Thursday, August 04, 2005
Air America - The Silence is Deafening
Michelle Malkin has been covering the paucity of commentary regarding the Air America scam within the mainstream media. As a reminder, Air America is AlFrankenradio for the energetic liberal set.
It is small surprise that this is where Air America has landed. It was widely reported (in the WSJ esp) in mid 2004 that Air America had been initially funded under false pretenses by its founder, had changed management, and had been bridged/bailed out by a group led by Rob Glaser, the CEO of Realnetworks. Its ratings performance has generally been poor, so the financial pressure has continued.
So it is fair to ask, why isn't Air America more successful, leaving the scam bit to the side for a moment. The answer, I think: a rather silly business strategy. Liberal consumers of Air America have lots of alternative sources which satisfy them - CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times, the LA Times, the Boston Globe, NPR -- the list goes on and on. In other words, the provision of left-leaning content is incredibly competitive. The provision of right leaning content is much less competitive. FoxNews does not have much competition for its customers. And it has all the right wing talent, whereas the left leaning media talent is spread out amongst the various channels. Let's not forget that Rupert Murdoch is, above all else, a brilliant businessman.
And Al Franken, most assuredly, is not. Bye bye Air America. How long til Al Gore's new TV venture dies?
It is small surprise that this is where Air America has landed. It was widely reported (in the WSJ esp) in mid 2004 that Air America had been initially funded under false pretenses by its founder, had changed management, and had been bridged/bailed out by a group led by Rob Glaser, the CEO of Realnetworks. Its ratings performance has generally been poor, so the financial pressure has continued.
So it is fair to ask, why isn't Air America more successful, leaving the scam bit to the side for a moment. The answer, I think: a rather silly business strategy. Liberal consumers of Air America have lots of alternative sources which satisfy them - CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times, the LA Times, the Boston Globe, NPR -- the list goes on and on. In other words, the provision of left-leaning content is incredibly competitive. The provision of right leaning content is much less competitive. FoxNews does not have much competition for its customers. And it has all the right wing talent, whereas the left leaning media talent is spread out amongst the various channels. Let's not forget that Rupert Murdoch is, above all else, a brilliant businessman.
And Al Franken, most assuredly, is not. Bye bye Air America. How long til Al Gore's new TV venture dies?
1 Comments:
By 
TigerHawk, at
Thu Aug 04, 05:03:00 PM:
Air America is AlFrankenradio for the energetic liberal set.
Hah!
