WRTK/1540 "Rejoicing" In New Format

Well, HERE’S something different, at any rate.

100000watts.com reports that Beacon Broadcasting’s WRTK/1540 Niles has flipped from urban to black gospel, using ABC’s “Rejoice” 24 hour format – also known as “Musical Soul Food”.

Not like it’s a surprise to us here at OMW, of course. In fact, we predicted months ago that this is what Beacon owner Harold Glunt would do with the Youngstown-market daytimer. Glunt hung onto the station’s urban format long after he purchased the station, declining to flip it to a simulcast with “family friendly” oldies WANR/1570 Warren, WLOA/1470 Farrell PA and WGRP/940 Greenville PA.

The black gospel format fits perfectly within Glunt’s operation, which also includes Christian rocker WEXC/107.1 Greenville PA (“The Freq 107”). And Glunt’s hooked up with ABC 24 hour formats in the past, as WANR ran ABC’s “Memories, Unforgettable Favorites” shortly after Beacon regained control of the station from a group headed by Don Hanni III, which was running Air America liberal talk on the frequency.

We haven’t run over to the Youngstown/Warren market to hear the new WRTK format yet, but we assume Beacon is also running local paid religious programming as well…

Frustration – Our Own "Rants"

In the past week, OMW’s mostly resembled the classic Bill Murray movie “Groundhog Day”…what, with our menu pretty much limited to the same topics over and over again – SportsTime Ohio’s affiliates, David Lee Roth’s radio show, and the upcoming “Cleveland Rants” co-production between Fox Sports Net Ohio and Salem’s Cleveland sports talker, WKNR/850.

But that’s about all that’s going on right now, so we apologize for another “Rants” entry…and apologize for OMW looking like the background to a “Flintstones” cartoon – rock, tree, house, rock, tree, house, Dino, rock, tree, house…we’re actively looking for other stuff to talk about!

Anyway, WKNR has finally gotten around to putting a note about “Rants” on its website…after days and days of constant on-air promotion about the new “alternative” Indians post-game show, scheduled to start on Opening Day…

The mention on WKNR’s website once again calls “Rants” the show where there’s “no managed message”…implying, of course, that “official” post-game shows on WTAM/1100 and SportsTime Ohio are handing down the team’s Message from On High.

But whenever they added the “Rants” plug, and the picture above of WKNR’s Neil Bender and FSN Ohio’s Les Levine, the WKNR folks STILL HAVEN’T FIXED THE WEB STREAMING LINK!

That’s right, the problem we outlined some time back is still there. An unvarnished MP3 file link for live, continuing audio leads most browsers to trouble. Even if we set things up to hand off the MP3 link to WinAmp, which is built to handle MP3 live streaming, it fails. The only thing that works is directly entering the MP3 URL into WinAmp’s “Open URL” dialog.

It’s a bit frustrating, when your Primary Editorial Voice can figure this out on a blog, and the station isn’t paying attention to it at all…and we know we could help fix this if we were in that loop…

Another STO Update – This Time Over-Air

In addition to the list of cable providers mentioned below, SportsTime Ohio has announced agreements with stations in the Columbus market (WWHO/UPN) and Erie PA market (WICU/NBC-WSEE/CBS) to carry the over-air Indians games shown in Cleveland on WKYC/3.

The over-air network also includes previously announced affiliates WYFX “FOX 17/62” in Youngstown, and WLIO/35 (NBC) in Lima. We’re wondering if they’re still trying to sign up a Toledo broadcast affiliate, where the cable games will be seen on market dominant provider Buckeye Cablesystem. If they can’t get one of the broadcast stations to sign up, perhaps Buckeye’s “WT05”, the WB-to-become-CW affiliate, will step in…

Though the release says the WKYC games will be in HDTV on WKYC “and the ‘over the air’ network”, it’s our understanding that the HD broadcasts won’t be available to the other market affiliates…and the broadcast games will only be seen in HD on WKYC itself.

But that could be academic in the case of many of the affiliates. WYFX is a pair of LPTV/Class A stations with no HD feed, though the station does plan to provide an HD feed to cable systems. And neither WICU nor WSEE are even broadcasting their networks’ HDTV programs on their digital transmitters…yet, at least…

SportsTime Ohio’s Friday Press Release

It wasn’t quite what we predicted here in the Mighty Blog of Fun(tm) the other day, but close.

