“For our target audience, entertainment is the gateway drug to news,” said Nicole Childers of L.A. Public Media (LAPM) when she unveiled LAForward, the first content offering of Radio Bilingue’s service for a new generation of young adults in Los Angeles. Childers, chief content officer of the CPB-backed start-up, presented the website and the research that informed its design Sept. 24 during a session at Public Radio Program Directors conference in Denver. The multimedia website launched Sept. 16 with coverage of news, entertainment and sports–key topics defined during seven months of research led by Paragon Media Strategies. Short-form video is key to reaching young Angelenos, Childers said, and she screened several that reflected the balance her editorial team is trying to strike between cultural relevance, news that directly impacts the lives of young Latinos, and passion for sports.

Do you feel caught in the kudzu of the public media 2.0 ecosystem as entities network and proliferate? Check out “A Guide to Rising Public Media Networks in the U.S.,” courtesy of Jessica Clark at the Center for Media, via the MediaShift blog.

The Library of Congress is turning over to the British Film Institute more than 68 rare recordings from 1957 to 1969 that were discovered in the Library’s National Educational Television Collection, reports the Government Video website. NET was the forerunner to PBS. PBS had donated its film and video holdings, some 20,000 reels, to the library through WNET/Thirteen in New York. For many years, NET imported a host of British teleplays and comedies — still popular on PBS today. One gem that is typical of the collection: Maggie Smith and Robert Stephens in “Much Ado About Nothing,” stage-directed by Franco Zeffirelli, from 1967.

The Public Radio Satellite System has updated its “Public Radio Resource Guide,” listing everything from technology and equipment services to training, funding and underwriting, membership organizations and conferences. “There is an overwhelming volume of information online of interest to the public radio community,” Pete Loewenstein, NPR v.p. for distribution, said on the Radio World website. “Our new guide is an effort to put some of this information in a format that’s easier for stations and producers to access.” And it’s free.

 The Sept. 27 launch of Dot Diva, a new initiative co-sponsored by WGBH to get young Massachusetts women interested in computing, is already sold out. The kickoff will be at the Microsoft New England Research & Development Center in Cambridge and feature an interactive fashion show, tech music demos, an “Artbotics” art installation and local college fair. It’s funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to increase the number of college-bound girls studying for a career in computer science. Women are still underrepresented in the field, according to WGBH. The station, along with co-sponsors ACM (the Association for Computing Machinery), NCWIT (the National Center for Women & Information Technology), conducted a national online survey of more than 1,400 college-bound high school students, ages 13-17; that research indicated a significant gender gap in attitudes toward computer science.

Grab your guitars, the NETA Nashville 2011 conference registration is now officially open. Once you’ve registered for the January event you can visit the confab’s Facebook page. Not sure what that means? Then you’d better stop by the conference Social Media Help Desk while you’re at the Loews Vanderbilt Hotel. That’s a new kiosk that will be “staffed by friendly experts in the use of Facebook, Twitter, texting and all sorts of handheld devices, ready with advice or a helping hand.”

Angela Lansbury, Jimmy Fallon, Brian Williams and Joel Grey are among celebrities set to appear on At the Paley Center, a new interview series produced by a partnership of Paley Center for Media and WNET.org’s Creative News Group, the two announced Wednesday (Sept. 22). Hosted by Pat Mitchell, president of the Paley Center and past president of PBS, returns to the network as host. Each half-hour program in the six-part series features a conversation with someone who has made a significant contribution to media, particularly television. First up is actor/activist Ted Danson on Oct. 1 (above, with Mitchell; image: Michael Priest Photography).

NPR’s Robert Siegel, senior host of All Things Considered, will receive the 2010 John Chancellor Award for Excellence in Journalism, Columbia University announced today (Sept. 23). Siegel was chosen “in recognition of his extraordinary career at NPR where he has engaged millions of listeners with journalistic rigor and professionalism for more than 30 years,” the announcement said. A nine-member committee selected Siegel for the award, which comes with a $25,000 prize. The honor will be presented Nov. 6 at a dinner at Columbia University’s Low Library in New York.

