O&A / XM apology

[Caveat Emperor]

Wackbag (the main O&A fansite) is reporting that XM has actually fired Opie & Anthony and that they won't return after 30 days is up.

I, for one, am beyond upset -- both as an O&A fan and as a firm believer that self-censorship is killing this country.

[WMR]

Damn. Is that credible, CE?

[Red in Chicago]

I can't wait to get howard's take on this tomorrow. Silence on his part would speak volumes.

[Caveat Emperor]

Damn. Is that credible, CE?

Sounds like it. The guy who posted it is an admin at Wackbag and it was confirmed by one of the "show regulars" who has some close ties to Jim Norton.

Anthony has an account on the message board and is pretty active there, but I don't think he's posted anything yet.

I should also note, for the record, they DID mention their studio at XM was getting renovated here very shortly and the timing would be right for a fake "suspension"/"firing" to get them out of there to do the work. However, after all the ranting they've done on the fake radio suspension bit over the years, I can't imagine them doing that.

[Reds Fanatic]

Sounds like it. The guy who posted it is an admin at Wackbag and it was confirmed by one of the "show regulars" who has some close ties to Jim Norton.

Anthony has an account on the message board and is pretty active there, but I don't think he's posted anything yet.

I should also note, for the record, they DID mention their studio at XM was getting renovated here very shortly and the timing would be right for a fake "suspension"/"firing" to get them out of there to do the work. However, after all the ranting they've done on the fake radio suspension bit over the years, I can't imagine them doing that.

I can tell you they are not out for the studio renovation. Ron and Fez had mentioned earlier they would be on vacation a few weeks this summer while the studio is renovated. They use the same studio as O&A. Ron and Fez are still working so this is not the renovation. I would not be surprised if they are fired. This is the way radio usually fires someone. They suspend them for about a week or more then just fire them before the suspension is up. As a big O&A fan this whole thing is disgusting. The only reason I will stay with XM is Ron and Fez and baseball.

[Caveat Emperor]

As a big O&A fan this whole thing is disgusting. The only reason I will stay with XM is Ron and Fez and baseball.

Yup. If it weren't for R&F I'd have already gone to cancel my XM subscription. Though, I doubt every O&A fan cancelling would change the decision at this point. The ferver over this had completely died down, which means something nobody is privy to got O&A canned -- I'm guessing something said to someone in XM's brass by someone close to the government.

Once again, the listener gets screwed as a result of all this. I guess I'll just set my computer to record the stream from WFNY and then listen to the previous day's show on my way into work every morning. That is, if they don't get bounced from the CBS gig as a result of this too.

Funny thing is, this'll be the second gig they get fired from for something they didn't even say. Last time it was the caller doing the report from live in St. Patrick's cathedral. This time it was the homeless guy they set up in the studio.

[Reds Fanatic]

Yup. If it weren't for R&F I'd have already gone to cancel my XM subscription. Though, I doubt every O&A fan cancelling would change the decision at this point. The ferver over this had completely died down, which means something nobody is privy to got O&A canned -- I'm guessing something said to someone in XM's brass by someone close to the government.

Once again, the listener gets screwed as a result of all this. I guess I'll just set my computer to record the stream from WFNY and then listen to the previous day's show on my way into work every morning. That is, if they don't get bounced from the CBS gig as a result of this too.

Funny thing is, this'll be the second gig they get fired from for something they didn't even say. Last time it was the caller doing the report from live in St. Patrick's cathedral. This time it was the homeless guy they set up in the studio.

I have no proof of this but my guess in some way Mel Karmazin has something to do with this if they were fired. Mel is the head of Sirius but would be the head of the merged company if the merger ever went through. While XM and Sirius are 2 seperate companies behind the scenes the management of both meet regularly to plan out the merger and try to get the merger to go through. It is well known Mel is no friend of the O&A show. If Mel thought in any way the controversy from last week was jepordizing the merger I would not be surprised if he was the one putting pressure on to get rid of O&A to save the merger. Again that is just a wild guess but something had to change behind the scenes for this to happen this suddenly when the whole thing seemed to be going away.

[GSURedsfan]

2 points I'll make here:

1. O&A are *****es to the entire Howard crew, with the exception of maybe Scott Ferrall.

2. I think the whole suspension/firing stems NOT from what the homelessguy actually said, it's that O&A did nothing to atleast ATTEMPT to apologize for what the guy said.

Brent

[Yachtzee]

2 points I'll make here:

1. O&A are *****es to the entire Howard crew, with the exception of maybe Scott Ferrall.

2. I think the whole suspension/firing stems NOT from what the homelessguy actually said, it's that O&A did nothing to atleast ATTEMPT to apologize for what the guy said.

