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Free FM Cancels Gen.Y.U.

Free FM’s evening talk show was pulled earlier this week. Here is what John Fiske writes:
“To our friends, family, and listeners, Last Thursday, April 19, 2007, Kris, Brent, and John of Generation Y University met with 103.7 FreeFM station management to inform them that John’s involvement in the show, which airs successfully five nights a week from 7-10pm, would be reduced to only one or two nights a week so that John could spend more time with his bride at home.
The following Monday, April 23, 2007, Kris and Brent hosted the show without skipping a beat. For all three hours on both Monday and Tuesday, Kris and Brent discussed serious political and social issues, blew out the phones lines, engaged San Diego in substantive and compelling content, and nobody in San Diego even noticed any change in the show. In fact, one caller thought that Brent was John. Yesterday, Wednesday, April 25, 2007, 103.7 FreeFM station management met with Brent and Kris and cancelled the show.

It now becomes clear to us that the station is not as concerned with our cause as we are. When we started our show, over a year-and-a-half ago, we set out to provide a content-based, substantive program for young listeners from a young persons perspective. Along the way, we met great success. We received much press for our efforts- many newspaper and magazine articles, the show was listed as one of 50 People to Watch in San Diego (San Diego Magazine), and we were involved with not one but two national documentaries about young Americans (Judy Woodruff and MacNeil/Lehrer Productions), among other things. Additionally, San Diego responded to the show with vigor and excitement. Listeners would call our show in surprisingly large numbers, both engaging in intelligent conversation and thanking us for our willingness to break a stereotype that young people aren’t interested in important issues.

Although we thank the station for giving us the initial platform, we are greatly disappointed in their decision to abandon the greater cause… even before the ratings had a chance to come out. We have no grand delusions about our impact on media in trying to provide substantive content for young people. We wanted to offer to our peers something other than MTV or US Weekly. We now see why this type of effort hasn’t been executed succesfully in the past. There’s no room for content and substantive shows for young people in mainstream media.

THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH FOR YOUR WONDERFUL SUPPORT AND INTEREST IN OUR SHOW! WE WOULD HAVE HAD NOTHING WITHOUT YOU! Truly, three 23 year old nobodies from Rancho Pensaquitos had a great run!

John Fiske

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