• Welcome to BellGab.com Archive.
 

Art Bell Quits Dark Matter

Started by DesertFox, November 01, 2013, 08:13:24 AM

dortmunder

Quote from: jazmunda on November 01, 2013, 03:36:00 PM
I agree. Art shouldn't have said anything. Alas cryptic has always been apart of Art's MO.

Jaz, maybe he'll move Down Under and broadcast from one of your spare bedrooms ;-)

Job

Quote from: area51drone on November 01, 2013, 03:38:46 PM
I'm blaming you Jazmunda... so many calls he thinks you're the only one listening!!  j/k
lol  Yeah, Jaz sounds cool on Skype.

Juan

Quote from: Sardondi on November 01, 2013, 03:12:04 PM
I'm having a hard time finding the simple decency, much less honor, in trying to wheedle a unilateral change in the contract you bound yourself to a mere 6 weeks earlier.
Except that the contract could specify, or contain language giving rise to reasonable expectations, that the stream would work.  It could be that Art is getting enough error messages emailed to prove a breach on the part of Sirius.  Plus, Art is an engineer.  Engineers are all perfectionists and huge pains.

lonevoice

Quote from: Sardondi on November 01, 2013, 03:12:04 PM
I'm having a hard time finding the simple decency, much less honor, in trying to wheedle a unilateral change in the contract you bound yourself to a mere 6 weeks earlier.
Are you referring to the part where people are speculating that Art's contract with SiriusXM stipulates that they SHALL provide functioning infrastructure sufficient for the needs of Art's paid internet subscribers, and SiriusXM has already breached the contract?  Or the part where people are speculating that Art has issued an ultimatum to SiriusXM, and threatened them that he will breach the contract if his demands aren't met?  Which of the parties are showing a lack of honor and decency?  Based on what factual information?

I've seen both of these speculations here.   I've also concluded that no one here knows jack about what's going on. 

DanTSX

Art should stay out of the streaming discussion unless he feels the need to stick up for fans. Sing persecuted by the corporation.

It would be for the better.   SiriusXM know that this is going on, but only care once the piracy reaches a certain magnitude where it is worth limited legal resources.  While Art is a big deal, I assure you that he is a blip of revenue for SiriusXM and isn't a huge concern unless he wants to make some sort of contract precedent that will affect other content.   

The difference to SiriusXM's lawyers on dark matter and say any other content is that if a music channel is being pirated, every artist can sue everybody listening making a huge mess.   Doing the same to DM is only messing with one content source and property for the most part

onan

Quote from: UFO Fill on November 01, 2013, 03:49:40 PM
Except that the contract could specify, or contain language giving rise to reasonable expectations, that the stream would work.  It could be that Art is getting enough error messages emailed to prove a breach on the part of Sirius.  Plus, Art is an engineer.  Engineers are all perfectionists and huge pains.

excellent points... engineers is a perfect point

shell88

Quote from: UFO Fill on November 01, 2013, 03:49:40 PM
.  Engineers are all perfectionists and huge pains.

He is that - shall I say finicky to the extreme.  It's always a problem with those mercurial Geminis.

Uncle Duke

Quote from: UFO Fill on November 01, 2013, 03:49:40 PM
Except that the contract could specify, or contain language giving rise to reasonable expectations, that the stream would work.  It could be that Art is getting enough error messages emailed to prove a breach on the part of Sirius.  Plus, Art is an engineer.  Engineers are all perfectionists and huge pains.

Art has an engineering degree?  I never knew that.  EE?  Any idea where he went to school?

jazmunda

Quote from: dortmunder on November 01, 2013, 03:48:57 PM
Jaz, maybe he'll move Down Under and broadcast from one of your spare bedrooms ;-)

Spare bedroom singular. You make it sound like I live in a mansion.

Art is welcome to broadcast from my house as long as he doesn't mind sharing a room with my daughter's imaginary friend. ;)

I thought of a decent solution to this.

The reason Art wants to stream through his site live is because he wants international listeners to be able to listen to the show without pirating it.  But by doing so, this offers less incentive for people to subscribe to SiriusXM.  So why not offer a subscription service on Art's site for just Art's show (live and archived streaming), and Sirius gets a large cut from the service?  That way the international listeners can listen in and SiriusXM still has a way to profit from a premium service.  The service would be like streamlink for terrestrial radio, but SiriusXM still has a part in it.

Edit:  I forgot to mention the server issues.  The stream would be hosted on a large dedicated server separate from SiriusXMs streams, so there would be less chance of crashing or issues.

georgesucks

Quote from: jazmunda on November 01, 2013, 04:01:38 PM
Spare bedroom singular. You make it sound like I live in a mansion.

