Public Broadcasting Atlanta Teams with Arts Organizations

The Atlanta Opera Supports Arts Marketing Collaborative 2010/08/31

The Atlanta Opera Opera announced today they will join an effort by AtlantaPlanIt.com to increase awareness of Atlanta's arts offerings. AtlantaPlanIt.com is a service of Public Broadcasting Atlanta. 40 organizations have joined the effort so far. It is hoped that 400 hundred will become involved.

Public Broadcasting Atlanta is increasing its impact with the cultural community. If they take this to next steps they will not only be reaching out, but will become engaged with the community. It's the same as networking. The sharing of ideas and resources can make the institutions involved in this effort stronger.

For a better idea of what AtlantaPlanIt hopes to accomplish look over their website.

About Atlanta PlanIt

Atlanta PlanIt is a unique Web site exclusively dedicated to arts and cultural entertainment information and organizations in the metro Atlanta region.  First created by the Metro Atlanta Arts and Culture Coalition (MAACC) in the summer of 2004, Atlanta PlanIt is prospering at its new home at Public Broadcasting Atlanta (PBA), where it is slated to serve as the arts and culture component for Lens on Atlanta, set to officially launch in 2010. 

Are you an arts organization and don’t see your info on PlanIt?
Visit our submission guidelines page.

What is Lens on Atlanta?
Lens on Atlanta is a first-of-its-kind online social community site that gives regional institutions, community organizations, activists and individuals a free social media/Web platform that will allow them to build stronger relationships, engage the community and raise awareness of community initiatives.

About Public Broadcasting Atlanta
WABE 90.1 FM and PBA 30 brings NPR News, music, the arts and PBS programming to hundreds of thousands of listeners and viewers each year. Today, people turn to public broadcasting for their news, music, arts and entertainment. Yet, few people realize that public broadcasting began as “educational television” — strictly a learning resource. As a broadcast service of Atlanta Public Schools in partnership with the Atlanta Educational Telecommunications Collaborative (AETC), PBA has never lost sight of its original mission. Education remains at the core of our operation at every level, from preschoolers to our elders.

Visit Lens on Atlanta
Visit Public Broadcasting Atlanta

Peconic Public Broadcasting Could Default August 31

WLIU still needs to raise $300,000 by August 31. If they fall short, Long Island University says they will sell the station to the next highest bidder.
There's more on this story in the Riverhead News Review. If you're interested, you can donate on-line at http://www.wliu.org/site2009/index.php

KUHF Looks to Double Audience

Chron.com is reporting that the University of Houston is seriously considering purchasing KTRU from Rice University. The Trustees at Rice have already approved the deal. The U of H governing board votes on the proposal, Tuesday, August 17.

KUHF is currently running a dual format station with both classical music and NPR news. The purchase of the KTRU will allow KUHF to program NPR news on  KUHF and classical music on KTRU which will become KUHC. KUHF is estimating that their total audience will grow from about 380,000 to 800,000 within three years. The increase in public service programming will benefit the station and the community it serves.

 KTRU currently airs an eclectic mix of music, but as a community service is grossly underachieving. The audience is too small to show up in the Abritron ratings service.

The price of the sale is reported to be $9.5 million. 

Classical Music Ebbing Away?

WEKU format change means a switch in classical music offerings - Business - Kentucky.com

Another Public Radio station has refocused their programming to include more public radio news and information programming. WEKU has added news and information programming mid days from public radio program sources. The reasons include serving more listeners and increased listener income.

WEKU is offering classical music on-line. I'm not sure how many on-line listeners it is going to take to make the service sustainable. So far about a half-dozen classical music listeners have asked WEKU for assistance in streaming classical music. The station will continue to offer classical music over night. Other types of music will be offered on the weekend.

Station manager Roger Duvall says they are seriously looking into acquiring another signal to devote to classical music programming. Duvall says their effort to acquire another stick for classical music programming has quelled some of the criticism.

Royalty Rates For Music Stations

Jazz | AllAboutJazz.com

According to the proposal presented in this article...most non-commercial stations would have royalties capped at $1,000 a year. Commercial broadcasters would be on the hook for considerably more. The fee for a station earning more than $1.25 million a year would be 1%. A station with yearly revenue of $4 million would pay $40,000 a year in royalties.

The deal is being hammered out between NAB and Music First. Fees for streaming are said to considerably less. The agreement is still in negotiations.

WHQR Hires Station Manager

Star News Online is reporting that Cleve Callison becomes WHQR's new station manager in September. The hiring is the next step in the road back for the Wilmington, North Carolina station beset with financial troubles in 2008 and 2009. Cleve was most recently Station Manager of WUMB at Miami of Ohio.

Play these pianos, they're yours

Play these pianos, they're yours

Cincinnati Public Radio is celebrating a combined 150 years of broadcasting by engaging the community with "Play Me, I'm Yours," an interactive art installation by the British artist Luke Jerram. I first got a chance to witness the installation in New York in June. Dozens, then hundreds of people were gathered around a piano as people of various talents performed. There were a lot of smiles.

Cincinnati Public Radio has an interactive webpage on their Website that maps the locations of the piano and will also keep people update as the pianos move to various locations around the greater Cincinnati area. The website encourages comments. "After Play Me, I'm Yours" ends its run, the pianos will be donated to community art centers and local children in need of an instrument.

WUSF buys WSMR Splits Formats

WUSF buys WSMR, looks to programming format changes - Tampa Bay Business Journal

WUSF is joining the growing list of public radio stations who are willing to split out their news and classical formats. There is risk involved. WUSF bought WSMR for $1.3 million. WSMR will carry the classical format but the signal footprint does not cover the same geography as WUSF.

Those who will be in the WSMR signal area will be blessed with full-time classical music programming. The Tampa/St.Pete market will now be able to listen to NPR news and information programming all day. This strategy seems to be working in New York, Boston, Cincinnati and Minneapolis/St.Paul.

There are plenty of comments on the blogs and online news outlets.
http://www2.tbo.com/content/2010/aug/04/041550/wusf-fm-switches-npr-format-moves-classical-progra/news-breaking/

http://blogs.tampabay.com/media/2010/08/tampa-public-radio-station-wusffm-to-purschase-wsmrfm-in-sarasota-for-12million-shifting-classical-m.html