January 7, 2010

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NEWS Thursday, January 7, 2010 years old and I haven’t stopped since,” says the multifaceted performer whose singing career began in the ‘60s as a member of the Osmond Brothers. “You can’t beat hard work and that personal touch.” To bring the latter, Citadel Media is making the show available in two versions: voice tracked via FTP site for stations to customize and add their own music, or as a fully-produced, satellite-delivered network show. Most are opting for the network version. Osmond tells Inside Radio he’ll cut station IDs and promos for affiliates. “Whatever is happening locally, I will cut those pieces for individual stations. Part of making the show successful is making sure it’s localized.” Osmond will also stage contests to fly winners to Las Vegas to see the Donny & Marie show at the Flamingo and offer other “carrots to make it entertaining and a little different than the other guy.” Osmond says his “non-celebrity lifestyle” — he mows his own lawn — will help him relate to listeners. “I can tell legitimate stories about a real person washing my car or filling it with gas, yet I can also talk about what happened behind the scenes of ‘Dancing With The Stars’ and performing for the Queen of England.” His timing couldn’t be better, coming on the heels of a “Dancing With The Stars” win, which made for Thanksgiving week’s most popular prime-time TV program, according to Nielsen. Osmond: “I’ve always wanted to do something like this.” Donny Osmond’s on-air arrival is the latest example of the medium seeking fresh talent from outside the business. Conversations began one year ago, when consultant Mike McVay, in search of “a celebrity who could also be an entertaining radio personality,” approached the performer. The two met in Las Vegas last March and talks continued. Among the discussions that lead to the announcement by Citadel Media and McVay Syndication were how to work a five-hour weekday radio show into Osmond’s Las Vegas workload — he performs a live show with sister Marie at the Flamingo Tuesday through Saturday evenings. A sound booth was added to his Flamingo dressing room. Osmond, who also has a home recording studio, says he can produce the show “anywhere I’m at” with a laptop, microphone and internet connection. The former teen idol that scored his first #1 with “One Bad Apple” in 1971 has a special affection for radio. “It was radio that brought me back into the limelight when everybody else wrote me off,” he says of his 1989 comeback “Soldier Of Love,” which went top 20 at AC after he traveled from station to station, working the song. More than a decade later, Citadel Media senior VP of programming Carl Anderson believes radio is ready to embrace Osmond in a different context. “Stations dealing with economic conditions that often times cannot afford the talent that Donny brings are now able to have access to a superstar like him in the form of a customized show.” Inside Radio Survey: Most employees don’t blame management for cutbacks. Layoffs, smaller paychecks and lost 401(k) employer contributions aside, a vast majority of radio employees don’t appear to be holding a grudge against their company’s management team. A survey of Inside Radio readers finds three-quarters believe management is suffering along with everyone else. That is down slightly from one year ago when 84% said everyone was feeling the recession’s pinch. That’s not to say everyone is happy. One survey respondent says managers of bankrupt companies who still get bonuses “deserve a long, slow burn in hell.” More from the Inside Radio survey tomorrow. Pandora takes its first step into the dashboard. It won’t be widely available or cheap, but it’s a start for webcaster Pandora, which believes web radio in the car is just a matter of time. The company has struck a deal with Pioneer to detect its settings when iPhone users plug into the Pioneer AVIC-X920BT. The devices allow users to easily reach their favorite Pandora webcasts, although its main function is an in-car navigation system. It also includes other options, including HD Radio and Sirius XM Radio. The navigation system goes on sale in March and it won’t be mass-appeal product, costing $1,200. The Wall Street Journal reports no money changed hands between Pandora and Pioneer. Nielsen: One-third of consumers willing to pay for online radio. With marketers spending less on advertising just as inventory across multiple platforms has never been more abundant, media companies are considering new revenue models to monetize content. Premium content freely given away on the web may eventually come with a price tag. The Wall Street Journal has charged for certain portions of its coverage for several years and now other newspapers are following suit. A MORE NEWS >> InsideRadio.com page
