Al Letson's Eerily Familiar final submission

The idea of roaming around the country and zeroing in on wacky or unique things in a specific area (in the US this works out nicely by State, since there's so many of 'em) is a ridiculously common platform for a show. I'd argue most talk radio and news (tv or radio) programs essentially do this. The huge difference between Al's submission and yours, is that Al isn't going from state to state looking at cheesy tourist attractions. He's really doing the opposite of what you wanted to do: he's giving listeners the experience of becoming a "local" in a particular city or state for the duration of the show. By focusing on the arts community of a given place, or the current controversies happening there, he's intentionally avoiding the "outsider view" your show idea seemed to rely on. And well, I'm not saying this to hurt your feelings, but a radio show about tourist attractions is kinda lame. States promote the hell out of the attractions they want people to come and see; your show would offer nothing new at all, since PR for the kind of things you wanted to "investigate" is already pretty ubiquitous.

Also, ignoring the contest after you lose, and then coming back only when you want to accuse the winner of ripping you off is really childish. This is likely why you didn't win; you don't care about your program or public radio so much as about being the guy with a radio show. And that kind of insincerity can be sensed miles away on the radio, in every state of the union.

Certainly it means you get half the money, right?