As expected, SportsTime Ohio has issued its wrapup press release on the cable TV negotiations that have taken place in the past few weeks, saying it’s “close to finalizing” all of its talks. STO boss Jim Liberatore notes that in “just six weeks”, the new Indians TV network has signed up 17 cable providers, and says there’s a “strong possibility” that additional partners will be aboard before STO’s first regular season broadcast on April 4.

We’ll translate for him: “Hello, DirecTV! Dish Network, this means you, too!” By the way, if Dish Network does bring on SportsTime Ohio, we expect it to be on channel 431. Those who watch the behind-the-scenes transponder movement note that the non-public STO feed has moved onto a satellite that can be picked up by dishes pointed at 119 degrees…

As noted here, STO has signed up all of the region’s major cable providers, along with a number of smaller outlets. But some cable viewers won’t be seeing the network’s 63 home HDTV games.

The STO release lists the channel numbers for the network on the services which have signed up. (We’ll attach the list below.)

And, while most Adelphia subscribers near Cleveland will get HD games from STO on cable channel 798 (“HD Bonus”), it looks like HD STO games won’t be seen on outlying Adelphia systems in places from New Philadelphia to Van Wert, or near Youngstown and the Shenango Valley.

Other systems without an HD channel listed may or may not just be omission at this point. The list also confirms the addition of Adelphia’s digital cable SD simulcast on channel 179 as an addition to the previously announced channel 17, and not a replacement…

Here’s the list:

——————-

SYSTEM – GEOGRAPHIC REGION: Analog Channel, Digital Channel, HD Channel
Adelphia – Cleveland & suburbs: 17, 179, 798-HD
Adelphia – Ashtabula area: 30, 179, 798-HD
Adelphia – Lorain area: 23, 179, 798-HD
Adelphia – Macedonia area: 97, 179, 798-HD
Adelphia – Port Clinton area: 17, 179, 798-HD
Adelphia – Shenago Valley and Struthers/ Lowellville: 71
Adelphia – Bryan: 15, 179, no HD
Adelphia – Cadiz / Amsterdam: 19
Adelphia – Defiance/ Deshler/ Napoleon/ Paulding / Wauseon/ Waterville: 37, 179, no HD
Adelphia – Cambridge/ Caldwell/ Apple Valley/ Newark/ Riverside/ Coshocton: 53, 179, no HD
Adelphia – New Philadelphia/ Minerva/ Sebring/ Newcomerstown / Carrollton: 69, 179, no HD
Adelphia – Marion: 69
Adelphia – Celina / Van Wert / Minster: 74, 179, no HD
Armstrong – Medina/Orrville area: 4,177-HD
Armstrong – Ashland area: 69, 177-HD
Armstrong – Boardman area: 66, 177-HD
Armstrong – Meadville, PA area: 69, 177-HD
BTC Multimedia – Bascom: 76
Buckeye CableSystem – Toledo Metro Area: 32, 653-HD
Buckeye CableSystem – Erie County: 57, 653-HD
CableSuite 541 – Conneaut area: 81
City of Wadsworth – Wadsworth: 77
Clear Picture – Central Wayne County: 10
Comcast – Lake & Lorain Counties: 73, HD is TBD
Cox – Western Cleveland suburbs: 58, 758-HD
Doylestown Cable – Doylestown: 16
Insight – Central Ohio: 60, 779-HD
GLW Broadband – Lorain County area: 37
Massillon Cable – Western Stark County: 11
Orwell Cable Television – Orwell area: 44
Time Warner – Northeast Ohio: 23, 523-HD
Time Warner – Northwest Ohio: 25, 757-HD
Time Warner – Mid-Ohio: 34, 758-HD
TSC Communication – Auglaize County: 12
WOW! – Cleveland area: 72, 221-HD
WOW! – Columbus area: 57, 221-HD

Station Not Many Can Hear Shuts Down

And no, we’re not talking about Media-Com’s Fox Sports Radio affiliate WJMP/1520 Kent.

(Sorry, we couldn’t resist!)

Under scrutiny by the Ohio attorney general, the folks at Written Communications Radio Service have been forced to shut down their radio reading service for the blind.

WCRS operated on a subcarrier of Akron University’s WZIP/88.1, providing reading of the Akron Beacon Journal, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, numerous magazines and original programming aimed at blind listeners. The station’s listeners needed a special radio to pick up the station out of the hidden reaches of 88.1’s signal.

