A man who prosecutors say planned a burglary that led to the 2016 beating death of a Terre Haute radio personality has been sentenced to 50 years in prison.
The Tribune-Star reported 48-year-old Donald Featherstone on Wednesday was the final defendant in the murder case to learn his punishment for the death of Matt Luecking, who worked for WFNB-FM. Authorities say Luecking was killed at his apartment in Terre Haute.
Featherstone earlier signed a plea agreement that capped his potential prison sentence at 45 to 50 years. Defense attorney Mark Mullican argued for the lower term, saying Featherstone was remorseful.
In March, 26-year-old John Edward Collins was sentenced to 60 years and 27-year-old Kathleen Featherstone got 30 years.
Another person faces charges in connection with the theft of Luecking’s car.
Authorities say the three defendants entered Luecking’s apartment on Oct. 24, 2016, while he was asleep with the intent of robbing and injuring him.
Police discovered the homicide after co-workers called police when Luecking failed to show up at his bank job.
An alert clerk at Walmart in Clinton tipped off police hours later that Luecking’s bank card was being used fraudulently.
➦In 1892...Lowell Thomas, one of America’s most respected newscasters was born in Woodington, Ohio.
He began his lengthy broadcasting career in 1930, as a replacement for NBC’s Floyd Gibbons. Thomas’ radio career spanned five decades and three networks. The first sixteen years were spent at NBC where his broadcasts became so important that the network placed two microphones in front of him … just in case one failed. Lowell Thomas would scoop the other networks and the newspapers wielding a clout and influence never before heard on the airwaves. After NBC, Thomas moved to CBS, where he stayed for thirty years.
Then, in his last years (he died Aug. 29, 1981 at age 89), he hosted Lowell Thomas Remembers, a series on National Public Radio. In ➦In 1931...the Radio serial, "Little Orphan Annie", was first broadcast on the NBC Radio Network.
➦In 1974..After initially arguing with his record company about releasing it as a single ("it's the same thing over and over"), Billy Joel gets his first Top 40 hit with "Piano Man."
➦In 1984...Windsor’s iconic rock radio station CKLW (The Big 8 ) switched format to Adult Standards, under the brand ‘The Music of Your Life.’
It is best known for having been one of the most influential Top 40 stations in the world in the 1960s and 1970s. During this era, CKLW used a very tight Top 40 format known as Boss Radio, devised by radio programmer Bill Drake. However, CKLW never actually used the handle "boss" on the air, just the style. Rather than a "Boss 30", CKLW's weekly music survey was known as a "Big 30". And instead of calling itself "Boss Radio", CKLW called itself "The Big 8". During this period it was the top-rated radio station not only in Windsor, but across the river in Detroit, and even in cities as far away as Toledo and Cleveland in Ohio.
➦In 2003…NBC News reporter David Bloom died of a pulmonary embolism at the age of 39 while covering the war in Iraq. ➦In 2011...Coyote McCloud, a popular Nashville radio personality for more than 30 years, died of liver disease at 68.
Coyote McCloud
Born William Lehmann on August 31, 1942,was a drive-time personality at several Nashville radio stations for over 30-years. He first became well known in the early 1970s on WMAK-AM, then a market-dominant rock and roll station, as host of its 7 p.m.–midnight program. He was called "legendary" among DJs.
McCloud was one of the most controversial deejays of the late 1980s when he was the lead man on "The Zoo Crew" on Nashville's Y107 (WYHY). While enormously popular amongst his target demographic, his outlandish on-air personality drew the ire of many within the community as being a "bad influence" on teenagers. He was one of the subjects of a CBS 48 Hours documentary in 1992 about "shock radio". McCloud enjoyed his highest level of popularity while working for Y107, and had his own fan club. He worked at the station for over 10 years, from 1984 to 1995. McCloud was featured frequently in Billboard.
Early in his career, he was an afternoon drive personality at WGOW-AM (owned by Ted Turner) in Chattanooga, using the name Bill Scott. In 1976, his recording of "Nitty Gritty Rock and Roll" was released as 45 rpm record on the Midland South label, distributed by RCA. The song included the catch-phrases he used as a nighttime deejay on WQXI "Quixie" in Atlanta.
