Terry Gross listens to tons of podcasts — including The Pub — and her own NPR show, Fresh Air, is also one of the most popular podcasts around. And yet, she remains committed to radio, both as a host and as a listener.
“I don’t want a world of just podcasts. I don’t want a world where everything is boutique-y and fragmented,” Gross told me on The Pub. “I want a world where there’s an All Things Considered and a Morning Edition — the kind of things you can only do with the kind of model that NPR has.”
In this, my final episode as host of The Pub, I have a wide-ranging conversation with Terry Gross about all of the big issues facing public media; also, she turns the tables and asks me more than a few questions, because — duh — she’s Terry Gross and that’s what she does.
Also on the show, I take the occasion of the Public Broadcasting Act’s 50th anniversary as an opportunity to drill a live audience in Washington about what public media’s fundamental purpose is supposed to be — to raise the bar, or to fill the gaps?
Adam Ragusea hosted Current’s podcast The Pub and is a journalist in residence and visiting assistant professor at Mercer University’s Center for Collaborative Journalism.
Adam, as a non-journalist, I have really enjoyed listening to this podcast for the past few years. One of the things I liked is that you don’t talk down to your audience. I wish more shows wouldn’t talk down to the lowest denominator. We do live in the information age and the public can easily search for unfamiliar terms. The public is smarter and more aware than most people think.
Anyway, I wish you well in your future endeavors, and hope you will post any future projects to twitter.