Why Did CBS Wait Until Now To Sue Howard Stern?
from the take-a-guess dept
The wires are buzzing with the story that CBS Radio is suing Howard Stern, his agent and Sirius Radio. The details backing up the lawsuit are questionable at best. They're upset that Stern continuously promoted Sirius on the air for well over a year since he signed the agreement to move to the satellite radio system. The complaint is that he gave them free advertising. That may be true, but it seems a to be a bit late in the game to be complaining now. If they were so concerned about all this free advertising, why not just fire him when it was going on or sue him then? It seems likely that they didn't bother because they were making so much money from his show. There are also some questions about the stock transactions involving Stern and Sirius -- which again, may be accurate -- but seem outside the scope of a lawsuit with CBS Radio. Shouldn't it be the SEC that looks into such things? However, the real reason that CBS Radio may be doing this could be similar to yesterday's bizarre lawsuit over the Da Vinci Code: to generate publicity. After all, Stern's replacement in New York has apparently not been able to hold onto much of an audience.
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No Subject Given
i personally don't really care if howard moved to sat radio, and am a little skeptable about buying into the whole thing with the way XM is going. Public radio format is going to change very soon with the introduction of HD Radio, and will very closely make sat radio unnecessary. I can put up with the ads and not have to pay a monthly fee. oh, and morning shows are probably the hardest show to do and takes quite a lot of effort to start and get your listeners listening.
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Howard
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Re: No Subject Given
Personally, I think Stern's doing the funniest stuff in years- AND just goes to show that just because you're a conglomerate, still doesn't mean you can own a person!
12 bucks a month is a small price to pay for free speech-
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Moonvies is vain
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I wonder how much longer...
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I think I Squizz'd
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No Subject Given
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Re: No Subject Given
HD in HD radio DOES NOT STAND FOR HI DEF.
its all marketing...read about it...its the same crap it just allows for digital streams of radio, and multiple streams from the same station.
YOU are also still going to have 10 minutes + of commercials..
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Hard Drive
High Density
Home Depot
Heavy Duty
Help Desk
Heart Disease
Harley Davidson
Half-Duplex
Home Delivery
...or just plain, Hot Dog
I guess "High Definition" can now be added to the list :P
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Get serious
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Re: No Subject Given
Funny. I always thought "HD" stood for...
Harley Davidson
No, sorry, Harley-Davidson has always been H-D, not HD.
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Re: Get serious
I can't imagine how CBS could succeed here, given their gross failure to mitigate damages. Stern was quite obviously and openly using his CBS show as free advertising for his upcoming cable radio show for many months. It just shows how messed up CBS is that they didn't just take him off the air then, but they were more concerned with eking out a few short-term dollars, I guess.
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Stern
They didn't want to can Howard because it was in te contract to pay him if they fire him for breach of contract. They gave him warnings and he stopped saying the word satellite radio as requested, but said "uh huh huh" to signify Satellite radio.
They could not stop the callers from saying satellite radio, it was inevitable.
Regular radio even with HD will not be any better unless the FCC lets freedom of speech go on.
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Re: Stern
Either someone cut the broadcast while the caller was talking about it or there was a tear in space and time centralized entirely within the studio.
But yeah, I agree wholeheartedly with everything else you said.
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dump
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No Subject Given
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Full Disclosure
He also didn't disclose the full terms of his agreement. Yes, everyone knew about the $500M over 5 years, no one knew about the 32M shares of stock he would receive if Sirius reached certain subscriber goals. Knowing he stood to make $100M-$200M if he brought in enough subscribers surely changed his on-air behavior. If you listened to the show at all the final 14 months were pretty much filled with references to Sirius, subtle or otherwise.
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Re: Full Disclosure
Eh, who cares anyhow, his show sucks, filled with idiot remarks, and really has no substance.
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