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Welcome to RBR's Daily Epaper
Volume 24, Issue 142, Jim Carnegie, Editor & Publisher
Monday Morning July 23rd, 2007

Radio News ®

Clear Channel says Indy problem was misunderstanding
The four radio companies caught up in the infamous New York payola dragnet agreed to provide 4.2K hours of airtime for musical acts signed to independent labels. Suddenly Clear Channel, good for 1.6K of the hours, found itself under fire for allegedly attempting to cut the artists out of royalties. Saying it never intended to harm independent artists, CCU has waived the waiver. The Future of Music Coalition had charged that a Clear Channel policy appeared to require "local, unsigned and independent musicians to grant a royalty-free right and license to the music upon submission to the radio programmers, which would appear to violate the voluntary agreement they entered into following the settlement." FMC called it an alternative form of payola, and quickly found a champion on Capitol Hill in the person of Russ Feingold (D-WI), who promptly fired off a letter to four radio group CEOs involved in payola consent decrees seeking information on the how the terms were being met. According to FMC, the clause artists were asked to sign off on was this: "You grant to Clear Channel the royalty-free non-exclusive right and license, in perpetuity (unless terminated earlier by You or Clear Channel as set forth below) to use, copy, modify, adapt, translate, publicly perform, digitally perform, publicly display and distribute any sound recordings, compositions, pictures, videos, song lyrics, still images..." The Dallas Observer says this clause has been dropped. According to Reuters, Clear Channel says it never had any other intention than to fulfill its part of the bargain with the FCC and was not intending to profit from its relationship with the artists involved. "This is a perfect example of no good deed goes unpunished," said CCU's Andrew Levin.

Action still in small markets
Look for June revenues to be down 2% when RAB issues its monthly report, says CL King analyst Jim Boyle. But he notes continued strength in smaller markets, where Arbitron markets #76 and smaller were up 6% for the month, while their cousins in the top 25 fell 6%, based on his data gathering. June, Boyle notes, is the second biggest revenue month of the year for radio, behind May, and the small and mid markets have now beaten the big markets 15 times in the last 17 months. "Apparently it is better to be in Des Moines than Detroit or operate in Lafayette than LA for revenue growth prospects, according to the market data," Boyle told clients. The analyst continues to believe that 2007 is shaping up to be the 7th year in a row of "slow-to-no growth" for radio. Is going private the answer? "When and if some radio companies decide to offer investors a significant premium near term to go private, even patient investors may have a very hard decision [to make] about the prospective long-term rebounds of individual companies in a seemingly mature media business versus taking the cash," he concluded.

RBR observation: Why is it better to be in markets #76 and below? No real good reason but the true answer, those market operators have to operate their stations and truly work for a living. They are local and being local means being out serving and promoting to your market. Most of the operators RBR speaks with in those markets are doing what they do best and that is local. They do not pay attention to the top 10 markets. As one operator said, "What new idea has come out of NYC, Chicago, or LA in the last 2 years? Zip!" Know something, that operator is right.


Investor ups pressure on Regent
Riley Investment Management isn't backing down from its efforts to force a sale of the assets of Regent Communications (4/5/07 RBR #67). In its latest move, Riley is seeking to expand the Regent board of directors and place four people of its choosing in the new seats. In its latest SEC filing, Riley says it now owns 7.4% of Regent's public stock, up from the 6.5% it held in April. In a letter dated July 19th and headed "Demand to call a special meeting," Riley requested that Regent call a special meeting of shareholders for September 3rd in Cincinnati to amend the company's bylaws and elect John Ahn, Bob D'Agostino, Jared Davis and Joseph Patrick Hannan to the board of directors. They would fill four proposed new seats, expanding the board to nine members from the current five. The immediate reaction from Regent CEO Bill Stakelin was to shrug off the dissident shareholder, telling RBR that the company had not received a legitimate request for a special meeting. "When and if we do the company will respond and deal with it," he said in an email.

