The Wires (Jan 3, 2009)

ZDNet: System Explorer 1.5. This full-featured system analyzing tool lets you take a sneak peek at everything that's going on in your system, from currently active processes to installed drivers, including also network collections, startup applications and any Internet Explorer add-ons. License: Free. OS: Windows XP/Vista.

Seattle PI: The impact of declining revenue and tighter budgets is showing up on the radio dial in ways listeners notice. Steve Slaton, one of the veterans of Seattle rock radio, was let go from KZOK-FM/102.5. Meanwhile, an industry trade publication reported this week that more cuts might be coming out of a meeting of Clear Channel managers in early January.

From RadioandRecords: New VP of programming Hal Brown announces changes at Broadcast Company of the Americas sports XEPRS/San Diego as afternoon drive is taken over by "The Bleacher Bums," featuring co-hosts Jordan Smith and Irwin Earl Milan, a pair of long-time callers to the station. Brown fills out the rest of the station lineup with former afternoon co-host Darren Smith taking over noon to 3 p.m. and former midday co-host Coach Kentera grabbing 7 p.m. to midnight.

From All Access: Net Standards Format Finds A Terrestrial Home. STANDARD MEDIA GROUP Internet radio station MARTINIINTHEMORNING.COM has found a second home -- on a terrestrial radio station. As of JANURY 1st, it can also be heard on CONTINENTAL BROADCASTING previously Talk KPHX-A/PHOENIX. Based in NORTH HOLLYWOOD, CA, the MARTINIINTHEMORNING.COM format was conceived by former CLEAR CHANNEL programmer Brad Chambers, who has created a "Classic Cool" of Contemporary Standards that features legends FRANK SINATRA, DEAN MARTIN, ELLA FITZGERALD along with more contemporary figures such as MICHAEL BUBLE, HARRY CONNICK JR., DIANA KRALL and ROD STEWART.

The Wires (Jan 2, 2009)

Arizona Biz: Debbie Wagner, who has spent all but 14 months of her 29-year media career in Tucson - and is as responsible as any executive for the success of the “Johnjay and Rich” morning radio show - has left the market. She was promoted by her bosses to take over as president and market manager of Clear Channel Communications’ seven radio stations in San Diego

AP: TIME WARNER CABLE subscribers rang in the new year still being able to watch MTV, VH1 and all VIACOM content, as the cable system reached a deal not long after a midnight deadline set LAST NIGHT (12/31) to continue carriage. The deal's terms were not disclosed, the AP reports, and details still must still be finalized.

San Diego Reader: Cover Story About Local Radio (Jan 1, 2009)

Excerpts: Why is radio under duress these days? The first inklings of turmoil began in 1996 with the Telecommunications Act, which deregulated the ownership structure of public media and opened the gates to corporate takeovers of local radio stations as investments. Jacor Communications was the first media conglomerate to own a pocketful of radio stations, purchasing 9 of them in the 1990s, including 91X. A decade of wheeling and dealing has meant that a lot of deejays and program directors have quit or been laid off. Firing and laying off locals is indicative of big changes in the scope and identity of San Diego radio, local or corporate, music or talk. In a recession, local program directors seek to jettison local talent as too expensive. Most news stories about radio these days highlight the demise of terrestrial radio. By one estimate, its audience has dropped by 22 percent since 1999. Earlier this year, Arbitron and Edison Media Research reported that 54 million Americans, almost one in four radio listeners, tune in to radio on the Internet every month. Our fair city has 13 AM and 27 FM stations. These are devoted to sports, talk, and music, the latter comprising several formats: adult contemporary, contemporary hits, smooth jazz, urban, country, rock, and alternative.

Some of radio’s growing pains may soon ease. David Tanny, a San Diego radio blogger since 1999, says that he’s waiting for the “convergence,” when listeners can get Internet radio away from a computer — in a car or on a portable device. That will, Tanny says, “put terrestrial radio in a heap of trouble.” iRoamer, billed as the world’s first universal Internet radio platform, has been launched in Australia, according to Computerworld Australia. For a small fee, it will “give wireless Internet radio capabilities to almost any consumer electronic device, such as portable media players, hi-fi systems, set-top boxes, IPTV units, car-radio products,” as well as iPhones. “A customizable Internet media aggregation portal” — a phrase that crawled out of a Philip K. Dick novel — will allow “users to listen to live radio in real time from anywhere.”

Read the whole article and comment on it at this link:

Why Local Radio Is No Longer Local

Funds Raised From Not Buying the Union-Tribune (Jan 1, 2009)

Issues not purchased: 12/1-12/31: 23x$0.75 + 4x$1.75 = $17.25 + $7.00 = $24.25

Total savings for the year of 2008: $170.75

That was enough in savings to afford lifetime alignment for my car, plus an oil change. I need money more than David Copley does. If you have money to spare, send it to me instead of buying the SD Union-Tribune.

The Wires (Jan 1, 2009)

TV Tech: FCC Releases List of Eligible 'Nightlight' Analog Stations. “Nightlight” stations are not allowed to program anything other than emergency announcements and DTV transition information on their analog channels after Feb. 17.

TV Tech: Don't Forget to Add a Leap Second Tonight! Failure to catch the leap second shouldn't take stations off the air, but if not handled correctly it could cause automated switching between programming and station breaks to look sloppy.

TV Tech: Looking Back on 2008... And Forward to 2009. If 2008 was a hectic year, 2009 promises to be at least as challenging, with the analog shutdown and many stations scrambling to switch DTV channels and educate viewers about the change.

TV Tech: FCC Maps Show Where DTV Coverage Doesn't Match Analog. One of the lessons learned in the Wilmington, N.C., analog shutdown was that digital coverage doesn't always replicate a stations' analog coverage, especially when the two transmitters are at different locations.

TV Tech: MLB Network Throws Opening Pitch on Jan. 1. While it’s not yet clear exactly how many homes the new sports venue will pass, MLB officials predict it will be as many as 50 million at its launch this week.

Kurt Hanson: NPR has launched "Mix Your Own Podcast," a service that lets listeners build a personalized podcast feed. Listeners build a list of preferred content online, based on topic, reporter, or station . Any NPR podcast that includes the selected content is then automatically added to the personalized podcast feed. Read more about the pending legislation in today's issue of RAIN : Radio And Internet Newsletter, at http://www.kurthanson.com.

Tom Taylor: Clear Channel summons its GMs to a meeting in Dallas next Tuesday and Wednesday. Decisionmaking will be handled by corporate. The advance word? High-priced talent which isn’t delivering the ratings may be gone. The local managers are being given a list of how their employees rank in terms of effectiveness, suggesting that the lowest ranked may be fired. If someone isn't doing their job in their on-air shift, then they could be fired and be replaced with a syndicated or voice-tracked show.

NY Daily News: TV wasn't so great in '08 - and here's 10 reasons why -- It's not hard to find bad TV, since whole networks seem to specialize in it. The frustrating part is programs or moments that should have been better than they were

Advertising Age: Viacom is threatening to pull all 19 MTV Networks, including MTV, Nickelodeon and Comedy Central, off Time Warner Cable systems seconds after midnight Jan. 1 unless the cable operator agrees to a hefty fee increase

Randy Dotinga: 2008 Through The Rear View Mirror.

Top Three Reasons To Watch Marley and Me

2. Good For the Whole Family.

3. 13 Year Old Boys Sitting In the Rear Seats are too overinfatuated With Jennifer Aniston!

The Top 10 Favorite Celebrity Babes of 2008*

9. Mila Kunis

8. Courtney Cox

7. Tina Fey

6. Valerie Bertinelli

5. Sarah Palin

4. Alyssa Milano

3. Susan Lucci

2. Julia Louis-Dreyfus

1. Jennifer Aniston

* = requirement: they have to be seen by the author.

The Top 10 Worst Years Ever

9. 1969

8. 1971

7. 1981

6. 1991

5. 1983

4. 1993

3. 1974

2. 1979

1. 2008