You'll recall that during Steve Jobs' demonstration of Tiger's Dashboard feature during this week's WWDC, he demo'd the RabbitRadio Widget, which finds your closest NPR station. Jobs started the Widget, played some incoming radio, and then remarked, "Nothing as great as NPR." That sure is a coincidence!

You know there is no such thing as coincidence when talking about Jobs and his keynotes!

If you watch the video of the keynote, you'll probably agree that his comment seemed full of sarcasm

'AvAG8DaM88.

Audio Hijack to the rescue! Donate directly to the station of your choice and TiVOize your programs with Audio Hijack Pro. (I am not affiliated in any way with the developer.)

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Guest wrote:
Audio Hijack to the rescue!

That's exactly how I get my NPR content -- NPR.org and Audio Hijack.

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Guest wrote:
If you watch the video of the keynote, you'll probably agree that his comment seemed full of sarcasm.

I'll agree that the dorks in the audience mistook it to be sarcasm.

All the garbage being spewed about "subscriptions" has so far been in the context of Microsoft's WMP .wma DRM 'functionality,' where users pay monthly fees to continue listening to songs they rented.

This has NOTHING to do with a 'subscription' plan where you'd be paying for new content. If NPR released a 'subscription' in iTMS for say "Car Talk," you'd really only be buying new issues of the program as they came out, not losing all your issues as soon as you stopped paying the 'subscription fee.'

In the real world, if you subscribe to "People" magazine and then stop paying your subscription, you stop getting new copies of the magazine. The publisher does not stomp into your house and destroy all the copies of the magazine you had received.

The market place (consumers) have entirely ignored the song and dance about 'subscription' music rental because it is an unnatural, greedy and unfair marketing ploy designed by corporatist pigs. WMA style subscriptions are anti-comsumer, and Apple has shown absolutely no interest in renting music.

There is not even the ability, currently, to enforce such a system in the iPod or iTunes/QuickTime, as there is by design in WMA players. The whole idea of 'software rental,' while tried repeatedly and pushed through media the 'experts' in various guises, has been a resounding failure. Microsoft has been trying to rent Office for the last ten years, and so far the closest they've come is inducing customers to keep buying newer versions.

Imagine how little Microsoft would have to innovate if it were able to simply sign up Office customers in subscription contracts where income was guaranteed, not earned through innovation! It would be similar to the forced purchase of Windows that all PC users have been locked into for the last 20 years, and the stifled amount of innovation that came with that.

All the WMA music websites 'rental' subscription plans together have had a grand total effect of next to zero compared with iTMS' individual sales of albums and songs.

By confusing the idea of 'subscribing to new content' and 'subscribing to pay to use what you already have,' you are doing your readers a disservice.

"Jennie Lawhorn" is wrong. Her name is Jennifer Lawson. Got a source? Get their name right.

Also, Bob Edwards was not unceremoniously dumped, even if the listeners feel that way. He left for money and because the show (Morning Edition) was changing in ways he didn't personally like.

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Anonymous wrote:
Also, Bob Edwards was not unceremoniously dumped, even if the listeners feel that way. He left for money and because the show (Morning Edition) was changing in ways he didn't personally like.

No, they took his show away from him and made him a "senior correspondent" without really explaining what that meant or what he'd be doing.

It was THEN that he decided to leave NPR.

Well, I guess you could count cancelling a show as a "change he didn't personally like" but that doesn't seem like the best way to describe it.

I use the Griffin RadioShark to listen to radio on my iMac which also allows me to record the broadcast. It even has a rudimentary system for scheduling recording ahead of time just like a VCR, and the recordings are automatically added to iTunes once the recording is complete. And of course they then end up on my iPod. I frequently record NPR radio broadcasts this way.

But I think NPR would also benefit from an iTunes podcast category where people could find just the type of broadcast thay are looking for instead of dealing with all of the above. I think the time of purchased podcasts is fast approaching, if not already here (setting such up via the iTunes Music Store would likely be trivial for Apple).

Um, no, they didn't.

They told him he would have a co-host; he refused that and left the show, wherupon he was offered the senior correspondent role.

to the NPR site as a streaming choice and Apple might make a deal.

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Um, no, they didn't.

Um, yes, they bloody well did.

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They told him he would have a co-host; he refused that and left the show, wherupon he was offered the senior correspondent role.

That was one of the excuses NPR lied about...er...came up with; it was never offered to him. Indeed, this particular lie was the only one that caused him to threaten to sue:

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www.bobedwards.info wrote:
NPR and its executives and board members began to circulate inaccurate rumors blaming Edwards for the dismissal, becoming vicious enough that Edwards threated to sue. He told the Boston Globe, "That really upset me...because that made me look like a chump. If they had told me I would have a cohost, I would still be over there. They were scrambling to think of something. I was satisfied with a written statement...that was enough for me to back off."

(Taken from http://www.bobedwards.info/bio.php with permission of the author...me.)

NPR itself repudiated this nonsense in a letter to member stations, making it clear Edwards was never offered a co-host position. Many reasons have been suggested by outsiders, but NPR never did get one that would "stick." Edwards himself told Tavid Smiley on his television program, "I asked the Vice President for News the other day. I said, 'You know, it's been a year. Can you tell me now why you did it?' And he said, 'No, we can't have that conversation.' So now I may never know."

It amazes me that the falsehoods the suits at NPR told about the guy to cover the screw-up they made in firing him still keep turning up. Fortunately, those of us with XM Satellite Radio can still hear him first thing every weekday morning - his show's almost a year old now (the one-year anniversary will be on October 4th), and gets better every week. NPR's loss is XM's gain.