Cory Doctorow, NPR’s principal critic during this whole linking debacle, still finds plenty to dislike about NPR’s revised policy. The latest article in Wired also includes some of his comments.

WFUV’s folkie listeners and the New York Botanical Garden’s orchid-lovers conflicted politely at yesterday’s FCC hearing in the Bronx, giving the New York Times lots of material for cultural stereotyping. The issue: WFUV’s half-built tower, which the Garden says ruins the skyline. Herewith: WFUV’s side and the Garden’s side. Nothing about the tower has been easy: its federal subsidy was held up by First Amendment issues.

Responding to widespread criticism (see posts below), NPR revised its linking policy today. You no longer need to request permission to link to its site. But NPR still seeks to bar framing of its pages, and says it reserves the right to withdraw permission for any link.

Charlie Rose had open-heart surgery June 25 to repair a faulty valve, reports USA Today. The talk-show host could be back to work within a week, says his exec producer (second item).

With CPB money, WNET launches African American World, a website about the AfAm experience that isn’t an adjunct of any particular TV show. The site is planned so that other stations can integrate it into their websites.

Reacting to a Providence Journal editorial suggesting the merger of Rhode Island’s WSBE with Boston’s WGBH, Rhode Island pubcaster Susan Farmer says the Journal might as well be swallowed by the Boston Globe!

The Online Journalism Review joins in condemning NPR’s linking policy. Also, BoingBoinger Cory Doctorow and NPR ombud Jeffrey Dvorkin both appeared on Minnesota Public Radio’s Future Tense to discuss the controversy. (RealAudio required.)

Former U.S. Treasury Sec. Robert Rubin will be the first guest on MPT’s newly revamped Wall Street Week with Fortune, says the L.A. Times.

A Baltimore Sun article attempts to capture the frantic activity behind the scenes at A Prairie Home Companion.

The Associated Press profiles Tavis Smiley, host of a new show on NPR.

As Maryland PTV readies its new Wall Street Week for debut on Friday, the Wall Street Journal reports that former host Louis Rukeyser has taken three of its four underwriters and kept airtime on public TV stations serving 60 percent of the population.

TV critic Tom Shales refuses to donate “money to a ‘public’ TV that has been privatized within an inch of its life,” according to his Electronic Media column.

After its “Stupid Pills” wear off, PBS moves Masterpiece Theatre back to Sunday nights, says Lisa de Moraes of the Washington Post.

Twin ITVS goals: capturing diversity on videotape, getting it seen

Last year was a good year for the Independent Television Service. ITVS had weathered its first 10 years as a funder and presenter of independent productions for public TV. It was feted with retrospectives at museums and film festivals across the country, which highlighted such fare as The Farmer’s Wife, La Ciudad, First Person Plural, The Devil Never Sleeps and Still Life with Animated Dogs. And it brought in a new executive director, Sally Jo Fifer. Having worked nine years as executive director of the nonprofit Bay Area Video Coalition (BAVC), Fifer was uniquely qualified to steer the difficult course between stations and independents.

Slate critic Virginia Heffernan on PBS’s animated Sagwa: “Surprisingly, Sagwa gets away with refinement and high-mindedness . . .”

AP trumpets Ken Burns’ new series of repeats on PBS Monday nights.

‘Our place is to offer an alternative for those who still want to learn’

We should not be surprised that most of television enters our people and our body politic, not as food for thought, but as an embalming fluid, a relaxing and displacing system of entertainment for those too exhausted, inert or numb to want more. But our place — your place, my place, the place of public television — is to offer an alternative to that, to serve the actual young and the forever young, the open and curious, those who still want to learn.

‘The Tavis Smiley Show’: created for a black audience, but all are welcome

There’s a burden resting on the broad shoulders of this man who’s bopping
his head to a funky beat, tongue out in a soulful pout, enjoying himself
before launching into the next segue. Tavis Smiley is at a studio mike, grooving to bumper music between
segments on a recent installment of his morning show, broadcast today
from NPR’s Washington headquarters instead of his Los Angeles digs,
because he’s in town for the Public Radio Conference. Smiley has polished off a double interview about U.S. policy on Cuba. Coming up, he’ll elicit a string of outrageous jokes from comedian Dick
Gregory in a comedy feature that’s a regular part of his Friday shows. “Back by popular demand, Dick Gregory,” he reads in a practice run,
then pauses.

NPR will reconsider its linking policy in the wake of its widespread blogger-led condemnation.

KPFX is a new, Web-only Pacifica radio station, cousin to KPFK in Los Angeles. (Via Walker, below.)