Liberals are in a major meltdown about this (KPOJ flip to
sports, and the Seattle station—owned by CBS not Clear Channel—is next). Obviously Romney is being blamed because of the whole Romney-Bain-Clear Channel connection, right? Despite people like me going on messageboards to explain, they still refuse to believe that:
—Sports is a hot format. Stations like this change formats to what is profitable. Radio is a business.
—Ratings for these stations are horrible and they are doing what is best for the companies etc. Of course the Telecom Act of 96, signed by Clinton, is how these eeeeeeeeeeevil companies can own multiple stations in the same market.
—The FCC is not in the format regulation business and attempts to get them to act, or Clear Channel to change its mind, won’t work.
—They believe in the Fairness Doctrine—even though it’s unconstitutional. Can a station be forced to change to something unpopular—liberal talk—and thus lose all kinds of money? There would be layoffs.
—There IS successful liberal talk and it’s taxpayer funded on powerful stations. It’s called NPR.
Evidently the Rethuglicans at Clear Channel are getting revenge because of the election results :)
One more:
—In Boston Clear Channel killed off its conservative talk station. Was that political?
>>Clear Channel Pulls the Plug on Progressive Talk KPOJ, Portland. The conspiracy theories from listeners and progressive talk fans are already pouring in – especially on the Portland-area blogs and mainstream media sites – but the notion that Clear Channel Media and Entertainment is flipping KPOJ to sports talk for political reasons and not because of business factors has no basis in reality.
According to a piece in the local Willamette Week blog site, KPOJ’s recent 12-plus ratings were around a 1.0 share compared to some of its spoken-word competitors (news/talk KEX and KXL posted a 3.5 share and 5.0 share, respectively). TALKERS is not privy at this time to how well Clear Channel was able to sell KPOJ but it should surprise few in the business that sports content has never been hotter from a consumption standpoint and political talk – whether conservative or progressive – is, from a sales perspective, controversial and therefore a much tougher sell, probably even in a progressive market such as Portland...The station, considered one of the nation’s more successful progressive talk outlets for many years, also carried WYD Media’s Thom Hartmann, Premiere Networks’ Randi Rhodes and Mike Malloy.
(boy if THAT'S successful...)
Even in loony liberal Portland the Trailblazer’s outdraw Randi Rhoades.