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Friday, July 28, 2000

Mistake Leaves Lucky Listener $20,000 Richer By Barbara Chavez Journal Staff Writer

A computer glitch Thursday morning left Albuquerque's newest country station $20,000 poorer and a 20-year-old listener $20,000 richer.

Scott Bauer was taking a break from his job as a computer technician at America Online when he heard a commercial on KBQI-FM (107.9). Bauer knew the commercial wasn't supposed to be there. But he's glad it was.

The station was running a contest that promised to play 20,000 songs, commercial free, or pay $20,000 to the first caller who caught them playing a commercial.

Bauer said he heard a few seconds of the commercial and headed for a pay phone at the nearest gas station. "I couldn't believe it," he said. "I was listening to the station and kind of half wondering if they would play a commercial. But I didn't really think it would happen."

Bauer said he doesn't have a mountain of bills to pay and is dreaming up ways to spend the money.

"I'm going to Vegas pretty soon, for sure," he said. "After that, who knows?" KBQI, or "The Big I," launched its contest last Friday, a day after former KRST-FM country radio host Tony Lynn was pulled off KBQI because his former employer insisted he comply with a no-compete clause in his contract.

The contest was supposed to end after all 20,000 songs had been played commercial free  or earlier if Lynn returned to the air on KBQI sooner.

Lynn was visiting the station when the computer that generates the music on KBQI blipped and went into a canned radio ad for Geico Insurance at 8:48 a.m., said Cindy Schloss, general manager of Clear Channel Communications, which owns KBQI and five other local radio stations.

"Don't think for a minute Cindy Schloss likes writing these kinds of checks everyday," Lynn said Thursday. "I can assure you, she doesn't." Schloss said she really wasn't prepared for the contest to end just a week into the promotion.

"We thought it was a good way to promote a lot of music until Tony came back on the air," Schloss said. "If you want to know if this was a genuine mistake, I can tell you right now that this was a mistake. And to be truthful, we didn't have to pay the money.

Our rules state that it must be a paid commercial  which this one wasn't, it was national ad, paid to run on another station  and that a technical error  which this was  couldn't be responsible for an interruption in the music. So, we didn't have to pay the money. But, I talked to our corporate office and they said pay it. So we did."

Schloss said she is asking the software manufacturer of the computer to pay the $20,000. If she gets an agreement from that company in writing, she said the station may start the uninterrupted music contest again.

http://www.abqjournal.com/news/89809news07-28-00.htm

-- (Dee360Degree@aol.com), July 29, 2000