Friday, May 6, 2011

Shifting the paradigm

KQED, San Francisco’s NPR affiliate, kicked off its spring fundraising drive yesterday. With a new twist: for a $45 pledge online you can opt to get a pledge-free Internet stream. 


Meaning that you can listen to the programming without those annoying breaks three or four times an hour where both on-air talent and behind-the-scenes folk pretend to be Dorothy Parker and Robert Benchley—but folksy, mind—to encourage you to cough up monetary support.

This is a very interesting use of technology, one I’ve been trying to figure out how to make work for a long time: pledge early and you go right back to usual programs for both NPR and PBS. Meaning no ghastly two-hour Yanni concerts or any number of tenors or Dr. Wayne Dyer or Suze Orman or Julia Child reruns; just regular programming. (Even though Mystery! isn’t a weekly show anymore.)

Sadly, it won’t work for over-the-air broadcasting, only an online stream. But wouldn’t it be just heavenly?

I also want to apply it to political campaigns: show evidence that you’ve voted early and you don’t hear/see political commercials for the rest of the electoral season. Radio, TV or Internet.

Well—a girl can dream.

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