Early in 1983 while hosting the morning show at Kix 104, McCloud was selected by Country Music Television network founders Glenn D. Daniels and co-founder G. Dean Daniels to be the first on-air "voice" of the network. When CMT (originally called "CMTV") launched on March 5, 1983, McCloud provided the first vocal announcement heard on the network under an animated "CMTV" logo with the words, "You're Watching CMTV...Country Music Television...in stereo." He remained the on-air "voice" of the network from 1983 through 1984.
McCloud also worked at Kix 104 (WWKX) in the early 1980s, Power Country 103 (WZPC) in the mid-1990s, and Oldies 96.3 (WMAK) in the early 2000s. Along with Cathy Martindale, he hosted Coyote & Cathy In The Morning on 96.3 (WMAK FM) and 97.1 WRQQ until late November 2006.
Nielsen has released its latest report on The State of Audio in 2018 and again the report indicates radio continues to lead all media in reach. The new report states 270 million Americans 6+ listen to radio each week.
Brad Kelly, managing director of Nielsen Radio, calls AM/FM the blue blazer of the media universe.
"Who would have believed 100 years after its debut AM/FM radio would continue to top the charts as the medium that reaches more consumers each week than any other," says Kelly.
Broadcast radio specifically continues to profoundly enrich the lives of listeners and create value for advertisers. Each week, more Americans tune into AM/FM radio (93%) than watch television, or use smartphones, tablets or computers. At the same time, digital streaming offers consumers even more ways to listen across many of those same devices.
By all accounts audio-based media is in the midst of a new age, according to Nielsen. In today’s harried, time-starved world, compelling audio content and expanding delivery options are helping drive consumer usage.
Some specifics:
According to Nielsen’s ratings data comparing adults 18+, AM/FM radio continues to reach more people each week than any other medium in the U.S. at 228.5 million consumers, compared with 216.5 million for TV (live, DVR and time-shifted), 203.8 million for app/web on a smartphone, and 127.6 million for video on a smartphone.
Looking at the audio landscape, broadcast radio’s weekly reach of 228.5 million also outpaces the 68.5 million for streaming audio, 35.7 million using satellite radio and 21.9 million consuming podcasts.
Radio plays a special role in American culture. Its audiences are as varied and diverse as our national makeup. All generations, demographics and ethnicities are tuning in. That fact has not gone unnoticed by the big national brands. Billion dollar advertisers are re-discovering the power of radio and how it can augment, supplement and amplify their media mix.
New ad dollars are flowing to the medium, and major national brand names that have been absent from commercial radio for decades can once again be heard on AM/FM radio.
Entercom today announced the addition of JoAnne Purtan as the new morning show co-host for WOMC 104.3 FM.
Purtan will join Stephen Clark on the Detroit heritage classic hits radio station beginning on Monday, April 9. The “104.3 WOMC Mornings with Stephen Clark and JoAnne Purtan” show will air from 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. ET.
“We are thrilled that JoAnne is part of the new WOMC Morning Show. In addition to being a widely respected journalist, she is an integral part of the Detroit community,” said Debbie Kenyon, Senior Vice President and Market Manager, Entercom Detroit. “JoAnne’s father, Dick Purtan, is a huge part of the heritage of WOMC and it’s exciting to have a Purtan back at the station.”
“
After 27 years in television news, I’m excited for this new adventure in radio. I listened to my dad on the radio for much of my life, and I’m truly humbled to be at the same station where he spent the last 15 years of his iconic career entertaining people in the morning,” noted Purtan. “Stephen and I have always worked so well together, and we’re so excited to team up again. After covering a lot of serious news through the years, we look forward to spending mornings with Detroit’s listeners, sharing good news, great music and some fun.”
“JoAnne and I have worked together for nearly two decades and I’m looking forward to starting this new adventure with her,” said Stephen Clark. “I can’t think of a smarter, more professional, more capable partner.”
Before joining Entercom, Purtan worked with WXYZ-TV for 20 years and was most recently the anchor of the noon and 4:00 p.m. “The Now Detroit” newscasts. Purtan is the recipient of four Emmy Awards from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences.
InsideRadio is specualating that with Cumulus Media coming to terms with Merlin Media for the purchase of modern rock WKQX 101.1 FM and the call letters and intellectual property of WLUP-FM in an $18 million deal, it could be planning to adjust classic hits WLS 94.7 FM to fashion a new home for “The Loop?”
The 97.9 signal, which formerly housed classic rock “The Loop,” was sold to Educational Media Foundation last month for $21.5 million and now airs the Christian broadcaster’s syndicated “K-Love” programming. Merlin retained the WLUP call letters and Cumulus kept an online version of the station alive at WLUP.com and on the HD2 channel of WKQX.
Shortly after the sale, and subsequent sign-off of “The Loop,” WLUP PD Wade Linder segued to the programming chair of WLS-FM as Cumulus transferred Brian Thomas to the PD post at country sister “Kicks 101.5” WKHX-FM Atlanta. WLS-FM morning man Dave Fogel, who returned to the station in December 2017, has since added middays on Cumulus classic hits sister KCMO-FM Kansas City (94.9). Mancow was in mornings at The Loop prior to its sale to EMF.
According to InsideRadio, it also makes sense from a ratings standpoint as WLUP outperformed WLS-FM in Persons 25-54 and Men 25-54, where it holds a nearly two share lead in the latter demo in the February PPMs. Overall, the stations shadow each other with two-tenths of share between the two Persons 6+. WLS-FM’s three-book-trend moves 3.0-3.1-3.4, while The Loop was up 2.7-2.9-3.2.
The Infinite Dial Canada, by Edison Research and Triton Digital, is the newest study of consumer behavior and media consumption in the Infinite Dial series and the first to be conducted in Canada. It is modeled after the original Infinite Dial report, which has been conducted yearly in the U.S. since 1998.
Some highlights from the study include:
Canadian smartphone ownership is at 76% (compared to 82% in the U.S.)
Smart speaker ownership is at 8% overall, with Google Home taking a larger share than Amazon in Canada
Nearly half of all Canadians 18+ (49%) are weekly listeners to online audio, with Spotify leading the pack in usage (16%)
As in the U.S., radio dominates in-car media consumption, with 64% of Canadians saying it is the audio source they use most in their cars
Monthly podcast listening is 28%, with 61% of Canadians 18+ being familiar with the term
Canadian podcast listeners listen to an average of five podcasts in the last week
Edison Senior VP Tom Webster presented the findings in a live webinar on April 4 – click here for the full replay with both audio and video.
iHeartMedia/Harrisburg has announced the debut of the new ALT 99.3, Central PA’s Alternative Rock.
WHKF Alt 99.3 FM had been CHR until this week, when the station started directing listeners to sister-station CHR WLAN Lancaster.
The station will also feature 99 minutes of commercial-free Alternative Rock music three times every weekday.
“We’re thrilled to bring this exciting station to the listeners of Central PA,” remarked Jeff Hurley, SVP/Programming for iHeartMedia’s Allentown-Harrisburg Region. “There’s been a void in the market for Alternative Rock and the new ALT 99.3 fills that void, and provides three 99-minute commercial-free blocks of music every weekday!”
WHKF 99.3 FM (1.35 Kw) Red=Local Coverage Area
Full Weekday Programming Lineup:
Jeff Hurley 6 – 10am
Wendy Rollins 10am – 3pm
Klinger 3pm – 7pm
Samantha Kelly 7pm – 12am
The new “Alt 99.3” will be looking pull from the listenership of Cumulus Media rock “105.7 The X” WQXA-FM in nearby York, PA. The Harrisburg-Lebanon-Carlisle market and the York, PA markets overlap with only 26 miles separating the cities of Harrisburg and York
ABC Radio and Skyview Networks are further aligning their considerable resources to identify, develop and syndicate talent and programs to broadcast radio.
ABC Radio will assess talent Syndication opportunities for both music and news/talk formats and provide affiliate sales while Skyview Networks will handle national sales and distribution. The companies will begin immediately focusing on opportunities that can scale nationally.
