npr

Sarah Palin's Wikipedia page scrubbed

Paul Boutin · 08/30/08 06:50PM

NPR reports that someone edited Sarah Palin's Wikipedia page Friday just before the word got out that she was John McCain's pick for a running mate. The edits were obviously made to make Palin look good. There were about 30 of them, made by one person. I'll spell out what NPR is dying to say: That one person was Sarah Palin.Had this happened to Joe Biden's entry, it wouldn't be deemed a story for National Public Radio. Still, I like this All Things Considered writeup, because it pretty much admits in the first sentence that NPR's army of anti-GOP reporters missed the scoop that Palin was McCain's pick. None of them thought to set a watch on her Wikipedia page.

Left of the dial…

Moe · 08/20/08 05:34PM

Yo check it out, a map with all the NPR stations! "If you know where you are, this map can tell you where to tune," says the description. Yes, NPR affiliates are usually relatively simple to detect by employing the two-pronged strategy of "pressing seek" and "listening for telltale overeducated barbituate user voice" but this is for people who need to make absolutely sure they are listening to the right station. (NPR listeners, yes!) It probably wasn't necessary to give those people an extra map to consult while cruising down the nation's interstates, but what do we care we barely leave the house anyway. [Uncommon Goods]

Mid-'80s Martin Scorsese Classic Also His Best Accidental NPR Rip-Off

STV · 05/27/08 12:15PM

We vowed not to feel bad about drinking for 72 hours straight over the holiday, but seeing today how constructively Panopticist's Andrew Hearst spent his weekend, it's hard not to flog ourselves. After all, shouldn't our own curiosity have gotten the better of us years ago when we first heard those rumors about the screenplay for Martin Scorsese's most underrated '80s film, After Hours, being plagiarized from NPR host Joe Frank's 1982 monologue Lies? At any rate, Hearst now has audio that all but closes the book on this semi-scandal:

White Public Radio Announcer's Burden

Rebecca · 02/29/08 05:27PM

NPR newscaster Jean Cochhran recently described President Bush's trip to Africa as a visit to the "dark continent." Some NPR listeners took the retro phrase the wrong (read: racist) way, and, as they are predisposed to do, wrote in."I had no idea the term would be found offensive," Cochhran said. Yeah, there's a no reason a term that casts and entire continent of people as the Other should bother anyone. [NPR]

Ex-Sleater Kinney Blogs for NPR

Sheila · 02/28/08 01:32PM

Carrie Brownstein, member of defunct, earnest grrl-rock band Sleater-Kinney, is bloggin' for NPR. Everybody's blogging! Nerd-a-rific. (Although we often found the femband a bit cloying and shrill?) In response to the Maxim magazine/Black Crowes outrage in which Maxim reviewed their record without listening to it, Brownstein reviews albums by the White Stripes and the Shins that haven't been recorded yet. Um, everyone knows that feminists aren't really that funny, but judge for yourselves!

Choire · 08/01/07 01:38PM

"Bob Butler was just on NPR's Day to Day, discussing the email he wrote to his graduate students regarding his divorce and that email's subsequent appearance on Gawker. He was pompous and self-important to a degree that nearly did damage to the speakers in my car. The only quotes I can remember accurately was his referring to the comments on Gawker as 'vicious' and 'cruel' and 'a circle-jerk of self-righteousness.'" Ooh, it's online, you can go get berated in stereo!

Gross! Contest Attracts Public Radio Amateurs

lneyfakh · 04/28/07 03:38PM

Blood is in the water over at public radio, where top brass has apparently decided that Jesse Camp didn't teach big broadcasters enough lessons back in 1998. Officially, it's the "Public Radio Talent Quest," but Ira "I Am Shattering" Glass is calling it "This American Idol." The game is that people submit a short radio piece, and after a couple weeks of voting, the field starts to narrow and a panel of radio experts/personalities choose the best. If you win—and three people will—you get 10 grand and a mentor, who will help you produce a pilot of your show and shop it to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Old Man Too Busy Listening To Steve Inskeep To Learn About Imus Flap

balk · 04/19/07 11:34AM

David Broder—known as "the dean of the Washington press corps" because he taught a young H.L. Mencken how to read—offers his thoughts on the Imus affair and the Duke lacrosse incident today. Broder's columns usually read like a parody of, well, Broder columns, but this morning's missive is almost a parody of a parody of a Broder column.

Media Bubble: Hassan Elmasry's Campaign

abalk2 · 03/21/07 08:54AM
  • Read all about Hassan Elmasry, the Morgan Stanley portfolio manager who's trying to take the Times out of Sulzberger family hands, and the man responsible for tearing Pinch Sulzberger a new one at the late February board meeting. (In PowerPoint, no less!) [WSJ]

Daniel Schorr, You Have Peed Enough

gdelahaye · 09/01/06 08:27AM

We just want to wish NPR commentator and former Murrow man, Daniel Schorr, a belated happy birthday. May your stentorian delivery of the week's news with just the tiniest sheen of analysis that always seems to result in "it will be interesting to see" continue for another billion years.

The Old Hotness Is New Again

Chris Mohney · 08/17/06 01:40PM

NYU sociology prof Eric Klinenberg wrote a 2002 book about the 1995 heat wave in Chicago. As a result, he now returns with the inexorability of fire hydrant photography every summer, repeating the same statistics and advice for each round of reporters looking for a heat-specific talking head. NPR's On the Media asks the "media darling" how he deals with the repetitive notoriety of answering the same questions every year, then vanishing into obscurity for another nine months:

Human Journalism Institution Expresses Institutional Belief

Chris Mohney · 07/25/06 12:30PM

It's just you and a little machine and you can make history. I find that scary. Nobody should get into print or on the air without some kind of editor. I have an institutional belief that nobody can be above having a good editor.

Media Bubble: The 'Post' Can't Handle the Truth?

Jesse · 01/20/06 01:30PM

WP shuts off comments on a blog, because snooty MSM can't handle real reader's opinions. Or something like that; we haven't yet read the how-bloggers-should-be-dismissive memo. [NYT]
• TV news stars go to NPR to do reporting, get tote bags. [WSJ]
• This week fickle Jon Friedman crushes on Salon's Rebecca Traister. Because nothing's hotter than a chick who writes about chicks. [MW]
• MSLO had a good year, and only very partially because the boss got out of jail. [Folio:]
• Bonnie Fuller to speak to Columbia j-school; j-schoolers to throw themselves into Broadway traffic upon realizing they spent all that money to train for this? [WWD]

Today in Judy: Radio Killed the Newspaper Star

Jesse · 11/11/05 09:39AM

We missed Judith Miller on Morning Edition this morning, because, well, we never listen to NPR. (Every now and again, we like to play against demographic type.) Thankfully, though, several of you have filled us in on what we missed:

Walter Isaacson transcript

Gawker · 01/21/03 04:02PM

CNN Chairman Walter Isaacson, who recently stepped down to run the Aspen Institute speaks with NPR's "On the Media."
Transcript [WNYC.org]