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The U.S. public wants more news coverage of climate change, surveys find

As hurricanes, floods, wildfires, and heat waves have intensified over the past decade, public concern about climate change has grown dramatically. Today, 65% of the U.S. public is worried about the issue, up from 52% a decade ago, according to nationally representative surveys conducted by scientists at Yale University and George Mason University.

Quick Takes

Wednesday roundup: Pew releases annual media report, advocacy group protests renewal of WGBH license

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• NPR’s monthly listenership hit an eight-year high in 2013 with an average of 27.3 million listeners each month, according to the State of the News Media study from the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism, released Wednesday. NPR’s average monthly audience was up from 26 million in 2012. On public television, the weeknight broadcast audience for PBS NewsHour continued to slide, dropping 3 percent from 2012 to an average of 947,000 viewers. The average audience in 2012 was 977,000, down 8 percent from 2011, when the average audience was 1.06 million viewers. The Pew study also found that while legacy media, especially newspapers, continued to provide the bulk of content, audience for online news outlets continued to grow at a brisk pace.

Quick Takes

Monday roundup: TAL squelches PRX rumors; NPR Books boosts New Directions sales

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• This American Life has yet to decide on a new distributor, contrary to Chicago media writer Bob Feder’s report over the weekend that the show would go to Public Radio Exchange. Feder posted a correction today with a statement from TAL host Ira Glass. TAL hasn’t even started negotiations, Glass said. “We’re about to begin a round of talking to possible distributors,” Glass told Feder. “There’s also the option of self-distribution, which is attractive.”

Quick Takes

NPR stream joins slate of content on Apple’s iTunes Radio

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NPR announced Monday that it has landed the first news-provider slot on Apple’s iTunes Radio. iTunes Radio, which is integrated into Apple’s iTunes software, now features a 24-hour stream of NPR content including national newscasts and stories from Morning Edition and All Things Considered. The stream will also carry other NPR news and cultural programming. NPR said that in the future, digital streams from NPR member stations will also appear on iTunes Radio. Update: Acting NPR CEO Paul Haaga said in a memo to station executives Monday that digital streams from NPR member stations can be added to iTunes Radio if stations switch stream formats to meet Apple’s requirements.

Programs/Content

After 17 years, PRI ending distribution of This American Life

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Public Radio International announced today that it will end distribution of one of its biggest titles, This American Life. The Minneapolis-based PRI has offered TAL to stations since 1997. “During our most recent negotiation, it became clear that our organizations’ expectations regarding our futures were different,” and PRI will stop distribution July 1, said Julia Yager, PRI’s head of sales, marketing and distribution, in an announcement. Yager told Current that negotiations concluded today and that PRI does not comment publicly on confidential contract discussions. In a statement posted on the TAL website, host Ira Glass said that “looking at where PRI is now pushing its business and where we’re growing — especially on the digital side of things, which we’ve always done without PRI — both we and our colleagues at PRI came to the same conclusion: to go our separate ways.”

Quick Takes

Thursday roundup: Ruiz gets Sundance fellowship, new Muppet helps kids stay clean

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• Filmmaker Bernardo Ruiz (The Graduates/Los Graduados, Reportero) has received the Time Warner Fellowship from the Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program to work on his latest doc, Recolectores (The Gatherers). As a fellow, Ruiz will get services from the institute including mentoring, grant assistance and attendance at its famous film festival. Joshua Oppenheimer (The Act of Killing) also got a production/post-production grant in this round of Sundance awards, which went to 35 filmmakers out of 750 applications from 93 countries. • Sesame Workshop is participating in this week’s annual Reinvent The Toilet Fair: India, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation event that showcases the latest in modern hygiene for developing nations. Making her debut at the fair is new Muppet Raya, who always wears her sandals to the latrine and washes her hands with soap.

Tech

WNYC’s new feature lets listeners create, download playlists

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New York Public Radio’s WNYC recently beefed up its mobile app with a personalization feature allowing users to generate playlists of news content that can be downloaded for listening on the subway or places where their phones go offline. The “Discover” feature of the WNYC mobile app lets listeners curate stories about topics that interest them — such as technology, pop culture or movies — into playlists of lengths ranging from 20 minutes to three hours long. The app pulls both local and national news stories, downloading batches of segments for later listening. The feature was designed to target the city’s subway riders, said Thomas Hjelm, chief digital officer at New York Public Radio. “It started with the thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if there was an app you could use for a 30-minute subway trip?’”, he said.

Quick Takes

Wednesday roundup: Cutting locks at Pacifica; concerns about repacking interference

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• A new round of unrest is brewing at Pacifica. Current reported last week on the radio network’s board voting to oust executive director Summer Reese and this week on Reese’s defiance of the vote. An LA Weekly feature offers more details, including Reese removing a padlock from the doors of the network’s offices with bolt cutters and reading Bible passages to staff. The article recaps the history of the network and includes comments from former employees of Pacifica’s KPFK in Los Angeles. It’s reminiscent of the Village Voice’s September feature on New York’s WBAI (the Voice Media Group owns both publications). • PBS, CPB and APTS have joined the National Association of Broadcasters and commercial networks to warn the FCC about potential interference between TVs and wireless devices after spectrum repacking.

People

After 18 years leading KCET, Al Jerome announces retirement

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Al Jerome, the broadcasting executive who led Los Angeles public television station KCET out of PBS membership and into a partnership with satellite network Link TV, is retiring within the next six months, KCETLink announced today. Jerome has served as president of KCET for 18 years and is only the third person to lead the organization in its 50-year history. He will stay on through September and assist in the search for his successor, the statement said. He joined KCET in February 1996 after a 30-year career in commercial broadcasting at NBC, CBC and ABC. During Jerome’s tenure the station won 69 Emmys, seven George Foster Peabody awards, five duPont-Columbia awards and the Edward R. Murrow Award.