Lefty TV talker Keith Olbermann announced last month that PBS documentarian Ken Burns would be a “key contributor” and “regular part” of Olbermann’s new show on Current TV — which surprised Baltimore Sun TV writer David Zurawik. “Yes, I was surprised, too,” Burns told Zurawik in a column today (June 14). “I appeared on Countdown a lot. And he’s been a friend for a long time. And when he moved [to Current TV], I said, ‘Oh, I’ll come and do it [the new show]’. And I think that’s what it is.” However, Burns said, he refused to accept a salary as a regular contributor.

David Fanning, executive producer of Frontline, raised his concerns about public broadcasting on-air fundraising while accepting Quinnipiac University’s Fred Friendly First Amendment Award on Tuesday (June 14). An excerpt: “Where once stations were lead by broadcasters and educators who believed deeply in the mission of public broadcasting, now as money gets tighter a new generation of leaders comes in, brought in by worried board members who almost inevitably turn to the person in charge of fundraising to help manage the station. “With that comes programming choices that are safer, and the pursuit of audience for the sake of audience, and membership for the dollars.

In 2011, as partisan critics attacked NPR, Frontline chief David Fanning urged public media to specialize in strong journalism. Fanning, who was accepting Quinnipiac University's annual Fred Friendly First Amendment Award, quoted the famed CBS News producer: public TV's "most precious right will be the right to rock the boat."

NPR, Vermont Public Radio, and Austin’s KUT led public radio news outlets in National Edward R. Murrow Awards announced today by the Radio and Television Digital News Association. NPR won Murrows in four categories of the radio network/syndication division; VPR bested small-market radio stations in three categories; and, KUT won two trophies in the competition among large-market stations. Four additional pubradio outlets — Michigan Radio; KUNC in Greeley, Colo.; WSHU in Fairfield, Conn.; and WITF in Harrisburg, Pa. — won Murrows in news reporting categories. WBUR.org, a leading pubradio website published by Boston’s WBUR, took the national Murrow for news websites in the large-market radio division.

The websites for PBS and NPR took home several Webbys from the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences at ceremonies Monday night (June 13) in New York City. PBS.org won a People’s Voice for charitable/nonprofit orgs, and NPR.org scored both People’s Voice and Webby for news. NPR News’ “Election 2010: It’s All Politics” received a People’s Voice for politics. And in podcasts, NPR was a double winner again. Here’s a full list.

Media analyst Jessica Clark says that consensus on the “Information Needs of Communities” report from the Federal Communications Commission seems to be, the diagnosis is sound but remedies are lacking. Clark writes on MediaShift that the report makes a clear case that local reporting is dying — “yet, bafflingly … stops short of offering bold solutions.” She notes that in a statement in reaction to the report, Commissioner Michael Copps also observed that “the policy recommendations … don’t track the diagnosis.” She also compiled reactions to the report in the news using Storify. (Editor’s note: Clark is a senior fellow at American University’s School of Communication, which acquired Current in January.)

For 40 years New Jersey has justified having its own public broadcasting network by pointing to the limited reporting on its area by the Philadelphia and New York media. Now the state is moving to dismantle the New Jersey Network and entrust that reporting and its broadcast channels to public TV and radio stations in those two adjoining cities. The state has notified the NJN staff of about 120 that their jobs will disappear at the end of June, and observers doubt that a majority of the legislature will stop the process for more discussion as it did last summer. Republican Gov.

Ira Glass didn’t know what he was in for when he walked into the post office in the seaside burg of Brunswick, Ga., and asked the first person he met to name the most interesting character in town. Glass and his This American Life production team had given themselves a special assignment: to collect the best stories they could stumble upon far off the beaten path of their day-to-day reporting routines. They followed the standard operating procedure of the Atlanta Journal’s “Georgia Rambler” columnist Charles Salter, who researched more than 500 columns in the late 1970s by roving around small towns of the Peach State in a company car.

Software vulnerabilities, including an outdated operating system used by PBS.org, allowed the pirate band of hackers LulzSec to sail deep into the innards of the network’s main website over Memorial Day weekend. The marauders were retaliating for a Frontline documentary about WikiLeaks broadcast five days earlier. The hackers gave their assault a playful air, invading PBS NewsHour’s site and briefly posting a false report that the late rappers Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls were actually hanging out in New Zealand. Techs at PBS.org and at the NewsHour spent hours regaining control as the cyberattack exposed contact information for hundreds of staffers, stations, producers and press, as well as several internal PBS databases.

The board of trustees at Daytona State College could vote to drop PBS programming from affiliate WDSC at its Thursday (June 16) meeting. Interim president Frank Lombardo told the Daytona Beach, Fla., News-Journal that the school contributes about $700,000 to the overall operation of the station, including non-PBS programming. “We just can’t afford to do it,” he said. “There is limited money. We have to make sure the academic side, the classrooms and teaching and learning functions at the college are supported.” The trustees are voting on the fiscal 2012 budget, which begins July 1. They may use the channel to run government programming and lease parts of its spectrum.

The licensee for KCSM-TV is preparing to sell the California public broadcasting station. The board of the San Mateo County Community College District on Wednesday (June 8) “directed staff to prepare putting KCSM on the market,” according to the San Jose Mercury News. The board cited the station’s projected $800,000 structural deficit. “I’m disappointed,” KCSM General Manager Marilyn Lawrence said. “The station has been a legacy to the college. It’ll be a great loss to the community.” The television station already has drawn interest from four possible buyers and could sell for around $5 million, Lawrence said. 

Tom and Ray Magliozzi of Car Talk got out of the garage and headed for the Charles River for WBUR’s annual Spring Festival at the Community Rowing Inc. boathouse in Boston on June 5. The two, known on the air as Click and Clack the Tappet Brothers, turned up as boat captains; above, Capt. (Ray) Clack signs autographs. Some 1,000 fans turned out to meet the Car Talk guys and other WBUR celebs such as On Point’s Tom Ashbrook. The boathouse set a record for the day, teaching more than 500 persons how to row. (Image: WBUR)

Orlando’s WMFE-TV this week said in comments to the Federal Communications Commission that a delay in its sale to religious broadcaster Daystar “would be devastating,” and that its “cash reserves are limited and most have already been consumed” to keep the pubTV station running over the past few months, reports the Orlando Sentinel. The FCC has received 525 objections to the impending sale. Read WMFE-TV’s “Opposition to Informal Objections” here (PDF).

Maine Public Broadcasting Network got very good news late Thursday (June 9) when the state legislature’s Appropriations and Financial Affairs Committee voted unanimously to provide the pubcasters with $1.95 million for fiscal 2012, which Gov. Paul LePage (R) proposed eliminating. The committee also recommended a slightly reduced total, $1.75 million, for FY13. “It has been truly gratifying to see the support from so many of you who believe in MPBN’s contribution to the very fabric of all of Maine,” said Jim Dowe, network president, in a letter to supporters on MPBN’s website. “Your many and diverse voices were heard loud and clear in Augusta!

As in Houston, a student station in Nashville will move from broadcast to the Web, and the local pubradio station has doubled its over-the-air capacity, moving to separate news and classical channels. Vanderbilt University’s campus media group, majority-controlled by students, opted to receive $3.35 million, selling its 91.1 MHz channel to Nashville Public Radio, the Tennessean reported. The buyer will be able to go all-news with WPLN and play music on the acquired frequency, resolving a conflict that has pained the mixed-format station, General Manager Rob Gordon told the Tennesseean: “We’d have people call in and say, ‘It’s Saturday afternoon, I was wondering if Mubarak had resigned, and I turn on WPLN and you’re playing opera.’”