Ken,

First of all, Uncle Ricky provides one of the greatest resources out
there for people who want to listen to old Top 40 airchecks. The day
you run your own website, pay for your own website and administer your
own website -- plus polish all the audio and write most of the text --
then you can complain about "suffering" because of "his
self-aggrandizement."

Second, when you say "he apparently wants nobody else to provide
airchecks," you've obviously not spent any time on the website. If you
pay attention, virtually EVERY audio recording was provided by someone
other than Ricky. In fact, nearly every well-known collector has
contributed audio to the site.

Third, do you know all the different elements that go into having to
get permissions and rights to stream these audio presentations on the
Internet? After you get through jumping through all the hoops of
setting up an account with SoundExchange to pay royalties, not to
mention setting up the streaming server, let me know how much you
enjoyed the experience.

ReelRadio is very genre specific -- Top 40 radio. I wanted to share my
collection of 30+ years of airchecks, documents and photographs, so I
started my own website and jumped through those hoops. Oh, and if you
tried to post "advertising other aircheck collections or posting
excerpts from other sources" on my site, I'd do the same thing Ricky
did.

Sadly the ReelRadio forum is being operated under strict rules...

Again, spend a minute or two on ReelRadio to learn what it's about.
It's not a trading post. It's not a place that sells airchecks. And
don't forget that it's his website, and he can make the rules, the same
way you can when you set up your own website.

By the way, rather than starting another Yahoo aircheck group, why
don't you join one that's already there? I count at least five general
interest aircheck collecting groups on Yahoo right now, plus another
dozen with more specific interests. (Of course, they may have rules
that you disagree with.)

One of the best groups out there is Radio-Info.com's Aircheck Collector
board (http://www.radio-info.com/mods/posts?Board=airchecks), which is
regularly visited by some of the better-known collectors. Give it a
shot; it's moderated, but the rules are flexible enough that you won't
have the problem you encountered at ReelRadio.

D.J.