Ron & don's KIRO web pages riddled with plagiarism

The overpaid Ron Upshaw and Don O'Neill (KIRO m-f, 3-7p) think they don’t have to credit what they post on their web-pages to the underpaid newsies who wrote it in the first place.

Take, f'rinstance, Thursday’s post about the serial killer’s photos found in Shoreline.

Prosecutors in California said convicted serial killer Rodney Alcala used his camera to gain the trust of young women. The photographs he snapped decades ago could contain images of more victims.

Hundreds of Alcala's photographs were found in a Seattle storage locker along with personal items from two victims. More than 100 photos were released Wednesday by Huntington Beach police showing women and girls in candid and posed shots. Some show them naked and engaging in sex acts.

It was ripped nearly word-for-word from the AP story, posted legally all over the Net.. When KIRO news posted it, it was correctly attributed. 

The day before they lifted this lead about the serial killer from the LA Weekly.

In September of 1978, 37-year-old actor Jed Mills took a one-day gig that paid well. His role was playing Bachelor Number Two on the ABC hit "The Dating Game." Although Mills wasn't picked by bachelorette Cheryl Bradshaw, he did make a fast $400...Little did he know he was sitting next to future serial killer Rodneyl Alcala.

Ron & Don, whose show is in the news hour on a news talk station are being coached on current affairs and social studies, but the tutoring hasn't seemed to have kicked in.

They're still busy ginning-up outrage about such issues as Trader Joe’s not letting Girl Scouts sell cookies in front of their doors.  Or yelling at politicians for the wrong reasons.

It's google-deep, testosteronic, tabloid blather.

Being newcomers to consuming and dispensing news, maybe they don’t know the rules: You don’t get to steal other people's work!

As they did on Feb. 25, when they cut the lead from a PBS.com story on Ted Griffin, the Orca guy and pasted it as a blog entry.

Or the story on the Down Syndrome actress defending Family Guy from Sarah Palin... they ripped off none other than the New York Times on Feb.19th.

That’s just a month: how many more stolen posts would we find if we had the stomach to keep reading?

Nothing, probably, will come of this- KIRO management don’t care what their jocks say or do. Don't bother complaining to R&D: Public comments were deleted and banished last week from their site, as we reported.

It boggles the mind that these vapid FM shock jocks have an afternoon drive show on what was once a proud news talk station. They are its PM face and further tarnishes the KIRO brand ... which hasn’t been shiny for a long time.

Comments

[Obama is a black man]

Sad day for the news industry and for the journalism discipline. Ron and Don stealing stories and Dave Ross exploiting his Junior High School Science Project on his 10-year old Prius as hard science

[Duffman]

R&D possibly stealing stories and Dave Ross reporting on his own experimental findings...apples & oranges (as I believe you put it).

[Duffman]

...and Dave Ross (as far as I know) has not filed for bankruptcy and does not have debt of $700K (of which his Prius, thru Toyota Financial accounts for approx $20K of that debt). And I don't believe he has or has had a 'swinger's' web site nor is he reported to be involved in the porn industry.
Yep, I put my money on Ross...not the grown-up 'baloon-boy'. :)

[Andrew]

These are serious copyright violations. KIRO is not a non-for-profit, it is a very-much-for-profit, and it's profiting in a small way off of content produced at the time and expense of others. This isn't a joke. Whoever is responsible for their online content should be fired.

[Duffman]

I say the buck stops with them...ergo...

[Sandy]

Sounds like more major surgery for the Ron and Don website. what jerks.

[Mark C.]

Would just one of the alleged 250,000 listeners to the R&D show please speak up?

[Obama is a black man]

I have to believe R&D's days are numbered. This could simply be a desperate substitution for show prep. They are likely actievly looking for a new gig.

The guys are whores. Just the other day they began advertising for Volvo. A couple of weeks ago it was Toyota. A year ago it was that scheister selling BMWs in Fife. Remember the one you could call on his cell phone?

Hood states "overpaid". My insiders say they get $400/show (200-each). Not sure if that's overpaid. Nonetheless to finance this show it's hard to believe advertsiers pay much. How many laser eye surgeries for 999 can be performed by a attempted murder victim??? how many blinds can you sell??? how many people need a moving company???

I just don't get it!

[Garrett]

Don't expect to much from these two who refer to themselves as white trash. They're in trouble, and you can tell when they claim 250M people are listening to this trash. Really bad. They're even claiming they're national now. It also says something about the management. People who gum microphones fall into a special class of people. My mother, rest her soul, told me when I was young: If you live in a whore house your going to be a whore.

