There's A Ring To That

Pick the correct excuse for why I didn't get this week's column done on time:

a. My dog ate it.

b. I had a tummy ache.

c. I had to go to yet another convention, but when I got into my car and turned the key, nothing at all happened and it turned out my car battery was completely and totally drained, so I had to run back into the house and grab the other key and tell my wife (bless her) that I had to take her car and thus leave her stranded all day while I raced to Marina del Rey and run into the conference, where I heeded the instruction to turn my cell phone ringer off, only right in the middle of the opening presentations I got a call and the ringer not only rang but rang about as LOUD AS POSSIBLE, whereupon I frantically shut the ringer off and cut off the call, but even after that the phone RANG AGAIN, and I started pushing buttons and jabbing the screen and finally had to run from the room with a couple hundred of my peers staring at me in unanimous disapproval, rip the back cover off the phone, and pull the battery, and then spent the rest of the day as the butt of jokes and "oh, THAT'S the a-hole who didn't turn off his phone" comments and finally made it home to spend a few hours trying to get my car to start.

I'll give you a few minutes.

Yeah, Thursday was not a lot of fun for me. And to everybody at the conference, I can only offer my profuse apologies for the cell phone interruption with the stipulation that my cell phone is the worst smartphone ever. It does not deserve the name "smartphone." It is not smart.

Anyway, while they weren't being interrupted by some clown's cell phone, the presentations and panels yesterday were all about the PPM, and on my way home, a friend called me and asked what happened at the day's sessions. When I told him, he laughed; he said that he'd been through countless sessions and meetings about the PPM himself, the same minute-by-minute parsing of data, the same "see? You did this bit, and people tuned out" analysis. And after all of that, after all of the discussion of sample sizes and meter distribution and all the other things that people like to talk about at conventions, he'd come to the same conclusion I did.

It's simple, he said. Just do good radio and you'll do well in the meters. Spend too much time worrying about one bit on Tuesday that went too long, or whether you got into a topic fast enough, or whatever, and you'll drive yourself crazy and do a lousy job of entertaining. Research is good, but if it gets in the way of being creative -- if everything is designed specifically to game the system -- the long-term effect is that people will go elsewhere for their entertainment. But you knew that, because you've heard me bloviate about it right here in this column before. This thing, it's like a convention in print, only without the travel and the surreptitious checking of name badges when you forget someone's name and the alcohol. But you can add any of that on your own.

I have more to talk about here, including a little sort-of research project I've been doing on the side that might be of interest to you (you wanna know what young adults really think of you? I might have some interesting information about that. But it'll have to wait until next week, when I have more time and when I'm not spending the day in a Marriott ballroom trying not to annoy people.

=============================

You need topics for that "good radio" you're surely doing? All Access News-Talk-Sports' Talk Topics column is where to go, of course. It's where there's a big fat, sweaty pile of material just begging to be talked about on the radio. This week's extravaganza includes items like Global Handwashing Day, how the foreclosure mess is being blamed on the customers, a scorned woman's revenge, bugs in oatmeal, the lingering presence of a dead raccoon, the most epic toilet-paper-based prank yet devised, the least satisfying college major, a couple who went directly from appearing on the Jerry Springer Show to jail, a town putting time limits on dog barking, and much more. This week, you'll also want to read "10 Questions With..." Next Stage Business Radio Network's Pamela Muldoon, who started in radio, went off to become a business sales and marketing guru, and has now combined those into a new online radio operation. And, as usual, there's the rest of All Access with news, job listings, columns, music charts, and other resources. It's all free, of course.

Oh, yeah, you can also get the latest top radio news headlines through the Net News Twitter feed at twitter.com/allaccess and on Facebook. Don't forget to download the All Access iPhone app by clicking here or the All Access Android app by clicking here; both apps were developed by our friends at jacAPPS. Final plug: My personal Twitter feed is at twitter.com/pmsimon and my blog's at pmsimon.com, and both of those are not related to or the fault of All Access.

=============================

I'll tell you more about the semi-research thing I did next week. I'm pretty sure you'll find some comments about the National League Championship Series here, too. You wouldn't expect any different from me.

Perry Michael Simon
Editor
All Access News-Talk-Sports
psimon@allaccess.com
www.facebook.com/pmsimon
www.twitter.com/pmsimon