Paradigm Talent Agency has launched an expanded broadcasting division. The move unites Napoli Management Group and 3 Kings Entertainment under one powerful roof, representing more than 600 voices across media.
What We Know: Paradigm now stands as a major force in broadcast talent representation. Napoli Management — long known for repping TV news anchors, reporters, weathercasters, and sportscasters — brings deep ties to networks like FOX News, CNN, ABC News, and CBS News. Meanwhile, 3 Kings Entertainment, with over 23 years in the business, has placed on-air personalities, analysts, and hosts across ESPN, FOX Sports, NBC Sports, and beyond. Together, they cover broadcast, streaming, and emerging platforms.
What’s At Stake: Paradigm’s leadership emphasized that the combined division creates expanded access to entertainment, publishing, and brand partnership services for all clients. Executives noted the platform reflects growing industry demand for representation across both traditional and next-generation media outlets.
What Remains Unclear: It’s uncertain whether Napoli and 3 Kings will operate independently or in concert with one another within the broader division under Paradigm. Additionally, the full leadership structure is still undefined publicly. **UPDATE: Per Paradigm Communications: Napoli and 3 Kings will operate as one under the Paradigm Talent Agency banner**
What It Means: This is a significant power move in the talent representation space. Paradigm now oversees an expanded roster spanning news, sports, and digital media at a moment when demand for broadcast talent is intensifying.
Barrett Media produces daily content on the music, news, and sports media industries. Sign up for our newsletters to stay updated and get the latest information right in your inbox.
The Radio Hall of Fame has announced the class of 2026 inductees. The Class of 2026 will be honored October 8 at a ceremony taking place at the Fairmont Hotel Chicago.
What We Know: Eight honorees were selected. Six by a voting panel of more than 950 industry professionals, and two by the Nominating Committee. Balloting was conducted confidentially and overseen by Miller Kaplan’s Andrew Rosen. The inductees are as follows:
2026 Radio Hall of Fame Class
Boomer Esiason (WFAN – New York City)
Dennis Green (COO Sun & Fun Media – Key Networks)
Shotgun Tom Kelly (60’s on 6 – SiriusXM Radio)
Helen Little (WLTW – New York City)
Bob Pittman (Chairman/CEO iHeartMedia)
Rickey Smiley (Urban One – Reach Media)
Charlie Van Dyke
Fred Winston (Former WLS-Chicago)
What They Said: Radio Hall of Fame Co-Chair Kraig Kitchin “Our congratulations to each of our 2026 Inductees, on this well-deserved recognition. Each of these inductees has performed at the highest levels for a sustained period of time to make our industry that much more impactful to listeners and advertisers as a result. I’m thrilled to see them properly recognized by this announcement and the forthcoming Induction ceremony this October.”
What Remains Unclear: The official vote count was not revealed by the Radio Hall of Fame.
What It Means: This class reflects both the on-air and business sides of radio. The 2026 class brings together talent from major markets, satellite, and syndication, reflecting the medium’s remarkable range. Furthermore, names like Pittman and Smiley signal that both boardroom brilliance and on-air magic matter equally. Tickets are on sale now at: www.radiohalloffame.com. A portion of ticket purchases is a tax-deductible charitable donation to the Museum of Broadcast Communications, home to the Radio Hall of Fame.
Barrett Media produces daily content on the music, news, and sports media industries. Sign up for our newsletters to stay updated and get the latest information right in your inbox.
The 2026 Barrett Media Audio Summit is coming together in a way that genuinely excites me. Months have been spent building this lineup, inviting top personalities, executives, programmers, and business leaders. Our goal is to educate, celebrate, and challenge the media business to be better. We will do just that June 30-July 2, 2026 in New York City at the SVA Theatre on West 23rd Street.
One-day, Two-day and Three-day passes are available at BarrettMedia.com. A cluster rate is also available to help GMs/MMs keep costs down. Companies can also pursue barter arrangements to keep costs down by contacting iMar Entertainment here. Be advised, our news media show takes place Tuesday, June 30th. Sports Media is the focus on Wednesday, July 1st. And music radio takes us home on Thursday, July 2nd. If you’re traveling to NYC and need a place to stay, Hotel Hayden has rooms but is almost sold out. We can not add more rooms so reach out today to book your stay. It’s first-come, first-served at this point.
Welcoming Music Radio’s Best and Brightest
These next four individuals each bring something different to our Music Summit. They have gained real experience and a strong understanding of what it takes to wins on radio’s front lines. They’ve programmed incredible brands, entertained the masses, extended their shows into syndication, and even established hall of fame resumes. It’s my pleasure to welcome Broadway Bill Lee, Frank Kramer, Chris Lloyd and Justin Johnson to the 2026 Barrett Media Audio Summit lineup.
Starting with the talent, Broadway Bill Lee is one of the most beloved voices in New York radio history. His longevity at WCBS-FM is not accidental. It is the product of a genuine connection with an audience that very few personalities ever achieve — and a masterclass in what it means to stay relevant across decades of change. The radio hall of famer will join us on Thursday, July 2nd for a special session led by Jim Ryan that includes Scott Shannon and Jim Kerr. This will be a can’t-miss conversation.
