Alan Jones….just “Some In-House Stuff”

As “just a little outfit” Alan Jones went on a bit of a rant last week on the enforceable undertaking for the sale of Magic 2CH in Sydney on his 2GB and 4BC Breakfast show.

We all know the long drawn out story around the sale of the station by now, but that didn’t stop Alan dropping some gems like ACMA being “experts with no expertise”.

Apart from taking fair aim at ACMA “We are not over regulated are we… like bloody hell we are not”, Jones went on to compare the “little outfit” of  Macquarie Media to Newscorp and their vast array of interests in various media assets. Best take a listen.

Cutting to the chase, today Mark Day of The Australian has taken MRN to task with “Singo, Jones no licence to whinge”. It’s well worth a read.

Mark Day’s story clearly lays out the twists and turns of the MRN adventure in being required to offload 2CH, which we won’t cover off here again but Mark did highlight a couple of things.

“MML’s major problem is that the 2CH licence has a very limited value. It is an AM station playing oldies music, with a 3.1 ratings share. It does not have its own ­studios, let alone ad sales or admin staff.”

“It generates very little adver­tising on its own, but acts as a convenient “bonus” for buyers of schedules on 2GB and 2UE.”

The kicker at the end,

“Anyone want a radio station for $1? For that, you could buy a ­licence to lose money.”

Is that taking a dig at one of the rejected deals? Take a listen to Alan and if you like, a full read of Mark Days piece in The Australian.