I didn't say that.

However, I believe that once you trade off a wide variety of factors regarding how younger, affluent users of smart phones use there phones vs. how older affluent users use their's, it's probably a wash. I feel certain that lower socioeconomic demographics of any age will be little served by iPhone apps.

Moveover, I think the issue you raise — public radio's service to various demographics — is more an issue of content and programming than distribution.

I can point to lots of programming that NPR and other nationally distributed public media companies are producing to serve a wide variety of audiences. The more ways they are distributed, the more likely they are to reach the audiences that would like to hear them — and who, perhaps, can't access them now because of programming choices made locally.

More channels of distribution means more people can be served.

You think the demographic profile — age, income and education level, etc. — is the same for smartphone listeners and for those who listen only over the air, and will remain so?

I just wanted to respond to @Dorian regarding the demographics of public radio listeners. I know that in my market we have several public-licensed stations. Their programming ranges from rap to religion. The local NPR station has three different programming formats (FM, AM and HD) and streams and podcasts all in numerous ways.

I have no doubt the NPR (which also gets programming for other public media sources) has a highly desirable audience, but that has nothing to do with the way in which it is distributed. I think the fact that people who have iPhones are younger (which I don't necessarily believe) is also irrelevant as younger iPhone users have probably figured out a dozen other apps to access the radio stations and streaming music sources they'd prefer over-the-air. In other words, I think people bring with them their over-the-air preferences when they start listening to radio via a smartphone.

Those who use smartphones will tend to be of a higher socioeconomic status, and probably be younger, than those who listen only over the air. Phone listeners will get a richer, more diverse set of programming, and at some point may be more highly valued than those who listen only over the air. It's analogous to cable vs. broadcast, and how the broadcast-only audience is less valued, commercially, per viewer.

Public radio may find some dissonance between its mission to serve all and its desire to target higher revenues. The public radio listener demo tends to be a higher educated and desirable economic group than radio listeners overall, but what happens if that public radio group gets split into the have mores and the have-lesses?

http://gizmodo.com/5319316/public-radio-iphone-app-adds-on+demand-content-accidentally-kills-fm-radio

Far too many people misunderstand the fatal flaw with real-time streaming over distance, the world is round and there are 40 time-zones to consider.

Outside of the time-zone a station serves, the programming/output/content, whatever you wish to call it, becomes unlistenable to the human ear.

A station using real-time streaming has a maximum range on the Internet of a single time-zone. Always been that way with terrestrial radio, the Internet doesn't fix the physics.

My friend is a member of NPR's Los Angeles affiliate KPCC and was recently selected as a finalist in the Challenge.Create.Change contest for a video he created espousing the benefits of public radio membership. The contest, sponsored by Target and ConverseOneStar encourages people to challenge, create, or change something about their world. I thought this might be interesting to share with other affiliates as a means of encouraging people to contribute. You can watch the video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DviTjyyw8lo. Please encourage others to view it and if they like it, to vote for his entry "first charitable act" at http://www.youtube.com/converseonestar.

Thank you,

Valerie Garagiola

I'd like to share with you a comment made by our New Media Director, Anil Dewan, sparked by your story:

"As a local station, distributing our locally-developed app and charging 99 cents for it (11,227 downloads and 114,912 total sessions since June 10) we are doing what we feel needs to be done to maintain our connection to the audience, provide our content on an important new platform and still have a strong KCRW brand.

The Public Radio Tuner app has been around for a while (approx 1 million + downloads, last I heard). It does theoretically break the local/national model but from the user's perspective this is the most convenient. Not all stations can afford to develop and market their apps and not all users want to download a separate app for each station they might be interested in. My sense is that most people probably stick to their local stations or explore a couple of other favorites but probably don't go that much deeper.

In addition to streaming all three of our channels (Live/On-Air, Music and News), we distinguish our app from the PRX app by offering comprehensive on-demand programming, track lists for the music shows, event listings around town, and additional features coming soon."

Now a note from me: The KCRW Radio app streams all three KCRW web channels – on-air, music and news – with real time playlists. Two additional apps distribute video highlights from live band performances on Morning Becomes Eclectic, and the latest video webcasts from our popular weekend program Good Food. $0.99 each from Apple’s App Store on iPhone and iPod touch or at http://www.itunes.com/appstore/.

Perhaps the start of a new funding model for pubradio?

(PS: KCRW is about news and information but also so much more: we've got great original local programming, from live in-studio music performances, to food, entertainment industry, political and cultural shows plus great commentaries!)