught. If that’s wrong..I’ll stay wrong. (Anything to take a shot at logical Conservative thinking, jerk! (6/6/13) SNIP-( "Corporate Suits" know not to have public hissy fits or to call names. You've been punked you little pussy. Stop believing your resume. No one else is. Upper-Management-Suit, Silver Springs, MD)END-Ummmmmmm hate to bust your bubble but UCS did NOT post that I did. BTW you’re a true phony-“ Upper-Management-Suit, Silver Springs,) A smart corporate suit would NEVER post such an asinine email, AND he/she would know it’s Silver Spring…NOT SPRINGS! Where do they drag these fakes from?? (6/6/13) last year WJLA had teamed up with Baltimore Ravens to show pre-season game on Thursday nights, which mean they pre-empted my ABC shows that night. With the sale of the station, I don't know if they can do that again this year (6/6/13) [RE WaPo paywall:] I think what they need to do is provide better analysis and coverage that is more in-depth than the whip-snap coverage internet sites tend to deliver. They need to take advantage of the extra time it takes them to deliver by providing MORE. (6/6/13) [RE WaPo paywall:] If they had more long form stories and moved from their far left bias to the center a little I would pay. Until then - no way. (6/6/13) [RE Naked man seen in WJLA stairwell this morning:] That nutty Arch Campbell (6/6/13) [RE Naked man seen in WJLA stairwell this morning:] why didnt Melaine say anything? (6/6/13) [RE Naked man seen in WJLA stairwell this morning:] Dave, I thought you lived in Herndon? (6/6/13) Which station will push the panic button hardest on........pretty much a lot of rain? I'm thinking WUSA9. (6/6/13) WRC had some great opening back in the day (6/6/13) Media General finally gets the Richmond TV its wanted since the 1940's. And, it's the one D. Tennant Bryan lusted after, until the FCC caved in politically and gerrymandered Richmond's 8 to Petersburg. OK... so the RF is on channel 22. But, the current Media General stockholders will only have 32.5% of the 'new' Media General. -Unsigned Corporate Suit (6/6/13) Larry, please, More E.W.! More E.W.! Brian, the telephone thing was first implemented under George W Bush, not Obama. Frontline did a piece on it in 2007. Why is Sean Hannity obsessed with teenage and preteen girls and sex? Isn't it concerning that when a man Sean's age sees anything related to teenage and preteen girls and educating them on their their bodies and reproductive health, the first thing Sean thinks of and starts talking about is thousands of 11 and 12 year old girls having sex? Once again, Sean Hannity is taking a needed health education system, and in his mind turning it into an orgy of One Direction fans. He is sick, and WMAL should not allow this disgusting man back on the radio after he revealed, again, his extremely warped and sexually deviant logic. Let mothers and doctors communicate to our daughters about their reproductive health and their bodies; Sean Hannity should not have a say in educating girls about their bodies and health. Let me be clear, for Sean Hannity, an uneducated man, to insert himself as an authority on the consequences of education to girls about their bodies is beyond reprehensible. His logic and associations were also very dangerous, and his recommendations would definitely lead to horrible unintended consequences if enough people believe this dingbat Hannity is correct. He overstepped any decency boundary yesterday on the radio (WMAL) when he equated education with promiscuous behavior, and it is beyond time WMAL pull the plug on this dangerous, unqualified, self centered, blabbering idiot. Society will be much better when Sean Hannity loses his forum. (6/6/13) My, oh, my Unsigned Corporate Suit having a hissy fit isn't very pretty. Not very "Corporate" and certainly not befitting of someone who claims to wear a "suit". You aren't " usually right on target" and now we see how you handle being corrected for a blatant factual mistake. Properly trained "Corporate Suits" know not to have public hissy fits or to call names. You've been punked you little pussy. Stop believing your resume. No one else is. Upper-Management-Suit, Silver Springs, MD (6/6/13) Regarding ownership of WMAL's Greentree Road site, I suggest you check Montgomery County land records. -Unsigned Corporate Suit (6/6/13) [RE WaPo Paywall:] I