Frank Kramer brings a West Coast’s perspective on personality-driven radio with him to the big apple. The Heidi and Frank Show on KLOS has built one of the most devoted morning audiences in the country, and Frank’s understanding of how to make listeners laugh and feel connected to the show is something every programmer and talent in the room will benefit from. His involvement in our Rock panel will add a personality touch alongside some bright programming minds.
Chris Lloyd has operated at the intersection of programming and leadership for years. As WBAB 102.3’s Director of Branding and Programming since 2006, Lloyd’s station has been nominated six times for Rock Station of the Year. Serving as WBLI’s Director of Branding and Programming since 2021, Lloyd has led the brand to a Marconi Award as CHR station of the year in 2024. He also occupies the role of Director of Rock Content for all of Cox Media Group. Chris will join our Rock panel led by Barrett Media’s David Hill. Included in the panel are James Kurdziel, Frank Kramer, and Justin Johnson.
Speaking of Justin Johnson, 98ROCK’s Program Director has helped the station become one of the most talked-about brands in the rock format. Johnson’s station identity resonates beyond the dial — combining strong local presence with a digital and social strategy that reflects how modern radio audiences consume content. The brand’s creativity was especially on display around the Artemis launch. Spend a few minutes to see how 98ROCK capitalized on the moment. Justin understands that winning in 2026 requires more than playing the right songs. He’ll add his programming perspectives alongside Kurdziel, Lloyd, Kramer and Hill on July 2nd.
Though they work in different markets, different formats, and for different companies, all four understand that radio’s future depends on more than music. It needs personality, community, courage, creativity, adaptability and unique skillsets. Whether you are a morning host, music director, program director, market manager, or advertising executive — you’ll get smarter on July 2nd hearing from these gentlemen.
Join Us For the Summit
To secure your seat at the 2026 Barrett Media Audio Summit, visit the Summit section up top. In there, you’ll find additional details on speakers, hotel rooms, and our sponsors. For details on sponsorship opportunities, please contact Stephanie Eads at Stephanie@BarrettMedia.com.
We look forward to seeing you in New York this summer.
Barrett Media produces daily content on the music, news, and sports media industries. Sign up for our newsletters to stay updated and get the latest information right in your inbox.
Information is the most valuable thing in sports media. Everyone from the top CEO to the part-time producer benefits from gathering information and applying it. The insider role for networks has taken the local beat reporter position and amplified it on steroids. Instead of covering the day-to-day operations of a given team, personalities earn these roles through relationships with agents, franchises, and trusted sources built over the years.
Shams Charania is one of the best in the business. He has taken the mantle from what Adrian Wojnarowski helped build at ESPN and made it his own. The job itself is simple; in fact, it’s journalism. That’s something many in sports media claim is dead or dying a death of ten thousand paper cuts. Regardless of the timing, sport, player, executive, or team, Charania’s success is built on the information he gathers and disseminates to the ESPN audience.
This Sunday, Charania did his job. Early Sunday morning, he reported that the NBA Most Valuable Player Award would be handed to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander for a second consecutive year. Was the news stunning? Not really, especially if you have watched the NBA this season.
However, once the report surfaced, the information itself was no longer the story. Instead of celebrating the moment for the first back-to-back winner since Nikola Jokić in 2022, many people became outraged that the information was “leaked” ahead of the official announcement.
Oh no, a spoiler for an annual end-of-season award.
“It’s Sunday, Shams. Go to brunch, you nerd,” said Blake Griffin.
Social media, of course, quickly judged the heralded NBA insider for “leaking” the information hours before the official announcement scheduled on Prime Video. Truthfully, this is not the first time an NBA MVP winner has been reported before the official announcement. Charania’s mentor, Wojnarowski, did the same thing in 2020 when Giannis Antetokounmpo won the award.
It’s ‘Lacking’ Not ‘Leaking’
Information is the most valuable currency in sports media. Charania’s job is to gather and report it. What’s lacking, however, is consistency in the outrage expressed across sports media.
Far too often, people in sports media search for anything that generates clout and clicks through hot takes about journalism dying. Others simply react to the reactions. It becomes less about being first and more about being the loudest. Ironically, those who are not first are often the loudest voices in the conversation.
Yet, when Charania delivers quality journalism, it goes unrecognized and instead receives unwarranted criticism rooted in a double standard.
For instance, when Adam Schefter is first to report the signing of a major free agent, people celebrate the value of being first. Why? Because it’s information. What follows is immediate reaction to that news. It may be praise or outrage, but every piece of information generates conversation.
When Ken Rosenthal reports a trade before the MLB deadline announcement becomes official, it is praised as an insider scoop that sparks discussion.
When Pierre LeBrun releases information about a suspension following a controversial penalty the night before, that information immediately fuels reaction as well.
