Quick Takes

Continuing live election coverage? Count on Alaska’s KTOO

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KTOO-TV in Juneau, Alaska, is streaming coverage of the state’s midterm election recount to determine its next U.S. Senator. Visit the station’s 360North live feed page to take a peek at the recount “action” in Anchorage — 15 teams of election officials sitting at tables eying write-in ballots, set to a soundtrack of soothing yet determined vote-counting music. (Right click the image to enlarge.) “While we don’t expect much drama or excitement, every Alaskan will be able to watch through our cameras,” Bill Legere, KTOO’s general manager, said in a statement.

Quick Takes

Layoffs hit KPFA, protests go on-air

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The fight over staff cuts at Berkeley’s KPFA-FM has moved from the streets to the airwaves. A Nov. 8 decision by Pacifica Foundation Executive Director Arlene Engelhardt to dismiss the staff of the KPFA Morning Show — the local program that earns the most financial support from listeners — came under immediate fire. Engelhardt proposed to replace the morning news staple with another program from Pacifica’s Los Angeles outlet, KPFK. The KPFA Morning Show team — Aimee Allison, Brian Edwards-Tiekert, Laura Prives and Esther Manilla — were ordered off the air after Monday’s program, but they managed to mount a “renegade broadcast” on Tuesday Nov.

Quick Takes

WNED gets cooking with return to live show

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WNED’s popular live WNED Cooks is returning after six years, the Buffalo station says. A new show on “Family Favorites” airs from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Feb. 26, 2011. Viewers submit recipes, and eight will be selected to create the dish in the studio that day. All recipes are compiled in a cookbook.

Quick Takes

KCET’s new programming features old favorites, Asian offerings

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KCET in Los Angeles, which is cutting ties to PBS on Jan. 1 (Current, Oct. 18), announced early programming details to its members through a mailing this week. The Los Angeles Times reports that the station is “relying on a programming schedule that is largely available on DVD, and in some cases is decades old,” in addition to longtime local faves such as Huell Hower’s show and SoCal Connected. There’ll be several English-language shows from Japanese broadcaster NHK including NHK Newsline, a daily half-hour Asian news roundup; Asia Biz Forecast; Journeys in Japan and Your Japanese Kitchen.

Quick Takes

Triple-A convo set at new Wilmington branch of World Cafe music hall

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Triple-A music’s 11th annual NON-COMMvention will be held next May 19-21 in a new branch of the WXPN-FM-affiliated music venue World Cafe Live, to be opened just seven weeks before in Wilmington, Del. World Cafe Live At The Queen will open April 1 after a $25-million renovation of an old downtown movie house called the Queen. WXPN and a partner opened the original World Cafe Live restaurant/bar/music hall in Philadelphia six years ago. The station, co-presenter of the NON-COMMvention (with TheTop22.com), describes the event as “the music industry conference where contemporary, noncommercial radio stations, artists and music industry professionals from all of the country convene to discover new music and discuss current industry trends.”

Quick Takes

Colorado Public TV’s nonprofit news arm gets healthcare reporting grant

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Colorado Public News, a nonprofit news project of Colorado Public Television/CPT12 in Denver, has received a $386,250 grant to cover the cost of reporting on healthcare for three years, it announced this week (Nov. 8). The health-oriented Colorado Trust is providing the support, which will cover a full-time health reporter to produce multimedia reports. Colorado Public News supplies weekly coverage to a network of 14 news media on several platforms: television, radio, Internet, print and mobile. Donors fund journalists in particular subject areas, including state government, science, education or the economy.

Quick Takes

Former CPB Board chair suggests how to save funding

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Cheryl Halpern, who headed the CPB Board from 2005 to 2007, writes about what she sees as “A last chance to save CPB” in Monday’s (Nov. 8) Congress Blog from The Hill, coming at a time of increasing calls to zero out funding for public broadcasting. “The question that Congress needs to address is not whether the national providers of public programming should be shut down,” she writes. “It’s how to reform the legislation that created these institutions, given the changing media landscape.”She said Congress should consider amending the authorizing legislation so public broadcasters are “expected to adhere strictly to measurable and definable standards of accuracy and transparency.” She feels that legislators need to “delineate what public broadcasters can and cannot do with regard to the ever evolving and expanding digital and online media universe.”Halpern also found herself troubled recently after a visit to a public broadcasting channel’s website.