RBR observation: Riley's letter indicates that it is no longer acting alone. It requests that Regent management set the meeting for September 3rd, as requested, upon receipt of requests from shareholders holding a total of 20% of Regent's stock. That seems to indicate that Riley has lined up support from shareholders with at least 12.6% of Regent's stock in addition to that held by Riley. We wait to see if those other letters are forthcoming.

FCC road show headed for Windy City
The sixth and final FCC forum on media ownership is going to be held in Chicago on 9/20/07. As in the five previous public meetings, it will offer local citizens to weigh in on the topic of media ownership in general and to discuss issues of particular interest to that market. Chicago is the nation's third largest media market behind New York and Los Angeles, and it has a relatively long history of being a home to Hispanic media, something that is a work in progress in many markets. It is home to a very unusual radio/TV/newspaper cross-ownership triumvirate (WGN-AM, WGN-TV & the Chicago Tribune), owned by Tribune (the status of all five Trib cross-owned media combinations is under review). Previous hearings have been held in Los Angeles CA, Nashville TN, Harrisburg PA, Tampa FL and Portland ME.

RBR observation: While this event should wrap up Martin's promise of six public forums on ownership as the Commission considers the remand of its 6/2/03 ownership proceeding, it still leaves undone a pair of public outings on localism which were kicked off under Michael Powell's tenure. We would also note that this venue will skew the proceeding toward the large end of the spectrum. LA and Chicago are among the largest markets in the nation; Tampa is in the top 20, Nashville the top 50 and Harrisburg is around the 75 mark. The smallest, Portland, is Arbitron #167 as of Fall 2006, putting it on the large end of the small market spectrum. We suspect there will be some disappointed senators that the process didn't get into sub-200 territory. But maybe Martin will be able to deal with that omission if and when he gets around to the localism hearings. But we wouldn't get too worked up about it in any case - no matter where it's held and what its nominal topic is, it would figure to be a rerun of all that went before, for the most part.


Wall Street Media Business Report TM
Google miss shocks Wall Street
Google shares dropped more than 6% at the opening Friday and recovered only slightly in trading, after the company's Q2 results issued after the market close on Thursday shocked investors by coming up short of expectations. CEO Eric Schmidt insists all is well, saying he was happy that the company paid out more than expected to hire top-notch new employees. At the end of Q2 Google had a payroll of 13,786, up 13% from Q1. But what about revenues? Google still has lots of cash rolling in. Revenues of 2.72 billion in Q2 were slightly ahead of Wall Street expectations. But, of interest to RBR readers, there were concerns that the revenue growth rate for Google's advertising partner programs slowed to 36% from a year ago, compared to Q1 growth of 45%.

RBR observation: Google isn't going away by any stretch of the imagination. It is still a very profitable company, still a pretty fast growing company and its stock price is still way over 500 bucks. But because of its astounding success, Google faces lots of competition. The bigger you get, the harder it is to sustain double digit growth rates. That explains why Schmidt is willing to pay up to hire top talent instead of letting them go to those new competitors. That's also why Google has been so acquisitive, buying dMarc, YouTube and, if regulators approve, DoubleClick, just to name a few.


Ad Business Report TM

Chrysler ad goes over the edge
Reacting to public outcry, Chrysler Group has nixed an "edgy" ad that had aired in the Netherlands, showing a dog electrocuted when it urinated on a Dodge Nitro. Chrysler said the ad was also removed from YouTube, but we found at least one posting still available on Friday. At headquarters in Detroit, the company was in damage control mode. "Chrysler Group was dismayed to discover today that an advertisement created by an ad agency supporting our Netherlands Market Performance Center goes far beyond the bounds of what the company considers appropriate. The advertisement for the new Dodge Nitro, recently introduced into the market, which includes fictional yet inappropriate treatment of an animal, is in extremely bad taste," said a statement from Jason Vines, Vice President Communications, for the Chrysler Group. "Although European commercials - especially 'viral' ads like this one - are often edgier, this one went over the edge. Chrysler Group is investigating the origins of this commercial," he added.


