By David Farrell
Kingston man selling father’s vintage radio collection
A working collection of 200+ tube, bakelite, art deco and transistor radios is being auctioned off online as CityNews’ Audra Brown reports. Stephen Crosier from the Kingston Whig-Standard has the backstory, and the auction can be found online here.
Virgin Radio line-up changes in Toronto, Edmonton
Broadcast Dialogue reports that almost all of its on-air lineup has been ousted, further speculating that Bell Media may be gearing up for a brand flip for the station. Meantime Mike Bone’s Toronto Mike blog is reporting that the morning show in Edmonton is blown out.
English soccer clubs reach $1-billion broadcasting deal
English soccer clubs below the Premier League have concluded a domestic broadcasting deal worth £595-million ($1-billion) over the next five years. – AP
Garden shed broadcaster lands Beeb show
After 44 years from playing records in his garden shed to an audience of one, Deke Duncan, now 73, has landed a one-hour show on a local BBC affiliate station. The station was the subject of a BBC Nationwide report, recently tweeted by BBC Archive, prompting BBC Three Counties radio to track him down. – BBC News
Just how bleak is the future of traditional TV?
Though cord-cutting and cord-shaving remain a challenge for traditional pay TV providers, the vast majority of consumers in the U.S. say they’re still not ready to give up on what they consider “proven and deeply established sources of entertainment” via their cable, satellite or telco TV service(s) and have no plans to drop what they’re used to. This includes the majority of the important 18-to-34-year-old age group (58%), as well as 69% of people ages 35-to-49 and 80% of those 50 and over. – Dana Feldman, Forbes
Inside the two years that shook Facebook–and the world
This notion that Facebook is an open, neutral platform is almost like a religious tenet inside the company. When recruits come in, they are treated to an orientation lecture by Chris Cox, the company’s chief product officer, who tells them Facebook is an entirely new communications platform for the 21st century, as the telephone was for the 20th. But if anyone inside Facebook is unconvinced by religion, there is also Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act to recommend the idea. This is the section of US law that shelters internet intermediaries from liability for the content their users post. If Facebook were to start creating or editing content on its platform, it would risk losing that immunity—and it’s hard to imagine how Facebook could exist if it were liable for the many billion pieces of content a day that users post on its site. – Nicholas Thompson and Fred Vogelstein, Wired
The Facebook era is over
While the chattering class of Silicon Valley will brush this story aside as another PR snafu and talk about Facebook’s powerful and monopolistic network effects–where the value of the network grows with each new user who joins–that analysis alone misses the fundamental shifts happening under our feet.
The same viral loop that catapulted Facebook into every corner of Earth is now slowly turning the other way towards its unwinding.
To be sure, Facebook isn’t going away tomorrow. But in the same way we grudgingly use Microsoft Word with a complete absence of joy, the days of Facebook’s growth and inevitability are behind it.
So, what’s next? Here are three predictions: – Gina Bianchini, LinkedIn
The world’s highest-paid women in music
Katy Perry tops the Forbes list, pulling in $83M in pre-tax dollars in the ranking period running 12 months through June 1 of this year. Taylor Swift places second, earning $80M. Beyoncé, Pink and Lady Gaga place three through five. Celine Dion places ninth, with a take of $31M. – Zack O’Malley Greenburg, Forbes
RIP
Tributes poured in Sunday from friends, colleagues and average Montrealers for sportscaster Randy Tieman, who died on Friday, Nov. 16 at age 64.
Tieman, who worked at CTV Montreal for 34 years until June 2017, ranked with the best in the profession, said Gazette sports columnist Jack Todd, noting his passing follows that of Gazette hockey writer Red Fisher, 91, in January. – Source: Montreal Gazette. Supplementary comments on his death via Steve Faguy’s Twitter account
George Jonescu, a 65-year broadcast veteran whose voice could be heard on his Big Band Sunday Night show on Zoomer Radio, died Friday, Nov. 16 at his home in Barrie at age 84. His final show, which had been pre-recorded on Thursday, ran on Sunday, November 18th. His family will be accepting friends at Adams Funeral Home in Barrie on Friday evening from 7 to 9, and again Saturday morning at 10 ahead of the 11 am funeral at the Adams Funeral Home chapel.
This Sunday, November 25th, at 7:00 pm Zoomer Radio presents “I Remember George Jonescu,” a special edition of Big Band Sunday Night hosted by Frank Proctor and George Jonescu’s son, Robin. – Various sources
