Talk:NPR

Funding

The content of this section was taken entirely from [| NPR]’s website. While it appears to be factually correct, naturally they put their own spin on the funding. It is the indirect federal funding that gets an obscure treatment. Since CPB is really a Shell corporation (100% federally funded) the 1.5% that goes to NPR is about as directly indirect as you can get. At the same time CPB funds an average of 10% of the member stations revenue in addition to the 5.8% they receive from direct federal, state and local governments. Many of the universities, which contribute another 15% are public and therefore represent taxpayer-provided dollars. The member stations give NPR headquarters 50% of their revenue via dues, programming and distribution charges. I added content about member stations public funding but the process is so convoluted it is difficult to get an accurate picture.Grahamboat (talk) 04:03, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're asking here. Nearly every thing you mention here is mentioned in the article. aprock (talk) 04:09, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

I am not asking anything. I am pointing out that a significant amount of NPR’s funding is indirectly from governments. That was not very clear before. Grahamboat (talk) 04:48, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

From the sources, about 5-7% of NPRs revenues originate from the federally funded CPB. aprock (talk) 04:58, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

I see that you've undone the revert. I've taken that out again. Here is the sentence you want to add:

As NPR is a two-tier setup, indirect government funding can account for as much as 10% when fees paid by their member stations are considered

Here is what is already in the article:

... about 50% of NPR revenues come from ... member stations ... In 2009, member stations derived 6% of their revenue from direct government funding, 10% of their revenue from federal funding in the form of CPB grants, and 14% of their revenue from universities.

Your sentence says essentially the same thing. Now, maybe you think the copy could be clearer. That's fine. But having the article say the same thing over and over again isn't improving the situation. aprock (talk) 05:09, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

The average reader is not going to do the math that you and I understand. Perhaps it would be better to add:

NPR receives no direct funding from the federal government, but indirect government funding can account for as much as 10% when fees paid by their member stations and contributions from CBP are considered. "adding a ref of course"

Readers clearly see how much public funding is evolved and the article would not be saying the same thing over and over again.Grahamboat (talk) 06:08, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

That does make the taxpayer funding issue more clear. This article argues that actually over 20% of NPR's budget is taxpayer funded. That is not from a reliable source, however, so we need other sources. Drrll (talk) 12:51, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Rephrasing what is already there to be clearer is fine. Repeating the same content is not a good way of handling this. aprock (talk) 14:40, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Added a half sentence which clarifies and summarizes indirect public funding. References will show money funneled through member stations equal 8% i.e. 50% of 10% plus 5.8% and the direct public funding from CPB and other government agencies equal 2.8%. Grahamboat (talk) 02:20, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

If you would like to rephrase what is there to be clearer, by all means give it a go. Duplicating content is not the solution here. aprock (talk) 04:11, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

I added:

, but indirect government funding can account for as much as 10% when fees paid by their member stations and contributions from CPB are considered.

Which I intent to change to:

, but indirect government funding can account for as much as 10% when fees paid by their member stations and direct contributions from CPB and other government agencies are considered.

Aprock insists that this clause is just duplicating what is already in the article. (S)he offers no specificity other than repeating “duplicated content” over and over.

• where in the article is indirect funding mentioned?
• where in the article is the direct funding from CPB to NPR mentioned?
• where in the article is the total of 10% indirect government funding mentioned?

The paragraph ended with “NPR receives no direct funding from the federal government”, but what about the indirect government funding. Those are facts readers would like to know and there is no reason to hide them. The well sourced clause introduces new information and summarizes details that are obscured in the proceeding text.Grahamboat (talk) 19:04, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure if I'm ok with calling money that has changed hands more than once still "government" funding, direct or otherwise. Let me make sure I understand correctly (which may certainly not be the case:))..are you counting fees, revenues paid through the local stations to NPR as indirect "government" funding? I think that stretches things a bit...especially since we already account for those revenues directly from the stations. If the funding isn't coming from the government, it's no longer government funidng. I think DRRL's comment below draws a more balanced view. Please let me know if I am misunderstanding your derivation of the 10%.Jbower47 (talk) 19:11, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I count these government funds as indirect funding to NPR. That is what indirect means and is exactly what, at least part , of H R 1076 is designed to defund.Grahamboat (talk) 19:41, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not questioning "Indirect" I'm questioning "government". The member stations are not governments. They receive government funding, but once they receive it, it ceases to be government funding. When they then spend it on something else, it's not government funding, it's revenue from member stations. To call it government funding makes an implication. If the government pays me a subsidy to plant corn, and I buy a hamburger with some of my money, it would not be correct to say the government indirectly bought a hamburger. Since the local stations get a mixed pot of funds, to draw a direct pass through of one funidng source to one expenditure is problematic. It is not direct pass-through, in other words. I'm worried that stretching it to be called indirect "government" funding gives the appearance of POV impropriety, even assuming Good Faith in your edits. regardless, i think it's simply more correct to say something like what Drrl has going below...i.e. "although it does receive grants from organizations like the CPB and member stations that receive federal funding". (a bit modified to incorporate both sources.)Jbower47 (talk) 20:13, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

