Beyond Bejing : WILD becomes CRI's window on the world (Boston black-talk station goes Chinese)

Boston Radio Watch ^ | 6/1/11 | Mark Schnyder

[raccoonradio]

Starting today, WILD 1090 is taking world news from a Chinese perspective, more specifically China Radio International (CRI), featuring news, music, language lessons and human interest stories from China live from Beijing. CRI which is leasing airtime on WILD's daytime only-signal will be heard every day from sunup to sunset.

WILD is owned by Maryland-based Radio One and has been featuring syndicated news/talk programing geared toward African-American audience since January 2006.

WILD is the second US station to turn its entire broadcast day schedule over to China's state-owned radio network. Last winter, KGBC 1540 in Houston/Galveston began airing CRI's 24/7 feed on Jan.1, 2010. The CRI network has purchased blocks of time on US stations since 1993. In Boston, it has previously aired on WBIX 1060 and WUNR 1600.

As reported in the Washington Post last April, China's ambitious $6.6 billion global re-imaging strategy itself is going to take it against the views of the country painted on CNN's, FOX's and MSNBC's of the world.

[raccoonradio]

Boston's legendary soul station WILD (remember Sunny Joe White?), which had been running African-American oriented talk, is now leasing its airtime to the Chinese government...China Radio International (in English). They own your credit cards and we owe them lots of money. Now they own the airwaves.

Previously, WILD had run shows like Rev. Al Sharpton. They have a YouTube page with a highlight video of Screwy Louie Farrakhan talking about Lebron James and "...the Jewish controlled media". A Facebook page for WILD gave a link to a Cleveland station (WERE AM 1490) so their listeners can enjoy Warren Ballantine, Sharpton, etc. and urged them to try and get other stations to pick up the shows.

On the Boston radio dial, the station--daytime only-- is between Catholics on WQOM 1060 and conservative talk on WXKS 1200 :)

[raccoonradio]

The guy who wrote this tweeted to me, “Get used to this; am told it’s a long term lease.” Boston’s black population will prob not be happy, though they do have a _pirate station_
at 106.1, “Touch FM”. (Another pirate, “Datz Hits 99.7”, was recently shut off by the FCC due to interference with a classical station, WCRB 99.5—and possibly interference to
aviation radio at Logan Airport).

Sunny Joe White rolls over in his grave...WILD had been
running: Tom Joyner, Warren Ballantine, Rev. Al Sharpton,
and soul classics after 4 pm. Some soul and gospel on
weekends. The station has to sign off at sunset due to
FCC regulations; at that point, Baltimore’s WBAL AM 1090
(Orioles, etc.) comes in instead.

[Buckeye McFrog]

This has been happening to a lot of “black” radio stations. Arbitron changed the method they use for calculating radio ratings. Instead of having participants log their listening patterns in a book, they give them an electronic device that automatically records the station and amount of time it was listened to.

The net result of this change is that they learned a whole lot of people who were putting in their diaries that they listened often to “black” radio were lying. (interestingly they learned the audience for conservative talk radio was much higher than was previously being reported).

This has sent ad rates for those stations spiraling downward and many went up for sale. The long time “black” stations here in Pittsburgh were sold to a Catholic religious group two years ago.

Let the howls of RAAAAAACISM commence...

[raccoonradio]

Yes I’d heard black oriented stations were among those hurt by the new ratings method. The electronic device sounds like what I had for a couple years as a “Nielsen family” for TV
(you did had to confirm what you were watching every now and then to prove you hadn’t fallen asleep)

Now, how does one say “Yes We Can” in Chinese...?

It was said maybe moonbats will see this as a victory for
diversity, though it takes away from black-oriented radio here. As I mentioned on Twitter to someone, how did the moonbats feel when their two Air America stations in Boston,
AM 1430 and 1200, later changed the format to Spanish language music (Rumba)? Diversity, folks! Later an epic WIN
when one of them (1200) would change again, this time to...
CONSERVATIVE TALK. (Hey, this is Mass.; Conservatives are a minority group..)

[massgopguy]

They best not touch Marc Coleman’s “Time Tunnel”. I love Ashford and Simpson. WILD needs Reese on the Radio! He’s on Spreaker.com today. If you were a WRKO Reese Hopkins fan, tune in.

[massgopguy]

They best not touch Marc Coleman’s “Time Tunnel”. I love Ashford and Simpson. WILD needs Reese on the Radio! He’s on Spreaker.com today. If you were a WRKO Reese Hopkins fan, tune in.

[raccoonradio]

I get the feeling the Chinese will run all of the programming but who knows.

[raccoonradio]

Thanks to our credit card debt, etc., we ARE paying for a country’s health care.

...China...

[Buckeye McFrog]

My parents had that Nielsen box in their home for awhile.
They thought they were doing good and by participating could influence the quality of TV programming to improve. They ended up highly disillusioned, because clearly it has just gotten far, far worse.

The sale of the black format stations in Pittsburgh was quite controversial. To the point where the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh has taken steps to officially distance themselves from the people who bought those stations.

[Hawthorn]

>> I get the feeling the Chinese will run all of the programming but who knows. <<

If so, nobody — but nobody — will listen more than a few brief minutes. Believe me. I pick up CRI quite often via satellite, and the programming is boring, boring, boring.

Ditto for the English language “Voice of Russia” — which is now carried full-time, 24/7, on AM 1390 in the WashDC area. Like that of CRI, VOR’s programming is mostly prattle by announcers with dull monotone voices, droning on endlessly about inconsequential, boring stuff. It’s about as interesting as watching paint dry.

In the meantime, the stations’ very savvy American owners must be raking in TONS of cash from the propaganda bureaucrats of Russia and China. These benighted functionaries are probably telling their bosses that they’ve pulled off some of the biggest PR coups of all times, while I’ll bet the stations have something like the lowest Arbitron ratings of any broadcasters in their respective DMA’s.

In other words, cash is still king, and capitalism triumphs once more!

[fella]

Does CRI stream on the net?

We should know what our enemies are saying and thinking. Years ago I used to tune in radio Havana every so often, it was strange to say the least.

[raccoonradio]

They probably do.

I think once for some reason I got radio Havana around 1100 on the AM dial (many, many years ago)

[cynwoody]

On the Boston radio dial, the station--daytime only--

Not any more. Lately, they've been transmitting an unmodulated carrier on top of WBAL late at night. However, the FCC still lists them as daytime and critical hours only. Maybe I should complain.