Art is welcome to broadcast from my house as long as he doesn't mind sharing a room with my daughter's imaginary friend. ;)
I think Art is planning to quit Dark Matter because he knows Noory is planning to retire from C2Cam.

dortmunder

Quote from: jazmunda on November 01, 2013, 04:01:38 PM
Spare bedroom singular. You make it sound like I live in a mansion.

Art is welcome to broadcast from my house as long as he doesn't mind sharing a room with my daughter's imaginary friend. ;)

I'm sure they'll get along famously as long as he doesn't toss his spent e-cig cartridges into the yard.

dortmunder

Quote from: georgesucks on November 01, 2013, 04:05:22 PM
I think Art is planning to quit Dark Matter because he knows Noory is planning to retire from C2Cam.

Wait, are you speculating that Noory is retiring or do you know something?

shell88

Here's part of an interesting recent article found on the C.Crane website about Art:

"Years from now radio will probably follow Art's lead and integrate more of the Internet into the radio listening experience. For now though, Art seems to be one of the few radio artists who knows how to do it right. It's no surprise to find Art on XM Radio, or championing the possibilities of streaming radio on the Web. When I asked Art about the impact of digital or satellite radio his response was straight forward and honest: "I don't care how my show gets to people's ears, as long as they can hear it. Internet radio is stunted right now because of the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America). It was just taking off, when they stopped it."
 
Clearly, what Art is trying to do has been a longtime dream of his, and if anyone can pull it off he can.
The article in it's entirety can be found here:

http://www.ccrane.com/library/art-bell.11.19.02.aspx

Good luck Art!


CornyCrow

Quote from: Dont Fear The Reaper on November 01, 2013, 03:24:26 PM
Considering his "all-in" comment, it can only mean one thing if he is really serious about what he says - the end of Dark Matter on SiriusXM.

I mean, I love listening to Art. But when you boil it down to the basics, it's all a little disappointing. If SiriusXM was reneging on something, that would be one thing. But this basically comes off as "I'm not getting as many callers as I thought I would, blow up your business model and make my show free." It's kind of hard to look at that objectively and think "good idea."
I agree with you.  This should have easily been a contingency that he thought of before signing up. 

I know that Art keeps bragging about the half hour of commercial time vs. 3 1/2 hrs of programming, but I seriously think that will change over time.  I don't think Art is in this only for fame and glory.  I think part of the deal presented to Sirius is that gradually they might expand on commercial time which will mean more income for Art and Sirius.  I think more listeners on the web will give them more clout to demand more money from advertisers.  I think this ENTIRE THING is about money. 

CornyCrow

Quote from: shell88 on November 01, 2013, 03:26:35 PM
If your making 75000 a year and have to pay a producer and webmaster, your not left with much of anything. They need the money made from the advertising off his website.  Give sirius a cut and they are all happy.
As far as I'm concerned, that figure is just a rumor on this thread.  Bell certainly did not mention that figure on the show and NO ONE can give a site online where that figure is quoted. 

I don't believe it.  I am open to seeing proof, however. 

Yeah, he'd have to be paying the help that $75k salary plus a lot out of his own pocket.  Makes no sense at all. 

shell88

Sure he wants money and to reclaim or rebuild another empire.  He got burned badly by c2c.  He doesn't have much time to do it, so he's a bit impatient.

area51drone

I just got to the end of the show and heard the announcement.   It didn't even sound like a threat to me.  It sounded like he's working with Sirius and they're trying to help him.   

williedee

Quote from: area51drone on November 01, 2013, 04:42:18 PM
I just got to the end of the show and heard the announcement.   It didn't even sound like a threat to me.  It sounded like he's working with Sirius and they're trying to help him.

That's how I heard it too. People on here are getting way to worked up about this. Not to mention this website contains probably 80% of all people that even give a rip about this announcement haha

Quote from: CornyCrow on November 01, 2013, 04:38:23 PM
As far as I'm concerned, that figure is just a rumor on this thread.  Bell certainly did not mention that figure on the show and NO ONE can give a site online where that figure is quoted. 

I don't believe it.  I am open to seeing proof, however. 

Yeah, he'd have to be paying the help that $75k salary plus a lot out of his own pocket.  Makes no sense at all.
75k figure comes directly from Time Magazine. Not exactly a rumor.

Quote from: CornyCrow on November 01, 2013, 04:38:23 PM
As far as I'm concerned, that figure is just a rumor on this thread.  Bell certainly did not mention that figure on the show and NO ONE can give a site online where that figure is quoted. 

I don't believe it.  I am open to seeing proof, however. 

Yeah, he'd have to be paying the help that $75k salary plus a lot out of his own pocket.  Makes no sense at all.






Re: Art Bell

« Reply #14347 on: September 12, 2013, 12:30:07 PM »



I hope you don't mind me posting this - it is from the subscriber content at Time.com - a pretty great article/interview with Art that they just posted, and it includes some pretty exciting tidbits about the show. Again, my apologies if posting something this long is frowned upon here.

