Indie 103.1 is Completely Over, Now That Its Webstream Dies

And just like that, with no fan fare, Indie 103.1 is officially, finally, over.

Of course, the station left the airwaves at the beginning of 2009, so it hasn't really been a part of the conversation in Los Angeles for a long, long time. Yet it lived on as a web stream, remarkably, for another 8 years. The plug was finally pulled on April 1, and now Indie's website only features that message above: "Thank you to all the loyal listeners and DJs who supported INDIE1031.COM on this adventure that is now coming to a close. Keep striving to find and give the best to the world. You deserve it."

Liz Ohanesian wrote a great oral history of the influential radio station here. It's a fun read, and gives me quite a bit of wistful nostalgia for a time when you could hop in the car, turn on 103.1 and hear something new, interesting and different. Thankfully stations like KCRW and KCSN continue to provide that on the public radio side -- but Indie was something unique for commercial radio. I dream that one day, as terrestrial radio looks for ways to survive in a changing world, that we might again see stations go bold and try something different to survive. But for now, at least, corporate radio wins out.

Check out my euology to Indie 103.1 in 2009 here. An excerpt:

Hampered by a weak signal, Indie 103.1 never managed to climb out of the ratings basement or pose any threat to alternative radio rival KROQ. But Indie's adventurous music blend attracted loyal fans, and its specialty shows -- particularly the noontime show hosted by the Sex Pistols' Steve Jones -- became stuff of radio legend. The writing had been on the wall for some time -- it's actually amazing that Indie lasted five years, given its shaky ratings and the fact that Entravision specializes in Spanish language radio. Recently, morning host Joe Escalante was dropped, while most of the station's specialty shows were also scratched. The station also over the past few weeks started playing more mainstream alternative music, as well as much more classic tracks from the 1980s. But alas, not even those tweaks could save it. The writing was on the wall. Indie may have actually been kept alive by that weak signal (along with the attraction of its upscale listenership), as Entravision may have figured they couldn't do better than anything else -- and, so their thinking may have gone, perhaps all that critical acclaim would one day translate to more listeners. Rest in piece, Indie. The station may have taken a lot of criticism through the years, but we were lucky to have a station like that in Southern California... and our radio listening experience will now be a lot poorer for it being gone. I guess it's time to charge up the iPod.

More coverage:

Indie Reveals More Online Plans; "El Gato" Officially Launches

The Message That Forshadowed Indie's Demise

Introducing... "El Gato 103.1"

Retro Friday: The Birth of Indie 103.1

Anatomy of the David Letterman News Break: How It All Went Down, Step By Step

April 3, 1:03 p.m. (PT): R.E.M. bassist Mike Mills, performing on Thursday night's edition of "Late Show with David Letterman," sends out this Tweet to his approximately 1300 followers:

1:05 p.m.: TV Guide Magazine's Rob Moynihan, a big R.E.M. fan and likely the only TV reporter among Mills' small group of followers, sees the Tweet -- and checks Mills' Twitter feed. He sees that Mills had earlier Tweeted about his guest stint on Letterman that night, and suspects that Mills really is Tweeting about Dave's retirement:

1:10 p.m.: I see Rob's Tweet, and immediately suspected that big news was indeed upon us:

1:10ish p.m.: CNN's Brian Stelter sees Rob's Tweet also, and retweets it. Stelter has more than 200,000 followers, so once he does so, the news is out there. Everyone is off and running.

1:19 p.m.: Stelter confirms the news on his Twitter account:

1:40 p.m.: Everyone frantically calls CBS and Letterman's camp, but they're not responding yet. Perhaps thrown for a bit of a loop by Mills' Tweet, although it was clear they'd be putting the news out soon anyway. So it takes until 1:40 for Deadline to send out their news alert:

1:40 p.m.: Also by then, the radio interview requests start coming in (I eventually spoke to KNX Los Angeles, WTOP Washington and KFBK Sacramento on Thursday):

1:45 p.m.: Deadline sends out a second news alert.

1:47 p.m.: Variety's news alert goes out.

1:50 p.m.: The Hollywood Reporter's news alert arrives.

1:50 p.m.: Letterman's press relations firm makes it official:

2:14 p.m.: CBS follows up with their own statement.

2:30 p.m.: Barely an hour after the news was confirmed, Letterman analysis pieces already start posting, including this smart one by Brian Lowry:

2:40 p.m.: The body's barely cold, but speculation -- including some outlandish choices -- about post-Letterman scenarios are already everywhere:

4:45 p.m.: Letterman releases the full nearly 10 minute video from that night's show where he announces his retirement. Every news site quickly reposts.

