The Next Chapter Begins

For almost a year, I've been hosting the morning show on WINZ. In all honesty, I'm surprised it lasted that long!

As you'll see by listening to some of the earlier podcasts on this site, my radio career has dominated by music-- not talk, and certainly not politics! My passion was always music.

That is, until everything started unraveling under the leadership of George W. Bush!

I moved back to South Florida after a stint programming WXRV in Boston. I often say I don't which is worse, working for a behemoth broadcasting company, or the independent station owned by the crazy guy who thinks he knows how to program a radio station just because he has the money to be a radio station owner. I still don't know the answer.

Anyway, I had had enough of radio, and moved back down here to start my own little video production business-- taking people's old photos, home movies, memories and stories, and turning them into beautifully produced videos and DVDs to preserve the family histories and allow them to be passed down to future generations.

My problem was, and is, that I'm a creative person. I love doing the work. Not so much the business end of things. Certainly not the selling and asking for money. So, after a couple of years of burning through my savings, it was time to get back to radio!

But during those two years in South Florida, there was no music station to meet my eclectic taste. I had become a listener of the progressive talk station, and knew that was where I belonged.

I was hired to produce a new morning show with former Miami Herald columnist Jim DeFede hosting. The producer gig soon added lots of other responsibilities: Promotion Director for the station, and an ever expanding on-air role as a sidekick of sorts, and then news anchor.

Then Jim had some health problems, so when he was out, I sat in the big chair. The first few times were really weird. In music radio, it's drilled into you to say what you need to say in as few words as possible, and get back to the music. Talk radio is a completely different world.

When Jim's contract wasn't renewed last August and he left, I really didn't expect to be given the job, eventhough I though I was doing a fairly decent job. Finally, at the end of the year, they told me the job was mine.

And now, just about a year after I took over, I've been replaced with Imus.

I have lots of ideas about why they made this move, but contractually, I'm not allowed to talk about it. So I won't.

But I will take it as a sign that it's time to move on, and look toward the future.

The future of broadcasting, I believe, will come through the internet. It's the great equalizer. No longer will we need radio towers and transmitters to get our voices heard. Wi-fi is already in cars. Not mine... but if you have one of those new iPhones, you can stream internet radio! It will be in our cars before you know it.

I'll start slowly. Tomorrow morning, after I take Alison to school, I'll come home and record a commentary, and podcast it... right here!

It may take me a few weeks, but pretty soon I'll have the capability of doing interviews and taking phone calls. I hope you'll stick with me through the journey.

I will need some help to make this work. Advertisers for the podcasts. Clients for Legacy Video Productions (yes, I still do it on the side... and I still hate asking for money, but I will!), and clients for my voiceover services (that website will be active soon).

Stay tuned, and be sure to tell your friends where I am. Radio or Not... here I come.