Time to launch your streaming clearinghouse
Wasnāt that you who told me you always wanted to own your own radio-related internet domain, so that you could direct your friends and family to your chain of online radio stations that you program out of your spare bedroom?
Youāre in luck. Audacy, owner of stations nationwide including eight here in Los Angeles (seven if you count the failure of the KNX Newsradio simulcast (1070 AM, 97.1 FM) that earns roughly the same combined ratings as it did as a standalone AM signal, but I digress) is auctioning off the radio.com domain it once used for its online presence. The company dropped radio.com in favor of audacy.com when it changed its corporate name from Entercom to Audacy a couple years ago.
Available through GoDaddy.Com, the auction ends March 28, 2023. Starting bid: $2.5 million. Thatās right – $2.5 million. Minimum.
On a serious note and just for reference, Audacy couldnāt really do anything major with either radio.com or audacy.com. It is a decent little domain name, though ā¦ I just canāt see anyone or any company finding it worth that much. Generally speaking, online radio doesnāt make a lot (read: none) of money, so paying off that $2.5 million may take a while.
So if thatās too rich for your blood, Iāll sell you socalradiowaves.com for much less. Maybe half a million. Send me your offer ā¦
Also on a serious note: Iām kidding about selling socalradiowaves..
The Radio.Com domain itself goes back to at least 1996. It was once owned by CNET networks ā which paid $30,000 for both Radio.Com and TV.Com ā and became part of CBS Radio when CBS bought CNET. In 2010, CBS launched Radio.Com as a clearinghouse of all CBS radio station streams. When Entercom bought CBS, the domain became its own.Ā
AllAccess.Com, which broke the news of the auction, reports that similar domains such as Radio.Cloud, Radio.Co, and Radio.IM recently sold for anywhere from $2500 – just over $25,000.Ā
Americanās Samoaās Best Music
Ever wonder what the legendary KHJ (930 AM) might sound like, musically at least, if the station still played top-40? Wonder no more ā¦ South Seas Broadcasting has you covered.
Using the call-letters KKHJ and broadcasting at 93.1 FM out ofĀ Pago Pago in American Samoa, the station brands itself as 93/KHJ in a tribute to the original. The music is considered an adult top-40, which is probably what I would program on the station if I were running it here in Los Angeles.Ā
According to the station website at southseasbroadcasting.com/93khj, āthe idea for KHJ Radio came about in 1994 when Larry Fuss (now President of South Seas Broadcasting, Inc., the parent company of 93KHJ) was looking out the window of his radio station in Mississippi following a big ice storm. The streets were littered with fallen trees, broken branches and tons of ice, and the electricity had been out for over a week. Fuss thought to himself, āwouldnāt it be nice to have a radio station on a tropical island in the South Pacific?āĀ
āOn somewhat of a whim, Fuss immediately began researching the possibility and ran across an available frequency for a new FM Radio Station in Pago Pago, American Samoa. The FCC application was filed on November 20, 1995, and finally granted on February 13, 1998.ā
Regular programming began in May of 2000 ā almost exactly 35 years after the late April, 1965 āsneak previewā ofĀ the āBoss Radioā top-40 launch that helped change radio forever. Like the original, the format was an instant hit.
The station features a two-man morning team, a three-person news department, and runs public affairs programming benefiting the local community. And modern ā93/KHJā jingles ā¦ so cool. Hear it yourself on the various smartphone apps or online at the website.
Ratings
The December ratings (which due to the four-week cycles actually includes more of November than December) had KOST (103.5 FM) at the top, as usual, with their Christmas music format earning a whopping 12.1 share of the audience. You can expect that to be even higher when the āholidayā ratings period is released in January.
But what caught my eye is the stellar performance of KFI (640 AM), which tied with KRTH (101.1 FM) for second place at 4.7. Thatās right: an AM station tying for second place. It is truly amazing what happens when you program something people want to hear on the AM band: you get ratings. Just like so many stations did before they sent listeners to FM ā¦ such as KLAC (570 AM), XETRA (690 AM), KPRZ (now KEIB, 1150 AM), KEZY (now KGBN, 1190 AM) , KABC (790 AM) and even KHJ itself, most of which have never had ratings as high as they had when they played music (country, top-40, or even adult standards). KABC is a special case because they stopped trying to compete in talk in spite of inventing the format.
KFI does have an advantage of being a signal blowtorch, covering most of Southern California during the day and much of Western America at night. But they compete by having a good programming, good promotion, and a local presence that is missing from so many stations, both AM and FM. One could learn a lot by studying these successes past and present, especially now that so many competing stations donāt really try.
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