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KDND Manager: "Wii Contest Typical"

by Sue Wilson, published on October 1, 2009 at 5:43 PM

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Station Manager not told what Dangerous meant
In a videotaped deposition dated July 12, 2007, KDND station manager Steve Weed testified as to his forty plus year radio career. His role at KDND was to coach on air talent with the goal of entertaining and getting listeners, helping performers improve their craft, and making musical decisions. Part of his job was to listen to the various programs to look for deficiencies and help correct them. He said he punched in and out of the morning Rave the day of the contest, but felt the contest was consistent with those they'd had for the six years of the Morning Rave program.

Although he supervised Pechota, Weed said his responsibility was to supervise on air talent, and Pechota's was to run contests. He did not know who was monitoring the Wii contest, and did not ask as to the health or safety of contestants. He said there he had been no training concerning the health of contestants nor had anyone at Entercom ever instructed him to conduct such training.

Weed said at his previous position at WDBD he had been required to review contests before and after they were conducted, as was customary. At KDND he said he was not involved with contests after they had been planned. He said he did not have a supervisor with regard to contests, and that he was left to his own discretion. "There was no training from Corporate regarding contests," and there had never been a written report about contests for review.

Weed said his job was to make content more entertaining, but that there was no set criteria. He felt he had license to do what he chose, and talked about the vicarious trend, as in Fear Factor or Survivor, to have contestants "go through" something to win a prize, and said he had participated in planning contestsbefore the Wii contest where contestants must "go through" something to win.

Weed said Entercom's legal department in Boston would delineate factors for safety, but when asked which factors, he said he didn't know. He testified he had never seen anything in writing from Entercom Communications regarding safety, and that he had never been given any guidance on that. There was "no criteria to consider whether this contest would pose a health or safety problem."

Weed said he thought at the time the Wii contest was typical of the things they did at KDND, the "last man standing wins" was the kind of thing they did all the time.

Find more trial coverage and commentary at SueWilsonReports.com.
 

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