In none of those instances are insiders chastised for providing information. Yet what Charania did Sunday morning was simply his job. It was no different from Schefter, Rosenthal, LeBrun, or any other peer in the business. There was no “leak,” despite what critics claimed. He obtained information through sourcing and reported it accordingly.
“My job is to report the news. When I get it, and I’ve vetted it — no matter how big, no matter how small — my job is to report the news,” said Charania on The Pat McAfee Show Monday. “That’s what I wake up thinking about. That’s what I go to sleep thinking about. This isn’t the first time, and it’s not going to be the last time.”
The Double Standard
It’s frustrating that sports media still cannot decide what it actually wants. Do audiences want information or not? The same information that fuels reactions is the foundation of the entire content business model. Without sports, there are no insiders. Without insiders, there is no news. In turn, without news, there is no content because there is no information to react to.
Now, would Charania have done the same thing if ESPN carried the NBA MVP announcement on its own network? Probably not, but someone else likely would have. That’s the job of an insider: a reporter who gains information through trusted sources and delivers it to an audience demanding immediacy.
It’s a role that is not disappearing, regardless of how heavily scrutinized it becomes. Insider reporting drives value, interest, engagement, and, most importantly, attention. If any network or content platform wants attention, one of the fastest ways to gain it is by playing the insider game.
At some point, sports media must decide what it actually wants from insiders. You cannot celebrate the race to be first when it benefits your favorite team, league, or storyline, then suddenly clutch your pearls when information arrives a few hours earlier than expected during an awards show.
The outrage over Charania reporting the NBA MVP winner was never truly about journalism ethics. Instead, it was about personal preference masquerading as moral outrage.
It’s What You Know
The reality is simple: information is the business. It always has been. Networks invest millions into insider talent because audiences crave immediacy. Fans refresh timelines during free agency, trade deadlines, coaching searches, suspensions, and award season because they want to know now, not later.
The same people criticizing Charania Sunday morning are often the first ones sharing insider reports when those reports benefit the conversations they want to have.
That’s the double standard.
You either value information or you don’t. You either respect journalism and reporting, or you prefer curated corporate reveals packaged for television.
Sports media cannot continue pretending to champion breaking news while selectively condemning it whenever the timing becomes inconvenient. The double standard surrounding outrage over information needs to end because insiders are not ruining sports.
They are doing exactly what the industry has trained audiences to demand.
Barrett Media produces daily content on the music, news, and sports media industries. Sign up for our newsletters to stay updated and get the latest information right in your inbox.
Spotify changed its logo into a green disco ball for its 20th anniversary, and the internet reacted exactly how it always does.
They called it cheap. They called it corny.
But it also showed how loved the brand was, because nobody trolls something they’re indifferent about.
At least that’s what I told my exes.
Here’s the part radio should not miss while everyone throws shade at the shiny green meatball — which either describes Spotify‘s new logo or is the name of a ska band that opened for Reel Big Fish in 1998.
For a week, people were talking about Spotify. Not its stock price. Not its podcast strategy. Not the low artist payouts.
By using one of music’s most iconic nightclub visuals, Spotify said, “We are still rooted in music.”
That’s important for a company that spent the last several years expanding into podcasts, video, audiobooks, and creator tools.
Spotify is saying, “We do a lot of things now, but the party still starts with music.”
The Logo Comfort Zone
During my years of creating radio stations, programmers would more often than not open with, “Can I see the logo?”
And anytime it didn’t have a guitar for a country station, a lightning bolt for a rock station, or a neon color for a pop station, they’d look confused.
And I don’t blame them. Too much of U.S. corporate radio looks like nobody designed it to excite anyone. Plenty of programmers still gravitate toward stations that look familiar, and plenty of executives still approve logos that feel safely interchangeable.
Different companies. Same color. Same shape. Nearly the same logo.
And while we’re here, Beasley Media may want to casually send Dr. Dre and Apple a friendly inspirational invoice. Just saying — if the Beats by Dre logo and the Beasley mark ever ended up seated next to each other at NAB, people might assume they arrived together. Maybe that’s a Q3 NTR opportunity.
The Oddly Familiar Font
It goes beyond logos. The industry repeats itself with fonts, too.
iHeartMedia. Alpha Media. VaynerMedia.
Same familiar thin font, thick font, text lockup, maybe a splash of color if someone was feeling “artsy.”
All very professional. Like a LinkedIn headshot taken in front of a fake plant.
But professional is not the same as memorable.
I also told this to my exes, and based on their reactions, I clearly made a lasting impression.
Sameness Is Lameness
If the media business cannot clearly express its own brand differentiation, why should a local advertiser trust us to define theirs?
We tell clients we can make them stand out, then hand them an RFP from a company whose visual identity came straight from “Media Company Template 4.” That is not Canva slander. Canva is wonderful. Canva, call me.
We tell listeners this station is different, then surround it with sameness. Format sameness. Imaging sameness. Logo sameness.
And often a look that strikes out on strategy.
It’s Greater Than a Gradient
Instagram’s 2016 gradient logo drew ridicule when it replaced the beloved retro camera. But the company knew it was becoming more than just photos.
