Nice Above Fold - Page 461
KQED launches 11th season of ImageMakers and new spinoff show
ImageMakers, the indie film showcase curated by San Francisco’s KQED TV, will debut the Oscar-winning film Curfew, May 12. Every year, KQED Program Director Scott Dwyer makes the film festival rounds and screens over 2,000 productions to curate a new season of ImageMakers, a series featuring short independent films from around the world. He rushed to buy broadcast rights to Shawn Christensen’s Curfew in January 2012, as soon as he watched it and well before the drama started gaining recognition. “In order to compete with places like Starz, Sundance Channel and HBO, I have to buy them really fast, before they start to win awards,” said Dwyer, whose film festival circuit includes the Aspen Shortsfest and the Palm Springs International Film Festival.To connect with the under-30 crowd, NPR tries face time
NPR Generation Listen, the network's new outreach effort for millenials, sees one-on-one interaction as the key to cultivating its younger fanbase.NPR's Ina Jaffe wins national Gracie as outstanding correspondent
Among national award winners, NPR’s Ina Jaffe was named outstanding reporter/correspondent. The Gracies honor programming created for, by or about women. The national Gracies will be awarded May 21 in Beverly Hills, Calif., and the winners in local, online, public and student markets will be honored June 26 in New York.
Pubcasters win eight Peabody Awards for outstanding electronic media
Pubmedia and independent producers win eight Peabody Awards including PBS, which won two, one for “Summer Pasture,”a documentary about nomadic Tibetan herders and Why Poverty?, a PBS series about income inequalityAnd the pubradio brackets winner is . . .
Despite some impressive social-media cheerleading by several worthy competitors, the winner of KPCC’s Public Radio Brackets is This American Life. More than participants 50,000 chose their fave programs and as one commenter noted, “This was the toughest decision I ever had to make as a voter.”Repacking complications loom following broadcast spectrum auctions
Many broadcasters may be in for “unpleasant repacking surprises” following the FCC’s upcoming spectrum auctions, writes Washington, D.C., telecom lawyer Michael Berg on the TVNewsCheck media site. Stations on channels below 31 think they won’t be moved or reconfigured, but this will vary by market, he writes. And a station can be repacked even it it remains on its current channel. “It is important for television broadcasters to be aware of ongoing developments, and not to assume prematurely that repacking won’t affect your station,” Berg notes.
Maine Public Broadcasting cuts staff, puts show on hiatus after further loss in funds
Facing a $400,000 funding shortfall, Maine Public Broadcasting Network said Friday it will lay off up to 12 percent of its workforce and put a locally produced show on hiatus.Few 'Magic Moments' in March pledge
Pledge results reported by public TV stations from recently concluded on-air fundraisers were down 20 percent to 25 percent from the March 2012 drive, according to Kristen Kuebler, director of station research for Arizona-based TRAC Media. For most stations, the March fund drive is typically the biggest of the year, and revenues generated from it influence budgeting for the next fiscal year. Stations reported to TRAC and PBS that audience response to the latest pledge shows was tepid at best. The top-performing show among TRAC’s client stations was Magic Moments: The Best of ’50s Pop, a program that was first released for public TV broadcasts in 2005.Pat Perini, pubTV producer
Patricia “Pat” Perini, a public television producer, director, writer and production executive for more than three decades, died Feb. 21 after a long battle with leukemia. She was 68.Speedskater Bridie Farrell brings story of abuse to Milwaukee Public Radio
Milwaukee Public Radio host Mitch Teich could have predicted a few outcomes from his decision to take up speedskating — sore muscles, bruises from the occasional spill on the ice at high speed — but probably not the biggest story of his journalism career.Roger Ebert, film critic and pubTV icon, dead at 70
Roger Ebert, the legendary film critic who got his television start on Chicago PBS station WTTW, died April 4 after a long battle with cancer. He was 70. “Everyone at WTTW is deeply saddened by the loss of Roger Ebert, whose courageous battle with cancer in recent years was an inspiration to us all,” WTTW President Dan Schmidt said in a statement.Live radio captioning goes nationwide with Latino USA
Radio for the deaf,” a captioning technology developed and refined through an NPR Labs partnership, is moving into mainstream broadcasting with Latino USAGoogle updates Currents aggregation app, signs licensing agreement with APM
Google released updates to its Google Currents news-curation app March 20, including enhanced audio capabilities, and Minnesota-based American Public Media is taking advantage of them. The free app, currently available on Android platforms, has a structure similar to those offered by other digital news curators such as Flipboard and Pulse. Users subscribe to feeds from news outlets that appear as simple RSS lists or, if the provider has signed a licensing agreement with Google, as enhanced magazine-style content. Its latest updates include audio playlists and media bars with options to pause and skip tracks. More than 10 million users have installed Currents since its December 2011 launch.Walt Bodine, KCUR talk show host
Walt Bodine, a broadcaster who helmed a signature local talk show on KCUR in Kansas City, Mo., for nearly three decades, died March 24 at the age of 92.Tough reality for PBS: Roadshow audience doesn’t flow easily into Market Warriors
PBS has ended production of Market Warriors, the Monday-night series that was a lynchpin in its strategy to hold on to viewers of Antiques Roadshow, the most-watched regular series in the primetime schedule.
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