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What We Do: On Tour for Teen Driver Safety

Just finished the last of two weeks of interviews to promote Teen Driver Safety Week for the National Road Safety Foundation.

I did the last spot just now, live on Boston's WCVB-TV 5.  I also did several taped and live spots via zoom around the country over the past several days, and my NRSF associate Michelle Anderson did a few, along with teens from student advocacy groups SADD and FCCLA.

We also did a spot on WCBS Newsradio 880 in New York that aired several times over the past few days, with my friend and morning anchor Paul Murnane.

Thanks go to Bob Thomas for helping get these interviews set.  We did nearly two dozen interviews, from Portland OR to Atlanta, with stops in between, with tips on how parents can keep their teen drivers safe behind the wheel.

 

 

A Voice for Jazz Goes Silent

WBGO, the jazz radio station serving New York (and the world via streaming), announced that Michael Bourne, its longtime morning man and host of the weekly "Singers Unlimited," has died.  He retired from the station earlier this year after 34 years on the air, bringing the best in jazz to his listeners.

 

Who's Listening?

 

Americans spend nearly four hours a day listening to some form of audio, according to a study reported recently in The Wall Street Journal.

The bulk of audio time – 50 percent -- comes from traditional broadcast radio stations, both AM and FM.  Nearly tied as the second and third most popular sources are streaming (16 percent) and personally-owned music (14 percent), from CDs, downloaded music and even records. 

Following distantly is satellite radio – SiriusXM – at eight percent despite the fact that virtually every new car these days comes with a 3-month free trial.  SiriusXM is costly, so they probably lose many listeners once the free trial period expires.

And then there’s podcasts, today accounting for about four percent of listening.   But the relatively small portion of total listening time doesn’t give the full podcast picture.  About 26 percent of Americans listen to a podcast at least once a month – twice what it was only five years ago.  That’s about 73 million people ages 12 and up. 

What I find interesting is which podcast publishers today have the biggest audience.  Not the networks.  Not Spotify or Pandora.  NPR (National Public Radio) has the biggest podcast audience, with almost 19 million unique listeners every month.  iHeart Radio is second, with 14 million monthly listeners.  Two public radio programmers -  This American Life and PRX – have 9.9 and 7.2 million listeners.

The New York Times is at #6, with 7 million listeners for its daily news and analysis podcasts, followed by New York’s public radio station WNYC, with 6.6 million.

Podcasts often are supported, in part at least, by ads.  Podcast ad revenue this year is expected to hit $400 million, up from about $260 million last year.   Analysts expect it to exceed $600 million by 2020.

The big streamers Spotify and Pandora do carry podcasts, but they haven’t yet been a significant revenue stream for them.  Spotify carries about 150,000 podcasts and Pandora has a few hundred.  They say listening time for podcasts on their platforms represents less than one percent of their total listening time.

But that will likely change in the next few years, as the big streaming services see the potential and want a big piece of the anticipated growth in podcast ad revenues.  Their goal, says The Wall Street Journal, is to take more listeners – and more revenues – from broadcast radio.  The radio broadcasters don’t want to lose any share, but with total annual ad revenues of $14 billion, they’re hardly panicking.   

 

Local News Continues to Fade Away

 

It's important that we are aware and informed on national and international affairs, which is why read read and watch the news.  But it's also important to know what's happening locally in our own towns and neighborhoods. 

Local news traditionally has been the cornerstone of local media.  It's why we listened to local radio stations -- not just for the music, but to know what was happening in our own towns.  It's what we turned the TV on for in the early evening, to get an idea of what happened while we were at work or school.  And the real place we turned to for local news was our hometown newspaper. Our daily paper could give us a more in-depth look at and behind the headlines, especially if we lived in a smaller city or town.  Years ago, even small cities had their own daily paper, with real local news coverage.

I've decried this trend many times before -- the demise of local news outlets.  And it's not just newspapers. 

Radio used to be local.  Back in the 80s, when the FCC loosened the rules on station ownership and the amount of time stations had to devote to news and information, many stations dropped local news coverage or combined the news organization among the many stations a company like Clear Channel owned in each market.  Bottom line: less local news.

TV news, by virtue of the coverage area of its signal, is more regional than local.  But cable providers came along with local TV news like News12 and others in many markets, devoting their coverage mainly to a smaller area like a specific county or group of counties.  But those news channels are shrinking, as we've seen from recent announcements of staffing cutbacks and consolidation by some of the News12 channels here in the New York area.  What used to be News12 Long Island, News12 Westchester, News12 Connecticut is now just News12.  Bottom line, again:  less coverage of local news.

We've seen local newspapers disappearing left and right.  Media giants like Gannett have been cherry-picking struggling local and regional newspapers, buying them and -- again -- consolidating newsrooms, cutting reporters and editors and sacrificing coverage of local news.

Even here in New York City, we're seeing less local news coverage. 

The New York Times used to have good regional sections on Sundays, where suburban readers could get interesting background on local news, as well as info on local arts, events and dining.  Those disappeared in September with cutbacks, and it's all thrown into one metro section on Sundays, with much less real local coverage of the suburbs.

