You really think Ann Fisher carries that kind of reputation? The people I know who were fans of her predecessor (Fred Anderle) are uniformly lukewarm on Fisher. I view her as hosting a niche local public radio talk show with a pretty modest audience. Whenever I've tried to listen to her show, it's been a profoundly disappointing experience. She so often seems unprepared and lacking in any real knowledge of the subject matter. Terry Gross, she's not.
I’d like to think that her listeners have listened to her long enough to know her inadequacies and those of her show and guests. This. While she fills the big void of local call-in talk shows, she’s no Fred Anderle. He ruled. I miss his Open Line—no subject; call in, talk about anything in the news. I always found those hours interesting.
It's funny how a departing host can totally change the appeal of a program. I used to be a big fan of To the Best of Our Knowledge when Jim Fleming was the host, but have totally lost interest since he retired, even though his replacements (it's now kind of a shared role) have been on the show forever, too. Just not the same vibe. My wife still occasionally says how much she misses Anderle.
By the way, for anyone who's interested, this article walks through the various failed attempts to develop the new stadium site: https://www.bizjournals.com/columbus/news/2019/10/11/crew-stadium-launches-where-20-years-of.html Looks as though four major projects were envisioned for that area before the the stadium/Confluence Village finally happened.
I worked with her husband once upon a time. Because of that, I made the effort to read her stuff in the dispatch for a bit. let's just say that didn't last very long.
While I agree that most of Ann's listeners muscle through it and put up with her only to hear from her guests, whether we like it or not she still has the platform and though she is generally regarded as lacking as a host, her guests are taken at face value. And that's the dangerous thing: her show is contributing to the dialogue and public perception and, frankly, that's concerning to me. There is so much bad - or false - information being bandied about as truth that the public has no choice but to think that they're being fleeced by the city and Crew. If it was just that she and her guests disagreed with the project I wouldn't object as strongly. But the bad journalism is, well, bad.
Psst.... It's all bad. Shhhh.... don't tell anybody. These people get jobs because they're good with those word things. Not because they understand the material they're writing about.
I know we are early in the process but anyone have any insights into how the IBM (I think) company is helping with stadium tech. Curious what that really means or looks like.
IBM iX and Legends. I have no idea. But whatever they do, they do it with some of the biggest clubs on the planet. I'm hoping that the Short North.... what the hell's it called, experience center or something? I hope we can get these kinds of answers there. Here's a page of Legends case studies: https://www.legends.net/en-US/tag?id=5a6ca1232fe3c564ea536c24&name=Case Studies And here's the IBM iX site: https://www.ibm.com/services/ibmix/ Enjoy their video manifesto!
Really interesting link! This seems like the exact person you want in your corner to handle the building of a new stadium or facility.
Because so many communities have been burnt badly by stadium deals (Cincy with PBS, DC, Miami), there is always going to be skepticism on a stadium deal. Further, there is always an anti-tax, or anti-government, or NIMBY, faction willing to jump on the bandwagon. And because of the history, some good government groups/folk will lean against projects as well. But on this one, I think it is pretty tepid. The stadium saves both sites from being useless & abandoned & generating no tax revenue. No existing homes are being impacted. No neighborhoods, really. No NIMBY/gentrification issues. And the stadium is privately financed. Yeah, perhaps some other stuff gets thrown into the project that makes the overall number go up, but like Bill says, it is peanuts compared the entire cost, and as far as I can see, from previously funded development grants/funds and such. We cannot freak every time a news story runs. This is a done deal now. Relax. As for journos. The real decline came when news divisions started being run for profit. Clicks & eyeballs (ad revenue) were valued more than truth or information. What generates clicks doesn't just replace important information, it becomes all that is really important. I agree that Fischer is not a top notch journo, but even top notch jounos struggle to ask pertinent questions on a wide variety of subjects (watch a debate moderator). That is one reason you get gotcha/fireworks type questions instead of information type questions. On the stadium, we on this forum are so in the weeds on it, our knowledge far exceeds that of the host, or some of the guests. They look like dopes to us. The solution is to bring in experts to ask some questions, or have really informed guests, or both. Does not always happen.
I love peeking at that stadium cam. Who else finds it soothing to watch them move dirt around every day?
