Radio AM to FM

Radio AM to FM: September 13, 2002

The headline sent to subscribers of Don Barrett's laradio.com was ominous: the information site dedicated to Los Angeles radio would cease operations at the end of this year. The full story would run the next day.

I, of course, panicked, knowing that I would soon have to actually do my own reporting rather than just stealing it from his site. But I knew he was serious: Barrett has mentioned numerous times in the past that the time involved in keeping the site current is just too much.

"Now that LARadio.com has entered its 6th year, it's time to take advantage of other Internet opportunities," Barrett wrote. "I have been contacted by Paul Baba, bank manager of the Lagos Branch of the Orient Bank of Nigeria with an opportunity just too good to turn down ... All I had to do was claim to be his next of kin, send in my personal banking information, and at the end of the year I can collect 40% of the $25 million."

I figured he was so fed up that he wouldn't even give the real reason. Turns out he was just fed up with junk e-mails, and that laradio.com will continue.

I'm such a sucker.

After My Heart

Believe it or not, but I really do not write about every evil deed done by Clear Channel Communications. Sure it seems like it, but CC is so big and does so many things that hurt good radio (and, occasionally, something good) that it would take someone willing to spend a lot of time and energy to develop an entire web site devoted to exposing these traits.

Well Clint Sharp is the man with the time and the energy.

At his web site, www.clearchannelsucks.org, he reports on everything that is Clear Channel. Unlike me, he says that he doesn't want to see the company go away completely, but he does have an agenda (as written on the web site):

• To provide a comprehensive index of information available about Clear Channel on the Internet. We do not believe you should simply take our word for it that Clear Channel (expletive deleted); we believe you should become informed and come to your own decision.

• To provide a forum for users who are unhappy with the Clear Channel and its practices to interact.

• To provide information about what you can do about the situation. No matter how large the obstacle, in the United States of America nothing is insurmountable. We believe that if enough people, and specifically enough voters, are unhappy about something they can make a change for the better.

• Eventually, we hope that radio and live music will return to a state where all parties involved are happy and the market is fair. We hope to be a part of that.

Personally I'd be happy just to see the company go away ...

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