What if you moved away and nobody cared?

Excellent article in today's LATimes on the million or two paying listeners Howard Stern took with him to Sirius, out of the twelve million he got credit for on steel-tower radio.

The timing could scarcely be worse for terrestrial radio, which needs an oversized, rudderless audience now like it needs another intriguing and easy-to-use competitor — say, an iPod, podcasts, personalized CDs or, Stern notwithstanding, the siren songs of satellite.

Interesting to me: 1) The LAT writer quotes unnamed "analysts," saying NPR could be one beneficiary of the wandering former Howard-heads--because whatever his pottymouth ways, he's smart, funny, and liberal. 2) Radio trade writers and consultants say smarter things to newspaper reporters than they write.

Also on the article page: a "Faces of Radio" slideshow--from Warren Olney to Paul Harvey to El Cucuy de la Mañana. Not there: a "Great Faces for Radio" slideshow. Maybe I'll do that.