[BC] Interest in/Availibility of HD gear

[Rich Wood]

------ At 06:20 PM 1/16/2006, Davis, Steve - SVP wrote: -------

>So we need to get the CONTENT out there FIRST.  Enter the value of the
>Alliance.  Who is going to bother providing content for a medium that
>admittedly has very few listeners?  We in broadcasting need to do as the
>satellite providers have done: put the content out there first, even
>before we have listeners, then promote it heavily.  We are investing
>tens of millions in the equipment and programming (I can speak to this
>as fact, I've seen the invoices), taking a chance even though we KNOW
>the listeners and radios aren't yet out there, so we can then promote
>the content.

Do those invoices include the cost of real radio? Or are they simply 
for mechanized noisemakers. You can't talk about radio content while 
firing the people who create it. Let's say you're an Oldies fan. 
After years and years of WCBS-FM with legendary talent will you run 
out and buy an very expensive radio to be disappointed by what's left 
on WCBS-HD2.

I can guarantee you with absolutely no fear of being wrong that 
secondaries that are second thoughts won't do a damned thing to move 
radio product. The increase in IBUZ quality is minimal (if it's 
important at all) and certainly not significant enough to motivate a purchase.

My bet is that most of those tens of millions are being spent on 
hardware, not new people with new programming ideas. Wall Street 
loves hardware. They hate people. People can't be depreciated. How 
many new programmers have been hired? Or are the regional programmers 
already programming a dozen stations going to have to come up with a 
half dozen new formats.

I see the same scenario of NBC vs. CBS. Sarnoff was a techie. 
Performers were necessary evils. Paley saw entertainment and stole 
many of Sarnoff's best shows because he understood and respected the 
people listeners wanted to hear. Later ABC radio stole some great 
Talk programming from the competition with flowers and candy while 
the competition was ignoring them. Do you have a flower and candy budget?

>Then the listeners will want the radios, which will drive
>radio sales and bring down costs.  Even if today we decided to throw up
>"My favorite HD channel is.." in front of Olympic competitors as Sirius
>is doing, what channel would we promote?  There might be a channel in
>Chicago but not one in Des Moines.

Wow! I've won you over. I've objected to premature promotion from the 
beginning.

>Yep -- another reason we need an
>Alliance.  Otherwise a nationwide marketing campaign can't work.  And
>without nationwide marketing, automakers and consumer electronics
>manufacturers won't have any interest whatsoever.  The Alliance hasn't
>even ANNOUNCED the new formats, the stations haven't started
>broadcasting them, so what is there to promote?  Promoting now would be
>WORSE than not promoting at all because then when we DID have the
>content ready nobody would buy into our promotion.  It would be "I
>bought one of those radios, there wasn't anything good on it."  Sort of
>like crying wolf.

I'm afraid the HD Dominion personified by Jabba the HD and backed by 
mythical dollars (still no answer if there''s actually a bank account 
with $200 million in it) is bad news for radio. If I owned a golf 
course, I'd be thrilled. Maybe Jabba the HD and his snacks will ooze 
creativity on my golf course. The same people who sterilized radio 
are now charged with birthing babies. If Randy Michaels struck fear 
in the hearts of the triple starched, I can only imagine what the new 
generation of pierced, inked, ambisexual and not so reverent 
programmers will do to those who ring the bell in New York at 4pm.

They'll wrap their pudgy arms around every piece of hardware they 
come across. Emotionally safer than people.

>Those who really dislike the idea of an HD Alliance can take some
>comfort in this: it is a temporary solution, designed to get normally
>competitive broadcasters not known for cooperation, to launch together
>and maximize the offerings to the listeners until there is sufficient
>receiver penetration and consumer acceptance for the HD and HD2 channels
>to be self-sustaining.  Projections are that this will take 18 - 24
>months, but that may be optimistic.

Organizations like the HD Dominion aren't creative. Individuals 
competing with each other are. Jabba the HD doesn't move easily or 
fast. He's one, big fat mother. 18-24 months of huge egos trying to 
turn the ship of radio on a dime is an awesomely optimistic 
prediction. The composite Jabba the HD comes from sales, not creative.

Remember Luke Skywalker, Hans Solo, the Wookie (not boardroom types) 
and compatriots won. The Dominion didn't. Darth Vader had little more 
than a great voice. In today's radio he'd probably be fired rather 
than paid what he's worth.

Rich