So I’m hours away from launching a new site at work — scrambling on some last-minute fixes — and Lost Remote crashes. Why? Because our host has upgraded from PHP4 to PHP5. Yes, they told us this was coming… etc… etc… but who would’ve thought it would take down the site? Apparently, it barfed on one of my PHP hacks somewhere. Anyway, it’ll be a little ugly here on the LR for the next 24 hours. My apologies for the downtime. And if you live in Seattle, stay tuned for an all-new, kick-ass Citizen Rain.
April 8th, 2008
Seriously? Tribune is hiring radio execs from Clear Channel left and right. The latest hire is senior VP of programming at Clear Channel, Marc Chase, to be president of Tribune Interactive. And this is the real press release. “Marc Chase obviously blackmailed his way into a position he is not remotely qualified to hold,” it reads as a joke. B&C asked why the press release looks like an April Fool’s joke, and a Tribune spokesman said it was designed to demonstrate a “new Tribune and a new way of thinking about things.”
So you have to wonder if hiring a radio guy with little or no internet experience is a good idea (let alone pointing out that fact in glaring fashion in a press release that even a silly startup wouldn’t issue). MediaPost quotes some analyst who says hiring radio execs “makes sense” since Tribune’s focus is online video — something Clear Channel has been investing in lately. But if you ask me, hiring execs with no internet experience to head up internet units is about as dumb as that press release. (And Tribune isn’t the only one to do it.) The web is not TV. And the web is definitely not radio.
April 8th, 2008