WCRS’ operation of instant bingo games at the former Rollercade on East Market Street is being investigated by attorney general Jim Petro’s office, along with other operational questions. After being forced to shut down the instant bingo, WCRS kept going with regular bingo for a while…until finally closing the door on that as well. The loss of the bingo income led to the shutdown.

There’s talk in the Beacon Journal article about the local chapter of the National Federation of the Blind trying to restart the radio reading service, though we don’t know how likely that’d be. We’re wondering how many folks use the service these days, due to the advent of computer technology…but at least WCRS’ older listeners seemed to appreciate the service and its audio companionship…

Disclosure: As a teenager, your Primary Editorial Voice did some volunteer reading work for WCRS, which was then known as Tri-County Radio Reading Service…

Tracking Chuck Booms

Rumorama alert: Euclid resident and former Fox Sports Radio host Chuck Booms could be headed back to that network for weekend work.

Booms, along with former FSR partner Kevin Kiley, recently filled in on weekends on legendary Philadelphia sports station WIP/610. Aaron Bracy of the Cherry Hill (NJ) Courier-Post in suburban Philly said a couple of weeks ago the team could appear again, and called their first WIP appearance “bad”, saying the duo managed to “insult just about every Philadelphia sports icon” on their radio show.

Of course, Booms was most recently heard here in Northeast Ohio, in that tryout rotation for the WTAM/1100 Cleveland midday slot eventually occupied by Bob Frantz. OK, if you can call it a “tryout rotation”…

Diamond Dave’s Back

As (mostly) expected, CBS Radio syndicated morning man David Lee Roth returned to his on-air perch on WFNY, New York’s “Free FM”, and stations including CBS Radio classic rocker WNCX/98.5 Cleveland.

Roth told his audience that he was indeed suspended for two days by CBS, and went off on a rant about a memo by WFNY programmer Mark Chernoff with new show guidelines.

The new rules outline, well, the lack of some radio basics that Roth doesn’t seem to like…things ranging from having more topical interviews, less bumper music and more show prep. Oh, and there are less people in the Roth lair, which he referenced in his first hour for morning…but it hasn’t yet been confirmed that Roth’s manager and a sidekick are no longer with the show.

AllAccess reports that Roth said his program was “starting to gel”, but said the new guidelines come from “individuals in their late 50s who no longer have a connection to what’s happening in the neighborhood.” Interesting, coming from a 51 year-old guy who has featured old New York City nightclub stories from his uncle, and who was sharing old Jerry Lewis stories to open the show this morning…

So for now, it’s “stand down” for the troubled morning show. He’s not gone yet. We emphasize…YET…

And The Final Major System For SportsTime Ohio Is…

…Armstrong Cable, as expected.

In a note buried in another item on the Indians’ website tonight, an earlier-rumored deal between SportsTime Ohio and Armstrong has been confirmed. MLB.com Indians beat writer Anthony Castrovince reports that the agreement not only covers Armstrong’s systems in Medina, Orrville, Ashland and the Youngstown suburb of Boardman, but also Armstrong’s Meadville PA system.

We believe Armstrong is the final major cable provider in Northern Ohio to agree to carry the Indians via SportsTime Ohio. There are any number of smaller rural cable providers that may not yet have signed up, but all of the “biggies” are on board. Not on board yet, of course, are the two major satellite providers, DirecTV and Dish Network – both services, which reportedly serve some 800,000 subscribers in the Indians TV area, are reported to still be negotiating with STO.

And one interesting thing we spotted in today’s Akron Beacon Journal – a color display ad for STO’s high-definition broadcasts from Time Warner Cable…which we’ve reproduced in part here:

Under a picture of a C.C. Sabathia fastball appearing to go outside a TV screen, TWC touts its 63 SportsTime Ohio HDTV games – “You won’t find this on satellite!” The information is repeated in a burst at the bottom right – “INDIANS IN HD NOT AVAILABLE ON SATELLITE”. Click on the graphic to make it appear larger on your screen.

Unless TWC is taking advantage of the current status of DirecTV and Dish Network’s negotiations with STO, it seems possible that the satellite services – whenever they DO come to an agreement with the network – won’t be offering the HDTV broadcasts.

Satellite carriage of HDTV local sports networks is rather spotty, with very few being carried. As far as we know, the only major regional sports network offering its games in HD via DirecTV is the Yankees-owned “YES” network (to New York-area subscribers), and DirecTV may have some other spotty HD game offerings from a couple of other RSNs.

