Cort and Fatboy are moving from Error FM to PDX.FM, the duo announced on their online radio show today. They're also moving up from 2 pm to 10 am and adding listener interaction through phones and chat.

The two were fired along with most of the air staff from Portland rock station KUFO (101.1) in October. Since then, they've found success online, with their podcast reaching as high as #14 among comedy audio podcasts on iTunes, regularly surpassing offerings from Ricky Gervais, Dane Cook, and Z100 (KKRZ)'s Phoenix-based morning team, Johnjay and Rich.

PDX.FM's Robert Wagner tells OMC, "A certain local radio station may have 'got their balls back,'" referring to a promotional line from the relaunched KUFO, but "we're just happy to have their brains, talent, and wit. Besides, we weren't careless enough to lose our balls in the first place."

The Cort and Fatboy Show debuts on PDX.FM on January 4.

The new one-hour Cort and Fatboy show debuts at 2 pm today on errorfm after being canceled when KUFO reprogrammed its lineup last month. A podcast will be available shortly afterward.

The new Cort and Fatboy website is already online, featuring earlier podcasts, an already active forum and an events calendar.

In case you missed their interview on KOUG Radio last week, it's posted as well, and we've embedded it below. In it, Bobby "Fatboy" Roberts argues that Chris Patyk, the former program manager, should still have his job, since he selected all the music and KUFO is still using the same playlist. The station replaced him with Ditch, who pulls double-duty as KUFO's midday host:

Media Circus Update

And of course, Cort and Fatboy will be at Media Circus! on Saturday. We're up to 50 RSVP's. More guests have been announced on Twitter and will continue to be named today. Have you signed up yet? Please either use Upcoming to RSVP, post a comment with a unique username here, or email me at infooregonmediacentral [dot] com. Thank you!

Cort and Fatboy stopped by Portland Sucks today and more or less hung out for the hour, talking about their return to streaming and podcasting on Monday, their Midnight Movie tomorrow, and a range of other topics, including Rick Emerson, the KUFO playlist, and mannequins that look like Fatboy. To understand the first part of the conversation, you may want to listen to the special episode of Portland Sucks the night of the KUFO firings, which begins with angry KUFO listeners' voicemails.

The two have more upcoming appearances, including on KOUG Radio, WSU Vancouver's college radio station, moments from now at 4 pm and The Brew (105.9 KFBW) tomorrow at 1 pm with Daniel Bozyk.

Their Midnight Movie is tomorrow at 11 pm, when they'll show "Raising Arizona" at the Bagdad Theater. Doors open at 10, tickets are $3, and the event is 21+. And finally, the first non-KUFO episode of Cort and Fatboy is scheduled to be on their website shortly before 2 pm on Monday, November 9. It will also stream at 2 pm on errorfm.

KUFO casualties on KGW

KGW's Joe Donlon last night interviewed Rick Emerson and Cort and Fatboy, three of Friday's KUFO casualties, as well as Peter Ames Carlin, roving culture reporter for The Oregonian.

Emerson said the station seems to be headed in a "more guy, less geek" direction. Carlin leveled criticism against the station's new owner, Alpha Broadcasting, which he says fashions itself as being local, but "they might as well be from Peru," given how they're importing people from across the US.

Carlin also has an interview with Emerson in today's Oregonian. Emerson had a similar experience to Cort and Fatboy's, saying KUFO executives wouldn't return emails and that the station had become "this weird environment where everyone knows, but nobody says. I figured it was time to start packing."

Carlin confirms that Michael Ricker from KISW Seattle will host middays on the new KUFO. He also says there's uncertainty about the future of sister station KUPL's Lee and Alana in the Morning show. OMC has learned that, although Lee Rogers is retiring and Alana Lynn was told her last day is December 4, Lynn has been invited to audition with new potential morning show personalities while considering opportunities elsewhere. Whether she stays or goes, her current contract is still being terminated.

A careful observer might detect a theme of career uncertainty in radio.

We lied, Press Clippings took much longer than an hour to produce. We blame our terrible, awful, slow computer.

• KMHD host Al Evans tells OMC it will be "a couple of weeks at least" before the station moves into its new studio at OPB.
• Portland Sucks calls out Matt Davis for his BlogTown post, "Rape Allegations: Another Side Effect of Big Soccer?" The Mercury's Kiala Kazebee comes to Matt's defense in the comments. Also up for Portland Sucks' wrath is KGW's Breedlove exclusive. As always, there's strong language.
• OMC reader skihoodoo sends in a photo of KGW's other Skycam in Newport at the Embarcadero resort, a followup to a story in our last Press Clippings. Skihoodoo has been doing a lot to contribute to OMC, thank you!
• A variation on an idea from @newsjunkie60 via @PortORTraffic: When an event like Wimbledon disrupts the TV schedule, why not put regular programming on a digital subchannel?
• Local blog I'm in your water offers a Portland media roundup, including former Willamette Week columnist Byron Beck calling Cort of KUFO's Cort and Fatboy "Lars Larson."
• We almost missed this: The Alliance for Community Media is holding its annual conference in Portland, discussing ways to "protect community media at the national and local levels." The event runs July 15 through 18 at the Oregon Convention Center and Doubletree Hotel.

Beyond our region:

• The climbdown is complete: Washington Post editor Katherine Weymouth has apologized over the paper's pay-for-access scandal.
• NYU's Jay Rosen notes that CNN's Reliable Sources relegated that controversy to a commentary in the final moments of the show. Howard Kurtz' status as a media critic while under the employ of two major media organizations has long been a source of its own media criticism.
• And heavy criticism doesn't always lead to apologies: Columnist Connie Schultz is more resolute than ever that her idea to ban linking and summaries of news stories is a good idea. Should Press Clippings be worried?
• If you somehow missed it over the weekend, Sarah Palin has threatened to sue bloggers and traditional media over their handling of her sudden resignation.
• Newsroom veterans may be more likely to get promotions to general manager lately.
• There's a $3 billion gap between declining TV station revenue and online ad income.
• Layoffs of copy editors mean more complaints about typos at The Washington Post.
• The Saturday Evening Post is returning to its roots, differentiating itself on the newsstand by offering more creative writing and fiction.
• The Library of Congress now offers a searchable database of news stories from 1880 to 1922.
• Web video is evolving beyond the two-minute clip.
• Instead of non-profits, The News & Observer has an idea to operate newspapers as low-profits. Insert joke here.
• Most poll respondents said they wouldn't miss their daily newspaper if it went away. I believe there was a poll to the contrary that we posted recently. Once we add tags to our old stories, that sort of thing should be easier to find.

And another big thank you to our new contributor over the weekend! Donations are all that are making this site possible. As you may have seen in our last post, we're working on ways to increase traffic so we can get some ad revenue coming in. But even then, it's unlikely to be enough to keep us afloat. The slow holiday weekend did some serious damage to our average daily visitor count. If you'd like to help us out with any amount, there's a big shiny button on the left.

This is an open thread, what's on your mind?