Headlines

(By Loyd Ford) With all the politics and violence that is occupying social media, don’t you think people are looking for fun and entertainment? Of course they are! How will you respond? By taking advantage of this opportunity. You’re in radio!

(By Ronald Robinson) “People tend to get accustomed to their circumstances.” This was a general observation provided by my H/R trainer. He added, “Even when some situations become extremely uncomfortable or even intolerable, we are likely to accept those, as well.” Radio is in one of those very states – and radio tolerates it. Radio also does so without much internal awareness, grumbling, or angst.

Beasley Media Group’s Sports Radio WFNZ The Fan in Charlotte, NC, is broadening its reach with the move to the FM dial, simulcasting on 102.5 FM. WFNZ was initially only found on 610AM and HD Radio frequency 1037-2. The station is the official home of the Charlotte Hornets and Charlotte 49ers football, as well as the Davidson Wildcats and ECU Pirates.

iHeart pulls the plug on the news-talker for Spanish Sports in San Francisco. Gil Gross joked on his Facebook page that listeners may have been confused by his decision to do the show in Spanish. "It was the only way I could think of to show up Trump's speech. Or it could be that ESPN came by with a big check and Talk910 is now ESPN Deportes."

For years radio has been dodging daggers from companies claiming they are the new shiny delivery system and radio is an old and dead medium. Tell that to Brandon Lancaster of the new Country band called LANco. Lancaster tells Sounds Like Nashville he couldn't believe it when he heard the band's new single being played on Country radio.

Alpha Media’s G100 Savannah-Hilton Head has launched as “The Throwback Station!” and playing favorite throwbacks like the Notorious B.I.G., Snoop, Dr. Dre, 50 Cent, and many more. Savannah favorites Mia Amini will host middays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and Mark “Shark” Ediss takes afternoons from 2 to 7 p.m. The station was previously Rhythmic CHR WXYY (Y100).

Saga has completed the sale of a tower in Norfolk, Virginia, WAFX-FM, to SBA Communications, based in Boca Raton.

Other than the four companies participating in the announced new measurement service with Shazam, not many, if any, other radio companies knew about it. iHeartMedia, Cumulus, Entercom, and Cox say they will be a part of the service. According to BIA/Kelsey those four companies control about 1,500 stations across the country. We know for sure that Hubbard, Greater Media, Alpha Media, Beasley, Emmis, Connoiseur, and others, were not contacted about the new service and were caught off guard when they saw the announcement Thursday.

There are several radio executives we spoke to who believe this new measurement system was meant as "a poke in the eye" to Nielsen as the industry grows more and more frustrated with the ratings firm being unable to come up with a final product that measures both over-the-air listening and online listening.

The press release did not give many details about how the new Shazam measurement technology would work, or how Shazam would measure a radio station signal. So we reached out to Shazam's Chief Revenue Officer Greg Glenday to try to get you more details.