Media Business Report TM
Usual echo chamber, hold the megaphone
The world of talk followed standard operating procedure during the week of 7/8-13/07. It took to top news story of the week and bumped up the volume on it. But unlike most weeks, it was content to bump it up just the tiniest little bit. Straight news outlets gave Iraq policy 20% of coverage, and talkers upped that slightly to 22%. The pattern held for the 2008 campaign as well, which got 7% of the news hole and 8% of the talk hole. Here's the difference, though. The campaign was the #2 news story, but only came in #3 on the talk chart, after the domestic terror threat, #2 with 9% after getting only #4/4% of the news focus. Other terror and Middle East topics all competed with various other topics for small slices of the coverage pie.


Media Markets & Money TM
Second AM for Big Easy operators
MCDJ LLC, an ownership group including W. Christopher Beary, Mary Latter, Joseph A. Kunstler and David Rubin, is reaching into the northern fringes of the New Orleans market to take WASO-AM out of receivership. The station, licensed to Covington LA about 40 miles north of town, is coming from Claude C. Lightfoot, receiver for America First Communications. Lightfoot has been in charge of the station since 6/17/05. All four of the principals of MCDJ have a stake in Northshore Radio LLC (Beary has 22%, the others each hold 6% apiece for a 40% total), licensee of WGSO-AM. The price for WASO is 578,100.


Washington Media Business Report TM
FEC gets ready to
translate court ruling

The Supreme Court ruled last month that corporations and unions have wide discretion in the funding and airing of issue-oriented advertising. "Where the First Amendment is implicated, the tie goes to the speaker, not the censor," wrote Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, slapping down a major provision of the McCain-Feingold Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act. But it will fall to the Federal Election Commission to translate the Court's action into a new set of rules of the road. "The FEC intends to make clear how we are interpreting this exemption before mid-December, when the electioneering communication timeframes for the 2008 campaign will begin." said FEC Chairman Robert Lenhard. "We believe it is critical to have a clear rule in place in time for the Presidential primaries and caucuses in early 2008." It will be the topic of a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, which the FEC hopes to get under way in August. If you plan to comment in this, the FEC is essentially giving notice to start putting your thoughts in order. An August NPRM would tie into a September due date for public remarks.

RBR observation: Looking at the practical aspects of this, we'd say it's somewhat of a double-edged sword. On the plus side, such organizations will have no claim whatsoever to lowest unit rate and other such perks enjoyed by actual candidates. It probably translates into more money. But does it? It could simply mean more pressure on inventory and potentially strained relationships with regular year-round customers. If you have any ideas you think the FEC should consider, your chance is coming up soon.


Engineering Business Report TM
Martin's side channel proposal
up for comment

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin put forward a notion which he thinks could be a wedge toward increasing the presence of small businesses, and by extension, business owned by minorities and females, on to television airspace and cable channel lineups. It involves the leasing of digital side-channels, and it is up for comment. Martin's proposal, which he began talking about publicly in the spring of this year, is to use the ability of a digital television station to multicast six or more separate program streams at the same time, when not broadcasting high-definition programming. Whether or not multicast side channels must be carried by in-market cable systems remains one of the pending issues awaiting resolution prior to the digital deadline of 2/17/09. Under Martin's proposal, if a television licensee were to lease a side channel to a small-, minority- and female-owned company, the leased channel would be subject to must-carry. The problem with increasing minority presence on the airwaves is the lack of spectrum. In a regulatory environment which offers few tools to increase minority participation in broadcasting, Martin sees the digital side channel proposal as a way to increase diversity on the airwaves (along with pushing to increase the number of LPFM stations). The proceeding is filed under MB Docket No. 07-42, an NPRM "regarding leased commercial access and the development of competition and diversity in video programming distribution and carriage." Comments are due 9/4/07, and reply comments are to follow on 9/21/07.