“The Grace of Silence,” the new book by All Things Considered host Michele Norris, reveals painful parts of her family history, reports the Christian Science Monitor. While researching her ancestors, she discovered that soon after her father came back home to Alabama after World War II, he was grazed by a policeman’s bullet. Norris said the title refers to her father’s attitude after that incident. “He was part of a generation of black men and black veterans who were marginalized in the military and society and had every reason to be angry. It was easy to see how they’d become malcontents and grouse their way to their end of their lives.

PBS NewsHour’s Jim Lehrer spoke on a panel Wednesday (Sept. 22) addressing “The Death of Old News” at the University of Nevada Las Vegas, reports the Las Vegas Sun. Lerher talked about how the program is partnering with news websites including ProPublica, GlobalPost and NPR to reach a broader audience.“I couldn’t care less if someone is watching the program on their pink iPod, just as long as they are watching,” Lerher said. The event was sponsored by the Black Mountain Institute, a center for writers and scholars at the university.

Katy Perry’s snug-fitting gold bustier proved a bit much for her appearance on Sesame Street. Her “Hot & Cold” music video with Elmo has been pulled from an upcoming show, Us magazine reports. Sesame Workshop told the gossip mag that the decision was made following “feedback we’ve received” after the video went up on YouTube. It’s since been removed from Sesame’s YouTube channel, but is still available through Perry’s channel. (Oh and by the way: Look closely and you’ll see there’s flesh-colored netting up to Perry’s neck topped by a dainty bow.) The pop singer debuts on Sesame Street on Dec.

Starting Oct. 4, West Virginia students get help with their homework for free, says the Register-Herald in Beckley, W.V. The Homework Hotline show, approaching its 20th year, airs Mondays through Thursdays on West Virginia Public Broadcasting. It started out by offering assistance to students while the show was on the air. Now, teachers often later correspond with the kids by e-mail or phone to ensure everyone gets help. “The teachers that work with the show are very dedicated,” said Dennis Adkins, executive director of West Virginia Public Broadcasting. “They stay and answer questions long after the cameras are turned off.”

The Republican candidate for Lucas County (Ohio) auditor on Wednesday (Sept. 22) accused Toledo’s WGTE-TV/Channel 30 of favoring the Democratic incumbent, according to the Toledo Blade. Gina Marie Kaczala said she was told by a WGTE production assistant that part of her two-minute campaign speech for broadcast was “inappropriate.” Kaczala later discovered that the assistant’s brother-in-law is on the staff of the incumbent, Anita Long. Marlon Kiser, president WGTE, denied Kaczala’s charges. He said that part of her speech was negative, and the station does not allow attack statements in its candidate statement segments. Kiser told the paper that a station attorney who specializes in Federal Communications Commission regulations advised him to allow Kaczala to read the speech, which she did.

A seven-minute video of a free-climbing tower technician “has the broadcast engineering community abuzz,” says the TV Broadcast website. Free climbing “meaning no safety lines are used,” the narrator says. “It’s easier, faster, and most tower workers climb this way. . . . Free climbing is dangerous, of course, but OSHA rules do allow for it.” But a source in the story says the Occupational Safety and Health Administration does not consider free climbing an acceptable technique. In the video, an engineer takes an elevator to 1,600 feet, then free climbs the rest of the way to the top of the 1,768-foot TV tower.

University of Minnesota Vice President Karen Himle, who pulled the plug on a documentary that was to run on Twin Cities Public Television in October, is being asked to resign by a sustainable agriculture advocacy organization, according to the local Star-Tribune. Himle canceled the broadcast of “Troubled Waters: A Mississippi River Story,” which was produced by the university. The paper reported that Himle is married to John Himle, c.e.o. of Himle Horner Inc., a PR firm that represents the Minnesota Agri-Growth Council, an agribusiness advocacy association; he denied any role in the cancellation. The Land Stewardship Project is calling for her to step down.