Airbnb’s Bélo logo got dragged, memed, and anatomically analyzed.
Been there.
But they stuck with it because it connected to a bigger brand idea: belonging.
Great logos often tie to a strategy the internet art critics don’t have the vision to see.
Think Phil-Osophically
As you look at your station, your company, and your visual representation, don’t start with, “Should we change the logo?”
Go deeper.
➔ Would anyone notice if we did?
➔ Would anyone care enough to complain?
➔ Do we care if they do?
➔ Could our logo tweak start a conversation in the community?
➔ Could it involve local artists, listeners, landmarks, sports teams, schools, causes, or inside jokes only our market would understand?
➔ Could it become a multiweek social campaign, or is it just an updated PDF in the Google Drive and a new email signature?
➔ Could we create five alternate versions tied to neighborhoods, festivals, what we are known for, heritage, or local lore?
➔ Would it stand out among 50 other logos on the back of a sponsored 5K T-shirt?
A Tweak Is Not a Rebrand
A logo tweak does not have to be a full rebrand. It can be a temporary test. A way to make people look and talk about your station again.
Spotify put a disco ball on its logo. Note: they didn’t change the logo itself.
But they got the internet to argue about it and handle the free promotion for them.
The No-Logo Logo Test
Before selling another branding campaign to a client or trying to convince your EVP on a refresh, ask yourself these questions.
If listeners saw only your colors, font, logo, and writing style, would they know it was you?
Or would they think it was every other station, every other cluster, every other company selling “media solutions”?
Spotify’s disco ball may be temporary, but it told their story.
Does your logo tell yours?
Join me next week when we explore the real branding mystery: why Spotify sounds like an app that plays nothing but commercials.
Barrett Media produces daily content on the music, news, and sports media industries. Sign up for our newsletters to stay updated and get the latest information right in your inbox.
The practice became synonymous with manipulation. Labels pushed records through favors, relationships, and sometimes outright cash. The industry eventually cleaned up much of its public image. Still, the stain never completely disappeared.
Fast forward to 2026, and the conversation feels familiar again.
Today’s music business runs on streams, playlist placement, engagement metrics, TikTok momentum, YouTube views, and algorithmic discovery. The gatekeepers have changed. The charts have changed. Technology has changed. But the pressure to manufacture momentum never disappeared.
The Gray Area
Artificial streaming, bots, and manipulated engagement have quietly become uncomfortable realities inside the music business. Everybody talks about it privately. Few want to discuss it publicly. Modern music marketing now exists in a gray area between promotion and perception manipulation. That should concern the entire industry.
A recent Rolling Stone investigation highlighted how artificial streaming, bot farms, and manipulated engagement continue creating serious concerns throughout the music business. The report explored allegations involving major artists, fraudulent streaming operations, AI-generated fraud, and a growing arms race between manipulation tactics and fraud detection systems. Whether every allegation proves true almost becomes secondary. The industry now openly acknowledges the problem exists.
Today’s environment operates at a completely different scale than radio ever did. Instead of influencing a few gatekeepers inside radio stations, modern manipulation can influence algorithms, playlists, social feeds, advertisers, investors, media outlets, and listeners simultaneously.
Fake Streams, Real Charts — The Music Business Has a Credibility Problem
Songs can suddenly explode online with millions of streams. Social engagement spikes overnight. Playlist numbers surge dramatically. Then something strange happens. Radio research does not react. Ticket sales stay flat. Shazam activity remains soft. Concert crowds do not sing along. The numbers say the song is massive. Real-world behavior suggests otherwise.
That disconnect is becoming impossible to ignore.
The modern music business revolves around momentum. Streaming platforms reward engagement velocity. Algorithms reward activity spikes. Songs that appear popular receive more recommendations, which creates even more exposure. Perception itself has become currency. That reality created an opening for an entirely new ecosystem of questionable promotional tactics.
Some companies sell guaranteed streams. Others promise playlist placement through large account networks. Certain campaigns rely on click farms, automated listening, fake saves, and artificial followers. The language around those tactics often sounds harmless.
But everybody understands what some of it really means. Artificial demand generation.
The Solution?
That concern has grown large enough that entire businesses now focus on identifying suspicious activity. A platform called artist.tools was built specifically to help artists, labels, and marketers protect themselves. It monitors over 10 million playlists and one million artists, surfacing bot detection alerts before distributors or streaming platforms act. It can identify harmful playlist placements before they trigger algorithm penalties, royalty holds, or takedowns. The industry is no longer simply chasing streams. It is now trying to verify whether those streams are legitimate.
The scary part is that manipulated engagement can eventually create legitimate engagement. If a song gains enough artificial traction early, algorithms may push it toward real listeners. Eventually, actual audiences may embrace it organically. That creates a difficult ethical question. If fake momentum eventually becomes real momentum, where exactly is the line?
Labels want growth. Managers want leverage. Artists want exposure. Investors want upward charts. Everybody benefits from momentum. That makes artificial engagement tempting inside a hyper-competitive business where attention spans continue shrinking.
