The Bert Show in 2013
By RODNEY HO/ rho@ajc.com, originally filed Monday, November 9, 2015
Clearly, the sudden separation between radio hosts Jeff Dauler and Bert Weiss was not a clean one.
While Dauler in his note last week was nothing but gracious toward Weiss after his departure to Star 94 was announced, Weiss implied on air last week that things were not so gracious behind the scenes.
Now Radioinsight.com has discovered that Amy Howard, Weiss’ assistant, purchased at least 18 different urls on November 6 related to Dauler and the possible rumored combo of him and Jenn Hobby. Among the urls:
JeffDaulerAfternoons.com,JennAndJeffAfternoons.com, JennAndJeffOnStar.com, JeffAndJennOnStar94.com, JeffStar94.com, JeffDaulerInTheAfternoon.com, JeffDaulerInTheAM.com, JeffDaulerInTheMorning.com, JeffDaulerRadio.com, JeffAfternoons.com, JeffAndJennAfternoons.com, JeffAndJennAM.com, JeffAndJennOnStar.com, JeffAndJennOnStar94.com, JeffOnStar94.com, Star94Jeff.com, StarJeff.com and TheJeffAndJennShow.com
Star 94 has not yet stated where Dauler would be placed on air when his non-compete clause is up in February, 2016.
Weiss in a text this morning said this is a non-story, standard gamesmanship in radio. “Pretty common in our industry,” he said. “And that’s just my staff being proactive.”
Dauler said he has no opinion about this. “The Bert Show is the farthest thing from my mind this week,” he texted, given that he just had an engagement brunch yesterday, is celebrating his birthday tomorrow, has two sold-out stand-up shows Wednesday and is emceeing a big charity event for the Rally Foundation Friday.
Star 94 market manager Mike Fowler, who managed the Bert Show at Q100 from 2003 to 2006, had a simple response: “I don’t care!”
Is there a legal argument against what Weiss has done? I am not an expert on what is called “cybersquatting” but according to this Slate story:
The First Amendment makes it legal to grab even a famous person’s domain name in some situations: You might not get Hillaryclinton.com, but you could register Ilovehillaryclinton.com if you’re planning to use it for nonprofit political speech. You may also be able to use an established name if you’re setting up your own, unrelated company. If the domain name for Delta Airlines expired and you bought it up for your competing airline, that would be against the law. But if you were promoting a very different kind of company—Delta Plumbing, for example—then you’d be within your rights to use Delta.com. As long as you’re not profiting off a person or company by misrepresenting them, you’re probably OK.
Kevin Maxim, part of the Maxim Law Firm in Atlanta, which specializes in Internet-related litigation, said if the Bert Show plans to profit from the Jeff Dauler-related URLs, that would be against the law. But it’s a bit muddier if they are simply blocking Dauler from using those URLs if he wanted to.
Last week, a blindsided Weiss said emotions were too raw for him to be totally transparent on air. But he plans to say his peace about Dauler’s departure tomorrow, Tuesday, November 10, at 7:30 a.m. and then be done with it. (UPDATE: Producer Cassie told him that today is Dauler’s birthday so he told his audience at 7:44 a.m. that he would hold off and discuss Jeff tomorrow, not today. “Happy birthday Jeff!” he said, instead.