Brent

1. If Howard or anyone else in his crew is anything but against this suspension/firing, then maybe Howard and his crew are the <naughty words>.

2. Why should they have to apologize for anything? Condi Rice and the others that were mentioned are public figures. From what I heard, nothing that was said was what one would consider a serious threat or even a malicious falsity. It's a comedy show in which what is said is not meant to be taken seriously. Again, if Campari can run an ad featuring Jerry Falwell describing having sex with his mom, then I don't see what the big deal is.

[Caveat Emperor]

2 points I'll make here:

1. O&A are *****es to the entire Howard crew, with the exception of maybe Scott Ferrall.

Both Stern's crew and O&A's crew (including guys like Norton, Patrice O'Neal, Rich Vos and Bill Burr) are all really talented at what they do. I don't think you have to hate one because you listen to the other. At the very least you have to respect that, at one time, both of them broadcasted to a lot of people in a business where the majority of radio is/was local.

2. I think the whole suspension/firing stems NOT from what the homelessguy actually said, it's that O&A did nothing to atleast ATTEMPT to apologize for what the guy said.

From what I understand, the suspension is officially being put forth under the guise of O&A not taking an admonishment from XM to "apologize and move on" seriously. Apparently (and I wasn't listening at the time) they brought the incident up again on Monday when XM had specifically told them not to mention it anymore.

And I'm with Y on this one: why should they have to apologize for the words of a homeless guy that made some outlandish claims/threats in the middle of a comedy show? Thier JOB is to be outrageous.

[GSURedsfan]

My bad, when I said "apologize" I meant they should have said "woah.....don't you think you're going a bit overboard?"

Brent

Both Stern's crew and O&A's crew (including guys like Norton, Patrice O'Neal, Rich Vos and Bill Burr) are all really talented at what they do. I don't think you have to hate one because you listen to the other. At the very least you have to respect that, at one time, both of them broadcasted to a lot of people in a business where the majority of radio is/was local.



From what I understand, the suspension is officially being put forth under the guise of O&A not taking an admonishment from XM to "apologize and move on" seriously. Apparently (and I wasn't listening at the time) they brought the incident up again on Monday when XM had specifically told them not to mention it anymore.

And I'm with Y on this one: why should they have to apologize for the words of a homeless guy that made some outlandish claims/threats in the middle of a comedy show? Thier JOB is to be outrageous.

[Chip R]

And I'm with Y on this one: why should they have to apologize for the words of a homeless guy that made some outlandish claims/threats in the middle of a comedy show? Thier JOB is to be outrageous.

I'm not sure they have to apologize but it is their show and they should be responsible for the content on their show. And I'm guessing this isn't a homeless guy after all but some comedian posing as one. I'm also guessing that O&A had a pretty good idea what this guy was going to say. Maybe not exactly but in general.

That said, they probably didn't realize the trouble this was going to cause their bosses. They probably figured that this was XM and they - or anyone on their show - could say anything they pleased. But we all have a boss we have to answer to and if O&A's boss told them to move on and apologize then they had a choice. They could move on or they could bring it up again. They chose the latter and now, it seems, they have to answer to their boss.

Yachtzee, I think the difference between this and the Campari ad is if enough people who bought Campari complained about that ad, you can better believe that the ad directors who were responsible for that ad would have been fired. Larry Flynt didn't have to worry about that since he owned the magazine. If enough of his subscribers were upset enough about that article that they would have cancelled their subscriptions, he would have suffered a financial setback. Now if Hustler had a board of directors he had to answer to and enough people found it offensive enough to cost Hustler money, they would have had every right to fire Flynt.

If O&A are fired, they, like Imus, can sue for wrongful termination.

[WMR]

Howard's take on this today was that if they had any ratings they wouldn't have been suspended and/or fired, just like Imus when his big name sponsors started jumping ship(this was my initial take on it as well).

[Chip R]

Howard's take on this today was that if they had any ratings they wouldn't have been suspended and/or fired, just like Imus when his big name sponsors started jumping ship(this was my initial take on it as well).

At the risk of sounding like a dumb question, is there a legitimate way to rate satellite radio shows? If there is, do they compare it to other satellite radio shows or regular radio shows? I don't listen to any of these shows and I don't have any kind of satellite radio so I wonder how accurate Stern's statement is.

[WMR]

Well, XM charges a surcharge for the O&A show and I was told that they generated only 30,000 subscriptions which is why they went back to simulcasting their show on XM and "Free FM." Their Free FM ratings came out recently and they were ABYSMALLY bad. They were being dropped from several free fm markets anyway. I don't have the ratings in front of me, but they were REALLY bad.