News

In his latest blog, immediately following the change at the top of Pandora, Cumulus/Westwood One CMO Pierre Bouvard asks the question, "Will Pandora be to streaming what MySpace was to social media?" Bouvard says Edison Research's latest Share of Ear study reveals why trouble is brewing for Pandora, specifically in the 18-24 demo.

Rick Martinez has been appointed to the newly created position of Vice President of News and Information Programming for Curtis Media. Martinez rejoins Curtis from the staff of Governor Pat McCrory where he was Deputy Communications Director.

The pharmacy chain surged to number two (from 18) on the Media Monitors weekly chart, airing just over 32,000 commercials on radio stations across the country last week. GEICO held on to the number one spot with 39,656. Rounding out the top five were AutoZone (30,105), Nissan Dealers (25,421), and McDonald's (25,007). Along with Walgreens, other big movers included Macy's (from 22 to 8) and Sprint (from 27 to 9).

In his latest blog, broadcast attorney David Oxenford reminds broadcasters not to go too far with jokes and pranks on Friday, April 1. He points out the FCC’s rule against broadcast hoaxes prevents stations from running any information about a “crime or catastrophe” on the air if the broadcaster knows the information to be false, it is reasonably foreseeable that the broadcast of the material will cause substantial public harm, and public harm is in fact caused. Oxenford writes, "Air a program deemed a hoax, and expect to be fined by the FCC."

Sonya Blakey will host mornings from 6 a.m. to 12 p.m. and Marcella Jones will host afternoons from 12 p.m. to 6 p.m., weekdays, on Inspiration 1390AM, live in-studio beginning Monday, April 4, 2016.

89.3 WFPL News in Louisville has named Bill Burton (pictured) as the local host and producer of the NPR flagship news program, Morning Edition. The station has also hired Kathi Lincoln as WFPL’s new midday host and producer of The Diane Rehm Show, Fresh Air with Terry Gross, Here and Now, and Kentucky’s statewide newscast.

The comments former CBS Radio CEO Dan Mason shared about Nielsen's Portable People Meter at the 2016 Radio Ink Hispanic Radio Conference have created a lot of buzz throughout the industry. SBS New York City Market Manager Eric Garcia interviewed Mason at the show. Garcia asked Mason the question about PPM. Because of how much feedback we've been getting on that story, we wanted our readers to hear Dan Mason's entire answer. LISTEN HERE

Country station Y96.9, Colorado Springs, announced Monday that its 10th annual Country Cares for St. Jude Kids radiothon raised more than $101,000 to benefit St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. The on-air fundraiser took place on February 25-26 from 6 a.m. – 6 p.m. each day.

Automotive News reports that the month of March could be one of the strongest months ever for the U.S. auto industry. Sales are expected to increase at least 7 percent from a year ago.

Paid media spending will rise by 5.1% to $192 Billion in 2016 according to eMarketer. The election and Rio Olympics are two of the reasons for the projected increase in spending. TV still has the largest share of media spending -- 36.8%. Digital is now 35.8%. Print advertising is expected to bring in $26.74 billion this year -- down from $28.16 billion. And eMarketer says radio will slip to $14.12 billion from $14.27 billion.