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Something great has happened!

To: WAMC Northeast Pirate Network -
Excellent detective work in your updated Web site.  Interesting it is to see so many "hard-up" public radio insiders making that much money. 

American broadcasting is now in The Age of Talk. Just talk. In fact, talk a lot, and keep on talking, talking, talking, all day long. 

And when you're finished, talk some more.  No one listens to music anymore -- a far cry from the "golden days" of the 1960's, when music was a vital part of broadcasting, political struggle, personal consciousness and intellectual development. 

Nowadays, just keep on talking.  I really wonder about the intellectual level of WAMC listeners and supporters. 

Of course, when I see announcers at WRPI 91.5FM taking up so much of that station's airtime doing exactly the same thing as WAMC -- i.e., talk, endlessly -- and then busing or driving over to Albany to help "Dr." Alan in his fund drives, I doubt their sincerity as political activists and free speech champions. 

Fortunately, something great has happened: Several months ago, BBC Radio 3 upgraded its streaming audio service, so if anyone who loves classical music and genuinely intellectual programming wants to hear what a REAL world-class broadcaster sounds like, just go to http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/ and click on the "Listen" link (located at the top of the page and to the left).  Their streaming audio quality is superb now.

Compare the live Metropolitan Opera feeds, and note that their sound quality is vastly superior to the noisy, fuzzy, low-fi amateurishness of the Poor Folk of Central Avenue. 

Also, for anyone interested in hearing the Boston Symphony Orchestra live again during the regular season, just go to the Web sites of WGBH or WCRB and you can hear their Friday/Saturday concerts (albeit in the Windows Media Player format, which is sonically inferior to Real Player, used by BBC R3).  Yes, the Internet offers a haven from the Invasion of the Talk-Hordes!

Keep fighting the liars. Albany should stand for a lot more than "Dr." Alan's hot air, and the pseudo-intellectual level of his talk-obsessed listeners.

Don Drewecki
drewed@rpi.edu
Sunday, 18 February 2001


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