We just don’t know if the Indians wouldn’t be in HDTV on satellite because that’s just the way it is, or if it’s a bone that STO has thrown to the cable companies to help get them aboard…

Some "Rants" Details

In what seems to be the biggest promotional campaign for a radio and/or TV show in some time, the move to promote FSN Ohio and WKNR/850’s upcoming “Cleveland Rants” (non-official) Indians postgame radio/TV simulcast continues.

WKNR has been promoting the show incessantly in the past few days, and the season hasn’t even started yet! The hosts – FSN Ohio’s Les Levine and WKNR’s Neil Bender – appeared with the radio station’s Greg Brinda AND Kenny Roda today.

We heard part of the duo’s appearance on Roda’s show. Levine says that though the show is intended to be an “honest, objective” look at the team from a non-team-influenced perspective, it may some days resemble the name “Cleveland Raves” if the team is doing well. In other words, they’re not just there to gripe about what the team does wrong.

Levine notes that FSN Ohio’s part of the show will last about an hour each night/day, give or take a few minutes depending on the end time of the game in question. After FSN Ohio turns off the cameras, Bender will continue solo on WKNR for more.

It turns out there may only be about 145 “Rants” shows on FSN Ohio out of 162 regular season games…we assume that such things as conflicts with existing sports events (Cavs, college basketball/football, etc.) on the cable network will preempt 17 appearances on TV.

And though our radio hit some electrical noise at about the time Levine said it, we believe we heard that a studio is indeed being built for the show.

That’s significant, because we’d then expect Levine’s existing Adelphia cable show “More Sports and Les Levine” to move to FSN Ohio – when Adelphia closes up shop later this summer as part of the Time Warner deal. In this joint venture, it seems Levine is FSN Ohio’s representative.

Levine did mention on Roda’s show that his “More Sports…” won’t be affected by this new venture, as far as being taken off the air…but we’d put some money down on it moving to FSN Ohio, and the network’s new studios, when Adelphia becomes Time Warner locally…

Reading The Tea Leaves

Two pieces of information have us wondering if there is more behind the story…

INSIGHT ABOARD: As expected, Columbus’ third major cable provider has signed up with SportsTime Ohio. The Columbus Dispatch reports that Insight Cable will carry STO on Channel 60, which is normally reserved for – and will retain outside of STO’s Indians programming – ShopNBC programming. (Maybe the Tribe can talk to ShopNBC about offering Indians memorabilia after the STO post-game? Heh.)

But our question – why hasn’t STO or the team put out a release about this yet? The Dispatch article is the only mention of the new deal. Our guess – Armstrong Cable is next (we’ve already heard they’re aboard), and STO officials are waiting until they have deals with DirecTV and/or Dish Network to announce they’ve finished the whole affiliation thing. Expect a press release to that effect on Friday…”we’re done, enjoy the games, Play Ball!”

JV AND ELVIS: WFNY/New York midday hosts JV and Elvis once again appeared on CBS Radio classic rocker WNCX/98.5 Cleveland, as incumbent morning host David Lee Roth won’t be back until Friday morning.

And though CBS Radio swears up and down that Roth has not been fired – and JV and Elvis did once again make it clear they were “filling in for” DLR…we noticed a change this morning.

The pair had a fully produced opening montage today. They had something yesterday, but it was brief and sounded thrown together. Today, it sounded like – aside from a brief mention that they were filling in for Roth – it was being treated like their show.

Sure, they had to spend a lot more time explaining things on Wednesday, as they showed up out of nowhere and no one knew why Diamond Dave was gone. But, the mention of filling in for Roth today sounded almost like they “had to mention it quickly”…though they did indeed mention later that Roth was returning from Miami and would be back tomorrow.

And in some strange story about being beaten with a fly swatter on Times Square, the hosts said “it’s going to last longer than a day”… “a day, it could last weeks!” Listeners to talk radio shows often try to make out “coded messages” from the hosts. Though we’re not familiar with JV and Elvis – frankly, they aren’t even remotely our kind of talk radio – that odd line sounds to our ears like they were talking about not being beaten with a fly swatter, but their own presence in the “Free FM” morning slot.

We’re not 100% confident that David Lee Roth’s show will return tomorrow morning. We’re also not 100% confident he will not be back as promised, but again, we would not bet the nearly-on-the-market Palatial OMW World Headquarters on Roth lasting into the next month…