5:05 p.m.: By early evening, sites have already put together slide shows and other clicky clicks on the future of CBS' "Late Show":

Also by early evening, Letterman's YouTube channel posts this backstage interview with Mike Mills on how he broke the news:

7:25 p.m.: Even Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti is getting into the act, asking CBS to move the new "Late Show" to Los Angeles. Keep in mind, this news is just six hours old.

9:30 p.m.: By now, it's already on to David Letterman career retrospectives. He's still doing the show for another year, but looks like this will be The Longest Goodbye.

10:12 p.m.: Mike Mills is strangely getting into Twitter fights with people who thought the musician ruined Letterman's announcement. (Mills points out that the audience of 300 would have spilled the beans awfully quick anyway.)

Postscript: Mills now has 2,890 followers (and counting) -- having added around 1500 in the past day.

Today's Unfortunate L.A. Times Online Ad Placement

An ad buy's an ad buy... but an ad buy for "Grand Theft Auto V" on the Los Angeles Times web homepage seems a touch unfortunate today, right next to news of the shooting in Washington.

Los Angeles As Subject

(Flickr photo via gsjansen.)

One of my favorite spots on the web these days is Nathan Masters' excellent series of Los Angeles history lessons over at KCET's website. I live for this stuff, as many of you do as well -- so do yourself a favor and bookmark LA As Subject, part of KCET's "SoCal Focus."

Here are a few recent examples from 2012:

A Brief History of the Los Angeles Plaza, the City's Misplaced Heart

Why L.A. Has Clashing Street Grids

Sonoratown: Downtown L.A.'s Forgotten Neighborhood

How Santa Monica Almost Became a Commercial Harbor

Lost Tunnels of Downtown L.A.

New Blog Talks to LA Mag Editor Mary Melton

New L.A. blog Frying Pan News, from advocacy group LAANE and editor Steven Mikulan (formerly of the L.A. Weekly), has launched with a full variety of features, including an interview with our pal Mary Melton, the editor of Los Angeles magazine.

Among the things Mary talks about: How she and her team moved L.A. magazine away from the stereotype of being Westside-centric:

Through engagement. I have a responsibility to educate readers and take them into pockets of the city they wouldn’t see otherwise. This magazine was heavily identified with the Westside, and our goal was to change that. Even if our readers haven’t been to Fillmore or can’t find Bell on a map, they can have an understanding of these places. We have a lot of affluent readers but also people who just moved here and are living in apartments for $1200 a month. Information is really important. You can’t force someone who is not sympathetic to care, but you can present information that can motivate them to care. It’s vitally important to the life of the city to engage. I’m not sure that people don’t want to be engaged, I don’t think they know how.

The February issue of Los Angeles magazine just came in the mail, and I can't wait to dive in -- it deals with one of my favorite topics, "Classic L.A."

As for Frying Pan News, contributors to the new website include local journalist Erin Aubry Kaplan and LAANE communications director Danny Feingold.

KNBC Los Angeles Rebrands; Revamps Website

KNBC has started promoting itself in public as "NBC LA," using the new logo (above) in an outdoor print campaign around town.

The move coincides with a complete overhaul of its website. The new site once again emphasizes news, and is a vast improvement vs. the previous site. (Gone, thankfully, are the notations that Angelenos are "happy," "sad" or "angry" about stories.)

The "NBC LA" branding hasn't moved on air, however, as KNBC will still call itself "NBC 4" on the channel itself. "The NBC LA reference is designed to better connect our station with the LA community and also be more encompassing of the other platforms we use to serve the marketplace," a spokesman told us. "Our on-air graphics still reflect the NBC4."

Read more about the website redesign here.

Maria's Cards Featured in Real Simple Magazine

How cool is this? In a round up of "12 Creative Valentine's Card Ideas," Real Simple magazine's website includes Maria's letterpressed "Bee Mine" cards!

Check out the Real Simple piece here.

And there's a lot more where that came from. Check out Maria's letterpress and card portfolio at her MPRESS STUDIO site here, and check out her Maria Villar Design graphic design services here. (Hey, we've got mouths to feed over here, people!)

CBS' Los Angeles Web Site Launches in Beta Mode

CBS Local Media has started unveiling its new string of local websites, including CBS Los Angeles, which launched last week.

The new site, currently in beta, is part of CBS Local Media's efforts to combine its local TV and radio (specifically, news/talk/sports outlets) operations in different markets. CBS Los Angeles, for example, utilizes KCBS-TV, KCAL-TV, newsradio KNX-AM and talker KFWB-AM.

CBS also just launched a CBS New York site, which is in Beta mode as well.

Among the features of the new site: Content from local bloggers. The site Gastronomy, for example, just sent its list of L.A.'s best fried chicken.

The instant verdict: This makes CBS Los Angeles sound a lot like NBC's local blogs (including NBC Los Angeles), which relaunched last year. Both boast a heavy dose of lifestyle and entertainment news and info. But CBS' site at least still has a dedicated spot for local news, whereas you've got to really hunt to find a whole docket of news on NBC Los Angeles.

