Morning Stories at a Crossroads

For those of you who listen to the Morning Stories podcast from WGBH in Boston, you know that show has come to an end. The budget ran out for the program and it is no longer being produced under the aegis of WGBH. However, my friend Tony Kahn has not yet given up, and he has set up an alternative outpost for the Morning Stories body of work at his Hi Tony! site. I’m fortunate enough to be someone Tony calls for advice now and then (and the reverse as well because I am a lucky man). I gave a few suggestions on the project in general and the site in specific. Some of these have been done, some are still working.

I advised him to make the donate mechanism appear prominently on every single page. There is at this point no XML feed for new programs but that should be coming along shortly. My advice to Tony was to try to think in terms of the Doctorovian “macropayments” idea that I’ve been posting about. If you have 10,000 listeners, it would be great to get $5 or $10 a year from each of them, but it will be simpler with less wear and tear if you can find a way for 750 fans to give you $100/year, aka the Kevin Kelly “1000 true fans” thinking.

I’m glad to have any form of Morning Stories back in any fashion. Please listen and help support Tony and spread the word. He’s been a friend of podcasting since the absolute beginning, was the first public radio podcaster and used his influence at WGBH to help legitimize the intersection of radio and new media. The least we can do is help the brother out.