Broadcasting Telecasting (Apr-Jun 1957)

1957 PULSE for ROANOKE, Va. Shows WROV NOW ST NIGHTLY 5:00 PM to 12 Midnite Monday thru Saturday 20 of 28 quarter hours nightly with 38% AVERAGE SHARE OF AUDIENCE! 5:30 AM to 5:00 PM Monday thru Sunday with % NARTB CONVENTION AVERAGE SHARE OF AUDIENCE! #3 Station 1 5.5% #4 Station 1 3.5% Move your clients closer to the listeners with Roanoke's #1 station for Popular Music, Local and National Sports and Selling Personalities! EXCLUSIVE STATION FOR COMPLETE DODGERS BASEBALL! Represented by BURN-SMITH CO., INC. 0&> ^ MAN'S BEST FRIEND WR Burt Levine, Pres. ROANOKE, VIRGINIA L.................................................-....-! Page 118 • April 15, 1957 being realized in the rest of the industry. Others: too much time spent in committee meetings, too frequent crises requiring management attention, and excessive internal friction or dissention. Moreover, he said, when management's expectations are not met, the cause is either that the expectations were too high or that proper organization is lacking. Mr. Burk emphasized that proper organization planning and direction not only are essential for large companies but also should be started early by smaller firms so that a good framework will be established for future growth. Mr. Hayes presented the organization chart for WTOP-AM-TV's 200-man staff. It showed separate sales managers, program directors, promotion directors and technical operations managers reporting to the respective radio and tv vice presidents, but with a director of news and public affairs, a director of general services and a chief engineer serving both radio and television and reporting directly to the vice president for WTOPAM-TV. Mr. Rogers explained the chart showing the line of command and responsibility in WSAZ-AM-TV's 125-man operation, where there are four principal heads under the manager: engineering and administration, fiscal, programming, and commercial. Mr. Rogers stressed the necessity of making the best possible use of the personnel available, and the impracticality of getting people to fit into a pre-drawn chart. For instance, he said, the vice president for engineering at WSAZ-TV is the No. 2 man in the station and as such is in administrative charge of operations, while the music director doubles in personnel, and the assistant general manager is actually the commercial manager. In answer to a question from the floor, Mr. Hayes and Mr. Rogers — whose stations in both cases are newspaper-owned —agreed that stations owned by newspapers should operate not only separately but in competition with the paper. Charles H. Tower, NARTB manager of employer-employe relations, conducted this phase of the session. Kenneth L. Carter of WAAM (TV) Baltimore, co-chairman of the convention committee, presided over the tv management conference, which included reports on NARTB code affairs and on the Television Allocations Study Organization (see stories page 111 and 112) in addition to organization planning and direction. SG's Cohn Sees Danger In Too Many Tv Movies Conrad Hilton Hotel. He asserted stations should strive for creativity in film usage, including areas of packaging and selectivity and warned executives not to shrug off film potentialities in the light of tremendous investments. He said 30-minute films tend toward "mediocrity" today and questioned why "the more provocative half hour shows are so often live." Mr. Pack suggested it might be the result of a better "brand of writing." Mr. Rifkin claimed "a majority of broadcasters have leaned over backward to cooperate with film distributors" and have cooperated fully with producers. He emphasized importance of solving mutual problems so both industries can work toward common ends. Today's tv producer maintains an elaborate network of sales personnel and is anxious to find the sponsors who are receptive to films. "You can't make a good program cheap nor make a cheap program good," he observed. DANGER of the "pendulum swinging too far" toward feature film fare and the prospect of reaching "the point of no return" in tv station programming within the next half dozen years were posed before NARTB delegates in a television film session last Monday. Ralph Cohn, vice president and general manager of Screen Gems Inc., raised these possibilities while suggesting "the answer to better syndicated film programming is a better market for them." He urged expansion of the tv market on the basis of more and better time in "peak viewing periods." Screen Gems has a stake in both feature and syndicated films, he noted. Citing present one and two-station markets, Mr. Cohn asserted the "full complement of feature film programming, syndicated half hours and network shows" is limited to a "handful of five or more station markets." Mr. Cohn appeared on a tv film panel session which included Harold P. See, KRONTV San Francisco and chairman of NARTB Television Film Committee; Campbell Arnoux, WTAR-TV Norfolk, Va., and chairman of NARTB Television Board; Richard M. Pack, vice president of programming, Westinghouse Broadcasting Co., and Maurice J. Rifkin, vice president in charge of sales, Ziv Television Programs Inc. Mr. Arnoux stressed "intelligent utilization" of film as a means of "the care and feeding of contented sponsors and the development and maintenance of satisfied television audiences." He noted 1956 tv film sales volume hit an estimated $100 million, with approximately 20,000 syndicated episodes available. Tv audiences are more interested in program quality than in the live vs. film issue, Mr. Pack told a capacity audience in the Tv Movies Will Lessen Pay Tv's Role: Skouras PAY TV's future won't be as "lucrative" now as it would have been before motion picture companies started releasing thenbacklogs of feature film to free television, Spyros P. Skouras, president of 20th Century-Fox Film Corp., said last week. Answering questions at an informal breakfast reception given during the NARTB convention by NTA Film Network — in which 20th Century-Fox owns 50% interest — Mr. Skouras also said he thought motion pictures as well as free tv would suffer from pay television. In answer to another question he said Broadcasting • Telecasting