Posted on 05/08/2002 8:43:25 AM PDT by gubamyster
Wednesday May 8, 2002; 10:40 a.m. EDT
Fox News Channel talk star Bill O'Reilly laughed off allegations that his radio syndicator was paying stations around the country to carry his new "O'Reilly Radio Factor" show, agreeing with syndicated radio veteran Don Imus during a Wednesday morning interview that the practice was common.
Imus wasted no time getting to the controversy, grilling O'Reilly on the charges at the top of the interview:
IMUS: So then Matt Drudge has this story about Westwood One paying some radio stations to carry your program. And we laughed because that's done all the time. It's not a big deal. And half the time, the reason - here's the reason it's done.
If you want to sell to advertisers you gotta be able to say to advertisers: All right, this program is on in, say, 9 of the 10 top ten markets. If some of the top 10 markets you can't get on a radio station, you go to them and you say, "We'll pay you so much to run the program." And then you sell the advertising and you still wind up making money.
So, I don't know what Drudge's point was but it was a moot point. Anyway, why are you doing this?
O'REILLY: I just want to tell everybody that Matt Drudge is smoking crack - right now - in South Miami Beach on Washington Avenue he has a pipe in his ear. (laughter)
IMUS: He has his own pathetic little radio program that runs Sunday night someplace on some nothin' station....
O'REILLY: And he smokes crack all during that program. (laughter) And the authorities should know it.
IMUS: He's probably upset with - he's clearly upset with you.
O'REILLY: It's a tragic situation. But it's a disease, Mr. Imus. And there's no cure other than to kill Matt Drudge. (laughter).......
You know what the interesting story is here, you know, Drudge is the point man, but why are they trying to destroy the radio program, "The Factor" on the radio, before it even gets on the air. Just let it get on the air and then try to destroy it, you know. But they want to destroy it.
IMUS: Well, with a non-issue.
O'REILLY: It's ridiculous.
IMUS: I mean, anybody who's been around radio syndication for five minutes knows how it works.
O'REILLY: But you know, there's a drive behind it. You know, it's not just Drudge. It's somebody feeding him stuff and (telling him) "Let's try to do this." But most people don't care. They just want to listen to the radio program. If it's fun to listen to, they'll listen to it. If it isn't, they won't. (End of Excerpt)
On Tuesday Drudge reported that O'Reilly's New York flagship station, WOR, was paid $300,000 by Westwood One to carry his show and that the syndicator "had trouble placing the controversial TV host and best-selling author."
In contrast to Imus' assessment that such a practice was common, Drudge labeled the payouts "Talkola" and said they were "a dramatic reversal from normal radio practice."
"This is without precedent in the spoken word format of commercial radio," Drudge quoted one unnamed broadcast executive as saying.
WOR program director John Mainelli told the New York Post Wednesday that the station does not comment on contracts with its hosts.
"The O'Reilly Radio Factor" debuts this afternoon on two hundred stations around the country and will feature a succession of female co-hosts.
"Fox & Friends" morning sensation E.D. Donahey will be O'Reilly first co-host.
They typically negotiate the promotion budget for the show. Sometimes the promoter may want to promote the show a lot. If the show's talent is to be paid big bucks, the promoter needs to sell his 7 minutes quickly. Since the price per spot depends on the ratings, he wants to get the audience up rapidly. He is willing to spend big promotion bucks.
The stations sell their time locally and typically do not need the proof of rationg numbers to sell a lot of the show. They already have ratings for the station, and if they are not too bad, they may not realize any where near the return on the promotion investment the producer will get. Typically the producer can't generate much national business until he has good major market ratings.
So the show's producer springs for the promotion bucks. That often is in billboards. Typically the local station can buy the boards cheaper than the national promoter can. Stations often run billboard campaigns and have an established rate. They can almost always by advertising for less. So the local station buys the promotion at the local rate, and the producer reemburses the local station for the cost. That is what is happening here.
When new and relatively unknown talent is used they don't promote. Since O'Reily is a known factor with a big TV audience ads would be very effective for the producer.
No they do not. That is illegal. It is called payola.
The record company only owns music. They do not produce or own the shows or sell advertising in the shows.
Networks do. Some networks like Rush's EIB trade spot avails for carriage of his show. Others buy the time slot from the station and sell all the spots in the show natioally. That is what TV networks did for years. Cable channels pay your cable company to carry the channels. For example your local cable company pays CNN every month for the rights to deliver CNN to your home.
The TV networks pay stations to carry the Network shows. do you think the ABC stations carry ABC and all the Commercials ABC sells because they like Michael Eisner? When the 3 TV networks were the only game in town, they typically paid their local TV stations enough to cover the entire stations overhead. A local station could make money with just the money the network paid them. What ever they sold to local adverstisers went directly into the profit column. Before TV the networks paid their local radio stations to carry the network programming.
Drudge is just puting out Bull CRAP. Networked programs have to pay the stations to cary the show in some way. Otherwise why would a station carry the show?
Think about it. You run a radio staion. I come in and say I want you to carry the "tator" show. It has high ratings and is making me lots of money. The station says whats in it for the station? And I reply you don't get paid a single red cent. You are to do this because you like to pay the electricity bill and pay people to run the transmitter. How many stations do you think would carry my show?
If on the other hand I went into O'Reily's stations and offered to pay them twice what O'Reily is bringing in, how many stations would put "tator" on instead of O'Reily? Someone had the slots O'Reily is getting. The stations did not giver O'Reily the slot becuase they love him.
Au contraire, mon frere. They just don't call it payola, anymore, its "promotional payments".
Between O'R and Imus I suggest their combined IQ's don't reach room temperature.
Whatever intellect O'R ever had has long since been replaced by arrogance.
My hats off to his past work. But THAT IS IN THE PAST!
What have you done for us lately Matt?
Id you can't carry water anymore, then why pick on those that can?
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