Now many that know Cathy and me personally, know we go the distance. This request for your assistance is from two people who have a vehicle of RBR & TVBR and are trying to help and bring a Merry Christmas to 40 lonely soldiers in a far away place and seeing the worst of war. Will you help us to help the medics & soldiers during this Holiday Season?

Ship (via US mail only) to:
SFC Melick.
325th Field Hospital
APO AE 09355

Thank you and Merry Christmas
Jim & Cathy Carnegie

Many thanks for helping on this holiday request and you still have time:

325th Honor Roll
TM Century - Dave Graupner
Interep - George Pine and crew
10 WABC-TV - Pat Liguori
ABC Radio Networks /EXPN Radio - Walter "W" Price

We want to
hear from you.
This is your column, so send your comments to tvnews@rbr.com

This lawyer says FCC Chairman Michael Powell has changed his tune.
Harry F. Cole
Fletcher, Heald & Hildreth, P.L.C.
Arlington, VA | More... |

Indecency is always a hot topic...
Mike Padgett
Soft Rock 98.5 WTFM RADIO
| More... |

Divney named President/MTV Networks Ad Sales; Rohrer upped
Judy McGrath, Chairman and CEO, MTV Networks, named Larry Divney to President, MTV Networks Ad Sales. Additionally, Doug Rohrer has been named EVP/Senior Advisor to Divney focusing on a variety of areas including emerging new media platforms. Sue Danaher will continue in her current role and will also report directly to Divney. Divney will be responsible for managing the entire sales organization and its systems for all the company's cable and online businesses, including MTV, VH1, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, TV Land, CMT, Spike TV and LOGO. In addition, Divney will help to craft new sales strategies and ad sales systems for the company's many successful brands and businesses.

PPM costs could lead to two-tiered ratings
Radio group heads are choking on the 40-65% price hike that Arbitron is telling them will be needed to move to Portable People Meters (PPM) from diaries (12/17/04 RBR #245). But with advertisers and ad buyers demanding more accountability, there's pressure from the people who write the checks to move to PPM measurement. At Mindshare, Kathy Crawford, President of Local Broadcast, tells RBR that the radio industry has to make a decision. "Here's the thing, radio is at a very interesting crossroads in its life as a business. And it has to decide as an industry what it wants to be when it grows up. Or is it what it wants to be when it grows up? Is this it? I mean is this where radio is? Because they could do that too, and not invest in the PPM and not move ahead and just be a sleepy little media on the map there," she said of the decision to implement PPM or not for radio ratings. And, she noted, it's primarily up to the big players, Clear Channel and Infinity, whether to make the investment and lead radio into passive metering for ratings. "To be perfectly honest with you, I met with a major broadcaster who has stations in smaller markets rather than larger markets who made it very clear to me that only a small percentage of their business came from companies like Mindshare and, as a result, for them to be spending money on certain things for a small percentage of their business may not be prudent," Crawford said. So, she can envision a scenario where radio splits into different tiers - - with some markets using PPM (the grown-ups, so to speak) and the others sticking with low-tech diaries and, presumably, getting less interest from major ad buyers.

Plane crashes into KFI-AM LA tower; two dead
A small plane taking off from Fullerton, CA Airport struck one of CC Radio's KFI-AM LA radio towers in La Mirada, CA yesterday morning, exploding and killing both people aboard. The fire department says a man and a woman on board the small Cessna aircraft are confirmed dead, reports the AP. The plane knocked the 50-kW station off the air for an hour, KFI was back on the air shortly after. An F-A-A official in Los Angeles says the single-engine Cessna 182 struck the K-F-I Radio tower and the tower tumbled to the ground. The NTSB is investigating the cause of the crash.

News Years Media Resolution
We all in this media business must teach, help, push and encourage those of the new generation with the willingness to learn and who demonstrate with the passion for our broadcast medium the opportunities for self growth. We who must teach must also have patience and 55+ this is not easy but the will is there for tomorrow. In few days we will be in 2005 and the radio and television business are facing the new 5C's - Challenge yourself, Commitment, Content, Cross marketing and plat forming, and most of all using Common sense to re-establish each medium that has seen and is about to see its fare share of issues next year that are improved or like various species of animals become extinct. The key C that must be use in 2005 - (The Big C) - Common sense. 12/17/04 TVBR #245

Broadcast rights owners
ready to play hard ball
RBR/TVBR has heard and confirmed that broadcast station owners have gathered to form their own major league team to fight back and not let MLB just take its bats and balls over to XM. One broadcast rights owner told RBR/TVBR "Look for us to fight back early next year as MLB is in for a very big surprise."
TVBR observation: MLB has a lot to learn, especially the owners, that their marketing strategy is not hitting anything out of the park. The local city name is always before the teams. Pittsburgh Pirates, New York Yankees. Not Sirius Pirates or Yankees. The key if local broadcasters that really want MLB to be apart of their local programming content, which is always king, then best remind these owners and MLB of the facts of local radio and local TV does local promotions, local news, and local on air talent in radio and TV are the cheer leaders to put the local fans in the stands.
12/17/04 TVBR #245

Natalie Swed Stone
comments on Less is More
I would like to comment on the hoopla surrounding the Less Is More Initiative
1) It is an initiative in a medium that sorely needs revitalizing 2) Clear Channel is responding to widespread press and criticism about the rampant clutter on terrestrial radio 3) Clear Channel is attempting to prepare for the future - - both as it relates to minute by minute ratings and PPM as well as the threat from commercial free music on satellite radio and others 4) Clear Channel has the right to program its stations for maximum audience and attentiveness 5) Advertisers have the right to buy or not buy and negotiate price and position 6) Why is Clear Channel the target of all of this scrutiny while others and their policies, clutter and positioning go left unchallenged? 12/17/04 TVBR #245

RBR Close Up:
Hogan responds to Mandel comments on AAAAs letter, continued
Jon Mandel, Chairman of MediaCom US and Chief Global Buying Officer MediaCom, elaborated on the recent AAAAs letter sent to Clear Channel Radio CEO John Hogan and as we reported Mandel said in short - There are a lot of problems with what they're doing at Clear Channel.
TVBR observation: CC Radio has managed to put themselves on the radar screens of the AAAAs and important media people like Jon Mandel because of Less is More. Called - Accountability. RBR Recommendation to CCU: Better Talk, More Action, and Quality Marketing. Read inside because this is your 15 minutes of fame. 12/16/04 TVBR #244

RBR First Reported
Katz re-opening Eastman Radio
RBR/TVBR sources confirm that Eastman Radio Reps will be back in business, with Tucker Flood running the show. The move by Katz Radio Group is designed to placate some key clients - - including Saga, Cox, Citadel, Fisher and Nassau - - who've had some issues with the way Christal is being run within the Clear Channel/Katz Media empire. Some of the discontented groups had been pressuring Clear Channel to sell the independent reps to them, but as we reported a year ago, Mark Mays is resisting that idea. TVBR observation: Now the brouhaha - - apparently KRG honcho Stu Olds had not contacted all the groups involved. Next, what is slowing down the second part of the process is an internal fight over people because the people working in the trenches are the day to day producers for the rep firms' clients. 12/17/04 TVBR #244

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