Nice Above Fold - Page 453

  • NPR, AIR unveil resource site for freelancers

    NPR and the Association of Independents in Radio have launched the Freelance and Station Contributor Resource Site, an online repository of information for reporters interested in filing stories with the network. “This first of its kind site includes Ethics Guidelines, examples of good freelance/station producer stories, ‘how stories go from idea to air,’ key editorial contacts, FTP filing guidelines, the most current AQH audience data for producers airing features on NPR programs, and more,” wrote AIR Executive Director Sue Schardt in an email announcing the site. Freelancers who want to sign up should go to nprstations.org and fill out the registration form, selecting “AIR” under “Station Where You Work.”
  • InsideClimate News wins Pulitzer for coverage of 2010 oil spill

    The nonprofit InsideClimate News won this year’s National Reporting Pulitzer Prize for its investigative series The Dilbit Disaster: Inside the Biggest Oil Spill You’ve Never Heard Of. Reporters Elizabeth McGowan, Lisa Song and David Hasemyer took on a seven-month investigation about a 2010 oil spill in Michigan’s Kalamazoo River. The winning package consisted of a three-part narrative and follow-up articles delving deeper into the circumstances of the oil spill. “It was an important story, and we told it well through the eyes of the people who experienced it and who are investigating it,” said David Sassoon, founder and publisher of ICN.
  • “If you can’t make it important, it’s probably not worth doing”

    In an extended interview with Current, Frontline creator David Fanning recalls how he came to work at Boston’s WGBH more than three decades ago, and how the show is positioning itself for the future.
  • Three NPR journalists will embark on fellowships

    Three NPR journalists will start academic fellowships starting this fall, with Dina Temple-Raston and Alison MacAdam joining the Nieman program at Harvard, and Louisa Lim attending the University of Michigan as a Knight-Wallace fellow. Temple-Raston, who covers counterterrorism for the network, will study the use of big data in intelligence gathering. MacAdam, a senior All Things Considered editor, will study the business of the art world. In Michigan, Lim will study the sustainability of China’s current political structures. She currently reports from Beijing. An NPR release notes that reporters Chris Arnold and Eric Westervelt recently finished fellowships, studying housing and new media, respectively.
  • Planet Money crowdfunder soars, PRI campaign falls short of goal

    Two of public radio’s three biggest distributors launched major crowdfunding experiments in the past month, with wildly different results.
  • PBS acquires new British drama to anchor Sunday nights

    Aiming to build on its successful strategy to boost viewing on Sunday nights, PBS acquired a new hit drama from the BBC, Last Tango in Halifax.
  • University of Kentucky sues WUKY reporter over open records request

    The University of Kentucky has sued a reporter at its public radio station, WUKY in Lexington, in an attempt to guard information she had requested about surgical practices at its pediatric hospital. By filing the complaint, UK is challenging the state’s attorney general, who in March endorsed reporter Brenna Angel’s request for documents. UK declined the AG’s request as well, citing state and federal privacy laws. The dispute began in December 2012, when Angel made an Open Records Request to the university regarding the cardiothoracic surgery program at Kentucky Children’s Hospital in Lexington. The program has been suspended pending an internal review, according to local media reports.
  • Kerger describes factionalism within pubTV as system's greatest threat

    MIAMI BEACH, Fla. — PBS President Paula Kerger called for local public TV stations and PBS to move beyond their reputations as a “dysfunctional family” to embrace “the power of a collective system” to strengthen their public service. In a keynote speech opening this year’s PBS Annual Meeting, Kerger said public television has reached an important moment in its history — one that she considers to be “the most important moment of my tenure” as PBS president. Kerger pointed to the outpouring of support for public TV when its federal funding came under attack during the fall presidential elections and the international attention and praise that accrued to PBS and stations following the blockbuster Masterpiece Classic hit Downton Abbey.
  • Burns to produce cancer doc for public TV

    Documentary filmmaker Ken Burns is adapting a book about cancer into a six-hour series for public TV, reports the New York Times. The project was originally conceived by Sharon Rockefeller, CEO of WETA in Washington, D.C., who read Siddhartha Mukherjee’s The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer in late 2010. Rockefeller herself had been treated for advanced cancer. The broadcast will coincide with an outreach campaign.
  • Aereo reveals plan to add Atlanta as third market

    Aereo, the over-the-air TV streaming service that broadcasters have gone to federal court to block, plans to expand into Atlanta, its third major market, next month. The move into Atlanta is to take effect June 17. Aereo’s launch in Boston is scheduled for May 15. In March 2012, Aereo began offering  daily, monthly or annual subscriptions to television viewers in New York. It uses dime-sized antennas to capture broadcast signals and convert them into streaming video distributed over the Internet. Subscribers “rent” the antennas and have the option to watch television programming live or on demand via a device similar to a digital video recorder.
  • Upstate N.Y. pubradio outlet goes silent

    The newest public radio station in New York State went dark May 9, ending a six-year attempt to bring a local voice to small Otsego County.
  • KCSM owner leaning toward selling station to spectrum speculator

    San Mateo County Community College District Chancellor is recommending that the district’s pubTV station, KCSM, be sold to a spectrum speculator owned by private equity firm The Blackstone Group. Mark Albertson, who covers technology in the San Francisco area for Examiner.com, reported Monday that Ron Galatolo,  chancellor of the college, had chosen LocusPoint out of the four bidders for the station. Other interested buyers include: Public TV Financing, an arm of Independent Public Media, a nonprofit working to preserve noncommercial spectrum; KMTP-TV, a multicultural independent public TV  station licensed to Minority Television Project Inc. in San Francisco; and the Oriental Culture and Media Center of Southern California, a nonprofit promoting communication among different cultures.
  • WBUR announces newsroom changes

    Boston NPR station WBUR announced May 10 two leadership changes in its newsroom. Richard Chacón will fill the newly created position of executive director of news content, while Tom Melville has moved to news director from the role of executive editor of content. Chacón was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University and an Ethics Fellow at The Poynter Institute. He will start at WBUR June 10. Prior to joining WBUR in 2011, Melville was news director at New England Cable News. Melville changed roles May 10. “As the media landscape continues to evolve, WBUR is thrilled to have a team in place that will serve our on-air and online audiences with distinction,” said Charlie Kravetz, general manager, WBUR, in a statement.
  • CPTV's mobile venture to share revenues with PTV outlets

    Connecticut Public Television has joined with a digital media company in rolling out a new mobile platform that will offer digital downloads of children’s programs.
  • NPR, WLRN team up to expand reporting on Latin America

    NPR and Miami’s WLRN are collaborating to boost coverage of Latin America, with NPR’s Lourdes Garcia-Navarro assigned to a new foreign desk in São Paulo. In addition to Garcia-Navarro, the team of journalists includes Tim Padgett, a longtime reporter on Latin America and the Caribbean who previously wrote for Time and Newsweek and recently joined WLRN. Padgett’s primary task will be to coordinate coverage from Miami. Four reporters on the staff of the Miami Herald and its sister Spanish-language publication, El Nuevo Herald, will also contribute. WLRN and the Herald have collaborated on news coverage for a decade. The expansion positions NPR and WLRN to report on a country that has grown as a global superpower in recent years, said Edith Chapin, senior supervising editor of NPR’s foreign desk.