That modified version looks good to me, though I think I would change "from organizations like the CPB" to federal agencies like the CPB". Drrll (talk) 20:28, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

That is not quite true. That is why HR 1076 would restrict local stations from using any funds from CPB to pay NPR for programming etc. Obviously the House considers these funds to be indirect funding to NPR or why the restriction.

Taxpayer dollars go from the federal government to CPB. Some of those dollars go from CPB to local stations. Local stations send some of those tax dollars to NPR to pay for programming, distribution charges, and dues. That is what is meant by an indirect path. Another part of CPB taxpayer dollars goes directly to NPR. This is still considered indirect. Other taxpayer dollars go to the local stations from federal agencies, state and local governments (the 5.8%). Again local stations use part of that money to pay NPR for its services. Again this would be considered indirect taxpayer funding. You may think that it is a stretch counting these funds as indirect taxpayer funding to NPR but if they were cut off, as part of HR 1076 proposes, you would see how important to NPR they are. I am not a proponent of doing this, I just believe readers should know how important taxpayer money is to NPR and how much that money really is.Grahamboat (talk) 20:32, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

DRRL: Organizations was supposed to refer to both the CPB and the stattions..sorry, bad grammar. Re; "agency"...I know the term federal agency has been used often in terms of CPB, but they are a private not-for-profit corporation, even if, like other similar arrangements, they are majority funded by the federal governments (http://www.cpb.org/aboutcpb/). I understand what you're getting at...can we say it another way without calling them a federal agency, which in the literal meaning of the words, they are not? Does the "federally funded" bit get us there, or is there better text? (EDIT..I am mistaken, I think...this source seems to indicate they are not majority funded by the fed govt. http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/48836.pdf, though it's a couple years old.)

GRrahamboat: please refer to DRRL's suggestion above, does this work for you, mnus the federal agencies? Also, the sources 17,18, and 19 you added...I'm wondering if there are more obejctive third party sources we could find? I'm not comfortable with just 14 either, but the other three are a right wing opinion piece, a Republican committee report, and a right wing news organization...I think it gives the appearance of impropriety.Jbower47 (talk) 20:39, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

I sorry I’m getting lost here. Too many colons; can we shift left again? Which Drrll proposal were you referring to? As to the sources I didn’t realize US News & World Report was right-wing. I used the Republican committee report because it included the neutral Congressional Research Service report “CRS estimates that NPR’s total direct funding consisted of $5.2 million in FY 2010”Grahamboat (talk) 21:11, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Aprock has accused me of violating 3RR. After researching the history records I found (S)he was right; I was guilty. I thought I was being careful always posting on talk before editing etc, but I allowed my vest to get the better of me. I have decided to impose a voluntary three day suspension on myself as a penalty.Grahamboat (talk) 03:25, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Where is this "10%" figure coming from? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I've looked through the cites on that section and the figure isn't mentioned. This appears to be original research and synthesis. Unless notable and reliable third-party sourcing exists for it, it will have to be removed. Also, several of the cites that follow that claim are from non-WP:RS sources. These include: an editorial, a press release by the Republican party and Newsbusters. None of those are reliable sources for anything other than the opinion of their authors. --Loonymonkey (talk) 21:53, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps this is a better solution. The last sentence in the first paragraph is taken out of context and gives a POV slant. I have added the correct statement. Using CPB as a source I have added the total amount of federal funds given to support all public radio broadcasting. Note this is the same format used in the CPB article.Grahamboat (talk) 22:11, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Grants

