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Ruth Seymour, General Manager for KCRW, reacts to NPR’s Blueprint for Growth (download the 12-page Blueprint pdf here).

reposted with permission

“New Realities” : Drinking the KoolAid
A Dissident Viewpoint

Wading through the 12-page Blueprint for Growth, I am struck by the lack of focus on the reason people listen to your station and mine: it’s the programs.

According to Blueprint (p. 10): “…we need to curate and provide tools that enable individuals to engage in making the world a better place.”

This is the kiss of death for a news organization whose responsibility it is to report the facts on the ground, whether they make the world a better place or not.

Culture is created by artists driven by both demonic as well as angelic forces. When the impetus to create is driven by message, it’s called propaganda.

A quote by a Hugh MacLeod, cited in Blueprint (p. 5) is even more alarming. It states in part: “The market for something to believe in is infinite…. It’s not about merit, it’s about faith…”

Is this the philosophy that informs the “New Realities”? Since when have we joined the “human potential” movement?

It is certainly true that the revolution in technology has brought a seismic shift in the options for news, music and entertainment. The need now is to base our decisions on the current realities of the media marketplace.

The dangers of making the wrong kind of decision for your station can result in the loss of your station identity– perhaps by having it subsumed by NPR.

NPR has found a successful business plan, modeled on underwriting returns from its podcast initiative. An aggregation of all public radio content under one roof may diminish the ability of your station to attract an audience to its own website. Is this in your station’s best interest?

It may be. It depends on your resources. Think it over. You can partner with others — with community groups, with service providers, with other content providers. You have alternatives to consider before making a decision. You may want to sign on to one aspect of Blueprint, but not another.

Choose the best option for your station. Not for the group. Not for some amorphous ideology whose premise is questionable to begin with.

“Public radio,” as such, will probably mean less to listeners in a digital age – but programs will matter even more. Content is king, regardless of the platform.

The line between commercial and non-commercial has already been blurred all over the Internet.

The primary distributor of public radio’s podcasts is iTunes, a website designed to sell a commercial piece of hardware – the iPod. iTunes distributes more public radio podcasts, even of NPR’s own programs, than NPR does. iTunes also introduces a new audience to our programs, an audience that is broader, more diverse, younger, more international than one that we have been able to reach.

The business of the Internet is advertising. Online simulcasting, on-demand streaming, podcasts – they all offer underwriting opportunities for making your station money. So do banners and skyscrapers. Will your development staff be inhibited by a centrally-controlled sales and distribution division?

Weigh the options. Choose a model that can yield your station the greatest return.

Competition is not necessarily bad. Competition can be the stimulus that makes a station improve its performance by paying more attention to how it operates and how it sounds. It can lead to enterprising initiatives, new program ideas and entrepreneurial ventures.

A collaborative structure may work for some projects, but not others. Moreover — premising system growth on the belief that a central communal-type public radio system will increase listeners or dollars to your station is unproven. In fact, it’s counter-intuitive.

Make your decisions on the basis of self-interest, not on the basis of some supposed “greater good.”

Follow Ronald Reagan’s dictum: “Trust but verify.”

Find out how the pie is divided. Do you get a piece or just the crumbs?

Do your homework. Don’t drink the Kool-Aid.

Ruth Seymour: KCRW