Radio’s Role
Ironically, radio programmers now face many of the same questions once aimed directly at them. The industry spent years moving away from human gatekeepers toward data-driven systems. Now executives are discovering that data can be manipulated too.
Not every breakout hit is fake. TikTok genuinely launches records. Independent artists can build large audiences without traditional radio support. Viral moments happen naturally every day. But artificial engagement muddies the waters for everybody — especially developing artists trying to grow organically.
Once trust in the numbers disappears, the entire ecosystem wobbles. Fans question charts. Programmers question streaming spikes. Advertisers question audience authenticity. Without trust, the metrics become meaningless.
The old system manipulated gatekeepers. The new system manipulates the appearance of audience demand. In today’s music business, that distinction matters more than ever.
Barrett Media produces daily content on the music, news, and sports media industries. Sign up for our newsletters to stay updated and get the latest information right in your inbox.
Peter Rosenberg doesn’t sound like a man in crisis. He sounds like a man with a plan — several of them, running simultaneously, connected by group texts and sheer force of will.
When his tenure at HOT 97 ended in December 2025 after nearly two decades, Rosenberg didn’t disappear. He doubled down. He and his co-hosts Ebro Darden and Laura Stylez quickly launched The Ebro, Laura, & Rosenberg Show daily on YouTube, rebuilt from scratch and on their own terms. Four months in, the channel sits at more than 70,000 subscribers, with consistent live audience viewers every morning.
“We have a long-time connection with a lot of people,” Rosenberg says, “and we decided to continue to give them a daily show.” The choice to maintain a daily format wasn’t automatic. The team weighed their options.
But the logic won out quickly: they had always done a daily radio show, so why not do a daily radio show online? Producer Jason Griffin and video director Rahsaan Bascombe — both let go by Hot 97 at the same time — came along for the ride. The whole crew stayed together.
Building Something Real
What’s striking about the early numbers isn’t just the subscriber count. Rosenberg is more focused on something subtler: overall channel engagement trending upward across a publishing slate of roughly 25 to 30 videos a week. That’s a real media operation. “Seeing those overall numbers for the channel go up is satisfying,” he says. The merch is already live. The branding is sharp. It doesn’t look like a pivot. It looks like an established brand.
For someone who spent nearly 20 years measured by Nielsen ratings, defining success differently takes adjustment. Right now, Rosenberg is candid that the team is still figuring it out. “Ultimately it will be defined by paying people’s bills,” he says, with a laugh that’s equal parts honesty and pressure.
But there’s something else at play too — a sense that the new platform is actually reaching people in a way HOT 97’s digital presence never quite did. “It’s funny to now be more in people’s conversations, doing it on our own,” he admits. “That part’s crazy to me.”
The State of Hip Hop Radio
His read on the broader state of Hip Hop and Urban radio is sharp and a little grim. He sees genuine bright spots — more voices in the culture, more platforms that care about pushing it forward.
But Rosenberg, by his own admission a lifelong Hip Hop purist, isn’t impressed by most of what’s driving traffic. “Much of the stuff that’s done is cool, but a lot of it is done for the purpose of just — I need eyeballs.” He’s not naïve about the irony. “We have great conversations every day about culture, politics, music,” he says, “and having one hot take about Michael Jackson is the thing that gets everybody talking.”
He finds it, in his words, “profoundly irritating.” And he doesn’t see it improving.
There’s a distinction Rosenberg keeps returning to, and it matters to him enough that he makes it unprompted. He doesn’t think of himself as a content creator. “I’m a broadcaster and a host,” he says. “I do shows, and I care about them, and want them to be good.”
Rosenberg pictures an audience sitting down and listening to a show, with clips emerging from that show afterward — not the other way around. In an era of content farming, that’s an almost contrarian philosophy. He knows it.
Juggling It All
The workload is staggering. Beyond The Ebro, Laura, & Rosenberg Show, he has also recently brought his longtime late-night Hip Hop passion project to SiriusXM with Real Late on Shade 45. Rosenberg also co-hosts the afternoon sports show Don, Hahn, and Rosenberg on ESPN New York, covers WWE pay-per-view pre-shows, and appears on Pro Wrestling Nation on Fridays.
The secret to managing it all, he says, is surprisingly unglamorous: text message threads. One for the sports show, one for wrestling, one for the morning crew. Conversations running constantly, keeping him tethered to each world.
He’s also honest about what that breadth costs. Talking about Hip Hop specifically, he says, “I’ll never know as much as I did when I first showed up at HOT 97. I was strapped with information. There was no doubt about it.” Back then, being Joe Hip Hop was the whole job. Now he’s covering Hip Hop, sports, politics, and professional wrestling in the same week. The knowledge has had to give some ground.
What he’s gained instead is craft. “I think I’m a much better performer,” he says. “The hope is that you’ve sharpened that skill set enough, and that allows you to be the guy who does everything.”
A New Kind of Accountability
Fatherhood has shifted things too, in ways that combine with the professional transition in unexpected ways. His daughter has made him more conscious of how he carries himself, and the kind of work he wants to be remembered for. But it’s the combination of the baby and losing HOT that has recalibrated his approach to the most charged topics on air.