The Wall Street Journal launched, in the spring of 2010, its "Greater New York" section, to add more localized coverage of news, finance and lifestyle.  It was an attempt, I'm sure, to lure some local advertisers for whom the national pages of The Journal wouldn't make sense.

My review of that section a few days after it launched was mixed, since it certainly was a mixed bag back then -- a bit hard to pin down.  But the section, to me anyway, found its footing and became a welcome part of the paper.  I found myself missing it when I'd read The Journal on out of town trips, where the New York metro section wasn't available.

But here we go again... The Journal just announced plans to trim down its metro section.  The official announcement says "it will be a more concise, focused daily report on life and business."    That sounds like corporate-speak for "less."  Less local news, less local analysis.  

The official announcement said there will be "an elimination of some positions."  They're going from a staff of 36 for the section down to 16 -- 12 reporters and 4 editors, according to a story in MediaPost.  The section used to have as much as 16 pages, but lately it was averaging 6 to 8.  Beginning Nov. 14, it will consist of two pages within the main section of the paper.  The Journal is also trimming some other sections including the Personal Business section and its Friday "Arena" section covering the arts.

It all means less local news.  And that's not good news for any of us.

   

Political ads not paying off for local media

 

 

A presidential election generally means ad time is harder to come by, both on the national and local level.  Local media outlets -- TV, radio and newspapers -- had been banking on an ad windfall this year as the campaign heated up.  But it just hasn't materialized, according to a story today in Adweek.

The big media story earlier in the campaign cycle was all the free media that the candidates, especially Donald Trump, were able to garner.  Ad forecasters predicted the political media buys would ratchet up once Trump became the Republican nominee and had access to GOP campaign funds. (And don't forget, he's the guy who said he'd fund his campaign out of his own pocket.)

The Democrats are spending for ads, nationally and in key states.  But the Trump campaign has been miserly in its ad spending, both nationally and locally.  It's causing some distress in local markets that had been counting on political ads, especially for media that held back some time availabilities in their inventory, expecting the last-minute demand for political spots.  It hasn't happened.

About $2.8 billion has been spent in local media for political ads -- not just for the presidential candidates, but for local races as well.  But that figure is about 15 percent below what the forecasts had been.  The Republican presidential campaign this year is actually spending a bit less than the McCain and Romney campaigns spent four and eight years ago.

Adweek cites experts who say spending by presidential candidates generally accounts for about 30 percent of total political ad buys, with the bulk going to support Congressional, gubernatorial and local races.

To keep it in perspective, the $2.8 billion represents less than 10 percent of total local ad spending, which is pegged at about $30 billion.  But local media must be giving prayers of thanksgiving for their neighborhood car dealers, reliably buying time and space to push new cars off the lot.

 

The News Revolution

 

But is it always real news?

 

Back in the 1940's and 50's, most Americans got their news from daily newspapers.  Most major cities and many smaller ones had more than one paper -- the morning paper with news from the previous day and early evening, and the afternoon or evening paper with news of that day.

Then along came TV, which quickly became the dominant news source for most of us.  And it wasn't too long before network newscasts had to share their audience with cable news - first CNN and then several other 24-hour cable news channels.  All-news radio stations in bigger markets also had - and continue to have - big audiences.

But the internet has changed the equation yet again.  It's not just the more "legitimate" online news sources like the news sites of newspapers and TV stations, and other sites like Huffington Post.  The somewhat startling news is that social media that has become the dominant source of news, at least for younger Americans.

A new study by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism finds that 28 percent of Americans ages 18 - 24 cite social media as their primary source of news.  Twenty-four percent of that same age demo say their primary source of news is TV.  It's even higher among people who search for news on the smartphones --  48%.

Facebook is the most popular social media site for young people to get their news, with 44% saying that's their top go-to place for news.  YouTube comes in at 19%, Twitter at 10% and WhatsApp at 8%.

What troubles me about these numbers is how easy and commonplace it is for online readers to get misinformation that's disguised as news. It's not unusual to see Facebook and Twitter posts that refer to an article in a trusted major news source, but the facts get twisted, often intentionally.  Just the other day, a friend told me about an article she saw in The Washington Post that had some troubling information about Trump's mental state.  As much as I dislike Trump, the story just didn't sound right.  I had my friend show me the article and it turned out to be a Facebook post that referred to the Post story.  But there was no link and when I went directly to the Washington Post site, there was no such story. So someone along the way put out a false post, incorrectly citing a major news outlet as the source.  And it got re-posted online countless times. 

This happens a lot on social media, so if nearly a third of young people are relying on social media for news, I'd say we have a problem. 

 

A bit of comedic broadcast legend is gone

 

Bob Elliott, half of the legendary radio comedy duo Bob and Ray, died this week at 92.  With his partner Ray Goulding, who died in 1990, Bob Elliott was known for his low-key groundbreaking humor, mostly on radio. 

The two began their 40-year career together when they were co-workers at a Boston radio station.  Elliott was the station's sportscaster and during rain delays during Red Sox games, he would fill time by riffing and improvising with Goulding, who was a DJ there.  Part of their riffs included inventing wacky characters they would impersonate.