Insomniac Radio King Art Bell Reclaims His Crown
The curious voice of late-night America returns to the airwaves
By Jack Dickey / Pahrump Monday, Sept. 23, 2013

Read more: http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2151794,00.html#ixzz2ehU9iB4g

Not much happens in the patch of the Mojave Desert an hour's drive west of Las Vegas' nonstop carnival. It's hot during the day. Most nights the sky fills with stars. Sometimes there's a lightning or dust storm.

But since July, two events have shaken the typically sleepy region. After decades of obfuscation, the CIA acknowledged the existence and location of Area 51, a base for testing secret military aircraft that has long been central to UFO lore. And Art Bell, whose late-night radio show once attracted an audience of millions of loyal insomniacs, announced he was returning to the airwaves full time after more than 10 years away.

For Bell fans, the timing wasn't a coincidence. They are the sort of people inclined to believe the government knows more about mysterious shapes in the sky than it lets on. Bell has been speaking and listening to them since 1984, broadcasting first from Las Vegas and then, after 1988, from a studio in his home in Pahrump, an unincorporated town of 36,441 not far from Area 51.

From 1 a.m. to 6 a.m. E.T., six days a week, Bell held forth on all manner of science, science fiction and science-maybe-fiction in his smoky, spooky voice. He was a one-man band, cuing the bumper music, taking calls and interviewing guests entirely on his own, explaining everything from clairvoyance to the chupacabra in a relaxed but foreboding style. From 1997 to 2002, his Coast to Coast AM was one of the five most-listened-to shows on talk radio, syndicated to as many as 500 North American stations and attracting a peak weekly audience of 15 million. Then Bell walked away.

Bell had taken breaks before, most notably a two-week spell in 1998 after his son was molested by a teacher and a longer one in 2000 to deal with the ongoing fallout. When he retired in 2002, Bell agreed to host weekends, saying the lighter load would ease his back problems. Weeknights were ceded to George Noory, his eventual successor. As Noory took command, Bell's hosting duties gradually tapered off. He last appeared on the show he created in 2010.

Bell says the decision to come out of retirement was entirely his, a response to the direction that Noory has taken the show--closer to talk radio's overcaffeinated political chat (Alex Jones, the conspiracy theorist best known for claiming that the government perpetrated the Boston bombings, is a regular guest) than the open-minded exploration of the supernatural that defined Bell's tenure. Noory, he says, has "ruined" the franchise. Noory declined to speak to Time; a spokesperson for his syndicator, Premiere Networks, said the company is "fortunate" to have him.

"Not a chance in hell," Bell says, when asked if he would ever return to his old show. "It's not personal. It's just an institutional hatred. I really hate them."

But he still loves radio, and listeners still love him. And that's why, at age 68, after a sojourn in the Philippines, Bell is back in Pahrump preparing for his return. From a studio in a double-wide trailer on his property, the onetime king of insomniac radio is working out the kinks of what will debut Sept. 16 on Sirius XM satellite radio as Art Bell's Dark Matter. It will run live from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. E.T., four nights a week (reruns will air the rest of the week), though Bell says he plans to go an extra hour most nights, putting his new show in competition with the first hour of his old one. Dark Matter will feel familiar to Coast fans: Bell plans to cover the same topics, with many of the same guests, and he's even recruited the old Coast announcer to set the mood.

But more than a decade away can sow doubts, even among the best. "Memories grow fond over time," Bell says, fretting over his return. "My listeners may remember me being better than I was."

Talking Through the Night

America's overnight army--insomniacs, long-haul truckers, emergency-room nurses--need something to keep them company while the rest of the country sleeps. Radio has long been a willing companion. The format favors good listeners and drawn-out discussion, an even keel over daytime's hot temper.

Long John Nebel, a New York City--based disc jockey, dominated the overnight air in the 1960s with a call-in show heavy on tales of ghosts, aliens and witches, according to Michael Keith, an expert in radio and American culture at Boston College. The supernatural gave way to political chat in the 1970s, with Larry King as the standard-bearer. But King's move to daytime in 1993 opened the door for a return of the weird, and Bell burst through it.

He moved away from politics and embraced the solitude of the night and the possibility of the desert. Who better to talk about Area 51, after all, than the man broadcasting from its shadow, who claimed to have seen things out there "that'd make your hair curl"?

Simply listening to Bell, though, could make your hair curl. It wasn't just the creepy topics--aliens, monsters, life after death, parallel universes--but the way he milked the theater of every moment. Callers often sounded impatient, breathless, as if they knew too much and were running out of time to share it. You, almost certainly alone somewhere in the dark, were scared. You had to be.

Bell ministered to the overnight army and added a large contingent of sci-fi junkies to its ranks. In the days before everyone had endless microtargeted media options on demand, Bell pitched a very big tent. And that audience remained during Bell's years away, hungry for his return. Every vague comeback rumor was met with a flurry of online anticipation.