He still cares deeply about politics. He still talks about it every morning. He’s just asking himself harder questions about what the point is. “Am I changing hearts and minds, or am I just yelling really loud to get clips from the people who already agree with me?”
His wife pushed him toward an answer: you can say everything you want to say, but find the way to say it that doesn’t risk everything you’ve built. Expressing dismay, frustration, even fear — without the part that makes people wonder if you’re a problem.
“She got to eat,” he says, about his daughter, laughing again. There’s a lot packed into that line — the weight of it and the lightness of it at once.
Still Holding Both Worlds
Peter Rosenberg has always been someone who holds two worlds at the same time. Hip Hop and pro wrestling. New York and Maryland. Purist and mainstream. Radio and whatever comes next. The balance keeps shifting, but the man holding it, and most certainly his work ethic, hasn’t changed much at all.
Barrett Media produces daily content on the music, news, and sports media industries. Sign up for our newsletters to stay updated and get the latest information right in your inbox.
Three years. That’s how long the AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act has been sitting in congressional purgatory, and frankly, the industry — and the American public — should be furious about it.
Sens. Ed Markey (D-MA) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) introduced the bill three years ago with the kind of bipartisan fanfare that doesn’t come along very often in Washington. The legislation had a clear purpose: require automakers to keep AM radio as standard equipment in every new vehicle sold in the United States. Simple. Popular. Necessary. And yet, here we are, still waiting.
So whose fault is it? That’s the question worth asking. Because if this bill is as popular as the numbers suggest, someone has to answer for the fact that it’s gone essentially nowhere.
The NAB Has Done Its Job
Let’s start with the National Association of Broadcasters, because that’s where fingers often point first. In this case, though, the finger doesn’t belong there. NAB President and CEO Curtis LeGeyt has been vocal, consistent, and relentless in his support for the bill. He’s lobbied Capitol Hill. He’s touted the bipartisan support the legislation has attracted. And he’s celebrated every incremental win along the way, including the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s 50-1 vote to advance the bill last fall.
The NAB has even released public service announcements in both English and Spanish, urging listeners to contact their members of Congress directly.
The numbers the NAB has helped build are remarkable. The bill has cleared 375 co-sponsors across both chambers. National polling shows 83% of Americans support keeping AM radio in new vehicles as a public safety measure. Of more than 6,000 bills introduced this Congress, only two have more co-sponsors. By every measurable standard, LeGeyt and the NAB have done their jobs. The blame doesn’t live there.
What about the radio industry itself? Broadcasters could certainly be more assertive in pressuring lawmakers directly. Station owners and operators have platforms, audiences, and community relationships that carry real political weight. That said, industry-wide political lobbying is precisely what the NAB exists to do. Expecting individual broadcasters to carry the legislative load that their trade association is built to handle isn’t a reasonable standard.
Congress Needs to Act
That brings us to where the blame actually belongs: Congress. And this isn’t a partisan critique — it’s a systemic one.
It’s genuinely disheartening to watch a piece of legislation with hundreds of supporters on both sides of the aisle collect dust for three years without even making it to a floor vote in either chamber. Speaker Mike Johnson is a co-sponsor of this bill. Majority Leader Steve Scalise has pledged a floor vote. Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Cruz co-authored the legislation. These aren’t fringe supporters — they’re the people with the power to schedule a vote tomorrow if they choose to. So why haven’t they?
The government shutdown last fall stalled momentum in the House. Three senators have used procedural objections to gum up the Senate version. Automakers and the Consumer Technology Association have spent millions lobbying against the bill in 2026 alone. Every time the bill builds a head of steam, something knocks it sideways.
That’s not a coincidence. That’s Washington.
Here’s the truth, though: this isn’t just a radio industry problem. It’s a symptom of a Congress that talks a big game and then struggles to execute even on the easiest wins. A bill with 83% public support, filibuster-proof backing in the Senate, and a 50-1 committee vote shouldn’t require three years and counting to reach the floor. In any other professional environment, that kind of performance would be unacceptable.
The radio industry should keep pushing. Listeners should keep calling their representatives. And Congress needs to stop stalling and vote on the AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act — because at this point, the delay itself should’ve become the story.
Barrett Media produces daily content on the music, news, and sports media industries. Sign up for our newsletters to stay updated and get the latest information right in your inbox.
When Steve Jones looks at Skyview Networks, he doesn’t see a transaction. He sees a career-defining commitment to an industry he’s loved since he was a teenager interning at a radio station. Jones recently completed his acquisition of Skyview Networks. And his reasoning cuts straight to the heart of what he believes audio can still deliver. For advertisers, for talent, and for the business partners who depend on the company every day.
Jones didn’t arrive at this moment by accident. He joined Skyview seven years ago after a long career at Disney ABC, and the seeds of this acquisition grew from conversations he had with the company’s shareholders over time.
