Curiouser and Curiouser

Submitted by rocky on Fri, 03/07/2008 - 11:07am.

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?

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NPR
Submitted by Anonymous Source (not verified) on Fri, 03/07/2008 - 1:58pm.

I thought the late Joan Kroc, wife of McDonald's founder Ray Kroc, left NPR $200 plus million dollars in her will. I can't imagine that NPR is broke -- unless NPR spent all that money.

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Ken Stern
Submitted by LynnS on Sat, 03/08/2008 - 1:53pm.

...presided over one of the most fiscally successful periods of NPR history, the (still very present) Kroc endowment being the jewel in that crown. He was forced out by affiliates who didn't like the new media directions he was pushing the network into.

This has broader implications than just NPR. The networks are beginning to realize that they don't need the affiliates any more.

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Lynn Siprelle * Fairy Blogmother

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NPR's dilemma
Submitted by Spiro on Sat, 03/08/2008 - 2:10pm.

Ken Stern recognizes that NPR is much, much more than the sum of its affiliates. As commercial broadcasters are finding out, the big-stick-in-a-field definition of radio is rapidly fading.

NPR's superior journalistic product is available by streaming, podcasts, cell phone, and (to a limited degree) by Sirius satellite radio. Yet these alternative platforms are not even mentioned in NPR's mission statement, which is all about member stations.

Stern has pushed all of these alternative platforms, and that made the board of directors--heavy with member stations--nervous as hell about their own viability. He was fired Thursday. But the board can't fire the future.

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firing the future
Submitted by LynnS on Sat, 03/08/2008 - 10:00pm.

exactly. I envision that the current affiliate/network relationship will be dead in the next ten years, not just in public radio but across the board.

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Lynn Siprelle * Fairy Blogmother

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