That’s what’s being reported. Arbitron’s new Portable People Meter (PPM) system has found that listeners to conservative talk radio in New York have been undercounted for years and listeners of hip-hop and Hispanic stations have been overcounted. It also shows that WABC may have made a bonehead move to kill the Curtis & Kuby Show to make room for the dessicated and boring Don Imus. PPM shows that Curtis and Kuby had been undercounted by 75,000 listeners. The Daily News reports:
New York radio got the first look at its new ratings system Wednesday, creating smiles at mainstream pop and rock stations and causing at least one urban station to say it reads like a death warrant.
“These numbers could put us out of business,” said Vinny Brown, program director of WBLS. “And it’s not just us. Listeners need to know this could threaten the future of black and Hispanic radio across the board.”
The new system replaces paper diaries with “personal people meters” that are supposed to be more accurate and will prevent faking diaries. But many civil rights advocates, anticipating the changed numbers, were up in arms over the new results befor they even came out:
Specifically, the Council and NABOB are alarmed about the recruitment, composition and administration of the sample panel, the attribution of sporadic exposure, and the absence of a metric that reflects listener engagement. Inaccurate representation of listeners has a negative affect on advertising revenues, and ultimately hamstrings the ability of smaller stations to stay afloat in a competitive media landscape.
How long will it be before we have calls for affirmative action for radio shows?
