Month: November 2020

The coronavirus has turned the NFL into a joke, and nobody should be laughing

Topics:

The NFL was a joke Sunday, at a time when nothing about the coronavirus warrants laughter. In Baltimore, the Ravens reported a positive test for the eighth straight day, further jeopardizing a twice-delayed game against the undefeated Pittsburgh Steelers. In the Bay Area, the San Francisco 49ers were rendered temporarily homeless, if they want to keep playing football, because of local restrictions. And in Denver, the Broncos played — or something like that — without a true quarterback.

Contact info:

Chairman Pai Announces His Intent to Depart FCC.

Topics:

Ajit Pai announced this morning that he will be stepping down as Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission on Jan. 20. In a statement he called his time at the agency “the honor of a lifetime” and noted that on his watch the Commission adopted more than 25 proposals to update media regulations. Pai, 47, was appointed by President Obama to fill one of the Republican-controlled seats. In 2017, when President Trump was sworn in, he turned to Pai to take over the agency. Pai’s departure will allow President-elect Joe Biden to name a new head of the FCC.

Contact info:

TV Recruiting Faces Pandemic Challenges

Topics:

By Paige Albiniak | TV NewsCheck
Just like so many other things, the pandemic has forced much of TV stations’ hiring processes to go virtual. Stations have made it work, even when it comes to such challenges as hiring new leaders — and relocating them, which multiplies the degree of difficulty — and hiring entire rosters for such mammoth endeavors as launching a new network or a new show.

The good news is that TV stations are still hiring. In most cases, they aren’t expanding their teams or trying to grow, but they are maintaining head counts and filling spots that come open due to promotion or attrition. Part of that is because while local TV was hurt early in the pandemic due to the resulting advertising slowdown, much of that money came back when the election heated up in late summer and fall.

READ MORE

Contact info:

Political Revenue Reached New Heights At Radio In 2020.

Topics:

Forecasters called for record-shattering political ad spending this year and radio participated in the windfall. Based on results from the third quarter and the month of October, most publicly traded radio companies told investors on their quarterly earnings call they expect 2020 to surpass previous in-house records for the category.

At iHeartMedia, political put $40 million on the books in Q3 and another $55 million in October. “This will be by far the biggest political year that we’ve ever had,” President and COO Rich Bressler said during the company quarterly results call. All told, iHeart execs said they expect political to be up 67% from the presidential election of 2016. The impact can be seen in three battleground states. Total October revenues in Michigan were up 25% year over year, Florida grew 14% and Wisconsin increased 12%. “While there was clearly unevenness in the political spend by geography, our results demonstrate the value of a broad distribution of markets,” CEO Bob Pittman said.

Contact info:

How To Make Ownership More Diverse? Broadcasters Tell FCC It Comes Down To Money.

Topics:

Familiar problems of tight-fisted lenders and new hurdles brought by the coronavirus, and the recent focus on racial justice dominated much of the conversation Friday as the FCC’s Diversity Advisory Committee put the focus on broadcast ownership. The daylong symposium was held virtually, a reflection of the current situation with COVID-19. Beasley Broadcast Group CEO Caroline Beasley, who chairs the FCC Diversity Committee’s Access to Capital Working Group, said their focus “shifted” this year as the impact of the pandemic on business became clear.

Much of the discussion centered on the ongoing problem of too little financing available for minority owners, which has prevented them from buying stations. FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks said the pandemic has only made the problem worse for small business owners like radio station operators. “Many of them are in small markets where they operate on razor thin margins to be profitable. Unfortunately, some have had to shutter and hopefully more won’t before this is over,” he said.

Starks, like nearly all of the speakers, backed a revival of a minority tax certificate program, which has been long been endorsed by the Diversity Committee. The bill that use the federal tax code to incentivize current radio and TV station owners to spin-off stations to women and minorities was passed out of committee in September and there is hope it will be taken up by the House and Senate during the lame duck session.

Contact info:

NAB’s Smith: ‘Time to Acknowledge the Election of Joe Biden’

Topics:

President Donald Trump still refuses to concede the election

WASHINGTON—After days of news coverage of mail-in votes across multiple states being tallied, broadcasters and media officially called the 2020 presidential election for former Vice President Joe Biden.

Biden is now the president-elect and set to take office as the 46th president on Jan. 20, 2021. However, President Donald Trump continues to baselessly claim that he won the election and is filing lawsuits in multiple states.

NAB President and CEO Gordon Smith released a statement over the weekend after Biden was declared the winner.

“It has been clear for days now that Joe Biden has been on track to win the popular vote in his run for the presidency,” Smith said. “It is decisive that today [Saturday, Nov. 7] he has surpassed the threshold of 270 electoral college votes. NAB congratulates Joe Biden on becoming president-elect of the United States of America.”

 

Contact info: