The REAL Reason Progressive Talk Hasn’t Flourished In Rochester (So Far)
With Rochester’s WROC (950 AM) about to change from “progressive talk”, to something else (at least one RT reader suggested it would be ESPN sports talk), conservatives are crowing that this proves that progressive talk won’t work. “Look at ratings for conservative talk station WHAM 1180, they blow 950 a-way!”
Oh no! If WHAM 1180 has a 10.8 rating, and WROC 950 has a 0.8 rating, that must mean that there’s 10 times as many conservatives in Monroe County as progressives, right? That Democratic registration edge must be an illusion! We’re doomed!
Not so fast, my friends. If you take nothing else away from this article, remember this:
If you have a really low-powered signal, and you don’t promote your station, how are people supposed to know about it, exactly?
Check out this graph below that we put together. It shows Rochester radio transmitter strength vs. station popularity ratings.
Squares are AM radio, diamonds are FM radio. Three of the AM radio stations are political talk– WHAM 1180 (it’s the red square in the upper right hand corner), WYSL 1040 (it’s the red square at middle left), and our own beloved WROC 950 AM (it’s the blue square at lower left).
Some of our findings:
- Generally, for those stations like WROC that have a transmitter strength of less than 10,000 watts, ratings increase as the strength of the transmitter increases.
- WHAM has one of the strongest transmitters, and so conservative talk is already flooding our airwaves in this area of New York, even with the option of WROC.
- Given the very weak power of WROC’s transmitter, the low ratings are understandable.
- WSYL, however, has a much stronger transmitter, and yet their ratings are even lower. Is there room for only one conservative talk station in Rochester?
- There are a number of stations that do not fit the pattern: there is one that has a very low transmitter strength and one of the best ratings. There are also several stations that have a 50,000 watt transmitter but have mediocre ratings.
Let’s take a quick look at that low power/high ratings radio station. It’s WDKX FM. It has a really low signal, but that signal is FM, and is smack dab in the middle of their target audience: urban listeners. WROC’s target listeners, on the other hand, is progressives, spread throughout the county. People have told me they can’t even get WROC’s signal reliably in big parts of eastern Monroe County.
Plus WDKX promotes their site. Visit the Lilac festival this year? WDKX had a big booth with a big truck next to it. While I stood in line for an hour for kettle corn, I watched people constantly coming and going from the WDKX booth. I’ve seen similar promotional booths set up by conservative talk station WHAM.
Why care about promotion? Here’s why: I’ve been to, and been told about, a number of progressive meetings recently where the majority of the people there weren’t even aware that Rochester HAD a progressive talk station. And these would be key, hard-core members of WROC’s target audience.
Think about it: how would those ratings look for WROC if they reached out to those progressive groups? You don’t just put a plant in a pot and hope someone comes along and waters it.
Related posts:
- More on progressive talk radio
- More on losing Progressive Talk Radio in Rochester - Say Hello to Sportsradio 1280 WHTK
- Keeping WROC 950 AM’s Progressive Talk Format
- Funeral For A Friend - Rochester’s Progressive Talk Radio
- The back story on the 950AM format change - Yes, our Air America station is leaving Rochester
How about buying a radio station. Bet several might be available at a really cheap price.
Another reason is quite simply that progressives don’t listen to radio. Terrestrial radio is a dying medium, and the demographic is an older, less tech-savvy audience. I do listen to NPR and some Air America stuff, but I do it via podcast. The younger and more educated demo uses iPods in their cars, not radio.
I’ve not been listening to WROC largely because I’ve been disappointed with a lot of the programming, or the stuff I’ve wanted to listen to has been at times when I’m not available. Still, there’s no question that the lousy coverage spoiled the fun for me. I was able to listen to Air America fine in Farmington, but driving home, I’d hit pockets of dead air or the station would literally go off the air ne’er to return for the rest of the day.
I also have to agree with Chris in that a lot of people simply don’t listen, especially when they can just podcast instead.
Good points but remember - dying medium or not, dead air or not.
Someone is running this business and if they really wanted to grow the station - boost the signal and promote it otherwise why bother having a station to begin with.
btp - you should be running the “spin” for some Democrat candidate. You are quite good at it.
Spin Elmer?
Please explain. Actually you have dropped several broad comments without explanation in various posts - this being latest one.
So share your thought’s Elmer. RT awaits.
LOL! I have too many little kids to spend time on a campaign. So, where do you disagree with our analysis?
I’ve been podcasting Air America for years now.. its a good service, though I’m often a day behind on the news. Not a big deal, though, and commercial free!
Rochester may be unable to support a good progressive station, for the reasons that this post outlines. With a lot of wattage and above-half-assed marketing, I think it would work. But who has the antenna to do it? PRogressive radio has been kicking ass in big cities when they have good coverage. Give it a few years..it took Rush Limbaugh about a decade to make it big.
big tings gwaaan!
Btp sez:
I don’t see this on the plot you showed. I don’t see a pattern at all for those stations under 10K watts.
I don’t see this on the plot you showed. There is quite a spread of ratings for stations with low power signals.
Failure to follow the pattern implies that perhaps there are several causes in effect here. Doesn’t that undermine the central hypothesis of your post that WROC’s low ratings are due to their low signal strength?
Oh no, several stations don’t fit the pattern. What exactly is the point of your graph? And specifically, I don’t have your data, so I can’t do the calculations myself, but it looks to me like there is zero correlation on your graph (could you please compute the correlation number and let us know what it is?)
Nice piece. I’ll do a follow up later based on things I heard at Netroots. It was quite interesting what they had to say.
i would advise caution on the technobabble that the internet replaces more public media like radio and television and that such media are “obsolete”. The limits of he internet and such are still major. There was an interesting article (in a “print” journal on how MoveOn.org was running up against the limits of internet organization. If one were inclined to read history one would see that every new technology was accompanied by such hype. Yet when new technologies are developed older ones still survive. Radio still has a place in the age of television.Movies have survived television though in a changed way. We still read if in new ways. Argue these sweeping generalities at your own peril.
Paige-
Those bullet-points were all my comments, so take it up with me and not btp.
“I don’t see a pattern at all for those stations under 10K watts.”
Maybe you should look again at the graph. 6 out of the 9 stations under 10K fit into a pattern.
“There is quite a spread of ratings for stations with low power signals.”
Hardly. Again, 6 out of the 9 stations with a transmitter strength of less than 10K have ratings less than 2. And DKX, which we talked about at length in the post, is the only one that goes above 4. So your wrong on that point.
“Doesn’t that undermine the central hypothesis of your post that WROC’s low ratings are due to their low signal strength?”
It would. But you’ve misstated the central hypothesis of our post. btp put it quite clearly in bold lettering: “If you have a really low-powered signal, and you don’t promote your station, how are people supposed to know about it, exactly?” By no means are we saying that transmitter strength is the be-all and end-all of radio station ratings.
“Oh no, several stations don’t fit the pattern. What exactly is the point of your graph? And specifically, I don’t have your data, so I can’t do the calculations myself, but it looks to me like there is zero correlation on your graph (could you please compute the correlation number and let us know what it is?)”
First of all, the sarcasm is unnecessary and it tends to undercut your argument. Believe me, I’ve learned that the hard way. The point of the graph is not as you describe, to show a correlation, and for that matter the pattern that I talk about is a theoretical straight line that goes from (0,0) to (12, 60,000). That might be the reason that the word “correlation” does not appear once in our post. So maybe I should have been clearer, but I think it’s obvious to anyone who read the entire post that transmitter strength is only one of several factors that influence ratings.
I get the sense that you just skimmed through the post, read the bullet-points, and decided that that was enough to make a damning comment about our post. I suggest reading it again, especially the part about promotion and advertising.
Finally, shouldn’t we be in this fight together? Rather than offer your usual flippant commentary, why not try to be more constructive with your criticism and actually read the entire post next time.
You blame the radio station’s format failure on everything but the fact that either (1) there aren’t enough progressives in Monroe County or (2) the content lacked something.
Ifs the format change definite? If so, when?
I meant, “Is the format …”
Those aren’t “facts” as you put it. They’re your opinions… and not well-informed opinions at that. As we explained in the post, there are many more Democrats, and by implication more progressives, in the county than there are Republicans. That’s just a fact. You don’t have to believe us when we say that many of the most active progressives in the county know nothing about WROC, but that is also a fact. As for the content, I don’t think it lacked in anything. But if it did, then how do you explain the reality that progressive talk- despite being only several years old- outperforms conservative talk in plenty of media markets across the country?
Also, we don’t “blame the radio station’s format failure on everything.” We blame it on two things: a lack of promotion and a pathetically weak transmitter.
[...] We have discussed it before. We broke the news, reminded you to call, the station, dealt with the doubters and ultimately asked Mr. Press who confirmed the story. We asked why and faster than you can say weak signal and no promotion, ultimately figured it out. [...]
