News

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai continues his aggressive attack against pirate operators, especially those that are repeat offenders. Following the announcement that North Miami pirates would be hit with the maximum fine allowable ($144,000), Pai said since becoming Chairman he's made it quite clear that the FCC won’t tolerate the unauthorized and illegal use of the radio spectrum.

On Tuesday, the Federal Communications Commission issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that proposed to eliminate rules requiring certain broadcasters to keep paper copies of FCC rules. Copies of the rules are now available online and the Commission stated the paper copy requirements are outdated and unnecessarily burdensome.

The Philadelphia 76ers aren’t moving on the radio dial and have announced a multi-year extension with Beasley Media Group’s 97.5 The Fanatic (WPEN) to serve as the team’s flagship radio station. The Fanatic will continue to exclusively broadcast 76ers games, as well as remain the official home of 76ers pre-game, halftime, and post-game shows.

The Indiana Pacers have renewed their play-by-play deal with Emmis' 107.5 FM/1070 AM The Fan in Indianapolis. This will be the 22nd season Pacers games have been broadcast on an Emmis station. Terms of the new agreement were not disclosed.

Five House members and another Senator have joined as cosponsors of the resolution opposing "any new performance fee, tax, royalty, or other charge" on local broadcast radio stations. The Local Radio Freedom Act now has 211 cosponsors in the House and 24 in the Senate.

We want to know who the 25 people that have had the biggest impact (good or bad) on the radio industry over the past 25 years are. And we want you to tell us. The results of our poll will be published in the November 13 issue of Radio Ink -- celebrating the 25th year of the magazine.

Over the past few weeks our readers have been voting for the top 20 AOR stations of all time. You'll find that final vote at the end of this story. Before we list how you voted in our poll, we turn to three AOR experts to see how they voted. Both John Sebastian and Lee Abrams have ranked their lists. Fred Jacobs provided us with a list of 20 stations as well. Fred's top 20 are not ranked.

(By Eric Rhoads) Being in the role of RAB president is one no one in their right mind would want. (With respect to Erica Farber, current RAB president) because you not only have to be a visionary, you have to manage the politics of the needs of each member sector…. The big-market players like Clear Channel (now i-Heart Radio) as well as the small-market independent players and the needs of everyone in between. Gary Fries handled them all masterfully.

The New York Post has a piece devoted to the upcoming departure of Mike Francesa from WFAN in New York. Francesa has been voted Radio Ink's #1 sports talker ever since our list was created. He's leaving at the end of the year when his contract expires. The Post points out that if it weren't for this one person, Francesa would have never been hired.

He was the GSM in L.A. and now he's running the show in San Diego. Steve Brodsky has been promoted to GM for Salem's KPRZ-AM and KCBQ-AM in San Diego. Brodsky was the GSM at Salem’s KKLA-FM Los Angeles where he was for the past two years.