Posted on 03/06/2015 11:00:39 AM PST by Bratch
Talk radio veteran Darryl Parks is a harsh critic of how the format continues to lose touch with most of the radio audience who aren’t white male baby boomers. In a new post this week he takes aim at Rush Limbaugh, describing the leading conservative talk host’s “fall into oblivion.”
Parks notes that Limbaugh’s program is sinking in the ratings in New York and Los Angeles and has been shuttled off to lower ranked stations. Now it’s rumored– as first reported by Robert Feder–that his Chicago affiliate is preparing to dump ol’ Rushbo, too. A spokeswoman for WLS-AM owner Culumus Media has denied that rumor, though Parks says, “three different Cumulus executives have told me on different occasions they wish they could get rid of Limbaugh’s show and they can’t sell it.”
What’s best about Parks’ tough love missives for talk radio are the behind-the-scenes details he drops about how the business really works. It’s common knowledge that the Limbaugh show is produced by Premiere Networks, which is conveniently owned by iHeartMedia, giving it easy access to hundreds of stations. But Parks fills out the story, revealing that along with requiring stations to carry Rush, “the local stations have to pay a ‘rights fee’ in addition to the barter commercial inventory they broadcast from the network. There was no negotiation whether to broadcast the show or what fee was to be paid.” Barter inventory are the commercials included by in the show that stations air without compensation.
As a result, he says this non-negotiable requirement to carry and pay for the program, “forced local stations to lay-off other talk hosts, producers and gut news departments. Talented people left the radio business and the death spiral for talk radio began. It began years ago.”
I knew about the barter obligation, but I didn’t know that even iHeart’s own stations had to tithe, too. But I guess the heavily indebted company has to find some way to keep writing checks to fulfill Limbaugh’s $400 million contract.
It’s important to point out that Parks identifies as a Republican, lamenting how talk radio has missed the boat on reaching younger generations. He says he tried to warn Clear Channel execs of the impending fall, but his advice fell on deaf ears.
Me, I see this as just more evidence as to how the commercial radio business is a victim of its own greed, myopia, and mismanagement, typified most clearly in the way iHeart doubles-down on Limbaugh at the expense of anything that remotely resembles fresh programming. Radio isn’t dying, but their AM talk audience, and hosts, are.
AM talk radio was dead when Rush started. There were no other listeners to lose. Rush saved AM radio.
JMO but without Rush Limbaugh, AM radio would have been gone 25 years ago.
That's probably why he's going after Rush. Free advertising!
Jesse Jackson, the late Mario the Pius, Jim Hightower, and even Alec Baldwin plus countless other liberals have failed on the radio. Sour grapes article by lefties who wish any of their hosts could get even a third of the audience numbers Rush gets everyday.
I think the best talk radio is Armstrong and Getty in Northern California. They are libertarians, smart, funny and play off each other very well.
“The entire medium is becoming obsolete.”
Bingo. It’s not that Limbaugh has lost his touch, it’s that traditional radio is becoming more and more a thing of the past. It’s not much different than the decline of print media, or the “Big Three” tv networks.
Good point. He may incease his audience to 20 : )
The minutes of information to the level of ads, drove me away.
That's why I've never listened to AM radio. The incessant commercials would drive me crazy.
Not so. I get a huge kick out of listening to Michael Berry!
Sports talk is all over the place here - and it’s migrating to FM.
Evidently Rush needs to talk about bitches to connect with youth (Hillery excluded of course).
“Bingo. It’s not that Limbaugh has lost his touch, it’s that traditional radio is becoming more and more a thing of the past. It’s not much different than the decline of print media, or the “Big Three” tv networks.”
That is part of the trend. I listen to Satellite radio. But that is becoming obsolete, too.
Internet radio seems to be where things are going.
The Internet is dragging down AM radio. And here in Indy, Rush went from AM to FM many years ago. But I mostly listen to him with my “TuneIn Radio” app on my iPhone (grandfathered UL data), so I can pretty much pick him up, in any market, anywhere. Like I’m listening to him now, as I type.
Parks notes that Limbaugh’s program is sinking in the ratings in New York and Los Angeles
I lived in los Angeles. these cities are very liberal and tend to believe the liberal lie narrative. I don’t know how many times I have been told how evil and bad rush is by people that have never listened to him.
In analogy with “Gender Queer” — i.e., those who deny conventional sexual distinctions and simply “identify” however they please, let me propose that we retire the use of the term RINO, and simply call Parks and his ilk, “Republican Queer.”
I can cut it to a sentence.
This is the work of a bitter, angry man who lost his job at a radio station that happens to carry Rush.
“Fall into oblivion” my *ss. Rush pretty much single handedly resurrected AM radio from the dead.
Of course, there are always foolish radio executives who want to try. I can just imagine Rush being told that he needs to get a slick talking, accented Hispanic sidekick and play snippets from Hispanic pop songs as his bumper music. Fortunately, Rush knows the radio business and owns his show so he does not have to entertain such nonsense.
Last week I bought yet another portable AM/FM radio - - -
I listen to Rush every day here in Ventura County.
Here, too, his show was removed from an L.A. station but found on a (’obscure’) station in the county next to L.A.
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