StarBulletin.com

Isles' Marriott time shares score in online ranking


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POSTED: Wednesday, February 24, 2010

The only Hawaii time-share resorts on RedWeek.com's annual Top 25 Timeshare Resorts are run by Marriott.

RedWeek.com is an online time-share marketplace that allows browsers to search some 5,000 properties free and members to link directly to owners and operators.

Marriott's Maui Ocean Club and its Napili Villas and Lahaina Villas are in the top 10, while Marriott's Ko Olina Beach Club is No. 13 on the list.

Nine Marriott-branded time-share resorts made the list, while five Disney-branded properties include the second consecutive top ranking for the Disney Beach Club Villas at Lake Buena Vista, in Florida.

Hawaii did well as a destination with four spots on the list—three of them clustered together on Maui—but Caribbean locales appear eight times and Florida got seven mentions. New York and Mexico each got two mentions, while South Carolina and Virginia each got one.

In a statement, RedWeek.com said none of the resorts is affiliated with it and that rankings are determined by e-mail alert preferences chosen by its 1.4 million registered users. Registration is free, while complete access costs $14.99 annually.

Using common disclaimer-ese language, the Top 25 announcement says RedWeek.com “;does not make any representations or warranties regarding the resorts mentioned,”; noting that results reflect preferences of site users. In other words, your results may vary.

Radio sans boundaries

The small but feisty Radio Heritage Foundation based in New Zealand has come up with its own radio ratings—the Borderless Radio Rankings—because with the Internet, geography and topography no longer limit a radio station's signal.

“;With new digital wireless radio receivers, such as DAB capable sets in Australia (or) HD radio in the USA, as well as mobile phones receiving online audio streaming as broadband costs get incrementally lower, listeners across the globe can connect directly to thousands of online radio stations,”; wrote founder David Ricquish.

While mostly true, some U.S. broadcasters, such as CBS Radio and Clear Channel Communications Inc., as well as online music service Pandora.com, bar access to online streams outside the U.S., according to trade publication Inside Radio earlier this month.

It quoted Joe Kennedy, chief executive officer of Pandora, as saying, “;The good news is, the Internet is global. The bad news is, copyrights are country by country.”;

Nevertheless, the Radio Heritage Foundation's Pacific Region list ranks Honolulu-based KCCN-FM 100.3, KINE-FM 105.1, KIKI-FM 93.9, KDNN-FM 98.5, Hilo and Kona's KAPA/KAGB-FM combo and Honolulu's KRTR-FM 96.3 in its BRR top 10.

Some 38 other Hawaii stations from Oahu and the neighbor islands are listed among the 66 Pacific-region stations on the foundation's rankings, including noncommercial stations that don't get included in ratings reports by Arbitron Inc. Its four Honolulu market surveys each year measure commercial station listening.

The top-ranked site is a portal for three Paris-based broadcast streams.