rocky's blog

Ken Stern, chief NPR CEO and COO, has stepped down. "During his tenure, Ken was instrumental in improving NPR's financial health and for initiating important work extending NPR's reach to various new platforms including satellite and digital distribution," he said. "Under his watch, NPR News significantly increased the number of staff, foreign and domestic bureaus and areas of coverage." from Huffington Report.
And just why???? Being the money-maker for a broke NPR why is he leaving?

Along the lines of Lynn's post about FCC getting kicked in the pants. This time it is about "The Federal Communications Commissions (FCC) was bombarded today pleas to keep a tight reign on the upcoming 700 MHz spectrum auction to prevent phone and cable companies from expanding their grip on Internet access in the wireless realm."
Maybe it will be kicked in the pants #2. The FCC has been bribed and lobbied for a long time to grant the Internet to big Telecoms. With enough advocacy from consumers we might get the Internet for us.

http://www.freepress.net/news/23623

[changed the headli

Jack Bogdanski, curator of Jack's Bog Blog is thinking of giving up Portland's most important Political Blog. How sad, here we could get the low-down on the political beat way long before the media had any idea of what was happening. After 5 years Jack seems tired of his blog taking over his life, I suppose that does happen. This will be missed by me and many others. In this day of Non-enlightenment from media, this is a severe handi-cap. As I have been banned at Blue Oregon for seeing Democrats were not clothed, Jack allowed me to point out the failings of democrats as well as republicans. Jack has a fairness about his blog I will really miss.

I guess my question is: Has CBS abandoned broadcasting to KOIN TV? Sunday afternoon KOIN TV went from 3:30PM to 5:00PM with all paid programing, KATU TV had an hour also of paid programing . In a few months will these Bush-League network stations fall to the status of KPXG TV? I wonder if this only true to Portland?

So I'm a little slow to catch on.lol I just found OPB's Town Square a place for comments to a formal discussion of their choosing. Today the subject is
"Is Senator Smith Vulnerable? " The link is found at the bottom of their web page http://www.opb.org/
What I like, is that I do not have to give my "E" mail addy...I figured this would be away to spam me for donations, but not. How long before spammers hit them is anyone's guess, but till than I will enjoy.

If you follow my blogs you know I get most of my news from the Internet. Internet newspapers, Drudge local papers, both Alternative and legitimate, and of course Blogs.. This is really funny, and to their credit I don't think any local media jumped the gun. Politico.com had this: "Reporter Ben Smith attributed his report that the former senator was suspending his presidential campaign -- "and may drop out completely" -- to an 'Edwards friend.' Smith later apologized on his blog". This was done 1 hour before John Edwards made the announcement he was staying in the race for presidency. What will be done for fleeting fame and glory?

Portland Public Schools running a PPR news agency? Of course, I wish Wilie Weak would have been more explicit on which media were DUM enough to run these articles free of charge. One of the spokesman with PPS, was a ex-newsman from a local TV station, and I always thought he was hired because of his influence rather than a need for his PR work. If someone is on the budget committee of PPS, maybe seeing how much is buried for PR work would be nice to know. It ain't easy, I know, I served on a budget committee for years and those things can be found in the darnedest places. Hiring a Free-Lance writer, as Arte Johnson would have said, Verrrry Interesting.

The rodent network is now blending and blurring 1/2 hour sit-com with advertising. Consider this with Info-news releases in news programs and the possibilities of 24/7 advertisements in endless. Prime time can be Geico followed by a soap with a pharmaceutical blending and than onto a sports event that is fixed so the Gillette man wins, than to the 11:00 pm newscast about better Dell computers, home buying and selling, and stock market secrets for becoming a millionaire all done in the scope of news.. etc.etc.Scrip writers and journalists no longer needed. Just everything out of Madsen Ave will do.

60 minutes and PBS tried to blame the Internet for the falling of newspapers in this country. Los Angeles Times was the subject of this discussion on last "Frontline" broadcast. Not true according to this Mother Jones article.

Senator Boxer pinned Kevin Martin, new FCC chairman, and made him appear foolish with report from FCC, published 2 years ago, that Powell had buried from daylight. As we all know, except the FCC, that mega newspapers and TV networks are not the best for public interest. A long but great read.

[Edited title for precision, story for url.--L]

" 8 Channels and nuthin' goin on", is the theme of today's Big O's editorial. While not coming straight out in support of the challenge to the TV license renewals, the editorial does admit to lousy public interest features of the profit driven TV owners . The Big O seems more dissatisfied by election results than anything else. While this is true I find the TV stations could be much more resourceful in reporting more political going-on's, especially during legislature proceedings...if I remember right only one TV correspondent is in Salem during the session.