MEANWHILE, BACK IN DINOSAUR MEDIA: The fight for the future of NPR: Can public radio survive the podcast revolution?
The tumult was touched off in late March, when an NPR executive announced that the network’s own digital offerings—most importantly, its marquee iPhone app, NPR One—were not to be promoted during shows airing on terrestrial radio.
The ban was widely viewed as proof that NPR is less interested in reaching young listeners than in placating the managers of local member stations, who pay handsome fees to broadcast NPR shows and tend to react with suspicion when NPR promotes its efforts to distribute those shows digitally.
Why, it’s as if taxpayer-funded public broadcasting was an outmoded idea in an era of satellite radio, hundreds of channels of digital television, and endless Websites and podcasts or something. I’m old enough to remember multiple generations of Republicans vilified for even broaching the topic.