I listen to WROC.. I enjoy Bill Press. Ed Schultz is good except when he gets stuck on some topic and grinds away at it until I get bored. Randi Rhodes offended me and I stoped listening to her and didn’t miss her when she left. Stephanie Miller is funny in small doses, but the schtick gets old. The rest of the shows I miss becuase I’m doing other things - like sleeping or interacting with my family.
I think there should be room for these folks locally. But this is a capitalist society and, unfortunatley, money dictates. I don’t think it has anything to do with trying to force McCain down our throats. I think it is money.
Success in this venture requires commitment and vision. What I see here is lack of commitment with convenience manufactured excuses that pass of a “oh, well it doesn’t /can’t work” mind set.
It is money - the question is do you actually want to earn it?
it is impossible to speak of “free enterprise” or “competition” when very few companies control most of the media. You have if not a monopoly an oligopoly. Second the media are not a commodity. They are a public good in which there are public interest considerations.
I have serious questions whether an unrestricted free market is compatible with democratic participation. however we don’t have anything like a free market in media.
If we seriously gnat to confront concentrated media power, we need a lot more thoughtful analysis. There is plenty of good material out there.
I’ve got to side with paige on this one. If you’re not trying to show a correlation between signal strength and ratings, then why use the graph at all?
To draw comparisons with other stations in the same media market when it comes to one of the factors that has an impact on radio station ratings.VN:F [1.4.6_730]
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I tend to agree with your rundown of the shows on WROC. I wasn’t offended by Randi Rhodes, but then again I was never big on Hillary Clinton or Geraldine Ferraro, and I could see how a supporter of hers would be deeply offended at what she said. She definitely put her foot in her mouth big time. Also, Miller’s schtick never really gets old with me, but I could see how it would to some people. Schultz does tend to grind away at things until they get boring, but I like how he has all the connections in the Congress and has multiple Senators and Congressmen on each day. His callers are really annoying sometimes.
I disagree with you on the second half of your comments, but unfortunately, I don’t have the energy to respond.
Low signal strength and lack of promotion of course. In addition, this station had the worst technical staff I have ever heard and that includes small college stations. Dead air, playing two different commercials simultaneously, playing the wrong program hour, playing the same program twice, etc. The list goes on and on. You had to be really dedicated to listen to it.
I stand corrected.
6 out of 9 is precisely my point. You are looking at a fraction of the data, seeing a pattern, and declaring that the pattern exists. I am looking at the entire data below 10K watts, and seeing no pattern. What makes your analysis, based upon 2/3 of the data, better than my analysis, based upon the entire set of data below 10K watts? I don’t see any reason to pick yours over mine.
You have ignored 3 data points to make your case. You haven’t given a reason to ignore those 3 data points (33% of the total data), although you have given reasons why DKX should be taken out of the analysis. You can’t simply ignore the three data points just because they don’t fit the pattern you want to see. Imagine, if say Fox News did a survey, and they ignored 33% of the sample (Obama voters) and concluded that McCain was a lock?
There is a well-known problem with human perception, that humans tend to see patterns that they want to see. That’s why some humans see patterns in clouds, patterns in random numbers or patterns on graphs. The patterns aren’t real, they are random, you just think they are real patterns. And that is why the discipline of statistics doesn’t really accept data points being thrown out unless you have a valid reason. If we allowed data to be thrown out without a reason, you can show anything you want from this set of data. I don’t accept throwing out data with no valid reason. And therefore, I don’t accept your conclusion.
And if you haven’t shown, via statistical analysis, that one component of the hypothesis is true, then your hypothesis hasn’t been demonstrated. What one component of the hypothesis haven’t you shown to be true? The one you display on the graph, that there is a relationship between signal strength and ratings.
This is the exact situation (the theoretical straight line that you described) where statisticians would compute a correlation. This is basic statistics I am talking about. You haven’t computed a correlation. You have used your eyeball to pick out the parts of the graph that follows the pattern and explained away one or two other points and ignored the rest that don’t follow the pattern.
There is a reason why statistical analysis in this situation is the preferred way to go. It eliminates your perception and my perception, which are different, and calculates an objective statistic. We can still argue which points should be excluded, but after that is agreed upon, the measure is the same regardless of whether you calculate it or I calculate it. Furthermore, statistical analysis would also include something called a hypothesis test, which loosely speaking determines whether what you see could have occurred via random chance; and I think the overall pattern on your plot is simply random chance, but I don’t have the data otherwise I would do the actual computations.
Constructive criticism is mentioned above. Do not ignore data points for no reason. Compute a correlation and do a hypothesis test.