I added "although it does receive grants from federally funded organizations" at the end of sentence that says that NPR does not receive direct funding from the federal government. This is an important distinction to make, since NPR does receive some indirect funding from the federal government, and it's a distinction that NPR makes itself in the two NPR sources in the paragraph. While "grants" are mentioned earlier in the paragraph, the first instance primarily describes grants by individuals and non-government organizations. The second instance (CPB grants) refers to grants to member stations, not NPR. Drrll (talk) 16:31, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

I think this is a very reasonable way to handle it, and states the relationship directly. There was other text above in the discussion that seemed to want to count CPB as federal funding. I think clarifying the relationship (grants from CPB, who recieves federal funding) is the best way to go, so this works just fine.Jbower47 (talk) 18:43, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

This is already in the article: 10% of their revenue from CPB grants, which is referenced in the previous sentence as the federally funded Corporation for Public Broadcasting. To be clearer, I'll synch the names in both sentences. After this I'm going to take a break from this article to allow other users voice their opinion on the section. This whole debate seems excessively silly to me. I can certainly see making the current copy clearer, but debating about how many times to include the same information just doesn't make sense to me. aprock (talk) 19:48, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

see (and hopefully improve on) my potential proposed merging of these and other comments in the discussion above...Jbower47 (talk) 20:19, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

aprock, it is not already in the article. The "10% of their revenue from CPB grants" refers to member stations, not NPR itself, which the last sentence in the paragraph addresses. Drrll (talk) 20:22, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Public radio programs not affiliated with NPR

I don't see the point of this section in an article about NPR, not about public radio programming. I think the mention in the summary of other sources of public radio programming is sufficient to make the point that not all programs on public/community radio stations come via NPR. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Samtha25 (talk • contribs) 19:44, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree. Especially the long list of non-NPR programs is irrelevant for this article. Should be removed.Miradre (talk) 23:32, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Especially as it looks like advertising. Objections to removal? Miradre (talk) 23:24, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I object. I don't see anything that looks remotely like advertising. It might be possible to trim the list some, but the basic idea is that people listening to public radio might not be aware which programs are or are not produced/distributed by NPR. older ≠ wiser 00:26, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

That is like arguing that the ABC article should list the programs done by its competitors.Miradre (talk) 08:22, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Not at all. Public radio stations play programs from a variety of sources. However, people very commonly consider NPR and public radio to be synonymous. When this section was not present, people would routinely add programs from other sources that they thought were NPR because their local public radio station broadcast them. older ≠ wiser 11:20, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

But NPR and public is radio is not synonymous. That this article should list the programs done by NPR's competitors is ridiculous. If there are mistakes, then they can be removed. As they would be on the ABC article and so on.Miradre (talk) 11:31, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

If your claimed problem really is serious, I suggest that we add note to the listing of NPR programs explaining that not all public radio programs are from NPR.Miradre (talk) 11:42, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

A list of individual programs might not be needed. I think keeping the heading and much of the non-list prose in the section would be enough. Although, on second thought, many of the programs in the list are not part of the big three public radio production/distribution sources (NPR/PRI/APM). It would be nice if there were a category for public radio programming in the U.S. older ≠ wiser 19:42, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

You can certainly create a new category template for US public radio programs.Miradre (talk) 20:10, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

NPOV Dispute: Tax money used for subsidizing the wealthy and lobbying

See [1]. Please explain. Criticism stated to the US Congress so it is significant.Miradre (talk) 16:08, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

As noted in the edit summay the content is undue. aprock (talk) 16:05, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

How can it be undue when it was stated to the US Congress as a criticism? Miradre (talk) 16:08, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Their efforts are dwarfed by the National Association of Broadcasters members, representing the for-profit broadcasters, which is traditionally 1st or 2nd among donors to campaigns. You don't see that mentioned in the ABC/NBC/... pages. Those broadcasters have lobbys in Washington as well. Both kinds of efforts dwarf whatever NPR is doing. I've worked for businesses and they have all done lobbying. None of their articles mention lobbying. WP:UNDO --Javaweb (talk) 16:46, 5 August 2011 (UTC)Javaweb

Possible problems in other articles are irrelevant for this article. One possible wrong does not justify new ones.Miradre (talk) 16:48, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

But the lobbying efforts in the businesses I worked for don't merit mention either. It is ubiquitous. --Javaweb (talk) 16:53, 5 August 2011 (UTC)Javaweb