Just a thought: Does anyone know what these stations pay white trash? Just a ball-park figure, please?

[Duffman]

I don't know specifically, but I was recently told that there was no one in Seattle market with a major talk show getting paid less than $100K. Now I don't know what that does to a two-person show like R&D?

[Obama is a black man]

I know for sure that Frank Shiers earns $300/night or $72K/year. Is that a major show? I would think so.

[Duffman]

Hmmmm, yeah I would think so too unless it's not considered in 'prime' hours. I may have gotten some bad data but it was from someone I've known for a while who's been in the radio industry all of his life.

[Obama is a black man]

It is my understanding that these two bozos also make a cut out of all those god-damn voice overs. Not sure how much that amounts to. The last thing I would want as a company is Don O'Neil screaming my brand over the airwaves.

[Obama is a black man]

The hourly news just announced that the Skamania Police just stated the "person of interest" in the missing person case was just released with no further action.

Ron and Don basically convicted the guy yesterday.

[Andrew]

$75k a year sucks when you have zero job security. Generally you could mortgage a small house with that income but you have to be pretty confident you will make that much for at least five years, not to mention actually seeing a 30 year mortgage through to the end. The same goes for buying a decent car. But that's the price you pay for working in entertainment.

[Obama is a black man]

Frank has a lot of family money plus he makes a few bucks drawing cartoons.

[Gregory McKie]

Buffoons

R&D can be replaced with one person with some talent for 1/2 their cost and get twice the show.

Maybe R&D will get to use the moving company they are hocking.

[Ryder]

Boys and girls it is my humble opinion that Ron & Don are doing exactly what KIRO wants them to do. As time goes on it has become plain to most of us that radio listeners want to be entertained. Turning afternoon drive into gossip talk, pledge drives for the day's latest sob story and staged arguments between the hosts in just what I've felt was coming. Radio listeners already have KOMO for news. If they want serious, though usually boring, discussion there is NPR. So what does KIRO do to go for the new market?

So there you have it. Program a show for the crowd running home to see who wins on American Idol or any number of other staged reality shows. Unless the ratings tank, Ron & Don are here to stay. You just wait. If they survive you can bet that KIRO will gradually turn the whole day into programing for the mostly comatose.

Please God, make everyone turn these clods off. Or better yet, turn them into peanut butter and raspberry jam.

[chucks]

Seems as if I am missing a major part of Seattle radio, but I don't think that I have ever heard Ron and Don.
Then again, KIRO FM does not make out here to my old radio shack radio.

[Andrew]

Let's keep things in perspective: this is about blatant copyright infringement, not how much they suck as radio hosts.

[Joel]

Ryder is probably correct about the niche the the boobs are meant to fill. That in itself makes me sad.
Andrew and Michael are right, this is about them stealing other people's copyrighted work on their commercial website. AP is usually quite grouchy about that.

[Dangerous Dan]

Ryder is right on the money! People want news on the drive home? They turn on KOMO. They want political commentary? They turn on KTTH. If anything, R&D are doing more of a morning drive show talking about populist topics. If they can raise your interest - or ire - to keep you listening longer...isn't that what radio hosts are supposed to do?

Would just one of the alleged 250,000 listeners to the R&D show please speak up?
I do, Mark! And probably the overwhelming majority of those who post here (whether or not it's "cool" to admit it) are listening to at least a quarter-hour or two. How else would they be so intimately familiar with the topics they discuss if they don't listen?

It's like Tom Leykis. So many people said he was a sophomoric Johnny One-Note. Yet for several books he had the #1-rated show in several prized demos and his local personal appearances were mob scenes.

You don't have to be as boring as NPR to be relevant to people's lives.

Info-tainment? Why not? Better than being beaten over the head with political/ideological blather after a hard day at work.

[CorporateSuit]

What do you expect? Their whole show and "shtick" is "cut & paste." Did you expect anything more from their "blog?" Also, I noticed you can't post any comments to their blog anymore...

You have to give kudos to Shiers, though. He interviewed Stan Lee (via telephone, pre-recorded--but, hey, it was STAN FUCKING LEE!). That was spot on guest-booking in light of Lee's rare appearance at Emerald City Comicon. Did R&D think of that? Noooooooo......

Give props to the Frankman!

[AprilMayJune]

I confess I listen occasionally, but only out of desperation. Some days I just can't listen to anything "intelligent" because it is so depressing.

Some afternoons my mind needs to be fluffed, so I listen for a few minutes and then, thankfully, I snap out of it. By only flipping back and forth, it is amazing how many times you can hear the same stupid stories. They get on moronic rant, and they don't stop.