Shouldn’t we be in this together? Depends on what “this” you are referring to. I am all in favor of increasing the audience of progressive radio. I am not in favor of the analysis you have done, which I think is extremely weak and un-statistical. I would be much more in favor of analyses that included the proper statistical measures. The best way to make your point and achieve your goals (which are my goals too) is with a solid, bullet-proof analysis, not by an analysis that throws out data points without a reason and contains no statistical calculations.
Paige-
Thank you for being more constructive this time. But I still disagree with you.
“You are looking at a fraction of the data, seeing a pattern, and declaring that the pattern exists.”
That’s why I began the sentence in question with the word “Generally.” We just differ on when it’s appropriate to draw conclusions when two-thirds of the data show that they’re going in one particular direction.
“Imagine, if say Fox News did a survey, and they ignored 33% of the sample (Obama voters) and concluded that McCain was a lock?”
If McCain was getting 67% in an unbiased sample (which ours is), then they wouldn’t have to take out Obama’s 33% to conclude that he is a lock.
“This is the exact situation (the theoretical straight line that you described) where statisticians would compute a correlation.”
That’s plainly incorrect. The dimensions of the graph could easily have been different, in which case I would have been discussing a theoretical straight line from (0,0) to (maximum x, maximum y). And again, you’re attributing to the article something that was clearly not said by anyone: namely, that there is a correlation to be statistically analyzed. There isn’t and no one even mentioned the word “correlation,” except you. Almost your entire response is based on some flawed statistical analysis which no one conducted, discussed, or posted about.
As I said to Itchy, the point of the graph is simply to draw comparisons with other stations, and not to talk about a correlation which you’re right to say does not exist.
“Constructive criticism is mentioned above. Do not ignore data points for no reason. Compute a correlation and do a hypothesis test.”
I wasn’t ignoring any data points for any reason (reread my last bullet-point). And it’s clearly unnecessary to compute a correlation which you and I agree does not exist, especially since it has NOTHING to do with the post.
Bottom line: I really don’t need to be lectured to about correlations, statistical analysis, outlying data points, hypothesis testing, lurking variables, or any of the other things that have little or nothing to do with our post. I took statistics just last semester and got an A-. I don’t need to take it again over the internet.
Finally, I would argue that the post, when taken in its entirety, is bullet-proof. I would agree though, that it’s clearly not Paige-proof. You can respond if you want to, but I get the feeling that we’re arguing from two completely different perspectives. You are attributing to our post something that in my view has absolutely nothing to do with it. I can’t make a valid argument against someone’s perception or make that person change the way they look at something.
You don’t have to, but I’m agreeing to disagree.
Clearly, I disagree. Your description of correlation is wrong. Correlation does not look for a “theoretical straight line from (0,0) to (maximum x, maximum y)”, it looks to see if there is any linear relationship between your x-variable and y-variable, regardless of the dimensions on the plot. Correlation calculations don’t even take into account the (maximum x, maximum y) of the plot. Look it up, or provide me with a reference that supports your statement about correlation. Here is my reference, the formulas there also appear in all of my textbooks that cover correlation.
You may have gotten an A- minus in statistics, but you haven’t computed any statistics nor have you analyzed the data statistically, and you are wrong about correlation, and you are wrong to conclude there is a relationship by throwing out data points without a valid reason.
I can do the same thing you did, delete several data points without giving an explanation, and come to the exact opposite conclusion you did, that the higher the signal strength, the lower the rating. So I still fail to see any benefit or correctness in you eliminating data points from your analysis. So, what makes your throwing out data points right and my example of throwing out data points in this paragraph wrong? Nothing. They’re equally invalid. Neither is bullet-proof.
[...] our coverage continues - There was this chart with analysis of contributing causes to WROC 950 AM low ratings - hint, it isn’t the programming. Exile (again from Netroots [...]
One thing I’d like to point out is there is a dramatic difference in coverage areas if you were to compare equivalent wattage between a Am vs. FM signal.
A 50K AM would still reach beyond a 50K FM.
Paige-
I didn’t bother reading your latest response, but I feel the need to respond for the sake of finality. We are not going to see eye-to-eye on this. You are hammering away at something that is completely irrelevant to what I originally offered in the bullet-points.
You are wrong in your interpretations about almost everything I said in the post and in my responses. I’m moving on, I suggest you do the same. Enjoy the last word, but again, I won’t be reading it.
I agree it’s not a free market. But that doesn’t mean that it’s not about making money from most stations’ perspective.