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KFWB employees were informed on Friday that the formerly all-news station at AM 980 will switch formats from talk to sports in September, Don Barrett reports at LA Radio.com. Current staffers also "were made aware that they would not be part of the new format.” Barrett quotes Diane Sutter, who oversees the KFWB Asset Trust, who says the station may or not start running Jim Rome's sports talk show.
The format flip comes at a time while CBS is still looking for a suitable buyer for AM 980. At present, CBS is still in violation of the market cap rules that prohibits any owner to own more than eight stations in the same market, the result of the CBS purchase of KCAL/tv in 2002....
“I’m running some CBS programming now and I’m running some NBC programming now. I don’t see what kind of conflict it would be. We will make the decision what’s the best programming to put on the station for where we are going.” In general, the decision to switch to sports is based upon what Sutter thinks will make KFWB successful. “It works however I think is best for the radio station,” she said.There have been rumors that when the switch is made, KFWB will have a live and local morning show, which would be the only local show among the L.A. sports outlets. “Again, all of those details are being finalized and worked on now and we will be announcing those in the very near future,” said Sutter. She also said that no decisions have been made about changing the current weekend programming.
KFWB is a storied station in Los Angeles radio lore — among other things, a major part of the introduction of rock and roll to LA before switching to all news.
More media notes:
- The Sparkletts tap in the Los Angeles Times newsroom has been turned off, apparently due to a billing, uh, discrepancy. The staff is getting thirsty and restless. Metro reporter Bob Pool posted on Twitter and national reporter Matt Pearce emailed the whole newsroom this afternoon. See below.
- Margot Adler, who joined NPR as a reporter in 1979, died Monday at her home in New York City. She was 68 and had been battling cancer, NPR announced, adding that Adler was also known for being a Wiccan priestess.
- The New York Times editorial board called for nationwide legalization of marijuana, calling it the second end of Prohibition. But the paper's HR side will continue to test job applicants for pot use.
- Joe Donnelly, the founding executive editor of Mission & State (see previous), defends the Santa Barbara news startup's accomplishments. SB View
I can assure you, everyone who worked with me approached his or her job with the utmost integrity. It is mostly for them, their work, and their legacy, that I feel compelled to address the onslaught of unchallenged misinformation regarding Mission and State, at least as I knew it.
The first thing I want to put to rest is the narrative of failure being foisted onto the community. Publicly circulated attempts to justify the missteps regarding the disposition of Mission and State and to spin its demise in recent news accounts have explicitly or implicitly trafficked in the notion that Mission and State wasn’t meeting its objectives, was “burning” through its budget, that “radical action” was need to save it from failure, that the Knight Foundation had pulled its funding, etc.This narrative isn’t accurate or fair and belies the hard work and commitment of the journalists who strived to make a difference with Mission and State.
OC Weekly editor Gustavo Arellano was married to Delilah Snell. Pictures on their respective Facebook pages.- Rich Hammond, the former on-staff blogger for the Los Angeles Kings, is back on the Kings beat for the Orange County Register.
- Catching up: Former Register sports columnist Mark Whicker now has a Sunday column on sports in the Los Angeles News Group papers. His latest, on the Angels
- From last week: Buzzfeed's editor's note about plagiarism by fired writer Benny Johnson.
Plus media tweet of the day by LA Times staff writer Martha Groves.
Seeing this for 1st time in the LA Times employee garage. Guessing it's one of the many monthly non-Timesian parkers. pic.twitter.com/ioHFXkA70V
— MarthaGroves/LATimes (@marthaGroves) July 28, 2014