“I joined Skyview seven years ago after a long career at Disney ABC, and I joined the company because of its culture, its values, its technology, and what I saw as real opportunities for growth,” Jones said. “That continued through my tenure there, and in discussions with the shareholders of the company, I saw an opportunity to further lean in and create this acquisition. So I did this not as a transaction intended to flip the company. This is about me believing in both Skyview and the industry. And really wanting to create the greatest opportunity that I can for my employees and also my business partners.”
A Business Built on Four Pillars
Skyview isn’t simply a sales house anymore, and Jones was quick to make that point. The company has evolved into a multi-revenue operation, and understanding what drives the business is essential to understanding why Jones wanted to own it.
“The primary revenue generator for the company is in network audio sales,” said Jones. “That’s about a billion-dollar revenue marketplace inside a much larger broadcast ecosystem. That has continued to be a place where Skyview has excelled, but it’s not without pressures.”
Jones laid out the four pillars that define Skyview’s business today. The first involves relationships with radio ownership groups that provide inventory Skyview monetizes in the network space. The second covers services and publishers, including The Weather Channel and the Associated Press. Which offer imaging, production, and other content in exchange for barter inventory Skyview then sells. The third pillar centers on syndicated talent.
“We also have many influencers, including The Dana Cortez Show, Bob and Sheri, Tony Lorino, Erik Zachary, and B-Dub, among others. All independent talents who are completely committed to engaging with their audiences and providing real value at the local level,” the Skyview Networks President, CEO, and Chairman shared. “Even though they’re syndicated shows, they’re the differentiators for these radio stations. For the listeners who engage with these shows and talents, it all feels and sounds like it’s a local friend on the radio. And we’re operating at the intersection to create the revenue for this talent that allows them to do what they do.”
Sports rounds out the fourth pillar. Skyview provides play-by-play technology, distribution, production, and ad insertion for major national leagues and teams — often without the listener ever knowing Skyview is behind it.
Technology, AI, and the Path Forward
Jones didn’t just acquire Skyview to preserve what it already does well. He also sees a technology story unfolding that could reshape the company’s future — and he’s already acting on it.
At the NAB Show, Skyview introduced Cirocast, a cloud-based, IP-delivered audio distribution product the company spent years developing. The product earned NAB’s Product of the Year recognition. It also solves a real and looming problem: in July 2027, the FCC has mandated that C-band satellite spectrum will be auctioned off. Which threatens to reduce the bandwidth that satellite distributors rely on to move content.
“Cirocast is IP-delivered and cloud-based, so the audio can be delivered through the cloud,” the longtime radio executive stated. “It can operate in a virtual environment or a hardware environment. It’s agnostic to the different types of technologies that are out there, and it provides reliability and durability. As a broadcast company, Skyview understands the importance of making sure the audio gets to the radio station with low latency. And that commercials reach the right listener, right station, at the right time.”
Beyond Cirocast, Jones sees artificial intelligence as something far more significant than a productivity tool. He views it as an organizational transformation.
“At Skyview, we view AI less as tooling and more as transformation,” shared the new Skyview Networks owner. “We’ve engaged in a very directed and thoughtful approach to integrate AI technology into the fabric of the company so that it is present across everything we do. It’s intended to create optimized performance and more efficiency. As we gain efficiencies, that allows Skyview to take that excess capacity and reallocate it into new opportunities and initiatives.”
Jones also pushed back on the narrative that radio’s audience measurement challenges represent a fundamental weakness. He pointed to data presented at the NAB Show — including Xperi DTS findings showing more than 100 vehicles engaging with broadcast radio in markets that national measurement had logged at zero AQH — as proof that the industry has consistently undercounted its own reach.
“There is audience that we are not measuring that engages with us every day, hears our advertisers’ messages. And we don’t get credit for that,” Jones said. “Skyview has 100% reach in the United States. There’s no geographic portion we can’t reach. We have over half of all adults accessible to us through the radio station content and barter that we provide.”
For Jones, the acquisition ultimately reflects something personal — a lifelong relationship with a medium he’s never stopped believing in.
“I have incredible passion for this business,” the Skyview Networks President, CEO, and Chairman shared. “I love it. It’s a seven-day-a-week habit for me. Anyone who is committed to succeeding, puts in the time and effort, builds the right team, and has the kind of people that I have at Skyview — people who are equally committed to success every day — is going to find there are great opportunities in front of us.”
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In a cluttered sports media content space, the ability to cut through becomes more difficult by the day. Every minute, creators attempt to find an audience that will attach itself and build community. Few in the world of women’s sports have built a digital community like Trysta Krick.
Her no-nonsense approach to discussing collegiate and professional women’s sports is unmatched by many. That’s why a growing list of her peers have come to respect the platform she’s built through her efforts.
“I’m not the same as everyone else. Which is a key reason why mainstream media, at least earlier in my career, hasn’t been that comfortable with platforming me,” says Krick. “Building the audience on my own has become the case study that there’s an ROI (return on investment) to be had. Me building that audience because what led those bigger brands to be attracted to me and therefore platforming me.”
