We know how boring this is, but it's about keeping the best talk radio station in Seattle on the air.
We speak of course of National Public Radio affiliate KUOW, "Nearly 95" at 94.9 FM. It's their Fall pledge drive and you need to call 'em up and give 'em some dough.
Make an on-line pledge here and get the Steve Scher "Sexy-sexy Man Work-out Video;" or the Ross Reynolds, 'Who moved my doughnut?' coffee mug, or the Marci Sillman nude answering machine greeting as free gifts with your donation.
Remember KUOW is a place where you'll never suffer a Bryan Styble, a Frank Shiers, or a Dori Monson. You'll never grit your teeth over Bryan Suits talking about man-boobs; or hear about The Invisible Fence, The Hide-A-Hose or Catlin Capitol; Laura Kiel never speaks- or sings! on NPR.
But if don't pay now, you must continue to listen to local NPR talkers motor-mouthing and doing the bucks & wing until you do.
NPR doesn't have traditional advertising, so it depends on the kindness of corporations (30 percent), and foundations (12 percent) but nearly half of its operating budget comes from member stations based on formulas tied to their listenership and dredged up on these semi-annual pledge drives.
(Contrary to the crap you hear on right-wing radio, no more than 2% of NPR's budget comes from federal grants. This has insulated it from Republican attacks on programming.)
In 2003, Joan Kroc, (widow of Hamburglar Ray of MacDonald's) bequeathed NPR $230 million- an amount so generous to the constantly panhandling national non-profit, the interest alone has paid for a large expansion in the newsroom- nearly 70 jobs- while other news organizations are cutting back across the board.
NPR is a great continent of hope for the future of real scratch journalism in an age when marketers and bean-counters are either drying up newsrooms or pushing them around.
(After the Kroc gift, you might ask, why do we have to give at these infernal pledge drives? Because half the operating budget is raised from listeners, that's why- so get out your damn wallet! Besides, the sooner you do it, the sooner they'll shut up and we can all get back to All Things Considered, Vaughn Palmer, and BC fish farm budgets).
In the last 10 years, NPR listenership has increased impressively- going from 12.5 million to 25 million listeners tuning in at least once a week according to Arbitron. And since nearly half of its budget comes from member stations based on listenership, total revenue has taken off- from $74 million in 1998 to $140 million this year.
KUOW is the most listened-to talk in Seattle and would come in 2nd or 3rd in the market if it were measured like a commercial station in the Arbitron surveys. According to recent reports, NPR's ratings will soon be reported with the commercial stations in Arbitron books. This will help put public radio in a persepctive of its popularity
And remember, righties: NPR is Michael Medved's favorite news source.
As liberal, socialist, commie, deadbeat elites, we love to see non-commercial, listener-supported broadcast media working so well within the free enterprise system while airing stuff they know will not get them a fraction of a scintilla of a ratings point. (like BBC sports, the most soporific half hour you'll ever spend short of 5 minutes listening to Rabbi Lapin).
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