Jian Ghomeshi, host of CBC Radio’s Q, said Sunday that he was fired by the Canadian pubcaster over a threat about allegations regarding his sex life going public. In a lengthy Facebook post, the ousted host said that an ex-girlfriend had been collaborating with a freelance writer on a story that would claim that Ghomeshi had been abusive in their relationship. The former host said the allegations were without merit and that he had filed a $50 million (Canadian) lawsuit against the CBC over his firing. Ghomeshi acknowledged that the relationship had included “rough sex (forms of BDSM)” but that all activities had been consensual.

The FCC has postponed its auction of television broadcast spectrum to early 2016, according to a blog post on the commission website Friday. Gary Epstein, chair of the Incentive Auction Task Force, wrote that “court challenges to the auction rules by some broadcasters have introduced uncertainty” into the run-up to the auction, which is mandated by Congress to clear broadcast bandwidth for the growing number of mobile devices. Under the FCC’s earlier timetable, the auctions had been slated for mid-2015. Though Epstein didn’t identify the court cases, two organizations’ complaints have been consolidated and are pending before the before the D.C.

A new marketing campaign mounted by Philadelphia’s WXPN-FM takes aim not at other local radio stations but targets the threat of online music services such as Pandora and Spotify. The Triple A station launched a six-week campaign last week to bolster recognition of the station in its market, attract new members and try to lure people away from online competitors. The “Vinyl at Heart” campaign features bus wraps and billboards as well as refresher campaigns and live events. Research commissioned by the station four years ago sowed the seeds for the new campaign by revealing untapped potential for new listeners in the Philadelphia market.

• Public TV stations in four states, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands will receive a total of $2.5 million in federal grants for upgrading transmitters, translators and production equipment. The grants from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, announced Wednesday, are part of the 2014 Farm Bill reauthorized by Congress. We’ll have to expense a trip to the islands to report back on their new equipment. • PBS has hired Don Wilcox, a former executive with Fox Broadcasting Corp., as v.p. of digital marketing and services. At Fox, Wilcox was v.p. and g.m. of branded entertainment, overseeing websites including Fox.com, 

Susan Sollins, executive producer of the biennial public TV series Art in the Twenty-First Century, died Oct. 13. Her age and the cause of death were not disclosed. In 1997, Sollins founded ART21, a nonprofit organization devoted to chronicling contemporary art and artists. In 2001, it launched Art in the Twenty-First Century, a series of short films focusing on contemporary artists both established and lesser-known. The seventh season debuts Friday. Sollins also directed William Kentridge: Anything is Possible, a feature-length film that debuted on PBS in 2010. Both that film and the series won Peabody Awards. “Susan was a visionary creative force and tireless advocate for contemporary art and artists,” ART21 said in a statement on its website.

Plus: Clocks for a few NPR shows are delayed, and comedians honor Jay Leno for a PBS broadcast.

ADDISON, Texas — More than one-third of the roughly 300 attendees at the annual National Educational Telecommunications Association’s professional development conference this week are first-timers, making for one of the most crowded Newcomers Welcome sessions in years. And those newbies have plenty of sessions to choose from at the conference, which runs through Wednesday at the Hotel InterContinental in this Dallas suburb. Topics include development, collaborations, marketing, community engagement, FCC regulations, education, promotion — one session even analyzes the “complex, arcane” structure of the public broadcasting system. The conference opened Monday with keynote speaker Evan Smith, editor-in-chief of the Texas Tribune, addressing the power of public conversation.

Plus: WNET goes deep on poverty, and a jazz radio legend has died.

Public TV stations are starting two new programming co-ops modeled after the Arts and Culture Major Market Group project, which gathers and repackages local content for more than 30 stations nationwide. WNET, which handles the arts project, now has producers compiling station contributions for a new technology initiative as well. The local segments feed into SciTech Now, a half-hour newsmagazine hosted by PBS NewsHour’s Hari Sreenivasan that premiered Oct. 1 in New York, Houston and Seattle. Another program-sharing pilot aiming for small and midsize stations, based at Maryland Public Television, draws from the popular genre of outdoors shows.

Plus: Grants to digital projects at PRI and WKAR.

A This American Life story may help a woman prove that Washington, D.C., police violated her civil rights when a detective obtained a false confession from her 18 years ago. Kim Crafton filed a lawsuit Sept. 3 against the Washington Metropolitan Police over the 1994 incident, which became the subject of an October 2013 TAL story. The report featured D.C. Officer James Trainum, who had interrogated Crafton, discussing what led to the false confession in her case. In February 1994, Crafton, who was 19 at the time, confessed to killing D.C. resident Lawrence O’Connell. Police had interrogated her for 17 hours.

An NPR editor has recommended that network journalists avoid referring to the Washington Redskins by their name and should instead use “Washington” or “the team” as much as possible. Standards & Practices Editor Mark Memmott provided the guidance Oct. 10 amid a growing backlash against a name that is a racial slur. Memmott said he is not calling for an outright ban, but that use of the name should be curtailed under the organization’s policy regarding potentially offensive language. “The team’s name is the name and our job is to report on the world as it is, not to take a position or become part of the story,” Memmott wrote.

An NPR podcast hatched from a friendship four years ago took a step in its evolution earlier this month, becoming a weekly radio show focused on Latino music and culture. Edited down from the weekly podcast’s 40 minutes, the half-hour Alt.Latino debuted Oct. 2 and is airing on stations in four markets, including Denver and San Francisco. The “alt” in the title refers to the show’s exploration of subjects that co-host and co-creator Jasmine Garsd sees as underreported by other media outlets. “We started off with a lot of indie music, but as the show grew we saw it more as delving deeper into Latin culture,” Garsd said.