That's what Sirius XM was after. Satellite radio's business model relies on hosts with fans passionate enough to pay for a subscription. The company had been hunting for an "Art Bell type," says Jeremy Coleman, Sirius XM's boss of talk programming. "Then I had one of those 'Duh' moments. What about actual Art Bell?" Coleman got to "stalking" Bell on social media, eventually paying to send him a priority message on Facebook. Coleman's pitch: "I told him that the show would work only if he actually spoke the truth ... We want one thing from Art Bell, and it's Art Bell."

Bell, who had resisted comeback offers from smaller syndicators, was sold. "I'm on extraterrestrial radio now," he says, relishing the turn of phrase.

Though the deal was modest by his standards--Bell says he'll earn $75,000 annually, plus half of the show's profits for three years--he was drawn by the freedom it offered: few commercial breaks, total creative control and the chance to prove that his brand of weird still has a following among America's overworked and underslept.

The audience for conspiracies and antigovernment screeds is vast, but Bell says he doesn't want them. "George can keep them," Bell says with a smile. He's after a different demographic: "The sane fringe."

On a recent August day, bell seems in better shape than he was the last time he was on the air regularly. He traded his Marlboro Lights for electronic cigarettes, and his 29-year-old fourth wife Airyn and their 6-year-old daughter Asia keep him spry. He looks like a droopier version of his 1990s self--not a bad outcome given the hours he keeps. (Bell never goes to bed before 2 a.m.) He says his time abroad rejuvenated him too. He moved to Manila to marry Airyn in 2006, three months after his wife's unexpected death from an asthma attack.

Night has long since fallen over the Kingdom of Nye, as Bell called his home county in the old Coast intro. The sky is pitch black; just a few stars are bright enough to slice through the inky pall. Normally you can see the Milky Way, but the unseasonable humidity, Bell says, has ruined the view.

"You know," he says, "I wish you had come on another night, to see it for yourself. It's really something." But it's not an option. I'll just have to take Art Bell's word for it.


Birds gotta fly, Art's gotta be cryptic.  You all agreed that you "wanna take a ride".  Well, don't complain now that the 'coaster is in mid-ascent!

Juan

Re: Art as an engineer - to hold the broadcasting jobs he held, he would have had to have had an FCC commercial broadcast license (used to be called 1st class, now something else).  People who earn those licenses in broadcasting are considered engineers, regardless of education.

jazmunda

I'm a Dark Rider goddamit and I demand to be kept abreast of all course corrections.

Uncle Duke

Quote from: UFO Fill on November 01, 2013, 05:08:56 PM
Re: Art as an engineer - to hold the broadcasting jobs he held, he would have had to have had an FCC commercial broadcast license (used to be called 1st class, now something else).  People who earn those licenses in broadcasting are considered engineers, regardless of education.

Thanks Phil.  As I suspected when the post was originally made, the term was being used as a job title, not to define a professional degree Art earned.  I was pretty sure I had heard him say he had not graduated from college.

popple

Quote from: jazmunda on November 01, 2013, 05:14:52 PM
I'm a Dark Rider goddamit and I demand to be kept abreast of all course corrections.

If for some reason Art ever split from siriusxm would he have to leave behind the Dark Matter name?  :'(

WhiteCrow

Could it be that Art's announcement was intended to hype an already done deal with Sirius XM???

He is the Master Showman!

nika01

I havent read all the posts here, but quite a number are just plain ill informed. I question why this thread even exists. From what I heard, the "request" seems pretty damn reasonable to me. Here is why it makes sense to give it away for free. Any bozo can download any DM show right now. If S/XM gives it away, they get free adverts. The only people that will want to pay are vehicle based users, and there arent that many relative to the total fan base. Furthermore, Art could just as easily produce his own show on the net with no big daddy sponsor. Seems to me that it is S/XM are the ones that have the most to lose.
One final shot, all the people that imply that Art is flaky/flighty etc..WTF. Look at all that went down. What would you do? Jesus H Christ y'all

bateman

Quote from: WhiteCrow on November 01, 2013, 05:59:47 PM
Could it be that Art's announcement was intended to hype an already done deal with Sirrus XM???

Entirely possible. A tease like that makes for great radio. We've been talking about it for days, and we'll keep talking about it until there's a resolution.

Unfortunately, I don't see Sirius complying with this request. Telling us could be a tactic to use against Sirius in the event they continue to be "uncooperative".

onan

Quote from: bateman on November 01, 2013, 06:16:46 PM
Unfortunately, I don't see Sirius complying with this request. Telling us could be a tactic to use against Sirius in the event they continue to be "uncooperative".

That is exactly the maneuvering (man I am using that word a lot) I was thinking about.

Powered by SMFPacks Menu Editor Mod