What Media speaks for the African-American Community?

In May, 2009 I wrote about the sale of WAMO. The parent company Sheridan Broadcasting's sale of WAMO-FM , urban AC WAMO-AM and gospel WPGR-AM (1510) "left Pittsburgh devoid of any black radio outlets and provoked petitions at the FCC to block the sale to St. Joseph Missions." Folks were upset about the sale going to a raced white religion group. Seeing this as a direct impact from the House Bill 848 authored by Detroit Representative John Conyer.

Now a Grand Rapid, Mich judge has intervened to prevent the sale of the radio station catering to the African-American gospel audience in Grand Rapid.

After defaulting on $360,000 in loans, WJNZ-AM was sold in an auction to Holy Family Radio, which intends to flip the outlet to religious programming. But a county circuit court judge blocked the deal from closing on Friday, after dozens of supporters of the station's urban AC format protested inside and outside the courtroom.

The root of the problem is that early financial support was not put back into the community or organization to insure that when raced white sponsorship disappeared the station would continue to stand. Had little businesses been established, perhaps these station would be able to support itself after the loss of ad revenue.

We see this loss of ad revenue having an impact on one of the oldest African-American publication, Ebony Magazine. The fact that the radio was a cheap way for fans to listen to their favorite artists is now being replaced by other media outlets that the African-Americans entrepreneurs were slow to embrace. Now the 64 year old Ebony is rumored to be up for sale The annual Ebony Fashion Fair Show is canceled for the first time because of the lack of sponsorship. Slow to divest funding to the new communication technology believing African-Americans would be the last to embrace this personal media.

O Magazine published by Hearst could be blamed for the fall of Ebony. O lead by co-venture, Harpo, LLC owner Oprah Winfrey, incorporates radio, television and print media steering African-Americans to the Internet. Although, O is not targeted exclusively to the African-Americans audience, it is used as an consumer media for upward mobile African-Americans women who were part of the Ebony magazine family.

One of the most successful launches in history, O, The Oprah Magazine is a National Magazine Award winner and 12-time finalist, and has been on Adweek's Hot List nearly every year since its debut in 2000. Touching on a broad range of subjects, with an emphasis on personal growth, the magazine incorporates everything from philosophy and spirituality to style and relationships. O connects with readers and encourages them to reach for their dreams.

Pepsi has decided to target the younger upward mobile African-American women with a website. Pepsiweinspire.com has sliced out a young music loving group within the African-Americans community that is lost both to O and Ebony. These folks are wired to the hip hop community.

So what does it means for the radio television station? That these folks are not waiting on old established media to go to them for their voices to be heard. These folks are not interested in the fight between legislation impacting radio station. These folks are mobilized behind their consuming habits and not those of the media owners who live a different lifestyle.