Please make them go away.

[Nantuckett]

KOMO isn't doing much news in the afternoons anymore. It's all consumer bullshit with Herb Weisbaum's pre-canned interviews and a few stories from Jane Shannon. It may be marketed as news, but it's just a bunch of consumer crap. KIRO has a golden opportunity here to do something worthwhile. Take the plunge, cowards.

[Dan D.]

Maybe they should stop calling it a news talk station, then. I am wearing a PPM as we speak, so is my my wife and 17 year old. We gradually stopped listening to KIRO.
we would hear Dave Ross, then Dori got unpleasant, then came Ron and Don. Never used to turn KIRO off. We are listening to more music these days. Guess we are not the only ones.

[Hallabalooza Bub]

Nantucket, you're right. KIRO always had better news, KOMO is lame, they seem to have been in the right place at the right time. I miss Tony Miner.

[joanie]

So timely. Randi played two cuts from "Network" - Paddy Chayefsky's 1976 film that made Howard Beal a household name. A tube of news for the comatose. That covers tv and radio pretty well.

Except of course for those of us with fully-functioning brains who are still curious after all these years.

[Coiler]

"You have meddled with the primal forces of nature...." I can see where Oliver Stone got his idea for Wall Street

[Tommy008]

I've stated befoe that Don is a genuine comedian, and he does not need Ron. Ron wouldn be missed. Dori thinks he's funny- Don IS funny. As for the personal shit that soem guy wrote a dozen posts ago about Don owing 700k and being in the porn/swinger scene, number one how the fuck do you know all this, and number two , i don't care even if it was true. Last time i checked, swinging and porn were both legal. I'd rather have a porn producing swinger who owes googobs of money, but has a heart and soul, than the bloodless ghoul Dori Monson on a white horse, any day

[Tommy008]

that quote is from Network, not Wall Street.

[Tommy008]

oh sorry disregard above post please, my bad.

[Tommy008]

how do we know Ron or Don or both are handling the daily chores of their webpage? don't they have their webperson doing this? i've heard them mention someone who does it? i don't want to throw out names, but i think it was some woman who works in the newsroom. doesn't sound like something "the turds" would be doing- lifting whole pages from newspapers and magazines...

[KSO (not KS)]

Hallabalooza Bub,

AFIAK, Tony Miner is doing the business reports on KIRO's morning news. You'll have to get your Tony fix in 4 minute increments twice an hour. What a waste of talent.

[KS (not KSO)]

R & D appeal to the lowest common denominator around this area, where there are enough to keep them going for the time being. Once again, they are getting free publicity (like Dori and Glenn Beck) on BW. They should probably send a thank you Blatherwatch note.

i like Tony Minor, but he also does news on KIRO FM in the afternoon and banters with everybody's most notorious local talk show (that BW helps out inadvertantly) - Monson.

[AprilMayJune]

Tony Minor is a tool, not a news man.

[Rob Fraser]

Tony Miner was an asset to KIRO. Hardly listen to KIRO anymore. Used to be a Northwest icon.

[Andrew]

Tony Miner was letting the objectivity slip a little and revealing a conservative slant. I realize opinionews is all the rage these days, but I thought it was unprofessional.

[KS]

OMG - maybe Tony actually agrees with Dori Monson - that's radio blasphemy according to the gospel of the usual suspects on Blatherwatch !

If Miner gave his opinionews, he joins about 95% of the newscasters out there who do it also and yes they are all unprofessional - unless they state upfront it is their opinion. Sad state of affairs.

[Andrew]

No, it's not professional, even if you happen to agree with them.

[Tommy008]

don't forget Jesus freak Carleen Johnson trying to turn the news AND the morning show into "Jesus Time", DURING SOME OF THE FINAL DAYS OF THE MORBIDLY OBESE ONE.

[Duffman]

I agree with Andrew on this one. A 'professional' news reporter does not display any bias in his/her reporting. Ergo...there are no such animals on either FOX and/or MSNBC.

[Obama is a black man]

It's hard to speculate what these 2 idiots will say today.

1. They convicted the friend of the girl without getting any facts. He was questioned by the police and then released.

2. They verbally assaulted the Undersheriff mocking him like some imbecile.

Obviously this was a terrible accident and in true 'ambulance chaser' style - Ron and Don expolited her story. Their firing based on this story alone would be justified.

[Mark C.]

Tony Miner is a staunch conservative. That is a fact. He lives in Sedro Wooley or some place.

[coach purses]

The best formula for happiness is to be able to develop the ability to tolerate frustration , to have a personal involvement and commitment , and to develop self-confidence and self-esteem.