“We are building on the momentum and tremendous success we’ve already seen in our existing partnership,” said Steve Jones, vice president and general manager of ABC Radio. “ABC Radio has always represented creative and innovative programming and we are excited to offer programmers and talent a new, stable business environment to grow and monetize their brands.”
ABC Radio currently has over 1,650 affiliates with partnerships across every major radio station ownership group. ABC Radio proudly produces ABC News Radio which has the #1 reach among all commercial news networks.
“The timing of our Syndication partnership couldn’t be more perfect,” said Ken Thiele, president of Skyview Networks. “We’ve heard from a significant number of programs and clearly there is a need for another Syndication option in the marketplace. We’re growing and continue to make substantial investments in technology and our staff, and it’s paying off. This new venture is really a reflection of the dynamic synergies between ABC Radio and Skyview, and our positive business trajectory.”
In July 2016, ABC Radio and Skyview Networks renewed their highly successful content, ad sales, affiliate sales and audio distribution agreement.
Skyview currently has national sales offices in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, Phoenix, Miami and Louisville.
David Smith, the chairman of Sinclair Broadcast Group, says the media is getting his company all wrong.
His remark, in a lengthy email exchange with The New York Times, came in response to renewed scrutiny of Sinclair after a video spread rapidly showing anchors at dozens of its stations across the country reciting the same speech about media bias.
Smith defended the anchors’ segments, known as “must-runs,” and likened them to the late-night shows that networks air on their local affiliates.
David Smith
“Not that you would print it, but do you understand that every local TV station is required to ‘must run’ from its network their content, and they don’t own me,” he wrote on Tuesday. “That would be all their news programming and other shows such as late-night talk, which is just late-night political so-called comedy.”
In the Sinclair-mandated segments, the anchors warned that some media outlets published fake stories. They also said they were “concerned about the troubling trend of irresponsible, one-sided news stories plaguing our country.”
“Our commitment to factual reporting is the foundation of our credibility,” the anchors added. “Now more than ever."
Asked about the widespread criticism prompted by the Deadspin compilation, Smith expressed disbelief.
“You cant be serious!” he wrote. “Do you understand that as a practical matter every word that comes out of the mouths of network news people is scripted and approved by someone?”
Media mogul Shari Redstone has been the catalyst behind the effort to recombine CBS Corp. and Viacom Inc., and she has grown frustrated by CBS' seemingly strident approach to merger talks, according to The LA Times citing three people familiar with the situation but not authorized to publicly discuss it.
CBS' recent lowball offer for Viacom, and its desire to dictate who would run the combined company, have caused considerable friction, the people said.
All this matters because Redstone and her family control nearly 80% of the voting stock of both companies through their investment vehicle, National Amusements Inc. Redstone believes Viacom and CBS would be stronger together as they and other traditional media companies face huge challenges adapting their businesses to compete against titans of technology — Alphabet Inc., Facebook Inc., Netflix Inc. and Amazon.com Inc.
Shari Redstone
Viacom on Wednesday rejected CBS' offer of 0.55 of one of its shares per class B share of Viacom stock, the sources said. Viacom's special committee overseeing the merger talks was planning to make a counteroffer to CBS late Wednesday or Thursday.
Beyond price, the sticking point is which executives would be on the senior management team of the combined entity. CBS has stipulated that its chairman and chief executive, Leslie Moonves, would run a merged CBS-Viacom for at least two years and that Moonves' second-in-command, Joseph Ianniello, CBS' chief operating officer, would continue in that role.
Redstone, however, wants Viacom CEO Bob Bakish to have a prominent role in the mix and had hoped the two teams would form a collaborative relationship, according to a person familiar with her thinking.
CBS does not view its bid for Viacom as unfairly low.
CBS "believes that they are in a position of strength in the evolving television landscape due to their lack of basic cable networks giving some freedom to operate outside of the basic bundle and their ownership of high-quality content," Cowen & Co. media analyst Doug Creutz said in a report Wednesday. "Viacom, on the other hand, is operating from a relative position of weakness."