We'll have more on the CBS Local Media strategy in the coming days.

Los Angeles Magazine Wants You to "Get LA"

Los Angeles mag's new "Get LA" film competition is already underway -- but you still have until the end of the month to digitally capture your take on our city.

To kick off "Get LA," L.A. mag's Chris Nichols put together the short above (click to watch). To shoot "Designed for Dreaming," he convinced "21 of the city's optimists, futurists, and dreamers" to perform this poem, created for GM in 1956 as a nod to the future. City Councilman Tom LaBonge, architects Dion Neutra and Frank Escher, Los Angeles Conservancy executive director Linda Dishman, "histotainer" Charles Phoenix and soprano Dabney Ross Jones (above) are among the notables chiming in.

L.A. mag hopes to convince as many Angelenos -- both filmmakers and civilians -- as possible to create their own three-minute videos about Los Angeles. Details:

GET LA film competition is open to Los Angeles County residents. The films can biographical, documentary, fictional, or aspirational portraits of the city and its residents. In order to be accessible to diverse members of the community entry of a film into the competition is free. Submissions for the competition will run from February 3-March 3, 2010. Finalists will be announced and posted online March 15 to be judged by viewers (who will choose an “Audience Favorite”) and a panel of notable Angelenos as judges (who will choose an “Official Selection”). The winners will be announced in early April. Film entries will be submitted and viewed at lamag.com/citythink/getla.

Judges include David Arquette, Richard Dreyfuss, Eric Garcetti, chef Evan Kleiman, movie critic Joe Morgenstern, and USA Network's Jeff Wachtel.

Volunteer org L.A. Works is also sponsoring the contest, along with the new L.A. Magazine Foundation. It's also a part of L.A. mag's 50th anniversary "City Think" initiative.

Perhaps KNBC Might Need to Consider Comment Moderation

KNBC's website emphasizes user-generated content and interactivity, and displays comments prominently. That's fine -- but in the case of KNBC, a large chunk of those comments are less-than-flattering posts about KNBC itself. A few unfortunate highlights I found on the site this week:













Hmm... if the comments are gonna be that harsh, perhaps the station might to, oh I don't know, de-emphasize them.

What's This? A Redesign That Works? Kudos to the L.A. Times Website

Redesigns are tricky. Most of the time, readers will register their objections immediately -- change, after all, is tough.

But lately, it seems like just about every redesign really does take things from bad to worse. That's why I was stunned to see today's latimes.com overhaul. Clean, well-organized, compartmentalized... it's a Virgo's dream.

Here's what's new, from online managing editor Meredith Artley and LAT editor Russ Stanton:

- Streamlined navigation at the top of every page, highlighting our main coverage areas such as local news, sports and entertainment.

- Right below the black navigation bar, you’ll see topics “In the News.” Here, you’ll find quick access to big stories we are following, whether it’s the state budget or the Emmys or coverage of unrest in Iran.

- Our new modular approach to the homepage means you can quickly find and access multimedia packages of the news of most interest to you. Scroll down the page, and you’ll see features including the award-winning investigative coverage of “Mexico Under Siege,” excerpts from popular blog posts and columns, top headlines from well-read sections and interactive databases such as Mapping L.A.

- We’ve simplified our articles, making them easier to scroll without interruption from related content or advertising.

- Design aficionados will note that we have gone from a sans-serif font (Arial) to a serif font (Georgia). Not only did we find that this was a more readable font, but we also felt it connected to our overall brand much better.

LA Observed has more on the changes here. I'm sure I'll find a few things to nitpick, but overall, nice work. (Now, about bringing back "Sally Forth" to the funnies pages...)

The Tortured Mind of Jon Arbuckle

I recently stumbled across the website Garfield Minus Garfield, and I think it's my new fave. I chuckle every time. Maybe it's because, as a kid, I loved the strip.

But when I got older, I lost my appreciation. It just wasn't funny. Whereas I was able to appreciate Peanuts on a whole different level as I aged, the older me realized that there was nothing all that complicated about Garfield: It was indeed just a comic about a cat that hates Mondays.

Enter "Garfield Minus Garfield." Strip Garfield from the strip, and it suddenly becomes something very different -- and dare I say it, interesting. The site describes its purpose:

Who would have guessed that when you remove Garfield from the Garfield comic strips, the result is an even better comic about schizophrenia, bipolor disorder, and the empty desperation of modern life? Friends, meet Jon Arbuckle. Let’s laugh and learn with him on a journey deep into the tortured mind of an isolated young everyman as he fights a losing battle against lonliness in a quiet American suburb.

Brilliant. A few more selections: