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NPR News on a commercial station?

Does anybody know if NPR allows commercial stations to air their news? I know of a commercial station that airs NPR news at the top of the hour and I was wondering if NPR allows this or if the station is just bootlegging the news. This is a privately-owned commercial station, not affiliated with any school or non-profit organization.

LF
 
The only one I know of is WOSO San Juan, Puerto Rico, which runs the NPR news show All Things Considered, and it is listed on the NPR station list at www.npr.org. It is one of Puerto Rico's few (only?) English-language stations. www.woso.com

In the Virgin Isles, a commercial band FM station runs NPR 24/7, but it seems to be leased by an ad hoc public radio group.

Interestingly, noncommercial stations that run religious programs, even just a few, find it difficult to become or retain NPR membership. Two cases were WSMC Chattanooga and WFUV New York. The parent Fordham University argued with CPB and NPR officials that broadcasting Sunday Mass and one or two other religious programs hardly constituted using tax-generated funds for advancing religion, and at any rate, NPR's stricture was an infringement of freedom of speech. Fordham prevailed. Both WSMC and WFUV are back as members, as is WAUS Berrien Springs, Michigan.

It seems that NPR is now a little more flexible about membership, but stations that are predominantly evangelical in purpose are not members. It is interesting that, on the other hand, NPR accepted WOSO, but under what terms I do not know. Perhaps commercial sales in the NPR block are not permitted. Puerto Rico is a special case, of course, because of language. NPR also lists WRTU San Juan, a noncommercial station owned by the University of Puerto Rico. It does not seem to be a student-oriented station, and it runs a great deal of English programming, but not the NPR news shows or even, as far as I can see, Car Talk or Prairie Home Companion. See www.wrtu.org. Most of the site, but not all, is in Spanish, and even high school Spanish will get you through the site.
 
The station I'm referring to is NOT listed on NPR's site as an affiliate. But they run NPR news hourly.

LF
 
lfuss said:
The station I'm referring to is NOT listed on NPR's site as an affiliate. But they run NPR news hourly.

LF
Care to share the identity or location of the station? There was one station that was doing this ages ago, in Maryland, due to no NPR in that area. However, I believe this has changed, after WETA purchased a station up in the mountains. NPR does have policies that would allow this to happen, but it would be very limited, and only be allowed when no other outlet was available or willing to air certain programming. PRI does the same thing.
 
Technically, all AM public radio stations and FM public radio stations from 92.1 to 107.9 are commercial stations.

That said, SHOULD NPR provide news or other programming to commercial stations?
Including (but not limited to) progressive talk stations which do not have a news service (of any quality) suitable for the fomat. Could be a good source of additional revenue. Certainly sounds better than public radio continuing to get money from the government.
 
NE Miss Radio said:
fredflintstone said:
Technically, all AM public radio stations and FM public radio stations from 92.1 to 107.9 are commercial stations.
You can have a station from 92.1 to 107.9 changed to non-comm status

Yeah... the FM non-comm band is off-limits to commercial licensees, but the reverse isn't true of the AM band or FM/92.1-plus. The folks at UW-Madison will tell you they started the whole AM band, with their experimental predecessor of WHA. They call KDKA a "latecomer."
 
redneckriviera said:
The folks at UW-Madison will tell you they started the whole AM band, with their experimental predecessor of WHA. They call KDKA a "latecomer."

KCBS could say the same about WHA, Madison.
 
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