More than four years ago I began co-hosting a weekly Thursday evening radio show called Gambling with an Edge. It took awhile to find our stride and settle on the best co-hosting partnership, but it’s now a popular show among both advantage gamblers and wannabe advantage gamblers. A surprising number of casino employees listen as well, partly to see what the players are up to. My co-host, Richard Munchkin, is knowledgeable about all sorts of gambling with the exception of video poker, which is where I come in.
That’s going to change. Our host radio station, KLAV 1230 AM in Las Vegas, is changing to an all-sports format. They were willing to keep our show, but we would be subject to regular preemption by sporting events.
While Richard and I did, indeed, wish to continue the show, we decided that we wanted more control over when we were going to be on the air. Because of the show, we have received lots of kudos from people we consider our peers. And in our preparation for the show, we both find that we learn quite a bit more than we would were we not hosting the show.
There were a number of options for where to place the show. We decided to go with Vegas All Night Radio, VANR, which is an Internet radio station closely related to the station from which we currently broadcast. This means that to listen live you need to have an Internet connection and go to www.vegasallnetradio.com.
While that might not be as convenient for our Las Vegas listeners as dialing an AM radio, we’ve discovered that fewer than 5% of our listeners catch the show live. The rest catch it by downloading a podcast version of the show. Since we are going to be hosting the show from the same studio complex and the raw podcast material is being created by the same people, those who listen to the podcasts shouldn’t notice any difference.
Except for one. Beginning April 21, 2015, we will be broadcasting between 10:00 a.m. and 11:00 a.m., Pacific Time, on Tuesday mornings. We’ll have the shows downloaded either Tuesday afternoon or early Wednesday morning. That’s two days earlier in the week than the shows have previously been available.
Our sponsors have been with us since Day 1 — South Point Casino, Palms Casino, and videopoker.com. We thank them very much and expect (hope) they will continue with us under the new format.
In addition to free podcasts being available at www.bobdancer.com and www.richardmunchkin.com , iTunes, Stitcher, and a few other services, our shows are now also available on www.CDCGamingReports.com/radio . Many of our shows have also found their way to www.youtube.com.
While Internet radio allows for greater freedom of speech than AM radio does (Internet radio is not regulated by the FCC and subject to their censorship), I don’t expect that to be too noticeable. Richard and I rarely curse, although some of our guests do on occasion. Being on Internet radio means they won’t be “bleeped.” But since that rarely happens, I don’t expect foul language to be a regular part of our show.
As listeners to the radio show know, it’s an interview show. We’ll see if our guests can appear mid-morning rather than early evening. Most of our guests do not hold regular 9-5 jobs, so we don’t expect it to be a problem for them to be available during our new hours. At the same time, getting up before noon presents a burden to some gamblers. We’ll see how it goes.