would only go to WaPo to read yesterday's news. If print media as well at local news wants to get back into the mainstream they need to go back to covering things before they happen, not after. Because I can get the info as it is going on, don't need them after the fact. (6/6/13) I see someone took a shot at Unsigned Corporate Suit for being incorrect about some “b” Chevy Chase movie. WTF? The guy is usually right on target with what’s happening/happened in the broadcast industry and he makes a mistake about some unknown film and suddenly he knows nothing. I think the poster of that stupid email is a wannabe Unsigned Corporate Suit. No, I think he’s a schmuck! (6/6/13) [RE DCRTV's Twitter & Facebook pages: Nice to hear Brian & Larry put some "thoughtful context" in girl's lung transplant story. Something missing from so much WMAL propaganda...] On a related story, I saw Chris Plante doing a debate segment w/ Megyn Kelly on FoxNews yesterday. This guy had a long, apparently very credible career covering the Pentagon. And he's Bill Plante's son, of CBS, if I'm correct about that. How did he become such a nut? Or is this showmanship for ratings? (6/6/13) DCRTV readers who have the hots for Wendy Rieger will want to see this 1989 cinema masterpiece made by local crackpot Eugene Delgaudio. Look for Wendy at 11:13. www.youtube.com ~~ Blair in Alexandria. (6/6/13) So before the Nats game F.P Santangelo and other Nats beat reporters are all tweeting about the huge fire a few blocks from Nats stadium where the smoke could be seen billowing over the back of the stadium. Do you think that MASN would show one shot of the smoke? Do you think that one mention would be made of one of the biggest fires in years? Of course not. (6/6/13) Dave, looks like the anchors at Fox5 are reading stuff on your site b/c Allison just made a comment regarding someone saying something on a site about her asking if an ELO song was pop. (6/6/13) Channel 4 news was running a recording of scanner radio chatter from the hardware store fire on Capitol Hill -- typical communication between the chief, dispatcher, and firefighters -- during its report. Was that audio legitimately released for broadcast by the DC Fire Dept.? I've been both a broadcaster and an Amateur operator for awhile now, and last I looked, FCC law said an intercepted radio communication could not be rebroadcast without permission. Only exception I know of is in the event of immediate severe danger or potential loss of life; neither of which I saw here. I'm fine with it if 4 got the OK to air it, but I want to be sure they got it. (6/6/13) Unsigned Corporate Suit, we'll forgive your Alzheimer's over Chevy Chase's first Movie. Maybe, if you weren't so busy obsessing over hobby sites and taking credit for things you didn't actually do, you could take just a few moments before posting and check Google for the information? Its become blatant that you are neither "corporate" and don't wear a "suit", but rather a tie and name tag. Here is Chevy Chase's first two movies/parts he played/date. - The Pro, Ashburn... 1968 Walk... Don't Walk He played "The Pedestrian"... 1974 The Groove Tube He was the Fingers/Geritan/Four Leaf Clover (6/6/13) I'm sure the good people of the Commonwealth of Virginia are so glad to know they have a fine, upstanding and rational candidate bearing the standard of the GOP. I cannot wait for WMAL's in-depth analysis of this brilliant theory. www.huffingtonpost.com (6/6/13) Why is Fox5 sending sports guy Dave Ross to Williamsburg, Va to cover a Jamestown excavation? (6/6/13) I too was disappointed with the sports folks covering the Ravens at the White House. Remember though a number of Baltimore sports reporters are local types who are not used to going to classy events. They are normally on a field. I bet most of them had to buy a suit. Reporting in Baltimore in general has lately turned into it's all about me. Some of that attitude you can blame on social media and some on poorly trained or inexperienced journalists. (6/6/13) UCS: On what basis do you make the statement "I know Disney/ABC still owns (WMAL's) Greentree Road"? You absolutely sure...enough to make a declaration in public like that? (6/6/13) /\ June 6 Messages /\ Messages from May 25 to June 5 can be reached HERE.....  |
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