Krick is a hybrid, blending a finance and business background with a love of the game. She grew up with dreams of playing in the WNBA one day, cheering for her favorite team, the Portland Fire. Krick’s love of music also played a key role in her upbringing, as she was writing and recording rap songs by the time she was just eight years old.
When she was 17, Krick received an offer from Sony Records due to her passion for weaving music with performance and wordplay. She attended the University of Oregon, earning a bachelor’s degree in finance in hopes that it would lead to her exit from poverty.
However, she sought something to fill her soul and found that conversations about sports could serve as that outlet.
“The reason I wasn’t drawn to talking sports to begin with was they tell you there’s no money in it. That’s a concern when you grow up poor like I did,” said Krick. “Also, there’s not a lot of opinionists that are women in this space outside of setting the table or asking questions. That’s never been who I am, so it was hard to find where I fit into this ecosystem.”
Instead of following the path of others, Krick decided to carve out her own lane.
Over the next decade, she found opportunities at both legacy and digital brands. She also continued to build her own platforms and define her persona.
“You have to reach the audience. Every place I worked, when I left it was trying to find a closer connection to the audience. In the beginning, the platforms are what got you close. Everywhere I went, I just found out that isn’t the case,” says Krick. “I learned how to find the people that resonate with what you already do naturally and authentically. That became the thing I leaned into.”
Establishing The Daily W
Leaning on her approach, experience, and business acumen, Krick co-founded The Daily Win March of last year. Alongside Emmy Award-winning producer Sarah Chovnick, the duo sought to create a destination for bold, fierce, and entertaining takes on women’s sports.
The project is Krick’s latest effort to continue building community while providing content to an underserved portion of the sports fandom.
“The community of The Daily W is the strongest of any that I’ve ever built,” said Krick. “I’ve networked well with so many other creators and their audiences over time and learned a lot from them. That’s why we built The Daily W from scratch. Trying to find fans of women’s sports who are underserved… The big businesses talking about women’s sports are curating versus creating for the fans.”
The process of growth is always educational for Krick. She continues to gain lessons and business insight while serving her audience with the content they desire. With growth in mind, she navigates opportunities to collaborate with other creators in the basketball space, hoping to bring audiences from other platforms to The Daily W.
The work does come with its pitfalls, especially when balancing the role of talent with managing a brand.
“I tell everyone that I’m working with that I’m probably not one hundred percent me all the time,” reveals Krick. “Being a talent can be very lonely and vapid. Very self-centered. I struggle with that; it’s just the nature of the business. It’s very competitive and prays on the worst parts of our personality… But building something for the good of women and society, and will eventually be a key part of history. That will be the most gratifying thing that I could ever ask for.”
Krick says she considers herself a better champion for the cause than for herself at times. Her passion lies in the continued growth of The Daily W, as she believes the journey is just getting underway.
Women’s Sports Gold Rush
This comes at a time when women’s sports are becoming one of the fastest-growing segments in all of sports.
“You cannot invest in women’s sports and get the ROI you’re looking for, especially in terms of attendance and viewership, if you don’t invest in women’s sports coverage. That piece is the next piece that’s missing in my opinion,” said Krick.
What Krick hopes The Daily W continues to provide is an outlet for storytelling across digital and social media, meeting an underserved audience where they are. Her goal, particularly with her growing social platforms, is to stop the scroll and swipe left and right by providing access, angles, and opinions that networks and other platforms have yet to invest in.
“Right now, it’s a gold rush. People haven’t strategically deployed how to get the best use of that money,” explained Krick. “We [The Daily W] will smoke every other competitor in this space. We are all working for free for an entire year and gaining more people who want to be a part of this mission. We’re building it off an approach of comedy, integrity, and an edge. It’s Barstool Sports without the toxicity plus great storytelling.”
Krick hopes the continued growth of The Daily W will establish it as a destination, even as networks attempt to serve an audience they have yet to fully capture. She has long believed decision-makers at major outlets often rely on traditional methods instead of taking risks. While that perspective carries weight, Krick is not waiting for executives to evolve their approach to investing in women’s sports.
Instead, she believes platforms like hers are inspiring more women to build their own audiences. It’s a movement centered on sharing compelling content on their own terms rather than relying on networks to provide opportunities.
“How we see analysis and opinion, the bar for that has been really high for women,” explained Krick. “Networks are just catching up and still struggling with it. That’s why they’re hiring internet-first personalities instead of talent who can speak on a long-form and short-form basis, yet have that proven audience as well.”
A year in, Trysta Krick is no longer chasing validation from traditional gatekeepers—she’s building something that may eventually make them irrelevant. In an industry still figuring out how to properly value and present women’s sports, Krick has already placed her bet: authenticity over access, community over scale, and creation over curation.
If the first year of The Daily W was about proving the concept, year two is about proving the ceiling doesn’t exist. If her track record is any indication, she won’t just meet the moment—she’ll redefine it.
Barrett Media produces daily content on the music, news, and sports media industries. Sign up for our newsletters to stay updated and get the latest information right in your inbox.
