Idaho Radio News Etc.

KTMY/Wow Country 104.3 has launched a television campaign. I saw a spot last night during the Tonight Show. The promos are very simple, and closely match the station’s website and van branding – with a static image showing several artist’s pictures in a rotating fashion. The spot features a Jack Murphy voiceover with a smattering of country samples in the background. The copy hits the high points: 104 in a row, new station, etc.

RadioActive noted in the comments thread to another post that the spots seem “simplistic” — which I suppose isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

Also: I’d bet that Statioinality (the company that put together wow1043.com) did the TV spot as well.

KIDO/NewsRadio 580 is shuffling the AM deck again. It has been just more than a year since Jon Duane and Chris Kelly exited – and a parade of folks have filled the morning slot.

Brian Norton is no longer in the Peak Broadcasting fold. Today, in his place was former KTVB feature reporter/sports reporter/photographer Brian Holmes. Holmes joined Dave Burnett for the shift today… no word on if the gig is permanent. The “new” Brian is a great writer who has a passion for news – so he’d be a good fit for the morning gig.

I’ve referenced the LostRemote TV convergence blog many times here. It’s full of good ideas, news and pushes people on my end of the business to try new things. Starting today I’m joining the panel of LR bloggers. The site is headed by my friend Cory Bergman, who oversees the web operations at KING/Seattle – and includes Steve Safran, Stephen Warley, David Johnson, Liz Foreman, and Richard Warner.

EEO Reports were due to be posted on station websites by late last month. Here’s a look…

Journal Broadcast Group
The group (including KIVI/KSAW) filled 14 jobs. For an open Program Director job, nine people were interviewed – with the job winner coming via AllAccess. The group interviewed eight people for an on-air personality job… and hired an internal candidate.

Clear Channel/Peak
CC/P – the company in transition… had 13 jobs open. The first KIDO morning position filled, Brian Norton – came via AllAccess. The second KIDO morning team member – Kimberly James, was an employee referral. James’ replacement, Gemma Gaudette – found out about the job via “personal inquiry.”

KXLT morning co-host Claire Day learned about the job by… what else — internal posting. KTMY afternoon DJ Don Jarrett learned of the job from AA, Panama Jack came from an employee reference and partner “Amber” found out about the job from a “non-employee reference.”

No mention of how the positions of General Manager, Sales Manager or KTMY program director were filled.

Citadel Communications
Citadel had fourteen jobs open. The only on-air job was nights at KZMG. Matt Johnson was referred via AllAccess.

Which Boise country station plays the most music? Two of them (KTMY and KQFC) claim to play a lot in a row… so who plays the most?

Last time we played this game, in December 2006 – KTMY was still My Country, and came out on top.

So here’s the spotcheck for work hours on 06/07/07:

KTMY
—-
9am – 9
10am – 10
11am – 17
Noon – 13
1pm – 13
2pm – 18
3pm – 13
4pm – 13
TOTAL: 106
AVERAGE: 13.25

KQFC
—-
9am – 16
10am – 13
11am – 14
Noon – 17
1pm – 13
2pm – 13
3pm – 12
4pm – 12
TOTAL: 110
AVERAGE: 13.75

KIZN
—-
9am – 13
10am – 13
11am – 13
Noon – 12
1pm – 11
2pm – 13
3pm – 12
4pm – 11
TOTAL: 98
AVERAGE: 12.25

KQFC comes out on top for this day at least, playing an average of half-a-song per hour more than KTMY/WOW Country 104.3. KIZN brings up the rear, a full song per hour behind KTMY.

John Schuster of the Tucson Weekly wrote up a “media watch” column today, and talks about the Peak/Citadel lawsuit.

Schuster is an employee of Citadel Broadcasting in Tucson… a fact to store in the back of your brain as you read this:

Lawley likes to win. He has that corporate drive that makes him a valuable asset if he’s on your team–and an asshole if he’s your opposition.

As for being involved in “highly confidential and proprietary discussions,” well, he was the No. 3 guy in the company. What that means in terms of the way Lawley handled his business dealings is up to the court system.

I find it fascinating that Citadel seems concerned about Lawley’s alleged raiding of Citadel Broadcasting employees; Citadel didn’t seem particularly upset about this occurrence when Lawley worked for them. A recent scan of the Citadel Tucson roster turns up at least a dozen employees who worked with Lawley during his days at Clear Channel–employees who made the move shortly after Lawley’s departure.