Those characters -- Biff Burns, a clueless sportscaster, nasal on-the-scene reporter Wally Ballou, and Mary Backstage, noble wife, and many more -- became regulars when the duo got a daily gig on the station.  Their humor took them to New York, where the did a daily TV show on NBC, and later runs on the NBC radio network and NPR.

Way ahead of their time, Bob and Ray lampooned game shows, soap operas, politicians and commercials.  Greats from Johnny Carson to David Letterman, Jay Leno and George Carlin said they were inspired and influenced by Bob and Ray.

I discovered them when I was in my teens.  They weren't joke tellers; they were storytellers, using crazy characters to tell stories and put the listener in the middle.

Many of their routines can still be heard online.  Even 25 or more years later, they are still funny and relevant.

Farewell to Bob Elliott.  As one of his characters, Biff Burns, would say as he ended his sports report, "This is Biff Burns saying this is Biff Burns saying good night."

What is TV these days?

 

 

Television is still, by far, the dominant mass medium in the U.S.   But it's light years away from what it was 30 – 40 years ago, before cable took hold and before everyone was hooked up online.

 

It’s a different world, for sure.  With literally hundreds of channels to choose from, plus on-demand and streaming programming, there's a dizzying array of program content.  Some programming on cable and, lately, streaming services like Netflix and Amazon rivals feature films in terms on content quality and production value.  In response, the broadcast networks have finally stepped up their game with some quality shows.  Yes, broadcast still has plenty of lowest-common-denominator drivel led by mindless comedies and "reality" shows,  but many are now calling this the new Golden Age for TV, based on content quality.

 

Nielsen says the hard-to-reach Millennials (18-34), highly coveted by advertisers, are spending 17 percent less time watching TV than a year ago, but it still averages nearly 22 hours a week.  Across all age groups, adults spend an average of 36 hours a week in front of the tube.  Boomers (ages 50+) watch much more TV -- 47 and a half hours weekly. 

 

Probably the biggest change – and the biggest challenge for advertisers --  is how we watch TV.  Even Boomers are now frequent DVR users, watching programs at their own convenience.  But Millennials in particular are getting their TV across a spectrum of platforms, and traditional TV is quickly losing out as the primary way they watch TV.  Increasingly, they watch TV on laptops, tablets and smartphones, usually with an absolute minimum of ads.

 

Radio, which doesn't get much attention in media circles, comes in a strong second.  Across all age groups, we spend just under 13 hours a week listening to radio.  Millennials listen less at 11 hours.

 

Smartphones account for 7-1/4 hours a week across all age groups.  Millennials use their smartphones a lot more -- nearly 10 hours/week.  Tablets account for 3-1/2 hours across all age groups and 3-3/4 hours for Millennials.

 

Yet another challenge for advertisers, of course, is how much their ads, regardless of the medium, are actually viewed. 

 

Weekend Thoughts

Who do you trust?

 

When it comes to preferences in music, movies and media, different age groups don't agree on much.  But a recent poll by the Pew Research Center shows Boomers, Gen Xers and Millennials do agree on which news sources they feel they can least trust.

All age groups say sources they trust least for accurate reporting are Buzzfeed and three widely-syndicated conservative radio shows hosted by Glenn beck, Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh.

Although many listen to the opinionated radio shows, they may tune in more for the entertainment value than for trustworthy news reporting.

The Pew study found more of a discrepancy by age groups when asked which news sources they can trust.  Millennials (ages 19-34) say they rely on two faux-news shows, The Daily Show and the recently-ended Colbert Report.  Almost as scary is that this group also lists Al Jazeera America as one its most-trusted sources of news.  Boomers and Gen Xers, maybe with wisdom that comes with age, said they don't rely on any of those programs for reliable information.  They say they get much of their news from local TV.

Troubling, to me at least, is that newspapers didn't figure into the picture for reliable news.  (And where do you think local TV gets many of its story leads?  The morning paper.)

 

 

A Radio Ad... 92 Years Ago

On Aug. 28, 1922 -- 92 years ago -- radio station WEAF in New York City aired a ten-minute pitch promoting affordable co-op apartments in Jackson Heights, Queens.  The developer paid AT&T, which owned the station, $50 for the airtime.

It was the first ad on radio in the U.S., bringing dramatic change to a new form of mass communication.

The ad helped the developer sell several apartments, which brought the interest of retailers including Macy's and Gimbels, who soon became sold on the power of radio advertising.

It's interesting that David Sarnoff, who headed RCA, which soon after bought WEAF, had been vehemently against using broadcast stations for commercial purposes.  RCA established stations and aired free programming simply as a way to create consumer demand for the Radiola radio sets that RCA built and sold.  He eventually gave in and NBC, which Sarnoff built, had stations throughout the country whose programming was used to sell ad time, eclipsing revenues that came from selling the radio sets themselves.  For decades, primetime programming on the major radio networks was produced by ad agencies and paid for by their clients.

That $50 spot 92 years ago has evolved into a $140 billion industry, with ads supporting 11,350 radio stations throughout the U.S. -- 4,726 AM stations and 6,624 FM outlets.

Even David Sarnoff didn't see that coming.