NEWS Thursday, January 7, 2010 Nielsen survey of more than 27,000 consumers in 54 countries examined attitudes about paying for online content The findings show that many consumers are willing to pay for online content — or are open to increased advertising to pick up the costs. But attitudes vary greatly by geography, demographics and content type. Consumers show a higher propensity to pay for music, movies, games and professionally produced video than for podcasts, blogs or consumer-generated video, the report says. Likewise, they are more inclined to spend money on what they already pay for, rather than on what they currently get for free. Of 13 content types surveyed, music and theatrical movies finished first with 57% of global respondents saying they have paid or would consider paying for them. Music radio finished eighth (32%) and news/talk radio finished 11th (26%). “Across geographies, demographics and content types, consumers think very differently about how they’ll pay for content,” Nielsen director of cross platform insights Nic Covey says. “Accordingly, monetization models will have to be flexible — there will have to be more, not fewer, options to supporting the cost of content.” The banks behind Border Media Partners aren’t just selling — they’re also buying. Lenders seizing control typically means the liquidation of a company. But six months after a consortium of banks took over Border Media Partners, their plans include buying stations. Border Media Partners began operating two Austin AMs at the beginning of the month, and it will pay nearly $2 million for the stations under a deal with Simmons Media. Border adds “ESPN 1530” KZNX and ESPN Deportes affiliate KWNX (1260). Broker Larry Patrick gets more than credit for the sale. He gets control of the Border Media Business Trust. “The lenders are willing to invest in the stations,” says Patrick, “The have the patience to wait for a rebound, when cash flows come up and prices come back.” The plan is to focus operations on Austin and San Antonio, while selling stations in Waco, McAllen-Brownsville and Laredo. The first deal spins-off Spanish adult hits “Radio Amistad” KFON, Austin to Richard Oppenheimer-led REO Radio Group for $1.4 million. Oppenheimer also owns religious “The Word” KLGO (99.3) in the market, and plans to flip KFON to a Spanish religious format. Patrick tells Inside Radio a deal to sell Waco standalone regional Mexican “La Ley 104.1” KWOW, Clifton, TX will be announced within the next few days and a sale of its Rio Grande Valley clusters is expected by month’s end. By one appraisal, Border Media Partners is worth $100 million. But the six-year old company’s debt totals nearly $200 million, which is owed to Goldman Sachs, Vestar Capital Partners, D.B. Zwirn, Fortress Partners Capital, Bernard Global Loan Investors and Canpartners Investments. Alaska’s EAS test deemed success despite a handful of radio glitches. Radio easily proved its reliability in a crisis as a first-ever live test of the EAS using the Emergency Action Notification (EAN) event code proved the system designed to give the President access to the airwaves in a national crisis works. “It was a success,” says Alaska Broadcasters Association executive director Darlene Simono. The EAS went out from Washington, DC at 10:01am Alaska Standard Time and lasted for two and a half minutes before the end code put local programming back on the air. The test wasn’t without some glitches. An Anchorage station didn’t air the alert because the daisy-chained signal was too weak to activate its EAS software. A snow storm that hit the market yesterday may’ve had an impact. A bigger issue was the state’s largest cable company never received the alert. More than 300 Alaska residents have already filed reports saying they heard or viewed the message. Since its creation in 1963, the emergency broadcast network has never been tested with a live EAN code. The FCC is working with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to build the next generation alert system. Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau chief Jamie Barnett says, “We will need some time to analyze the results, but we intend to move quickly to improve the system.” The agency’s annual EAS Summit is scheduled for February 28. A national EAS test will be conducted later this year. Ed Schultz could be North Dakota’s next Senator. Following the playbook that got former Air America Radio host Al Franken elected to the Senate in Minnesota, Democrats next door in North Dakota have approached Ed Schultz. They’re asking the Dial Global talk personality to consider running for the seat being vacated by Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND). Schultz isn’t ruling it out. “I’m flattered — I can’t say that I’m even considering it right now,” he told MSNBC yesterday. But while he’s a “long way” from any decision, Schultz seems reluctant to give up his radio and television shows. “I’ve invested a MORE NEWS >> InsideRadio.com page
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Page 7 and 8: RESEARCH Thursday, January 7, 2010

January 7, 2010

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