Programs/Content

OPB asks WNET for “assurance” that funder didn’t influence Pension Peril

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Oregon Public Broadcasting has asked New York’s WNET to demonstrate that no “improper influence” was exerted by the primary funder of its special news series covering public pensions. OPB said in a Feb. 13 statement that it is “seeking assurance from WNET” that its Pension Peril series was not subject to improper editorial influence. In a PandoDaily article published earlier this week, reporter and columnist David Sirota called attention to a major funder of the series, the Laura and John Arnold Foundation. According to Sirota, co-founder John Arnold has supported political efforts to reduce retirement benefits for public employees. Sirota argued that Arnold’s support for the WNET production calls its impartiality into question.

Quick Takes

Friday roundup: This American Doodle, troubles at KCETLink

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• Nothing spells love quite like This American Life. For a Valentine’s Day Doodle, Google has enlisted the Public Radio International program to present five love-themed stories from the series, complete with animations. Host Ira Glass provides an introduction. Time has a behind-the-scenes video of how the Doodle came together. • Veteran pubcasting exec Chet Tomczyk, currently managing Illinois stations WTVP-TV in Peoria and dual licensee WILL in Urbana in a unique agreement, announced yesterday that he is retiring, although he hasn’t set a date. Tomczyk has worked in the system for nearly 50 years, beginning in 1965 as associate producer of The Week in Michigan, a weekly travel and outdoor show produced at WKAR-FM in East Lansing, Mich.

Quick Takes

WNET responds to report on funding for pension series

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New York’s WNET issued a statement responding to a PandoDaily article that scrutinized funding for its topical reporting series, The Pension Peril.  In the article, published Wednesday, reporter and columnist David Sirota argued that the WNET production was ethically tainted by undisclosed funding provided by the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, which has a political agenda promoting public pension reform, the topic examined in its series. WNET rebutted Sirota’s criticism that it sought to obscure the funding relationship. The Arnold Foundation’s support for the series was “clearly disclosed” on the PBS NewsHour Weekend broadcasts that have featured the Pension Peril segments, according to the station’s Feb. 12 statement. WNET also posted a compilation of opening credits to the three broadcasts, each of which mentioned the Arnold Foundation without directly linking it to the Pension Peril segments.

Quick Takes

Thursday roundup: Flappy Bert takes to the air, WAMU host skis to work

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• Less than a week after the maker of the wildly popular mobile game Flappy Bird announced he would pull the plug on his creation, Sesame Workshop has introduced the browser game Flappy Bert. The gameplay, where players control a bird as it navigates Sesame Street’s Bert among obstacles, draws heavily on the original. It’s one of several Flappy Bird clones on the market but the only one starring Bert in an 8-bit sheen. • Today marks the premiere of a series of web video specials co-produced by PBS NewsHour and Al-Monitor, a news site featuring reporting and analysis by journalists and experts from the Middle East. The first, posting at 7 p.m. Eastern time, focuses on Syria.

Programs/Content

PandoDaily article questions funding of WNET pension series

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Charges that a public TV reporting initiative about pensions is ethically compromised by its funding sources led to a fiery exchange today between the funder in question and reporter and columnist David Sirota, who leveled the claims in an article for the Silicon Valley news site PandoDaily. Sirota pointed out in his story that The Pension Peril, a two-year reporting initiative produced by New York’s WNET, receives most of its funding from the Laura and John Arnold Foundation. Co-founder John Arnold, a hedge-fund manager and former trader for Enron, has contributed to political campaigns urging state lawmakers to reduce pension benefits for public employees, according to Sirota. WNET largely neglects to disclose the relationship, Sirota wrote, though he did turn up a reference on a Pension Peril report’s web page. According to WNET, The Pension Peril has so far delivered reports for two shows that it produces: PBS NewsHour Weekend, which PBS distributes nationally, and Long Island Business Report, which airs on WNET’s Long Island outlet. The reporting project examines “the deficit in funding for public employees’ retirement benefits,” according to a news release from the station.

Quick Takes

PBS names Betsy Gerdeman senior VP of development

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Betsy Gerdeman, former senior v.p. of development at KLRU-TV in Austin, Texas, has been named PBS’s senior v.p. of development services. She replaces John Wilson, a veteran PBS program executive who resigned Jan. 3. PBS President Paula Kerger announced the hiring Wednesday. “For much of the last 20 years, I have considered public television my home and its employees my family,” Gerdeman said in a statement.

Quick Takes

APTS chief rebuts FCC chairman on technical limits of channel-sharing

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In an exchange with FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, public television’s top lobbyist sought to dial back expectations for channel-sharing pilot tests involving KLCS-TV in Los Angeles. Patrick Butler, president of the Association of Public Television Stations, responded to a blog post in which Wheeler enthusiastically described the experiment as mapping a “future” of broadcasting in which TV stations use “50 percent less bandwidth to produce a picture with increased quality of up to 300 percent.” “We appreciate Chairman Wheeler’s enthusiasm about the channel-sharing pilot in Los Angeles, and we were honored to have him visit public television station KLCS, where the pilot is being conducted,” Butler wrote in a Feb. 12 statement issued by APTS. “But we should be clear that this pilot is not intended to prove that all broadcasters can get by with half the spectrum they’re currently using.

Programs/Content

KLRU beefs up BBQ With Franklin

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After letting their BBQ grillmaster marinate on YouTube, Austin’s KLRU is taking him to TV. The station will produce the 10-episode series BBQ With Franklin for national pubTV distribution in early 2015, based on a popular series of YouTube videos featuring Austin BBQ legend Aaron Franklin. The YouTube series, launched in 2012 with support in part from crowdfunding and PBS Digital Studios, has racked up more than one million viewers. While the YouTube series is mostly instructional in nature, the TV show will follow Franklin as he travels around central Texas learning about BBQ history and culture. KLRU will continue to produce new web-exclusive episodes concurrently with the broadcast series.

Quick Takes

Morning roundup: SCOTUS sets Aereo date, Burns gets GIF’d

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• The U.S. Supreme Court has set a date for ABC TV v. Aereo, a challenge to the startup service that allows subscribers to watch TV programs over the Internet via miniature antennae. Oral arguments are scheduled for April 21. Though ABC brought the lawsuit, filed in New York and Boston, PBS and New York’s WNET are also among the parties claiming Aereo violates copyright law. • Ken Burns participated in his first Reddit Ask Me Anything session Tuesday as part of the promotion for his new app. He laid out the planned release schedule for his next decade of films: The Roosevelts in September, A History of Cancer: The Emperor of All Maladies and Jackie Robinson  in 2015, Vietnam in 2016, Country Music in 2018 and Ernest Hemingway in 2019.