Why not? If it is ubiquitous, it is because it works, and thus certainly deserves a mention. The influence of political lobbying certainly should be noticed and brought to public awareness.Miradre (talk) 16:56, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

NPOV Dispute : Crowding out commercial programs

See [2]. Please explain.Miradre (talk) 23:45, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

WP:UNDUE, as in the edit summary. Mathsci (talk) 00:00, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

It is a US study about the effect of public radio on commercial radio stations. Obviously it is relevant for this article. We should present all views fairly. Even the criticisms.Miradre (talk) 00:04, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

One survey in 1999 is hardly representative. That's what I mean by undue. Mathsci (talk) 00:14, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Not a survey but a study. Why was it not representative? Do you have a source for that claim? Miradre (talk) 00:15, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

The study is only tentative, certainly not a definitive statement of fact. It primarily concerned the broadcasting of music (classical and jazz). The abstract reads, "Because broadcasters can capture only part of the value of their product as revenue, there is the potential for a classic problem of underprovision. Whether public support corrects a market failure depends on whether the market would have provided similar services in the absence of public broadcasting. We address these questions by asking whether public and commercial classical stations compete for listening share and revenue as well as whether public stations crowd out commercial stations. We find evidence that public broadcasting crowds out commercial programming in large markets, particularly in classical music and to a lesser extent in jazz." What was in the text does not match this abstract, particularly the heading.

Here is the conclusion of the paper:

conclusion

"This study has examined provision of radio broadcasting services by the market in the U.S., along with the pattern of public radio. Although the market provides most broadcast formats in most markets, some formats – notably classical music and jazz – are provided less frequently by the market. We examine the interaction between commercial and public provision of broadcast services in classical music, jazz, and music, and we find evidence of substitutability of commercial and public programming in jazz, and especially classical music. We document programming similarity between public and commercial classical music stations. Furthermore, public entry appears to displace commercial entry in large markets. Although the bulk of government support for broadcasting goes to public stations in markets without commercial competition, over a third of public funding of stations airing jazz and classical music programming is allocated to public stations in the markets which would be served by similar commercial programming in the absence of public broadcasting. "Arguments in this paper cannot demonstrate whether public funding of radio broadcasting is wasteful. Rather, we focus attention on the degree of similarity of commercial and public programming. Our findings of substitutability in classical music programming (and evidence of displacement in both classical music and jazz) do not demonstrate that public funding that displaces commercial programming in these categories is unjustified. Whether public funding of programming that displaces similar commercial programming is justified depends on the degree of similarity between public and commercial programming. "It is important to note that the results of this study do not necessarily imply that funding of public radio should be reduced. This study has examined the allocation of the current public radio budget across markets. The determination of the correct size of the public radio budget is outside the scope of this study. Even if it were true that some public radio funding should be withdrawn from some large markets, it is entirely possible more funding should be allocated to public radio in other markets. Such a determination requires information, that we currently lack, on the value of public broadcasting to its listeners in those markets. "While this study has documented many empirical regularities, the descriptive estimates we have presented do not allow us to realistically model the impact of public subsidies on available programming. The next step for this research is the development of realistic structural models of commercial and public entry and revenue, allowing simulation of alternative government funding policies."

Mathsci (talk) 00:36, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

First, please remove this massive copyright violation. Second, I fail to see only your point. Nothing there contradicts the text I added to the article.Miradre (talk) 00:41, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

It is not a copyright violation here, Did you only have access to the abstract and did you write the content from there? Mathsci (talk) 00:43, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I fail to see any exemption for the talk page for copyright violations. All material added, including on the talk page, are released to the public under various licenses which is certainly incorrect for copyrighted material. Please correct this immediately. Regarding the content dispute, I fail to see anything incorrect with the material I added to the article.Miradre (talk) 00:49, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Was this material new to you? Had you in fact ever looked at the body of the article that you cited? This talk page is "noindexed" at present, so is not searchable on the web. But other formats can be found if you feel disquieted in any way. Your title for the brief section, "Tax subsidized stations crowding out commercial only stations" seems to have been concocted by you. The one sentence (followed by an ungrammatical non-sentence) was an inaccurate and misleading summary of the article. The conclusion of the paper is tentative, apparently restricted to broadcast music and full of provisos. How can it be possibly used to write an encyclopedia article? Mathsci (talk) 01:01, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Whether it is searchable by search engines does not change your copyright violation. Look down, your long copypaste from a copyrighted article is now claimed to be released under the "Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License". Please correct immediately before you are reported.Miradre (talk) 01:07, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Never claimed that the study applied to other things than certain forms of music so your supposed point is unclear. My text does not make any claims not found in the study.Miradre (talk) 01:07, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Your statements about copyvios seem ill-informed and I have no idea why you are making them.

