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The most important gathering of the year is only weeks away. If you planned on attending Radio Ink's Forecast 2017, Early-bird registration of $1,395 ends today. As of Tuesday, November 1, registration goes up to $1,595. Register for Forecast HERE. Check out our agenda HERE.

SummitMedia Birmingham station Easy 102.1-FM is that city's first all-Christmas music station. It flipped on Friday. PD John Olsen said, “This has been such an emotionally difficult year and Christmas music brings so much joy, we wanted to offer listeners the opportunity to get into the holiday spirit early this year.” Easy 102.1 will play Christmas favorites through Christmas Day.

Last week it was announced that the FCC would hold a hearing regarding the license renewal of Entercom's KDND in Sacramento. The hearing was prompted by a station contest that lead to the death of a listener. On Friday, Entercom CEO David Field issued a statement (see next story). Today we turn to broadcast attorney John Garziglia to get his thoughts on this hearing, which way it might go and what managers should do regarding their contests and contest rules.

As we reported Friday morning, the FCC is conducting a hearing on the KDND Sacramento license renewal ten years after a listener died during a station contest. Entercom CEO David Field issued the following statement Friday morning....

(Bob McCurdy) Big data is getting a lot of headlines and has made the process of purchasing media more sophisticated over the past several years, as everyone is searching for ways to maximize the impact of their marketing spend.

(By Ronald Robinson) Very seldom, when I am visiting with old friends who are not involved in radio, do I bring up any of the material I discuss in this space. Somehow, I did touch on it when having a coffee with a good pal. He listened to some of the points I regularly make here, paused briefly and said, “Psy-Ops.”

(By Ryan Wrecker) There’s a misperception that producing digital audio is only “worth it” if thousands of people are ready to consume it, but that way of thinking has become antiquated. Many talents justify their passion for producing digital content with an “If you build it, they will come” philosophy, but for our own sake, we need podcasting to become so much more.

(Paul Weyland) Selling — and this is my definition — is simply the modification of the behavior of another person, without that person’s necessarily knowing that his or her behavior is being modified, in order to arrive at a mutually beneficial conclusion. Would you go along with that?

Milt McConnell, SVP/Market Manager of Portland has been promoted to VP, National and Group Sales Strategy. Lisa Decker joins Alpha Media to fill the role as Portland SVP/Market Manager and Amy Leimbach moves into VP Sales, Portland- Live Performance Lounges.