Top rated radio host and often controversial, from Talk Radio Networks (TRN), Dr. Laura Schlesinger is giving up commercial radio broadcasting.
Her decision, which she announced on CNN’s Lary King Live last night (8/17/10), follows a storm of controversy and protests over her repeated use of the N-word during her phone-in program. Dr Laura later apologized, saying she had said “the wrong thing”.
Schlessinger told King: “I want to regain my First Amendment rights. I want to be able to say what’s on my mind and in my heart and what I think is helpful and useful without somebody getting angry, some special-interest group deciding this is the time to silence a voice of dissent and attack affiliates, attack sponsors. I’m sort of done with that.”
Schlessinger’s contract with TRN ends at the close of this year (2010) and will move her career to the internet. “I’m not retiring. I’m not quitting,” she said. “I feel energized actually, stronger and freer to say the things that I believe need to be said for people in this country.”
RBR-TVBR observation: In short Dr. Laura is leaving terrestrial radio and heading for the digital world of internet radio where, as she states: “to regain my First Amendment rights.” With Dr. Laura’s popularity and controversial stand on topics will be one of the first to establish her program content on the internet full time.
This is something RBR-TVBR has been encouraging all terrestrial radio to do is to establish what RBR-TVBR brands, radio’s ‘New Asset Value’.
Dr. Laura making this decision to depart one medium for what is called ‘New Media’ will most likely is a key to open radio operator’s eyes to the internet business. Station affiliates may even consider picking up her Internet stream once her program is on the air. Radio open your minds and eyes to the internet. Out of this controversy comes new business model and with it comes revenue.
