“Despite Beyond the Color Line‘s scholarly pedigree and A-list interviewees, it too often falls victim to that bland, earnest tone that dogs the PBS documentary.” Slate reviews Henry Louis Gates’ new PBS series on divisions within the African American community.

WGBH is negotiating with Boston city authorities for permission to cover part of its new headquarters with a”digital skin” of electronic images overlooking the Massachusetts Turnpike, the Boston Globe says. ‘GBH promises to be classy but the city fears others might not be. [Earlier article on WGBH’s new home.]

Billy Tauzin, the Louisiana congressman who oversees broadcasting and CPB as House Commerce chairman, announced his retirement from the committee effective Feb. 16 and from Congress after this term, the Washington Post reported. Rep. Joe Barton (R-Tex.) is expected to succeed Tauzin as chair, the Post said. In 2002 Barton named himself as “one of the skeptics about the need for public broadcasting today.” Tauzin is expected to take the top drug-industry lobbying job. Public Citizen called for an ethics investigation because Tauzin had was a leader in negotiating the Medicare drug bill.

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation gave the Public Radio Exchange a $350,000 grant.

GuideStar, the data source about nonprofits, lists numerous Internet mailing lists (listservs) and newsgroups about charities and fundraising.

The Bush administration proposes to crack down on taxpayers’ valuations of cars donated to charities and other non-cash gifts, but will also would decrease tax revenue by giving limited charitable deductions to the majority of taxpayers who don’t itemize deductions.

“An election this week will determine whether a generation of young people in this region will grow up hearing America’s most important musical heritage or a steady diet of political propaganda,” writes the Washington Post‘s Marc Fisher about the upcoming board election for WPFW, the Washington Pacifica station. A Columbia Spectator article touches on the politics of elections at New York’s WBAI-FM, another Pacifica station.

In its FY05 budget, the Bush White House again chose not to propose an advance appropriation for CPB [PDF file], leaving the FY07 question for Congress to handle. Congress already has allotted $400 mil for FY06. The budget also tries again to terminate PTFP grants for facilities, but it proposes to plump the NEA budget by $18 mil and NEH by $37 mil for major initiatives on “American Masterpieces” and American history (“We the People”). The budget maintains Ready to Learn TV at its $23 mil level, but zeroes out Ready to Teach and Star Schools funding.

The g.m. of Antioch University’s WYSO in Yellow Springs, Ohio, Steve Spencer, resigned Friday, the Dayton Daily News reported. The bitter battle between Spencer and local activists [Keep WYSO Local] echoes the national campaign that deposed Pacifica Radio’s national leaders.

“I love the BBC and I am resigning because I want to protect it.” Andrew Gilligan, the journalist whose reporting sparked a battle over the BBC’s independence, resigned today.

“And now the second invasion of the Iraq war proceeds: the conquest of the British Broadcasting Corporation.” Investigative journalist Greg Palast writes that the Blair government’s attack on the BBC “portends darkness for journalists everywhere.”

WGBH has added Sesame Street to the portfolio of children’s programs it reps for national underwriting. WGBH’s Sponsorship Group for Public Television also seeks backing for Barney & Friends and Angelina Ballerina as well as the station’s own Arthur, Zoom and Between the Lions.

Anne Wood, creator of Teletubbies and now Boohbah always chooses “to go with the mind of a child and what the child needs” says PBS’s John Wilson in a Los Angeles Times interview. Wilson says that can lead to the “I don’t get it factor” with grownups. “But all you have to do is watch it with your own child a few times and you see that they do get it.”

As the crisis over the BBC deepened today, General Director Greg Dyke resigned. “I’ve sadly come to the conclusion that it will be hard to draw a line under this whole affair while I am still here,” he wrote in an e-mail to staff. Media analysts cautioned that the BBC’s editorial independence is in jeopardy in the Guardian.

A senior British judge criticized the BBC for its controversial report alleging that Prime Minister Tony Blair’s government “sexed up” its intelligence dossier on Iraqi weapons. BBC Director General Greg Dyke apologized for mistakes in the radio report, and BBC Chairman Gavyn Davies resigned. Reuters reports on the fallout. The Guardian breaks it all down into digestible bits in a special report.