News

Country Radio Broadcasters is now accepting applications for the Rusty Walker Scholarship program, which provides an all-expenses-paid trip to, and attendance at, CRS 2017 in February. Applicants must be full-time radio station employees and a first-time CRS attendees. Three scholarships will be awarded. Apply at https://www.countryradioseminar.com/. Deadline is November 7.

The Financial Exchange with Barry Armstrong and Chuck Zodda will be added to NH1 News Radio WNNH FM 99.1 in Concord, and WEMJ FM 107.3 & AM 1490 in Laconia, both in New Hampshire.

CBS Radio and Simon & Schuster have launched a new podcast called “The Paper Donkey Podcast” on the play.it network. The 45-minute podcast is a conversation between writers and editors about their work and will be posted every other Wednesday. It's the second podcast created by CBS Radio and Simon & Schuster.

Buzz Knight, the longtime SVP/program development for Greater Media, will be joining Beasley as VP/programming on the close of Beasley's purchase of Greater Media. He takes over from Justin Chase, who, as reported earlier, has been promoted to EVP/programming for Beasley Media Group. Chase called Knight "incredibly strategic and well suited for the Beasley company culture."

As Beasley gets ready to close on its purchase of Greater Media, Justin Chase takes on a bigger role as Executive Vice President of Programming. Chase was VP of Programming since 2013, after four years of service as Operations Manager for Beasley's cluster in Vegas.

Although the station had nothing to announce at this time, several reports in New York have Chris Carlin joining Ike Reese for afternoon drive on CBS's WIP in Philadelphia. Carlin has co-hosted SportsNet New York’s Loud Mouths since 2008. Carlin has worked at SiriusXM and did fill-in work at FAN. Early in his radio career Carlin was Mike Francesa’s producer for six years. Picture courtesy SNY.tv

Country Singer Todd O’Neill has won the NASH Next 2016 Challenge artist development competition. O’Neill, who hails from Hammond, LA, will receive national radio airplay on Cumulus Media radio stations, a recording contract with Big Machine Label Group, and will have an original song produced by Jay DeMarcus...

Whatever the reason or reasons, Pandora's revenue did not meet expectations and the stock price was reflecting that late Tuesday. Revenue was approximately $352 million, $8 million below the low end of Pandora's own guidance range. CFO Mike Herring blamed the miss on a soft advertising market, especially in national business, and overall softness in digital advertising.

That's what Pandora CEO Tim Westergren told investors Tuesday when the topic of local ad sales came up. And that includes at least one local mattress store in Dallas. Westergren, who has 154 local sales reps on his payroll, said when sellers come over from iHeartMedia or Cumulus they say it's like they received Willy Wonka's Golden Ticket. And, he still believes Pandora has 10% of all radio listening in the United States.

Yesterday, we told you about state Senator Chris Walters (pictured) who sent a “cease and desist” letter to several Charleston radio companies, demanding they stop running ads that he says falsely claim he testified on behalf of a convicted child molester. While none of those radio companies responded to our request to discuss the issue, broadcast attorney John Garziglia helped us out with an explanation on what managers facing the same issue might be up against.