From your other comments so far, I assume that you have never read the paper beyond the abstract. Your header pushed a negative point of view which is not expressed in the article. The text you wrote was not an accurate summary of the article. The paper, on broadcast music, is not definitive so it is WP:UNDUE to have a whole section devoted to it in this article. It is also evidently a primary source. Thanks. Mathsci (talk) 01:26, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Last chance. I will report this to the copyright noticeboard if you do not remove the copyright violation.

Again, nothing in my text contradicts either the abstract or the text. Primary sources are not disallowed.Miradre (talk) 01:30, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I've just sent an email to Moonriddengirl concerning your post above. The best thing probably is for you to have a quiet chat with her to clear up any misunderstandings of copyvio policy. It applies to text inserted in wikipedia articles.

You have attempted to insert information from one isolated paper into this article as if it were a major confirmed finding. That is not the case and therefore having a whole section on it (even with just one sentence) is WP:UNDUE. The same applied to previously deleted content inserted by you. Mathsci (talk) 01:54, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I have reported your copyright violation. See Wikipedia:Copyright_problems/2011_August_6.Miradre (talk) 09:05, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

A copy of the entire paper is temporarily available here. Mathsci (talk) 02:03, 6 August 2011 (UTC) Update: The second author Joel Waldfogel made a copy of the paper freely available on his website at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania here. Mathsci (talk) 16:32, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

That just makes the copyright violation much worse.Miradre (talk) 09:05, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

If you really think there is a serious problem, why not report it on WP:ANI? Mathsci (talk) 10:04, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

I have reported it at the correct place.Miradre (talk) 10:15, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Regarding the content dispute your last reply was "You have attempted to insert information from one isolated paper into this article as if it were a major confirmed finding. That is not the case and therefore having a whole section on it (even with just one sentence) is WP:UNDUE." I have not claimed that it is "a major confirmed finding". But it is an important view on this subject from a WP:RS. WP:NPOV states that all significant views should be included. Applies to criticisms also.Miradre (talk) 11:56, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

It is not up for us to pick what is an is not important. It is based on relative prevalence in the overall scope of verifiable information, specific notability, etc. Additionally, I agree with the other poster, I think you have misrepresented the study, and I don't think it's especially notable in the scope of this article.204.65.34.216 (talk) 18:07, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

NPR Names new President

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/10/02/140994384/npr-names-gary-knell-as-new-ceo-president?ps=cprs --Javaweb (talk) 23:01, 2 October 2011 (UTC)Javaweb

Juan Williams Firing

As most observors don't believe NPR stated reason for firing Juan Williams we should give equal weight to Williams claims especially with the Tottenberg Double Standard.Basil rock (talk) 16:24, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia does not accord equal weight to all viewpoints; it accords due weight to viewpoints based on the sources. siafu (talk) 00:02, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

advertising

In the Underwriting spots vs. commercials section it states "they cannot advocate a product". How does this claim square with the Carbonite adverts singing the praises of and pushing their shoddy, unencrypted storage solutions on me? These are not mere "statements" from an advertiser and are clearly positioned and worded as such to advocate for and sell me on this commercial product. They "advocate" the services features and sometimes even mention the pricing models for their services. 71.100.153.243 (talk) 02:03, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

How does this improve the article? This talk page is not a forum for discussing NPR in general. Acps110 ^{(talk • contribs)} 16:28, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

I am not discussing NPR directly. Rather, I am pointing out dubious statements and poor wording in this particular section and offering a real world example of commercial adverts for why such unsourced claims are dubious at best. They (NPR) clearly have commercial advertisements which are contrary to what is currently written. Section needs clean up and expansion with neutral, verifiable sourcing. 71.100.153.243 (talk) 16:49, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

idealogical bias

references seem to be a mess - if you are gonna cite UCLA or UMiss study, shouldn't you ahvet the right rev ? also, what about many studies, eg FAIR, showing strong conservative bias on NPR, eg % of speakers. Even more biased is selection of guests that favor the mainstream media thought ecosystems. (as a liberal, I find the idea that NPR has a liberal bias laughable)