Talk:WBZ (AM)

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Anyone else remember Larry Glick?

So I do not create a wikiwar, I would like to cite my source of the offical format. It is *not* a news/talk, its a "news" format, believe it or not according to Infinity. The link for anyone to know is www.infinitybroadcasting.com/stations/?sort=stat_market. Actually, "news" formats are 24/7, all news, all the time kind of format, which lead me to ask if someone should add "The newswatch never stops", "All news all day", "You give us 22 minutes, we'll give you the world" because within the last few months, WBZ has finally started using them. I think they would fit into the slogan section on the main page. Steven312 00:58, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Infinity's Web site can hardly be called an unbiased source of information. I checked the popular (for-pay) industry directory 100000watts.com and found WBZ listed as "News/Talk" (as I would expect, since nearly half their schedule is talk); I believe you will find the same thing listed in the published ratings summaries from Radio & Records and other industry sources. For published sources, The M Street Radio Directory (which now has a new name which I forget) also shows the format as "News/Talk" (but they use the same database as 100000watts.com so that's hardly a surprise). Everyone in the market seems to be puzzled as to why WBZ is suddenly running the liners from WINS; they don't have enough people on staff to run all-news and haven't launched the sort of hiring drive that would be required to do so. 121a0012 03:47, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, I was just quoting the offical parent company source - Direct from Infinity's mouth/website. That is the officaial format, according to Infinity. These trade industries are inaccuate because that is not the offical format. Again, according to the Infinity stations page, WBZ-AM is offically a news format even though it appears to be a talk station during the night. A News/Talk format acutally is a real all-talk station, just the fact they only air 6 minutes of news per hour. (WTIC-AM in Hartford for example.) I will refrain for updating this entry for now on because of potential editing wars and personal feelings againist this station... Steven312 14:48, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

I happen to know some of the people responsible for those industry sources, and something about their methodology. They don't put down whatever a station's ownership says; they actually listen to the station and decide what the format is based on their own independent criteria. When they say a station is "news/talk", they mean that it's news in some dayparts and talk in other dayparts. (If they meant that it was news and talk integrated, they might say "news-talk", but mostly this is just talk so they call it straight.) This is important information for advertisers to know; Arbitron subscribers can get the precise breakdown. To call a station just "news" means that it is all news, which WBZ emphatically is not, regardless of what the Infinity Web site may say. Given that you have one company-POV source which doesn't match reality, and I have several NPOV sources which do, I think there should be no controversy. 121a0012 15:13, 3 December 2005 (UTC)
I'll note that Infinity/CBS Radio seems to base their listing of their stations' formats from their branding in several cases (e.g., Free FM and Jack FM stations are marked as such in the formats column), so the claim by Infinity/CBS may just come from the fact that their branding is "NewsRadio 1030" (and, in part, from those WINS-type liners), similar to a "true" all-news station (and a longtime sister station), KYW (NewsRadio 1060). I just go with what the format actually IS (Jack FM is just a branding for adult hits that is being commonly used like Kleenex is for tissues), not by the owner's POV. --WCQuidditch ☎ ✎ 02:21, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] History problems

The first paragraph of the History section needs to be corrected. It states that WBZ was the first "commercial" license station in the United States. But both KDKA in Pittsburg, and WJZ in Newark (both also Westinghouse stations) were broadcasting with commercial licenses before WBZ. The paragraph also states that the station was first licensed as WBZA in 1921. This is not correct. The 1921 license was for WBZ in Springfield. The WBZA license for Boston was a few years later.

Also, does anyone know what happened to the Springfield station? Is it still around under another name? If not, when did it go silent? Jimtrue 17:06, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I have seen a photocopy of "commercial broadcast license" number 1. At the time WJZ and KDKA were licensed, the category "commercial broadcast" did not exist, but according to Donna Halper, it was Westinghouse's lobbying of the Department of Commerce that caused it to be created and WBZ to receive the first one. (Dozens of broadcast stations had received licenses prior to that date, but the Commerce Department did not consider them a distinct classification from radiotelegraph stations.) 121a0012 01:00, 4 August 2007 (UTC)