Wednesday, November 2, 2016

Marathon and on and on and....


Since we know that manager Berthold Reimers is a perpetually unreliable source when it comes to reporting WBAI's financial status, we have to pay attention to any figures that cross our path and try to come as close to reality as our gathered data allows. 

With that in mind, I grabbed the following post from the BlueBoard cemetary. It is R. Paul Martin's response to SDL's question: "How goes the beg-a-thon at this point?".

November 2, 2016
"On October 22, the General Manager said, 'I am going to extend the drive 1 more week so we can pay PRA and the National Office a few months,' and since the 'thon was already scheduled to go through November 6, this sounds like a plan to extend it to November 13. No telling what will actually happen though.

The latest information I have from Management is that the 'thon's tally was $292,558 at the close of October 31. That's an average of $10,088 a day. But he may be including some of the Saturday morning ticket donations in with that, and that is not supposed to be mixed in, as per the CPB.

The goal of this 'thon is a moving target. It's somewhere between $266,250 in which case it has achieved its goal, and $450,000, in which case it is quite short of its goal. The FY15 budgeted goal for the Fall 'thon was $470,500. The never adopted FY16 budget had the goal for that Fall 'thon at $460,000. The "draft of a draft" FY17 not-yet-considered budget proposal pegs the current Fall 'thon goal at $266,250. And yet I have heard that the General Manager has said that the goal for this 'thon is $450,000.

Meanwhile the NFC talks about FY17 budget proposals, a month into FY17. The reality of some of these budget proposals is questionable, in my opinion.  —R. Paul Martin, WBAI Treasurer

14 comments:

  1. Let's play the numbers game...

    SDL

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  2. You white liberals have nobody to blame but yourselves.

    KGT

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  3. Since that figure of $450,000 is complete BS, we should just declare the fundraiser a success and stop the Null and Bates show now.

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    1. Why not go that last step into fantasyland and declare solvency?

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    2. Is it a fantasy? I'm just going by the stated numbers. They're raising $9-10 grand a day. Even a low ball estimate puts them close to the lower realistic goal. An interesting question is how much of this money is from Gary Null?

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  4. How can there still be enough people left who would turn over $290K to these people? These can't be new suckers, since WBAI doesn't draw in new listeners. So it would have to be the same people giving over and over and over.

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    1. That is another mystery. especially since the pitches seem aimed at dummies and the prices are outrageously inflated. Also, if the same people are coming back to the WBAI market, the fact that thousands of "thank you gifts" were paid for but never delivered.

      BTW, does Gopiers!, Inc. ring a bell with anyone?

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    2. Null is probably one of the higher pitchers on WBAI, but I think his making 40% of their donations is a thing of the past. That period where he was kept off fund drives hurt his abilities to pull in the cash.

      WBAI can still pull $290K, with effort. However, in the process they probably lost some more listeners with not only incessant extendomercials, but the same handful of incessant extendomercials. Little by little the audience will tune away, find other resources, die, etc.

      I haven't listened to Fass in a while, so don't know what is going on. I tuned in tonight for a few minutes and heard his babbling with a rambling guy about a T shirt for a short time before Schmied cut Bob off and went to the same old extendomercial. Can you tell me what that was all about?

      Gopiers! Inc?

      SDL

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    3. They can sell their crap, but if the incentive to donate was WBAI and its programs, that amount would be drastically reduced—even the crap is failing to meet their expectations.

      One of the worst, most dishonest pitch is that which Bates makes to sell all that fabricated African history. Do you thin anyone with even a small brain believes that whitie kept the truth hidden for centuries, including the fact that Egypt is a part of the African continent?

      Whitie sure doesn't know how to keep a secret, does he!

      Interesting but not surprising that they didn't tell Fass that he was pre-empted. Suppose he wasn't doing his show from home... that sort of thing has happened—this is a radio station with a serious communications problem.

      Gopiers!, Inc.? https://homemetry.com/unit/1250+5TH+AVE,+5K,+New+York+NY

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    4. Not sure if Fass was scheduled to be preempted or Fass hung up the phone and Max decided to cut off the remainder because others would be hosting it and not Fass. Max did sound a little annoyed, though.

      OK, I see Reimers on the link. Not sure what it is all about.

      Finally, flipped on Byrd during dinner for a few minutes. Interesting thing was while offering a Robert Knight CD set, he also offered Haitian relief donations, but as an optional $50 extra donation. I wonder why.

      SDL

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    5. It occurred to me that Fass may have been obligated to feed something to the seemingly dwindling number of boondock stations that have been carrying his show.

      I also noticed that the Haiti charity has become an option.

      Gopiers!, Inc. is listed as a not-for-profit landscaping business. Odd, don't you think?

      BTW, the fabricated Africa-related "history" that Tony Bates drools over and tries to sell is crap these crooks downloaded from various sources. Surprised? Of course not!

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    6. Oh? Is Fass losing stations? I really haven't paid attention to him in about two months. He's bad, but those few regular callers are even worse, as they just seem to be out to use him and talk over him.

      Non-profit landscaping? As far as I know, ALL landscaping companies are, shall we say, involved in less reputable sidelines.

      No, I know about the bates crap. I looked it all up a while ago. All those kinds of things are downloads. What's amazing is that even with such little overhead as making a DVD or CD out of stuff, they still can't mail it out. Seriously, less than $1.00 to manufacture and they can't send it out?

      SDL

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    7. Fass may not be losing stations, but reading off the list used to be something he did several times during each show, trying—I suppose—to give the illusion of having a listenership that hasn't been there in decades. Now he only mentions two or three. Notice that, except for that fracking guy, Bob's three callers are surviving hippies.

      As you so correctly point out, the discrepancy between WBAI's actual outlay for these "thank-you gifts" and their inability to purchase stamps is not only laughable but a clear indication of the routine misappropriation practiced by Reimers. Compounding the outrage is the fact that that the s&h is an add-on charge.

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  5. They kept saying the 2014 audit is almost done. Turns out they owe something like $20,000 and a they need to make a deposit to get the 2015 audit going. Its amazing they're STILL talking about raising the money for the 2014 audit. The PNB had to repeat the same questions over and over to get that much information but when it came to selecting the next affiliate directors, suddenly the PNB became a well-oiled machine and got to work on setting up a meeting to elect affiliate directors.

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