Viacom's networks have struggled in the ratings, its movie studio loses money and its stock fell to about $25 a share as recently as last fall before regaining some ground.
The buzzy debut of Spotify Technology SA on the New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday drew retail investors across generations, not just the Millennials who make up the largest proportion of the music streaming service’s customer base, retail brokerages said on Wednesday.
Reuters reports Spotify’s listing was hotly followed, as it went public via the unusual method of a direct listing, without selling new shares. There was demand for the stock, and shares ended up 12.9 percent on their first day of trade on the New York Stock Exchange. On Wednesday, the shares ended the day’s session at $145.87, down 2.1 percent from Tuesday’s close.
Social media platform Snap Inc’s high-profile IPO last year had been notable for being popular with Millennials, the primary user base for the company’s mobile app Snapchat. But though Millennials are also a key demographic for Spotify, the Swedish company’s listing did not draw disproportionate interest from that generation.
Demand was seen across age groups, according to brokerages Fidelity and TD Ameritrade.
“There’s good interest in it,” said J.J. Kinahan, TD Ameritrade’s chief market strategist, who is based in Chicago. “It’s pretty well split across age groups.”
Fidelity said among its customers, baby boomers were slightly more active in trading Spotify shares than Millennials or members of Generation X. Baby boomers made nearly one-third more trades than Millennials and 20 percent more trades than members of Generation X. A similar pattern holds for other tech IPOs, a Fidelity spokesman said.
Facebook Inc said on Wednesday the personal information of up to 87 million users, mostly in the United States, may have been improperly shared with political consultancy Cambridge Analytica, up from a previous news media estimate of more than 50 million.
According to Reuters, Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said in a conference call with reporters that Facebook had not seen “any meaningful impact” on usage or ad sales since the scandal, although he added, “it’s not good” if people are unhappy with the company.
Mark Zuckerberg
Shares rose more than 3 percent after the bell.
Zuckerberg told reporters that he accepted blame for the data leak, which has angered users, advertisers and lawmakers, while also saying he was still the right person to head the company he founded.
“When you’re building something like Facebook that is unprecedented in the world, there are going to be things that you mess up,” Zuckerberg said, adding that the important thing was to learn from mistakes.
He said he was not aware of any discussions on the Facebook board about him stepping down, although directors would face a challenge if they wanted to oust him because Zuckerberg is the controlling shareholder.
He said he had not fired anyone over the scandal and did not plan to. “I’m not looking to throw anyone else under the bus for mistakes that we made here,” he said.
Facebook first acknowledged last month that personal information about millions of users wrongly ended up in the hands of Cambridge Analytica.
Facebook has shed about $90 billion in stock market value in recent weeks as investors digested the company's latest scandals.
Zuckerberg will testify about the matter next Tuesday and Wednesday during two U.S. congressional hearings.
Veteran Boston newsman Rod Fritz said he was blindsided when execs cut him loose from NewsRadio WBZ 1030 AM last week, the latest high-profile departure from the legendary station since iHeartMedia took the reins in November.
“This was not my decision, obviously,” Fritz told Jessica Heslam at the Boston Herald. “This was their decision. They just said that they were not going to renew my contract and here are your exit papers. I was kind of blindsided, without a doubt. I expected everything to move along nicely. I had no inclination otherwise.”
Fritz, a news anchor and reporter for WBZ for over a decade, said he met with Dylan Sprague, vice president of programming for iHeartMedia in Boston, and Jon MacLean, WBZ radio’s assistant news director, Thursday afternoon.
“I walked in,” Fritz said, “and kapow!”
Sprague told Fritz they were “going in a different direction” and weren’t going to renew his contract before handing him his exit papers, Fritz told me. MacLean, Fritz said, didn’t say anything.
Fritz, a shop steward for the station’s union, had hoped to stay at WBZ radio for a couple more years. His sudden ouster hit the newsroom hard.
“It’s taken me a few days to digest the reality that Rod Fritz no longer works at WBZ,” longtime WBZ radio reporter Carl Stevens wrote in a lengthy tribute on Facebook. “You always knew when Rod had arrived. He brought an immediate energy to the newsroom, the deep noise of unique joy ... Rod Fritz was, and is, a good man.”
