Clear Channel

Yesterday I was riding in the car with a co-worker/friend. He was flipping through the radio stations and, thinking I was all smart, I commented on how major corporations own most of the radio stations. "Yeah, like Clear Channel Communications owns like all of the "K" stations in the Cities," was his response. I couldn't even remember who it was who owned them! He proceeded to tell me that the owner of our store had sent him to a presentation done by Clear Channel on radio marketing. Clear Channel makes money off of paid ads, so they are marketing themselves by offering these presentations to business owners. My friend told me that their intro went something like this:

"How many of you picked up a newspaper already this morning?" A couple of hands.

"How many of you have watched TV already this morning?" Again, a couple of hands.

"How many of you have listened to the radio today?" Everyone in the room raised their hand.

Point taken. I was like, "Well, I hardly ever listen to the radio, and when I do it's MPR." "What about all day at work?" he asks me. Right. Again, point taken.

Those who control the radio, control much of the music and information that gets passed onto the masses. Here's some Clear Channel facts I found on their website http://www.clearchannel.com/

• Operates over 800 radio stations reaching more than 97 million listeners every week.


• Serves approximately 150 U.S. markets, including 89 of the top 100 markets.
  
• Reaches 45% of all people ages 18-49 in the U.S. on daily basis.

Here's the list of Clear Channel owned stations in MN:

Twin Cities
KDWB-FM
KEEY-FM
KFAN-AM
KFXN-AM
KQQL-FM
KTCZ-FM
WLOL-FM

Decisions about what 97 million people should listen to, who gets advertising, and what news should be shared are made by a handful of corporate execs. Kind of scary knowing that much of what gets played is based on payoffs.