Today, March 10, 2016, is the deadline date Gary Null gave Pacifica and certain individuals to respond to a settlement proposal outlined in a letter from his Attorney to Dan Siegel Pacifica's legal representative. Mr. Siegel is the covert crusader who is suspected of masterminding a self-serving rearrangement of Pacifica, having already played a major role in its crippling. As of 2 PM today, there has apparently not been any official response to his letter, so Mr. Null brought the situation up on his show, taking the opportunity to promote his own internet-based Friday offering.
Gary Null wishes us a good Friday... or does he?
BIX LIVES!!
ReplyDeleteKGT
Out of context, but today would have been Bix Beiderbecke's 113th birthday. As a teenager in Copenhagen, Bix was among my favorites. I even walked around with my cornet wrapped in newspaper, because I had read somewhere that he did that. :)
DeleteNow, back to the Grand Theft Audio game...
He keeps saying 'that's fine.' when it clearly isn't. He's getting pretty worked up over the few thousand dollars he gets/skims off WBAI. Is it the principle of the matter or is it ego? I think he just doesn't understand how he's getting bumped when he is supposedly the top fundraiser for the station. Maybe he should just buy the station and get it over with already. I think I'm getting a little jaded from all the LSB members and PNB members acting holier than thou. If everyone is such a great humanitarian, why is the network in such terrible shape?
ReplyDeleteThere is a hefty amount of ego there, but Gary Null is by no means the sole proprietor. He has contributed disproportionally to keeping the station afloat, but I think it has always been a mutually beneficial deal. The difference, I think, is that Null can do well without WBAI, but WBAI's amateur management has, over the years, allowed the station to become reliant on his input.
DeleteGary Null is a smart man, so I think he understands full well the game that is being played on him, but Reimers, who has never done anything for the station's welfare, has stabbed Null in the back. It's a betrayal that Null has put up with and tolerated for a long time, but the pirating of his DVDs is, I believe, the last straw. Reimers and his cronies belong behind bars. This is not to say that I believe Null is clean as a whistle, but he is industrious, motivated and living in the real world.
As I have said so many times before, I don't think WBAI is salvageble at this point, so it makes no sense to keep the wreck afloat. The only way to get rid of Reimers and the dross he surrounds himself with is to close shop and allow professionals to take over the frequency. That's sad, but I really see no other end to this, and if that means 99.5 will become the very kind of station Lew Hill sought to provide an alternative for, the fact is that Reimers, his immediate predecessors and cronies of that ilk have morphed WBAI into something far worse.
I have no real issue with your points. I just have some difficulty with the tactics on display which I think are way out of proportion. We're talking about a radio network run by a relatively homogenous group (in the sense that they are all progressives. No conservatives, business types, etc.) engaging in lawsuits, budget hijinks that even a child could see doesn't add up and incidents of harassment, violence and cheating on a level that is so blatant that even a casual observer will take notice. All of these actions for the goal of what exactly? Only a few people would see any real money from a sale. Control of the network? Who in their right mind would want to work at Pacifica let alone run it the way it is now? The WBAI LSB is a perfect microcosm of all this. They spend thousands of dollars for an election using outdated membership lists that they had to recreate because management openly defies them and they're still arguing about the results. Its a local station board folks not congress.
DeleteI am not so sure that the players in this farce have a shared definition of the "progressives" label. In fact, there does not appear to be a true unity of purpose... yes, they more or less agree that a couple of stations are expendable, but I see no indication of a shared motive. Some seem motivated by a need for power, others are clearly out to create a station specific to blacks, still others have personal aims, such as keeping air time no other broadcaster would grant them. Then you have your Marxists, etc.
DeleteAlso, as you point out, consider the fact that these are people who dabble in broadcasting and, for that matter, have neither experience nor business sense.
Just look at their priorities. Have you ever heard of a radio station that treats equipment and studio facilities as necessary evils? Have you ever heard of such pig-in-a-poke broadcasting schedule as, say, WBAI wants people to finance? Have you ever herd of a station manager who hides from staff and listeners, juggles the books to a fare-thee-well and cannot see the connect between program offerings and a mass listenership exodus?
Null is being such a little bitch ("Fine..."), while still being sure to get an advertisement in for his PRN. The engineer on duty should have hit the delay button every time he mentioned PRN and really ruined his day.
ReplyDeleteNull should be grateful he is even on WBAI after filing a frivolous lawsuit against people at Pacifica and WBAI. For ten years he is fine with allowing WBAI to "pirate" his material (which you can find posted for free on youtube) for their beg-a-thons, but the moment he gets dropped from the beg-a-thons, he turns around and sues them.
SDL
I believe Null filed the suit before they cut his air time down, but there is definitely a give and take going on here. The lawsuit should have been filed the minute convincing evidence of piracy surfaced. In all fairness, let's not forget that complaints were made to the PNB a long time ago and that Summer, then the ED, ordered the duplicating machine removed. The Siegel PNB ignored the complaints and countermanded Summer's order, then dumped her.
DeleteThere are faults on both sides, but I don't think a lawsuit that is based on facts can rightly be termed frivolous.
No, I said he filed the suit only after his premiums were taken off the beg-a-thon system. Remember a few months ago when Bates and/or Reimers first dropped Null premiums from the beg-a-thons?
DeleteNull even says that his stuff was "pirated" for ten years. So, why didn't Null do anything about that for those ten years until his publicity time hawking premiums gets taken away? Did he stop hawking his items? No. Am I the only one who finds it hypocritical that Null now wants WBAI to pay for the same stuff he posts on youtube for free?
I think Null didn't care about the "piracy," as long as he got the publicity and ego boost of looking like WBAI's savior. He is only pissed now that it's gone.