Furthermore, Citadel didn’t seem particularly bothered by Lawley’s significant involvement in wresting the million-dollar-a-year UA sports contract from its long-time home, Clear Channel’s KNST AM 790. It’s now the plum for Citadel’s KCUB AM 1290 The Source.

When you look around at all the people who have left Boise and gone on to do bigger things… has any station pumped out more successful folks than KQXR?

- Pete Schiecke is now senior program manager for AOL Music and AOL Radio
- Jacent Jackson is PD of WLUM/Milwaukee
- Kallao is doing afternoons at 91X in San Diego
- Erik Kristensen is PD at WDYL/Richmond, VA

..and I’m sure there are others. The X’s reputation for being aggressive and progressive seems to do big things for the careers of its former employees.

And to think. It all started in the corner of a then-billiards-hall, now-strip club with Bob Lee holding the title of owner.

One Boise radio insider sent me a great link about newspapers that has applications to all media.

The guy who writes Invisible Inkling has ten pieces of advice for newspapers. He tells them not to blame Google, or Craig… to slash some of the overweight staff — and to stop handwringing.

It’s good advice for all of our respective businesses. I especially like this:

Reporters need to do more than write. The new world calls for a new skillset, and you and Mr. Notebook need to make some new friends, like Mr. Microphone and Mr. Point & Shoot.

We have an intern at my place of work who will be a senior this fall at a J-school. I’ve been tasked with teaching her the ropes. I hope that by the end of the summer, she has an understanding that what we do isn’t just a single-channel medium any more. The more skills we all know in our respective fields, the more valuable we are. Instead of knowing how to just do one or two things, it’s better to be able to do many.

I heard another funny sweeper on the KZMG/Magic 93.1 morning show:

‘Shamus… Tara… and Brad. Proud to be Boise’s number 11 morning show’

KTMY/Wow Country 104.3 has launched its new website.

You’ve heard me talk about how KIZN.com is clearly one of the best websites in the market. Well, they’ve got competition.

Peak Broadcasting contracted with Stationality to build the new wow1043.com. The site packs a nice graphical punch, offers some audio from Don Jarett’s interview with Taylor Swift has links to each jock’s MySpace page — and even has some snazzy desktop wallpapers.

No streaming audio yet – but the station is using the YES.com song ID bar (though for some reason the time was all EDT for me… could be just a fluke).

The site is a bit on the cluttered side… but the fact that there is actually some content helps overcome that.

KIZN.com displays a “Your official CMT country station.”
Wow1043.com displays a large “#1 CMT Hook-up!” badge.

On a related note, the station has taken the wraps of a newly… um… wrapped van:

EA Sports released a trailer for its upcoming NCAA 08 game.

You might recognize the voiceover:

Careful listeners will notice the trailer audio has been slightly edited…

A New York court ruled that two separate incidents of the f-word being used on FOX-TV were not indecent today. The court then said the FCC was “divorced from reality.”

Then FCC chief Kevin Martin let forth this little tirade:

“I find it hard to believe that the New York court would tell American families that ’shit’ and ‘fuck’ are fine to say on broadcast television during the hours when children are most likely to be in the audience…. The court even says the commission is ‘divorced from reality.’ It is the New York court, not the commission, that is divorced from reality in concluding that the word fuck does not invoke a sexual connotation.”

A commentor on LostRemote had a good question: “Seriously, what would happen if a reporter read that statement, in full, on TV?”

The History of Idaho Broadcasting Foundation met at Peak Broadcasting’s Boise studios last week – and after a series of introductions and some other items, the group was given a tour of the group’s broadcast facilities. Tobin Jeffries showed off the cluster’s impressive studios and traffic center. Jeffries and Peak VP Mike Sutton were gracious hosts, and answered dozens of questions from the quizzical group.

KFXD-AM will launch a new talk format in the coming weeks – featuring hosts of the “non political” type. During the History of Idaho Broadcasting Foundation meeting last Thursday, I asked Peak Broadcasting VP Mike Sutton how local the new station would be – and the quick answer was “not very” – though he left open the possibility that some sort of local show could be featured.

Sutton was mum on further details, and said that contracts for programming have not yet been signed.