Blinq

Inky Airwaves

Ok, so maybe you didn't set your alarm for 10:37 a.m. Sunday to hear me on WHYY-FM talking about Philadelphia's passion for the sweat suit. Maybe you didn't remember the time change. Or, maybe - if you're like my wife - you had other things to do.

No worries. Here is a link to the audio of all the Inky commentaries -- Rick Nichols on local beer hunting, Melissa Dribben on beating the financial blues, Jeff Gammage (a former college soccer player) on the splendors of Chester, Monica Yant Kinney on curious property tax rates, Inga Saffron on the latest important buildings we lost, and John Timpane on the virtues of the word youse.

Collect them all. Trade them with your friends.

Milking the Bar

I'm on assignment, and so won't be posting anything today, but I managed to milk that Brokeback Snickers ad one more time, and was asked to talk about it on NPR's Talk of The Nation yesterday. So I did, and here's the link. My son says I stopped saying all those "Ums" after a few minutes. I think I wound up sounding as if I'm to the left of the lesbian comic from San Francisco.

Something to read while listening? (or while not listening) Former Penn State and NBA player John Ameachi becomes the first pro basketball player to declare himself gay. Grant Hill applauds the decision. LeBron James comes off a little less open-minded. Some Sixers quoted, including the injured Shavlik Randolph, a Duke grad, who said he's fine with homosexuality on the courts, "as long as you don't bring your gayness on me."

WOXY Signs Off

"After two years of raging against the machine, WOXY is gone." The Internet-only radio station signs off, casting doubt on a economical model that worked best for those who listened to it for free.

The Digital Music Weblog writes that operating costs were higher than one might think, and advertising revenue didn't come close to filling the gap.

New media and old media share a fact of life. "When your business doesn't make money, you eventually go out of business," according to a note on the Woxy Web site.

The letter to fans from the site's proprietors in Oxford, Ohio, begins with the lament, "this sucks."

The last song played: "Kick Out The Jams" by the MC5.

Suing Howard

Looking at CBS Radio's case against Howard Stern, UCLA corporate law professor Stephen Bainbridge writes that the now-celestial shock jocker may have talked himself into some serious legal trouble.

The network is suing Stern for breach of contract and misappropriation, contending that during the months he was waiting to start his show on Sirius Satellite Radio, he essentially used CBS's airtime for his own financial benefit, by boosting the value of his Sirius stock. The suit also contends Stern broke the law by getting his sidekicks to make the jump from terrestrial radio with him.

The Doylestown-born Bainbridge writes in TCD Daily:

To the extent Stern induces the sidekicks to break their own employment contracts, there clearly would be a problem. In addition, courts are much less forgiving of employee solicitation when the solicitor has a supervisory role vis-Ã -vis those who are solicited. On the whole, however, this strikes me as a much less clear cut case than the problem of soliciting customers of terrestrial radio to shift to satellite.

On that latter issue, however, the question may be: why did CBS wait so long? My guess is that they didn't want to offend Stern's fans, but once so many of those fans followed Stern to Sirius and Stern's terrestrial radio replacements bombed, CBS no longer had anything to lose.

Howard's Beginning

We've had David Hiltbrand listening to Howard Stern's debut on Sirius this morning, and here's his take.

Here's what the bloggers said:

Jeff Jarvis at Buzzmachine tuned in early. Caught the initial glitches. Heard George "Capt. Sulu" Takei's tale of losing his virginity at Boy Scout camp. Heard that David Lee Roth refused to take Howard's call. And caught a discussion of swearing and sat radio. Jarvis mused:

How many sacred cows bit the dust this morning: F-words, Star Trek, and the Boy Scouts. I want to buy Brent Bozell a Sirius subscription.

If you're looking for the play-by-play, Mark's Friggin' is back in action, chronicling everything breathlessly.

Sample: George Takei introduced the next reporter, Andrea Pyser, who asked Howard if he's excited about the new show. Howard said that he's very excited. Howard interrupted and asked George who he found to be the most attractive man in the room. George said it had to be Keith Olberman.

A few bloggers bit on Stern's announcement that he's married his girlfriend. One guy who seems to be live-blogging the moment, noted Stern conceded he made that up within two minutes.

Apparently Stern's arrival of satellite radio is not only causing Sirius's fortunes to turn. It is causing listeners to lose sleep. Writes DVGTR in LiveJournal:

Howard Stern has started on satellite today. I was going to listen for an hour or so and try to catch the evening replay but I'm going to forgo sleep today (nap in the afternoon, I shall) to listen to the whole thing live. So far, George Takei has used the "C"-word and discussed his first homosexual experience, Stern has said, "this is so f$%^&$ great", and thus and such.

I have a good feeling about the new direction of the show and look forward to a lot of really funny stuff.

Some fans hoping to catch the show for free on the Sirius Web site were disappointed. A three-day trial comes free, but apparently the show was not available.

One who did thought he heard something familiar - the Pat O'Brien sex tape.

"Where have I heard that before…," asked Insignificant Thoughts. "Oh right. Opie and Anthony."