Also, Null loved to boast of giving WBAI his premiums for free in the past. Well, was it actual physical premiums he gave them? Or was he allowing them to make copies for free and send them out? Think about that.
SDL
I agree that there is enough blame to go around several times. I always thought it odd (bizarre) that Null's anger was so sporadic—that game of tag between him and Reimers has been a farcical rollercoaster ride; here I find the term frivolous eminently applicable :)
DeleteNull's periodic assertion that this and that isn't costing the station a penny never had a ring of truth, not in my book. The lies and distortions have been rampant. Remember how we were told that Andrea Katz had secured the New School location gratis for a Null fundraiser? Well, why was that rental listed as an expense on a subsequent page in Reimers' cookbook? I don't know whose lies are more believable. :)
"'But he has nothing on!' a little child cried out at last."
Ever hear the saying "it's so corrupt, it's honest"? Pacifica and WBAI are almost there, in their Kafkaesque show.
DeleteUltimately, I think Null is a prima donna. When he is the star, he's fine. When he isn't the star, he becomes a temperamental little bitch. I still think he doesn't care about any "piracy," he cares about not being WBAI's big star. Reimers mistake may have been cutting only one day instead of all five. Four days left Null with a voice to criticize WBAI, but a voice which may say the wrong thing and blow his lawsuit. Could Reimers be smart enough to set Null up like that?
Now that I think of it, maybe Null was setting up WBAI by letting them "pirate" his material? A set up for the future, should he need leverage against them.
Maybe I am over thinking it all. These nitwits can't be that smart and Machiavellian. Their style is more geared towards childlike direct violence and aggression...
SDL
They hate to love each other.
DeleteI am curious to hear what they air at noon today. They replaced the late lamented Simon Loekle's program with a wannabe comedian in whose uttering I have yet to detect a whit of humor. Turning intelligence into idiocy, that's the pattern... it isn't working, so they will continue to follow it.
ReplyDeleteDid you hear the morning show today? It was guest hosted by Laura Flanders, whose articulate, intelligent approach made Haskins look even more pathetic, if that's possible. They need to get rid of Haskins, he isn't even good at running the board.
He said NOTHING about WBAI. He only talked about power-walking. That is his way of saying, "WBAI- F.Y." His silence was deafening, but that should not fake out anybody who follows this site. HE IS PISSED BEYOND WORDS. LMAO
DeleteKGT
I listened to Richard Wolff this a.n. and he made my skin crawl. What is the low down on him? Does he give 'em hell or is he telling the truth and I think it's hell?
ReplyDeleteKGT
Personally, I think Wolff makes good observations but offers the wrong answers much of the time. I think he's a little too much of an ideological socialist.
DeleteSDL
I have mixed feelings about Wolff, but I think his program rises above the current WBAI norm.
DeleteYes, agreed. It is intellectual. I just don't agree with a lot of his beliefs. However, I enjoy hearing him and making up my own mind.
DeleteSDL
Precisely how I feel.
DeleteYesterday, Gary Null said, "The future of broadcasting lies in internet broadcasting". Like Hell. You have to know Gary is on the internet to hear him. You won't accidentally tune in to him on the internet, as you might on terrestrial radio or cable TV. Even for SiriusXM, you have to know whom he is first and be interested in him to tune in to him. Gary's PRN is Gary's final graveyard. Adios MF.
ReplyDeleteKGT
Does anybody think Gary will throw a hissy fit like he did 15 years ago when Bernard White fired him and he picketed outside WBAI offices and ordered his audience not to financially support WBAI?
ReplyDeleteKGT
Gary Null is rather unpredictable as to his methods. His suggestion that listeners continue donating to the station has a hollow ring to it these days.
DeleteBai's international working womans month . Apparently only if you are a black woman.
ReplyDeleteTheir backdoor way of talking about black history/struggle/whining. Insulting to say the least .
I didn't expect Gary to still be on the air as he is today, after last week's ultimatum.
ReplyDeleteOK. The gloves are off. Do not contribute to WBAI while they lie to us and play this peanut under the shell game with us. Of course, this means ALWAYS. FOREVER.
DeleteKGT
Most of us are way ahead of you there, KGT
DeleteGary's taking a page from Howard Stern and Jay Leno, asking "the man on the street" questions and finding how ignorant they are. I think they did it first.
ReplyDeleteHe asked the people: "Who (whom) is our nation's Capitol named after".
DeletePeople would not answer, George Washington, because they were afraid the reported would ask next, "Did you know he was a slave-master"? So they didn't answer to avoid that and he is interpreting that to mean they didn't know the answer. What a cheap vaudeville stunt. You Appalachian Prick. You're the Southerner here. I am a Jew from Queens. You have to prove something. I don't. You are a product of the Slave-Plantation system. I'm not.
I would have answered, "George Washington Carver".
Fuck You, GARY.
KGT
KGT, you're starting to become a bore on the topic of Gary Null.
DeleteMark Simone used to do a "man on the street" questions segment on his old Simone Phone show circa 1980 on the old WPIX FM, primarily when it tried the new wave music format that failed.
ReplyDeleteThere were two WBAI connections with that show. One was that Tom Leykis was the producer, until he and Simone had a falling out. The second was that Lynn Samuels used to sell the NY Post outside the Empire State Building, where the WPIX FM studio was. Simone used to do the interviews right outside the EMP, so Samuels was always on them, with smart ass answers, like:
"Do you know where the Empire State Building is?"
"Why? Is it missing?"
Anyway, only one person knew the location...
The funniest one was when he asked people "Do you believe in euthanasia?" Only one guy knew what he was talking about. Most thought he meant youth in Asia...
I'm writing this during the "Cake" Davis self promotional program, btw...
SDL