RBR observation: This sounds like a very reasonable idea to us. What can it hurt? We can see the cable industry opposing it since they're opposed to any kind of coerced multicast carriage, but other than that, what would the objections be?


TVBR TV News
DTV transition still has doubters
The Senate Commerce Committee is going to grill an as-yet-unnamed panel on the progress being made toward 2/17/09, when analog broadcast television is scheduled to become a matter of history. The prospect of millions of analog receivers suddenly going blank still has many people in fret mode. Media Access Project's Andrew Schwartzman addressed the topic at the Minority Media & Telecommunications Council Access to Capital confab, according the National Journal, and he was worried that the people who most need to get the message that analog receivers will soon be going blank are also the least likely to get the message. His views were echoed by former FCC Commissioner Gloria Tristani. They predict that one problem will be getting first come, first serve set-top digital-to-analog converters to the right people and in sufficient numbers. Officials with NTIA and NAB's David Rehr took exception to that view, however. Rehr said everyone with a stake in this needs to help, but expressed frustration with people who "...tell us all the things we should be doing."

TVBR observation: The bottom line is that this is a bread-and-butter issue for broadcasters. We know that the FCC and NTIA have roles to play, and that John Dingell (D-MI) and Ed Markey (D-MA) are likely to find FCC Chairman Kevin Martin considerably more cash than the Commission currently has to spend on the effort. But the real push will likely come from broadcasters themselves. We suspect that every broadcast outlet that wishes to remain solvent on 2/18/09 will be pushing this message just as hard as it can. There are particular worries about Spanish-speakers. Does anybody truly believe that Univision is going to keep this a secret from its audience? The bottom line is that there are sure to be glitches, oversights and other errors associated with the transition. Since the demand for set-top boxes is a matter of educated guesswork, we would recommend that digital receiver sales be closely monitored and that Congress line up a source of additional funding to tap if needed. But we suspect that the transition will be relatively pain free, since the people controlling the medium - broadcasters - are the ones who will be kicked in the wallet if it is not.


Monday Morning Makers & Shakers

Transactions: 6/4/07-6/8/07
After a rip-roaring month of May with trading measuring well into the billions of dollars, it would only be natural to expect this frenetic pace to scale back a little bit. During the first full business week of June, it scaled back alright, almost all the way to the sub-discernible pulse level. Suffice it to say that most weeks, a mid-range deal would eclipse the total value filed with the FCC during this week.

6/4/07-6/8/07

Total

Total Deals

10

AMs

4

FMs

8

TVs

0
Value
5.762M
| Complete Charts |
Radio Transactions of the Week
Noalmark expands in NM
| More...
|
TV Transactions of the Week
This marks the beginning of a June lengthy nap
| More...
|


Transactions
47M KNOE-TV Monroe LA-El Dorado AR (El Dorado AR, CBS Ch.8). 100% of Noe Corporation LLC from Betty S. Noe, Indepentent Executrix/Trustee to Hoak Media LLC (Eric Van Den Branden). 2.35M escrow, balance in cash at closing. [File date 6/25/07.]

3.085M WXPH-FM Harrisburg-Lebanon-Carlisle PA (Harrisburg PA) from The Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania (Lori Doyle, VP) to Four Rivers Community Broadcasting Corporation (Charles W. Loughery, pres). Cash plus trade of WZXM-FM Middletown PA in same market. Transaction between two non-commerical entities. [File date 6/26/07.]

N/A WZXM-FM Harrisburg-Lebanon-Carlisle PA (Middletown PA) from Four Rivers Community Broadcasting Corporation (Charles W. Loughery, pres) to The Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania (Lori Doyle, VP). Trade of WXPH-FM Harrisburg PA in same market; U or PA also receives 3.085M cash. Transaction between two non-commerical entities. [File date 6/27/07.]

