Good King Wencelsas: Champion of the Poor

The Good King

Tom Manoff filed an interesting story on NPR about The Duke of Bohemia, King Wenceslas. The carol has been one of my favorites for a long time. (even more fun than the wassailing tune). Wenceslas was an early advocate of social justice and an early Christian. The last line of the carol sums up the King's Christian mission. "Ye who now will bless the poor / shall yourselves find blessing." 

Perhaps, a good reminder for the 1%, or at least the politicians who seem to be their champions.
 
Take a moment to listen to Manoff's report on NPR.

The Evil Bother

According to an article in Wikipedia he was the duke of Bohemia from 921 until his assassination in 935. His younger brother, Boleslaus the Cruel, was complicit in the murder. A group of nobles allied with Boleslaus plotted to kill him. The King was invited to a feast. At the feast three of the nobles attacked him. His brother is said to have Wenceslas through with a lance.

Is it a case of no good deed goes unpunished? Boleslaus and his allies acted to take control at a time of increasing tensions with the German Provinces. Boleslaus may have also been influenced by his pagan mother in a reaction to the growing influence of Christianity. Boleslaus later repented and became a Christian.

There's more about Wenceslas and traditional caroling  at"On Point."

It's All Local

I heard a public radio fundraiser talk about their investment in local programming and how most stations don't usually invest that much in resources. My thought...It only matters if the content matters.

A Personal Medium

More than once I've heard that radio is a personal medium. It's true. I choose to listen because the content matches my lifestyle and values.  The closer the content comes to this match, the more engaged I become. By extension, everything that comes out of speakers and headphones is local. And, this includes content on new platforms including social media.

Local or National?

It does not matter. As a listener the content and how the content is presented matters. So, when the person fundraising tells me that his or her NPR station invests a lot of time and resources on local content, I really don't care. He or she might care because he or she works there and has a lot invested in the success of the content. It's an inside argument that does not relate to my experience as a listener.

My Choice

As a listener, I decide what is important. It is my core values that are being served. And, if the content provided matches those values on a consistent basis, I am more likely to support the provider. It could be Morning Edition, On-Point, Colin McEnroe or Wait, Wait, it's all local to me.

Ebbing Loyalty

Straight to the Source

Earlier today, I wanted to listen in to the debate about Scott Walker's proposed cuts to the University of Wisconsin System. WBUR's On-Point put together a program about the cuts with several guests including:

• Karen Herzog, higher education reporter for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. (@herzogjs)
• Noel Radomski, director of the Wisconsin Center for the Advancement of Postsecondary Education. (@noelradomski)
• Christian Schneider, columnist at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. (@schneider_cm)
• John Sharpless, professor of history at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Republican candidate for the United States House of Representatives from Wisconsin’s Second Congressional District in 2000.

Convenient Listening

I used to work at WNPR in Connecticut. I still live in their listening area. You would think I have a certain amount of loyalty to the station. Despite my layoff from WNPR in 2009, I still help them raise money during pledge. I still listen while driving. But now, I hardly ever listen at home. Instead of listening to the feed from WNPR, I chose to listen to the feed from WBUR. I went directly to the source. 

Since I was unable to catch the program from the start (I listened on-line about half-way into the program), I will listen to the first half of the program later through the On-Point web page. It's a lot more convenient.

Loyalty

Does this mean I'm less loyal to WNPR?  It does! Here's how the Radio Research Consortium looks at Loyalty.

Loyalty is the total QHs of listening to your station expressed as a percentage of all QHs of listening to radio in your listeners’ diaries. It is a measure of how well (or how poorly) your programming elicits listening by your cume. Here is how to interpret this Loyalty rate: Of all the quarter-hours of listening to radio over the entire survey week by your 106,700 metro area cume persons, 37.1% of those QHs were spent with WRRCFM. The audience is 37.1% loyal to the station. What does the level of loyalty indicate? Low loyalty suggests you may be trying to serve too many constituencies. High loyalty, but low cume says you are superserving too small a target audience. High loyalty and high cume means you are doing a good job of bringing people in and keeping them involved with the station.

My loyalty may actually be the same. The percent of Quarter Hours devoted to WNPR might still be the same as before, but my listening to radio is less than it once was. The total number of Quarter Hours is a lot less than it was ten years ago. I still I listen to WNPR 50% of the time...that share of pie is still the same, but the pie is smaller.

Does this Matter?  

Loyalty is important when it comes to fundraising. So is the number of Occasions. My total listening time is down.  The more loyal I am as a listener to a public radio station...the more likely I am to contribute. My time spent listening matters to. As I spend less time listening...My willingness to contribute diminishes.        

AQH Persons

A way stations can determine if listeners are spending less time with their programming is to look at Time Spent Listening and the Average Quarter Hour Audience. For this example, I did for WNPR. In the past two years AQH is down 29% and TSL is down 19% in the Hartford Metro Area. The trend suggests it will be harder for WNPR to raise money from listeners. John Sutton from RadioSutton, a Public Media consultant, suggests that reductions in AQH require stations to use more leverage during fundraisers to meet their goals. For more information on the use of leverage, please read, "It’s Taking More Leverage to Generate Pledge Drive Contributions."

What's Next?

WNPR can help itself. It can make sure they are making the most of forward promotion opportunities. They can also carefully examine the appeal of its programming. They can look at which programming elements are drawing audience and which are not. WNPR can also realign resources to programming that defines their audience. They can then determine where changes are needed. They can also make sure they have a robust on-line and social media presence. I will need reasons to listen to their content on-line and on-demand. If they can do all that, they might be able to get me to spend more time listening to their content. By doing that, my time spent listening to their content will rise.