Journalism, or better yet, management of newspapers and TV stations have always been for profit businesses, and have always generated the lions share of their revenue by ad sales. Pick up a newspaper from the 70s or 80s, open the sports section and you'll find pages of tire advertisements. Guys would see the ads when they read the sports page. Different sections, different days, different ads. Heck, most of what you paid for the paper went to the circulation department to get it to your door. Same with TV stations. They put their product it for free because Gillette would advertise razers, or Swanson advertising TV dinners. The bigger difference today is that we have more than 3 networks dedicated to just 24/7 news available on cable (or streaming, or whatever delivery method). Part of their revenue is add paid. Part of it is paid by the consumer through the cable Co. Back in the day, you got 30 minutes of local news and 30 minutes of Walter Cronkite, minus commercials. The decline came when we started to expect the news to reinforce our world views.
Oh, I'm relaxed. To the point that it's often confused with apathy. However, this: Isn't being mentioned enough and is tainting public perception. That's all I'm saying. And though we like to downplay public perception, this franchise is in a battle for relevance in this city and every single PR win counts.
Good lord y'all. I get that. I 100% understand why the public is leary of municipalities even mentioning the word stadium. And that's what's frustrating about this particular deal: The conversation and narrative are being driven by people who aren't interested in facts but rather in only continuing the narrative that all stadium deals are bad and that the municipality should not be involved in any stadium project at all. And here, now, are two different stadium projects that are both privately financed and will have long term positive benefits for the metro area, both financial and otherwise. But all we hear about is the city's outlays for infrastructure development and the other projects that have been on the books and funded for years. I know this isn't the case, but sometimes it feels like y'all don't care what the rest of the metro area thinks about our beloved franchise.
I've looked at the cam a few times. It's even harder not to look over at the construction site when driving by on 670. It's not the smartest thing but I can not look.
I get this--I have a window office at some height that faces, albeit a mile or so away, Mapfre. I had fun, a number of years, ago watching the light towers go up.
Stadiums have a history of costing far more than originally stated and not returning the economic benefits that were promised. I don't blame anyone fighting public money being used for stadiums.
I'm not always convinced about those studies--either way. There tend to be politics involved and I'm not sure you get an unbiased report. I look at the Arena District. That's a good example, IMHO, of it working--given what was there before. Mind you, that's an "eyeball" test. And of course, a number of these people complaining about "public money" do so because they want that money to be spent on the things they find interesting. Most are just as happy to spend other people's money as long as it's on what they want.
Perhaps I should have worded it more carefully. They were not expected to turn a profit (and did not), until recently. Yes, of course they took ad money. But they were not expected to turn a profit. They ran, largely, off the profits turned by the entertainment divisions. Now, News divisions are run with an eye towards profit, when before they were not. More like the Entertainment divisions are. They want eyeballs and viewership. They do not want to offend anyone. Both sideserism. Less hard news. https://niemanreports.org/articles/the-transformation-of-network-news/ (Granted, old article, but the point still stands). Now, today, there are more channels/ways to get news, as you say, but they are all/mostly run on this principle. Or worse, they are niche news set to reinforce what people want to hear (Facebook, ONN, FoxNews, others) or just straight up propaganda (RT). Sinclair is on this spectrum. Closer to propaganda (though they do not dictate all news programming, just some selected stories). Anyone who sings out of key too much gets booted or demoted. Shep Smith at Fox (Wallace will be next if he keeps up). Donahue, Ed Schultz, & Cenk at MSDNC (Hayes will be next if he keeps up). Shep at Fox was out of tune with the audience. The MSDNC folk were out of tune with their bosses (at NBC). Who look to be kind of jerks if they indeed tried to bury the Weinstein/Matt Lauer (spelling) rape/assault stories. https://deadline.com/2019/10/chris-hayes-msnbc-ronan-farrow-1202760374/
Sure. I don't live in Columbus so my opinion means nothing but rebuilding the Kahiki should be a priority, complete with the Mystery Girl serving the secret drink.
As I understand it, the whole thing is in storage somewhere. Is my memory right on that? There is a tiki bar downtown, I think around Long & Grant, but I have never gone. I still have my Kahiki drink glasses.