N/A WPBH-FM Panama City (Port St. Joe FL) from Citicasters Licenses LP, a subsidiary of Clear Channel Communications Inc. (Mark Mays) to Aloha Station Trust LLC (Jeanette Tully). Stations going into trust pending sale. [File date 6/25/07.]


Stock Talk
Back to earth
Earnings misses by Google and Caterpillar sent stocks lower on Friday. The Dow Industrials retreated from Thursday's record 14K close and ended the day down 149 points, or 1.1%, at 13,851.

Radio stocks were down pretty much across the board. The Radio Index fell 2.598, or 1.7%, to 148.893. The lone gainer was Beasley, up 1.6%. The biggest loser among the radio groups was Entravision, down 4.8%. Google, which we follow for its radio ad sales operation, was down 5.2%.


Radio Stocks

Here's how stocks fared on Friday

Company Symbol Close Change Company Symbol Close Change

Arbitron

ARB

52.50

-1.51

Google

GOOG

520.12

-28.47

Beasley

BBGI

8.52

+0.13

Hearst-Argyle

HTV

23.13

-0.40

CBS CI. B CBS

34.73

-0.19

Journal Comm.

JRN

12.42

-0.28

CBS CI. A CBSa

34.75

-0.15

Lincoln Natl.

LNC

65.76

-1.69

Citadel CDL
5.99 -0.06

Radio One, Cl. A

ROIA

6.96

-0.05

Clear Channel

CCU

37.57

-0.22

Radio One, Cl. D

ROIAK

7.03

-0.01

Cox Radio

CXR

13.73

-0.09

Regent

RGCI

3.35

-0.03

Cumulus

CMLS

8.37

-0.40

Saga Commun.

SGA

8.83

-0.07

Debut Bcg.

DBTB

1.80

-0.01

Salem Comm.

SALM

10.50

-0.22

Disney

DIS

34.34

-0.13

Sirius Sat. Radio

SIRI

3.12

-0.07

Emmis

EMMS

8.59

-0.18

Spanish Bcg.

SBSA

3.76

-0.31

Entercom

ETM

23.74

-0.47

SWMX

SMWX

0.15

-0.03

Entravision

EVC

10.43

-0.52

Westwood One

WON

5.47

-0.11

Fisher

FSCI

49.96

-0.26

XM Sat. Radio

XMSR

12.65

-0.25


Bounceback

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Below the Fold
Ad Business Report
Chrysler ad goes over the edge
Reacting to public outcry, Chrysler Group has nixed an "edgy" ad...

Media Business Report
Usual echo chamber
Hold the megaphone the world of talk followed standard...

Media Markets & Money
Second AM for
Big Easy operators MCDJ LLC is reaching into the northern fringes of...

Engineered for Profit
Martin's side channel
Proposal up for comment...




Stations for Sale

New Hampshire
AM/FM combo

First Class facilities in NH's
fastest growing area. Double
digit increases last 6 years.
Priced at 10x trailing BCF $4.99MM
Inquiries 781-848-4201 or
E-mail: [email protected]
WEB: radiostationsforsale.net

Hispanic Stations-Connecticut
Two full-time established AM stations serving the Hartford & Bridgeport Markets.
Contact Dick Kozacko,
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607-733-7138,
[email protected]

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More News Headlines

EMI buyout drags on...and on
If nothing else, Terra Firma may set the world record for the slowest corporate buyout ever. Now that Warner Music Group has said it will not make a bid for EMI group, the meager number of shares tendered for the Terra Firma buyout has surged past 26%. But there's still a long way to go and Terra Firma has again extended the deadline - to July 29th. It was back in May that Terra Firma, a UK-based private equity firm, won an open auction for EMI Group. But almost immediately rumors began to swirl that Warner Music Group (WMG), which had not participated in the auction, was working to put together a topper bid. WMG later encouraged that view by publicly stating that it was still interested in making a bid. Former EMI CEO Jim Fifield was also out seeking backing to make his own bid. That kept acceptances of the Terra Firma offer down in the single digits while shareholders waited to see if either would step up to the plate. But with a bid of nearly five billion bucks on the table, British regulators stepped in and activated a legal deadline by which all counter-offers would be due. Both WMG and Fifield backed out last week, leaving only the Terra Firma offer. Even so, only a minority of shares have been tendered. We wait to see how much that grows by July 29th.

