iPod blamed for Chicago radio demise (NPR)

iPodNN ^ | 07/07/2006

[coconutt2000]

The iPod's fault that NPR failed to adjust, adapt, and present listeners with a compelling program.

[RexBeach]

Look, if public radio is so terrific, let it compete with the commercial stations. Taxpayers shouldn't be shouldering the costs of public radio or TV. It's like having a government owned and operated newspaper.

No good, no good.

[Red Badger]

"It's not our fault! It's Steve Jobs fault!"...........

[wideawake]

I see. It wouldn't be the fact that jazz has become (sadly) a tiny niche genre - it's the fault of the iPod.

OK.

[caver]

I doubt whether any iPod users were ever NPR listeners.

[justshutupandtakeit]

What will be the excuse after non-stop communist propaganda drives away the rest of the listeners?

[TommyDale]

It wouldn't take much. Every time I turn on a radio, I am subjected to more advertising than I can stand. One morning I turned on WABC 770 in NYC, and I listened for what seemed like 20 minutes before there was any programming.

[Shermy]

Sounds like a fake excuse.

[Red Badger]

What will be the excuse after non-stop communist propaganda drives away the rest of the listeners?

That IS what drove away the listeners!..........

[Chi-townChief]

They didn't "demise" - they just went to all lefty news and talk on the public dime, of course.

[Red Badger]

I doubt whether any iPod users were ever NPR listeners.

BINGO!.......

[ClearCase_guy]

music programming, which was mostly jazz

"It's all them young college students and their damn ipods! They used to be all hot for Jazz! Benny Goodman! Bird! Chet Baker! Then they all got their fancy ipods! Now they don't listen to our station any more!" [/grumpy old man]

[SaveTheChief]

Because the heart you break
Thats the one that you rely on
The bed that you make
Thats the one you gotta lie on
When you point, your finger cos your plan fell through
You got three more fingers pointing back at you

Solid Rock
Dire Straits

NPR, like the record industry, has made a boogeyman of the iPod rather than look at their own shoddy product.

[BackInBlack]

Part of the reason jazz has become a niche genre is that it's been put in a museum: stations like BEZ keep playing the same old stuff from forty years ago. And of course, every artist is a "legend." Maybe if clubs and stations put a little effort into featuring developments in jazz instead of the Wynton Marsalis and Ken Burns nostalgia for the good old days, the medium might be thriving instead of dying.

[Bigg Red]

It's like having a government owned and operated newspaper.

&&
You are so right.
These clowns may even be lying about this. Perhaps they were looking for an excuse to scrap the music so that they could devote programming to Bush-bashing 24/7.

[cloud8]

Create your own commercial-free jazz station. Or any format you want (except classical).

www.pandora.com

Shameless plug.

[coconutt2000]

I like jazz, and I agree with you. Radio jazz has been enshrined, and has since become uninteresting. Unremarkable DJs and programming on NPR doesn't help either.

One of my contemporary favorites is David Sanborn.


(And then there's the fact that NPR began a hard shift to the Left in 2002 and 2003 that it became painful to listen to their frequent "news" interruptions in their music and cultural programming.)

[spinestein]

It's more like having a government subsidized buggy whip factory.

[spinestein]

It's more like having a government subsidized buggy whip factory.