http://www.drudgereport.com/flash4.htm

"-=jd=-" wrote in message
...

If this is supposed to be some kind of sincere business venture, it's not
looking like one so far. One gets the impression that they are "winging
it" and hoping no-one takes notice. Still, I'd give them some time to get
their act together before writing them off as a failure.

Judging from what they have been through so far, I'm thinking they will
either get their act together and make it, or they will go down abruptly.
I don't see them withering away slowly.

-=jd=-

I've got no idea how long Air America will last. But I don't see many
reasons for the investors to stay calm. If they really paid Multicultural
$1,000,000 to broadcast nothing for two months in LA, as they claim, they
must be ****ing the cash away. Maybe they need to clear the 7th graders out
of the orginization. Here's the text of the "press release" from Air
America's website on the day the checks were stopped:




The Sludge Report

After just two weeks on the air, Air America Radio, the fledgling
liberal talk-radio network featuring Al Franken, Janeane Garofalo, and
that really loud woman from Florida, appears to have encountered
serious cash-flow problems.

Stop the presses!!! There's nothing more exciting than half a story
from a third hand source!!!!

Insiders tell SLUDGE, that the reason the network was pulled off the
air this morning in Chicago and Los Angeles, the network's second- and
third-largest markets, was because, the owner of both stations, Arthur
Liu of Multicultural Broadcasting, said, the network bounced a check
and owes him more than $1 million! The run-on sentence, tortured
grammar and the exclamation point clearly means it's true!!

Only it isn`t.

Normally we`d let this go because ``habitual liars`` like Drudge are
laughable, and ridicule is our business.

But Arthur Liu --- not funny. He lied to us, he ripped us off and now
we`re chasing him down with a pipe wrench. It`s a metaphor.

Here`s what really happened:

This Liu-ser was ripping off our boss Evan Cohen big time (he can`t do
that, that`s our job). Evan found out about it and he stopped payment
on a check to keep Liu-cifer from ripping him off even more. You can
touch Evan for the occasional meal or drinks but a million bucks is
crossing the line. And if we ever get low on cash, we can always call
Barbra Streisand. Or any of the Baldwins. Except Stephen.

So we got screwed, Liu`d, and tattooed. How Liu can you get? In Liu of
payment. Liu`d and lascivious behavior. These write themselves. What
we`re getting at is that we hate him.

So now everyone`s saying we`re going down the dumper in Chicago and
Los Angeles, but what they don`t tell you is that we're still on in
Portland. And we OWN Portland. And let's not forget Riverside and
Plattsburgh. And New York. And streaming on the internet. And XM. And
Sirius. Actually we`re fine.

So cool your jets. Air America Radio isn`t dead, we`re in court and
we`re going to slam Liu`s head in a car door. Another metaphor. We
hope to be back on the air tomorrow or the next day in those markets.

In the meantime, why don`t you give Arthur a call at (212) 966-1059.

Arthur Liu, I wouldn`t show your face around here.

Or Riverside. Or Plattsburgh.

DEVELOPING . . .




I guess I'm not the only one who saved this bit of telling nonsense.
There's plenty of saved pages of this on Google.

Frank Dresser

"-=jd=-" wrote in message
...


Freedom Of Speech at $500k/month. That seems a bit much. I hope they
are/were getting a big taste of the ad-revenue (what there is/was of it).


The million was for the two months previous to Air America's debut. Since
there was no Air America programming, Arthur Liu ran other programming. I
suppose the question in the court was whether the contract prohibited the
broadcasting of other programming. I also suppose Liu is saying he'd pull
the plug on whatever was on the air, the minute Air America gave him
something.

I really have no idea why Air America was paying so much for, well --
nothing. I'd think Air America would give Liu some programming to at least
promote the upcoming network.

Let's not forget SW time often costs around $25/hr.



Regardless of who was in the wrong in their contract dispute, I would
think they would be more tactful until after the matter is completely
resolved. Liu may have been a jack-ass for doing what he did, but he might
still be found in the right by the civil court. They need to wait until
it's settled and then unleash their "Democratic Attack Dogs" (to steal a
phrase from another thread).


Even if they never deal with Liu again, they have to deal with somebody.
There's no upside to that childish rant.



Right now, they need to worry more about expanding, rather than giving
people a reason to think twice about doing business with them. After
reading that "sludge report" I'd be a bit nervous about doing business
with them...

-=jd=-


Here's another Air America curiosity, if you haven't run across it:

http://www.guampdn.com/news/stories/...ws/238521.html

Frank Dresser

"-=jd=-" wrote in message
...


I'm wondering that, if Air-America paid 1-mil for two months, did the
agreement mandate that station had to run "dead-air" until AA got around
to broadcasting something? I find that hard to believe. What would be more
believable is if AA paid 1-mil for "2 months worth" of air-time that was
unscheduled. However, that doesn't seem right because they are moaning the
blues that the station charged for and utilized air-time that AA didn't
see fit to use and can't recover.


The 1 million number came from an Air America press release, for whatever
that's worth. I'd like to know if it's really true. If a low cost brokered
station can actually bill 1/2 million a month, I'd think brokered stations
would sell for alot more money than they actually do.

The brokered stations here sometimes run generic oldies programming or
something, without advertising. I'm assuming the generic programming is
time they didn't sell.



I would imagine any sane agreement would specify that AA has priority to
broadcast, but that if they failed to use the air-time, the station would
be well within it's rights to use that air-time as it saw fit, provided
the station "banked" the air-time AA didn't use.


Brother Stair has agreements like that. Much of the time he buys is
unguaranteed but at an extremely low rate, and he can get bumped from those
time slots by someone else. Alex Jones took over a couple of Brother
Stair's midday hours on WWCR.



If AA paid 1-mil for the right to broadcast only within that very specific
time period, and then for whatever reason neglected to avail themselves of
what they purchased before the clock ran out, then shame on them. Chalk it
up to "lesson-learned" and tighten up whomever is negotiating their
agreements.


If Air America couldn't get their act together well enough to put on real
programming, they might have made up their own generic programming. Play
folk music or something, "Brought to you from the upcoming Air America
network!".

I wonder how nervous Air America's investor's are getting?



I think there's more to this than meets the eye as I can't see AA paying
1-mil for specific air-time that it would not use...

Sort of like getting to the center of a tootsie-roll, toosie-pop, the
world may never know the "unspun" truth...

-=jd=-


Well, nobody's mentioned it, but I'm having fond memories of the great Mel
Brooks comedy "The Producers".

Frank Dresser