We owe our listeners some mea culpas this week. One listener wrote to inform us that we were “broadcasting dead air on the radio since 1:05 PM” one recent Friday. He was right; the recorded program Quirks & Quarks, for some reason, didn’t play as scheduled, leaving us scrambling to find the cause and insert another program to fill the time. Another time our stream just cut out suddenly, which it’s been known to do. Someone told me it’s because Mercury is in retrograde, whatever that means, and since I don’t have a better explanation than that, I’m going with it.
Another listener wrote to compliment us on our classical music selections, saying “Thank you for interestingly refreshing programming of content on your feed. It beats by a significant margin the usual rivulet of “audience favorites” geared to the listeners’ credit-card reflex instinct.” But he went on to take issue with our host’s pronunciation of the conductor Ernest Ansermet’s name. It’s a name I’m not familiar with either, and I really hope I pronounced it correctly just now.
Rachel Keith got some very nice comments about her recent NewsRoom interview with Lauren Collins, author of the new book “They Stole a City: Wilmington’s White Supremacist Coup.” One appreciative listener wrote, “I am so glad you were able to interview Lauren Collins. I went to the book signing event, and it was standing room only and was unable to see Lauren. I really wanted to meet her as my Great-Great Grandfather was B.F. Keith, who was one of the Alderman who was overthrown and threatened by the white supremacists for switching his party to Republican. The family home still stands in Currie, NC, which is where they fled to during the massacre. I’m happy that this story is being told not just for Wilmington, but for the country as a whole.” If you missed this interview, you can listen to it on our website as the most recent episode of The NewsRoom.
We got a question about exhibiting art in our MC Erny Gallery. “This morning or perhaps last night I caught a brief snippet on air about applying for a show in the gallery space for 2027. I went to the website but was unclear on how to proceed!” Development Associate Lily Zukerman responded with all the information, which can be found on our website at whqr.org/art.
A listener recently brought a Facebook group called the NPR Network to my attention. It had about 56,000 members and sported the NPR logo, but closer inspection reveals that it was unaffiliated with NPR. The majority of posts to this group were by one person, all of which were clickbait and misinformation. I was surprised to find some of my Facebook friends among the subscribers. This illustrates a major problem with social media these days. A recent survey showed that 54% of Americans report social media is now their main source of news, overtaking TV news for the first time. I’m sure that percentage is higher among younger people. When it comes to Facebook, apparently you can pay for a blue check mark, which means you are “verified,” for what that’s worth. The important thing to remember is that not everything on social media is journalism.
We love to hear from you. Please send us your questions, comments, and criticisms. You can email us at feedback@whqr.org. You can also find us on Facebook, Instagram and Bluesky. Thanks for your feedback, and we look forward to hearing from you.