Update 12/15: Video coverage from OakFoSho here.

Update 12/14 : Angry KGO listeners will protest at 900 Front Street at 11:30 am on Thursday 12/15. 

Owner Cumulus has, true to the usual media consolidation model, fired all the local hosts but one at former Bay Area ratings leader KGO. 

KGO, whose general style of talk radio ranges from liberal to centrist, has been a top ten station in the nation's 4th largest broadcast market for years, KGO had the highest ratings for a long time, although it has slipped to positions 5 and 7 as of late.

Whatever one's opinion of the political range of views on offer at KGO, most would agree that within the constraints of big broadcasting, it presented a thoughtful and long-form talk format that often was one of the more reasonable commercial options available on the broadcast dial.

The new format, which retains only host Ronn Owens (apparently due to an ironclad contract) eschews local hosts and provides a "newstalk" cycle that is heavy on the repetition and boiler-plate wire service style coverage.

Unhappy KGO listeners seem to be congregating on Facebook.

Given the Federal Communication Commission's format agnosticism and the long experience of Cumulus with executing similar format changes in radio markets throughout the United States, it seems unlikely a license challenge would meet with success, at least at this point.

Paired with the Clearchannel decimation of 960-Air America, this week in the Bay Area has been filled with victories for media consolidation and losses for non-rightwing voices on commercial radio. A more graphic illustration of the invisible chain between corporate media consolidation and the paucity of liberal/progressive voices in commercial media is difficult to find.