Quick Takes

NTIA report says broadband usage increased sevenfold between ’01 and ’09

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A study released Monday (Nov. 8) of 54,000 American households shows that between 2001 and 2009, broadband Internet use rose sevenfold, from 9 percent to 64 percent. But “Exploring the Digital Nation: Home Broadband Internet Adoption in the United States” also reveals that significant gaps persist along racial, ethnic, and geographic lines, according to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. Also, nearly a quarter of households did not use the Internet at home, with most of those respondents citing lack of need or interest. The report is here in PDF format.

Quick Takes

Mashable tracks social media’s possible impact on Nov. 2 races

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Here’s an interesting roundup on Mashable.com of how various social media sites may have figured into the midterm election results. For instance: Facebook, the world’s largest social network with some 500 million user accounts, reported that in 98 tight races for House seats, 74 percent of candidates with the most Facebook fans won. Looking at 19 Senate races, 81 percent of those with more fans won. The widely read Mashable follows news in social and digital media, technology and web culture.

Quick Takes

Pittsburgh’s WQED finally marries off its sister station

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After trying for years, WQED Multimedia is succeeding in selling its second TV channel, WQEX, the Post-Gazette reported today. Ion Media Networks will buy it for $3 million, the newspaper said. The buyer, which will now have stations in 60 markets, was selected by the WQED Board from “an extensive list of interested parties,” WQED said. Since 2004, the unreserved UHF channel had been leased to Home Shopping Network and then ShopNBC as an outlet for shopping channels; WQED retained three hours a week for the FCC-required children’s programming. But WQED’s attempts to sell the channel were thwarted repeatedly by economic conditions, an unwilling FCC and other factors.

Quick Takes

Where in the world is Red Green? Alaska!

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Even in far-flung Fairbanks, Alaska, Red Green pulls in the fans. Nearly 200 lined up Sunday (Nov. 7) at Big Ray’s outfitters store for the chance to greet the popular pubcasting character, reports the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner. Green, portrayed by actor and writer Steve Smith, continues nationwide on what may be his farewell tour, “Wit and Wisdom 2010.” The Fairbanks newspaper noted that Smith “arrived at Big Ray’s in a septic truck, dubbed the Red Green Limousine, which was provided by Glacier Point Pumping and Thawing.”

Quick Takes

NPR’s Schiller: “We take these calls for defunding very, very seriously”

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Today’s top story in the Daily Caller, the news website founded by former conservative TV pundit and PBS host Tucker Carlson, is headlined “Feeling the Heat.” It reports on NPR President Vivian Schiller’s remarks yesterday at a forum on the future of journalism, convened at St. John’s Episcopal Church near the White House. Acknowledging that the new Republican House majority may make good its campaign season threats to “defund NPR,” Schiller explained that NPR receives very little of the federal aid distributed by CPB. “For small stations, and even for large stations, that’s a big chunk of their revenue,” she said, according to the Daily Caller’s account.

Quick Takes

New APTS president: Patrick Butler

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The Board of Trustees for the Association of Public Television Stations on Sunday (Nov. 7) approved its search committee’s selection of board member Patrick Butler, chairman of the Maryland Public Television Foundation, as APTS president and chief executive officer. Butler formerly was a speechwriter for President Gerald R. Ford, and a special assistant to Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker (R, Tenn.). He served on the National Council on the the Humanities during the Reagan administration. He chaired the public programs committee of the National Endowment for the Humanities, and recommended funding for projects including Ken Burns’s The Civil War.Butler retired as senior vice president of the Washington Post Company in December 2008, where for 18 years he had managed public policy, new business development and special corporate projects.He had earlier served as Washington vice president of Times Mirror, the corporate parent of the Los Angeles Times, and as government relations vice president of RCA, which owned NBC.Butler takes the helm on Jan.

Quick Takes

Correction on APTS appointment

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This morning’s post regarding recently retired PBS Senior Vice President Pat Hunter’s appointment as the new APTS president was incorrect. Current is removing the post, and regrets the error.

Quick Takes

Longtime “Washington Week” panelist McDowell dies

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Newspaper columnist Charles McDowell Jr., an 18-year panelist on Washington Week in Review and contributor to several documentaries by Ken Burns, died early this morning (Nov. 5) in Virginia Beach, Va. He was 84.For Burns, McDowell appeared in an interview in The Congress, spoke a character’s voice in The Civil War and did voice and consulting work on Baseball.He was a Washington Week in Review panelist from 1978 to 1996. McDowell also narrated or hosted other PBS programs including Summer of Judgment: The Watergate Hearings, Richmond Memories and For the Record.A memorial service is set for Nov. 13 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

Quick Takes

CPB funding could be reduced, but probably not eliminated: Report

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A comprehensive post-election analysis from the powerhouse Washington, D.C., law firm Patton Boggs is cautiously optimistic that public broadcasting funding will not be zeroed out, despite recent calls by conservatives to end that support.While the furor over the firing of NPR commentator Juan Williams has generated a flurry of demands to end federal financial backing of the pubcasting system, the Patton Boggs analysts expect the controversy won’t significantly endanger that support. Also, the Republican takeover of the House and increased presence in the Senate don’t necessarily signal a cash catastrophe. ” … [W]e do not expect federal funding for NPR or public broadcasting will be eliminated,” especially because the White House strongly opposes those cuts. The last attempts to do so “were not successful because supporters of popular programming rallied to defend the appropriation, and we expect a similar outcome this year.”However, challenging times remain ahead.

Quick Takes

It’s “Social Media Day” on Poynter; view event online

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The Poynter Institute’s “Finding the Future of Journalism: Social Media Day” is live streaming until 5 p.m. Eastern today (Nov. 5); watch it here (live blog is directly beneath the schedule, takes a few seconds to load). Matt Thompson, editorial product manager for NPR’s Project Argo, speaks from 1:30 p.m. to 2:00 p.m. on “From Stories to Streams: The Evolution of the Beat.”In other Poynter news, the institute announced today that is will collaborate with the Online News Association for training, events and digital content next year. ONA members will receive discounts on training, and Poynter will work with the association and the Newseum to promote and archive the Online Journalism Awards.

Quick Takes

Battle brewing over proposed staff cuts at KPFA

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More than 100 people joined a picket outside Pacifica’s KPFA-FM in Berkeley yesterday (Nov. 4), protesting staff cuts proposed by Pacifica Foundation Executive Director Arlene Englehardt to help close a reported $1.1 million budget shortfall. “We’re here because we understand there is a plan afoot to cut ¼ of the staff at the station,” Sasha Lilley, protest organizer and KPFA co-host, tells the local news website Berkeleyside. “These are difficult times economically but there are alternatives to cutting staff.” The station has lost more than $500,000 in listener support and other funding over three years, KPFA and Pacifica Foundation board member Tracy Rosenberg told the San Jose Mercury News. KPFA fundraising has brought in $2.5 million this year, far below what’s needed to meet is $3.6 million budget, Rosenberg said.

Quick Takes

End of state funding kills Ready to Learn at KEET

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State support for Ready to Learn at KEET-TV in Eureka, Calif., was discontinued last month, ending the program that had been a staple of the station’s outreach for 14 years, reports the local Times-Standard. KEET Executive Director Ron Schoenherr told the paper that the cut, which wiped out the vast majority of the program’s budget, came as a shock to him. Station staff are scurrying to replace the $30,000 annual state cash with local donations and grants. California Department of Education Child Development Division Director Camille Maben said the cut was part of a line-item veto by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in the $50 million Child Development Block Grant from the federal level. KEET was informed on Oct.

Quick Takes

Revived web association IMA sets its conference at SXSW in Austin

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After a hiatus and reorganization, Integrated Media Association will hold its 2011 conference on March 10 and 11 at the start of the insanely popular South by Southwest Interactive Festival in the preposterously cool Texas capital, IMA said today. The festival begins Friday, March 11 and runs through Tuesday, March 15. Saturday has been designated Public Media Day. IMA, now based at Public Broadcasting Atlanta and headed by Jeanne Ericson, former head of PBA’s Lens on Atlanta portal, which is rebuilding its membership and looking for pubTV webheads to join, is selling IMA/SXSW tickets at a $300 discount to its members through January. In the meantime, IMA expects to have reps at the second annual National Public Media Camp, Saturday, Nov.