Stevens wrote: (Fritz') shift started at 8, and he was usually in before that. You always knew when Rod had arrived. He brought an immediate energy to the news room, the deep noise of a unique joy. You knew the baritone day had begun when Rod walked in. I appreciated the way he treated all of us in the news room with respect. And I liked the way he brought an immediate lightness to the place, laughter. In the business I'm in, we're often reporting on some unpleasant things, telling stories that sometimes crack the tuning fork in your soul. Rod said the same words on the radio, told the same stories. But, in the news room, he had the ability to make us all smile. I'm going to miss that."
Last November, iHeartMedia, formerly Clear Channel, picked up WBZ when radio giants Entercom and CBS Radio merged.
The station’s longtime news director, Peter Casey, left that same month. Mary Blake, an anchor and reporter, was let go over a month ago. Chris Citorik, executive producer of “NightSide with Dan Rea,” recently left on his own for a job at WBUR. Part-time employees have had their hours slashed and the station has cut some features.
Americans are consuming more news than ever — and it’s driving us further and further apart.
That’s according to a new paper from Neil Johnson, a physicist who now runs the University of Miami’s Complexity interdisciplinary group, which is examining collective behavior in a number of fields.
The Miami Herald reports Johnson and his team have found that when it comes to digesting news of any kind, Americans now exist in a state of pure polarization: the size of the extremes of the left and right are now so large that they outnumber those in the middle ground.
It doesn’t even matter whether news is real or fake, let alone left or right: The mere act of absorbing news that everyone else is seeing causes a polarizing effect.
“Even on issues for which there is no conceivable counter-evidence, a surprisingly large number of people may [take] an ‘anti-crowd’ viewpoint, e.g. the many people who believe the world is flat and attended the 2017 Flat Earth International Conference,” Johnson and his team write. “Even within the community of professional scientists, there is a non-zero ‘anti-crowd’ that are skeptical about global warming.”
What causes this to occur? Johnson’s finding hinges on a basic assumption: that people make decisions based on rewards. Johnson compares his model to what happens when someone makes an investment decision based on a piece of information. If that individual gets a return on her investment, she will continue to assign value to the piece of information, as well as the source itself, until the returns start to dissipate.
Johnson finds that if you assume news consumers act on a piece of information using their own mental rewards system to make a decision like, say, voting, they will naturally polarize. Johnson’s model reproduces what Facebook researchers themselves have observed in their own data in terms of a U-shape showing large sub-populations with beliefs towards the extremes. It’s also confirmation of a 2014 Pew Research Center study that found a strong correlation between political engagement and polarization.
Johnson says that it’s not clear whether the polarization represents a new phenomenon, or whether it’s now just easier to model. But he has a hunch that more Americans now consume news than in the past — and that’s bringing out latent polarization that’s always been there.
Traditional mainstream media -- including TV news outlets and major newspapers -- are losing the credibility war, as one out of three Americans believe they report “fake news.” That’s the top line finding of a survey conducted by Monmouth University in early March.
MediaPost reports the poll found that 77% of Americans believe major news outlets report fake news -- up 13 percentage points from when MU asked Americans the same question last year.
Nearly a third (31%) believe mainstream news media report fake news “regularly,” while 46% say they do it “occasionally.” Only 21% said major news media do not report fake news.
“When it comes to the meaning of ‘fake news,’ a majority believe that it involves editorial decisions as well as inaccurate reporting,” the report notes, including 58% who believe the media publishes fake news “on purpose to push an agenda.”
The study also found that most people believe social media platforms such as Facebook and YouTube are partly to blame for the spread of fake news and they don’t believe they are doing enough to stop it.
In fact, the vast majority of Americans consider “outside groups or agents” planting fake news in both mainstream media and social media to be a “serious problem.”
Despite the overwhelming perception among Americans that major news outlets report fake news, more Americans trust the major cable news networks (CNN, Fox News, MSNBC) than believe President Donald J. Trump.