Arrest in Mike
Webb murder

Police in Seattle have made an arrest in the murder of radio talk host Mike Webb, whose body was found last month (7/2/07 RBR #128) after he disappeared in April. According to KIRO-TV, 28-year-old Scott White has confessed to killing Webb. White is said to have lived in Webb's home while trying to recover from drug addition. Webb, himself a recovering addict, had befriended several such people over the years.




SmartMedia Magazine


Coming in September
FALL NAB ISSUE
SPECIAL DISTRIBUTION:
NAB RADIO SHOW

Radio Roundtable:
Radio execs find solutions.

Media Markets and Money:
What's attractive to equity capital these days?

Ad Biz:
Gennele Niblack, Katz Political President

Sales:
Dial Global's Eileen Decker on radio ad sales

News/Talk:
Using your website to get, keep and grow your audiences

Political Advertising:
Greg Pinello, GMMB: Political dollars for radio: The need for there to be more ideological diversity in the news-talk format; Tom Edmonds, a Republican strategist with Edmonds and Associates

Legal Ease:
Gregg Skall:
"The FCC rules on political ads-Network exception issue".

HD Radio:
Monetizing Conditional Access

New Media:
Gary Arlen: YouTube, Joost and the emerging Fox-NBC website are just the start of big bandwidth video via the Internet.

Streaming:
The impact of CRB Royalty rates on webcasters and streaming ads.

For advertising
information, contact:

June Barnes
[email protected] 803-731-5951;
Jim Carnegie
[email protected] 813-909-2916 or
Carl Marcucci
[email protected] 703-492-8191.


RBR Radar 2007
Radio News you won't read any where else. RBR--First, Accurate, and Independently Owned.

Arbitron charts growth course
With Portable People Meter (PPM) contracts in hand from his largest customers Arbitron CEO Steve Morris is ready to grow the company. In his quarterly conference call with analysts, Morris indicated that Arbitron is on the prowl for acquisitions. Not just the smaller tuck-in acquisitions that it has made since its separation from Ceridian, but bigger buys - acquisitions that would expand Arbitron beyond audience measurement, but still within the general field of research. What does he have up his sleeve? Stay tuned. Morris can move in this direction now because Arbitron has a clear path for growth in revenue and profits from its main business, radio ratings. 2007.

RBR observation: If Morris follows the course of their television colleague in The Nielsen Company this should be interesting. Nielsen has paved the road in beyond just normal audience measurement but the entire structure of Nielsen. Morris and his advisors should examine this business plan for radio.
07/20/07 RBR #141

Indecency vote gets
unanimous thumbs up
Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) received a swift up-or-down vote on S. 1780 last Thursday afternoon in the Senate Commerce Committee. It's very narrow thrust is to restore to the FCC the right to fine broadcast stations for airing fleeting expletives, a right struck down recently in the Second Circuit. To say that the measure sailed through the committee would be a grotesque understatement.

RBR observation: You'd think a speech-chilling assault on the First Amendment would be worth at least a sentence or two. You'd think that at least one legislator would rise in opposition to increasing the FCC's role as national nanny. You'd think at least one senator would object to wasting more of the taxpayer's money on costly litigation over minor slips of the tongue. You'd even think that at least one cautious legislator would consider that continued litigation over this fringe indecency issue may well eventually lead to the toppling of the entire body of indecency regulation. But no, it was waved on through with no more thought than a flagman waving a car past roadwork. Unbelievable. Go get 'em, Mr. Tribe.
07/20/07 RBR #141


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