What happend at KUDO-1080?

[tibbiit]

No more local shows in the afternoon?
tib

[Blue_In_AK]

1. We were just talking about that tonight

while volunteering over at Diane Benson's campaign office. I guess they have been bought out or something. My husband is devastated because he listened to KUDO all day while messing around on his computer. Shannyn and Aaron must be pretty upset, I would guess.

[Arctic Dave]

2. I thought the IBEW owned KUDO?

[Blue_In_AK]

3. That's what I thought, too...

Did they sell the station? All my husband was picking up today was Rachel Maddow and Air America stuff. It's just not the same without the local people. Did they piss somebody off enough to get them put off the air? It's just kind of sad that they would all lose their jobs. I heard someone say today that Aaron was now over at 750, but that could just be a rumor. :shrug:

[Blue_In_AK]

5. Dave, I assume you saw the article in the ADN this morning...

If not, I've posted it below.

[Blue_In_AK]

4. In case you missed it, here's an explanation...

http://www.adn.com/politics/story/391150.html

KUDO firings shake up station
By BETH BRAGG
[e-mail]

The city's only politically liberal radio station fired its highest-profile broadcaster this week, but new managers at KUDO-1080 say the station will keep leaning to the left and will still air three local weekday call-in shows.

Aaron Selbig, who focused on state and local politics and gave Democrats a weekly forum on Fridays, lost his afternoon talk show and his job as program manager Sunday.

<snip>

"We're not moving the direction of the radio station. We'll maintain an important position in that we're the only forum where people can discuss the other side of the coin," he said. "But it doesn't do us any good to be a progressive radio station and rank 20th. We want to be a progressive station and rank fifth."

KUDO will launch a new schedule Thursday with the debut of a morning call-in show hosted by the man who fired Selbig -- Cary Carrigan, a longtime Anchorage broadcaster and KUDO's new program director.

Carrigan said his first guest will be U.S. Senate candidate Jake Metcalfe -- a former IBEW attorney who figures in a controversy Selbig had been talking about on his show, involving Web-site attacks against Ethan Berkowitz, another Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate.

On his show last week, Selbig alleged a connection between the Web attacks and a Jake Metcalfe political advisor. Carrigan and Robbins said Selbig's firing had nothing to do with any of this. It was a business decision based on economics and ratings, they said.

<snip>

Selbig said he doesn't think the timing of his firing and his comments on the anti-Berkowitz Web sites were entirely coincidental.

"The last guest on my show was Ethan Berkowitz. I got fired two days later. You tell me," he said Tuesday. "They told me it was a cost-cutting measure. I have no choice but to accept that at face value."

<snip>