Web links related to the Back of the Book program of May 22, 2006


It's Tuesday evening 5/23/2006 19:31:21 and this Web page is finished! I've added the graphic of the Uncle Sidney Timmy Tom T-shirt below, and I've posted an archive of this program, since the official WBAI archive is not there. We pitched without notice! We got to the below topics and a little bit more, and we only raised $753 since we couldn't alert listeners beforehand that we were going to be pitching.

The next WBAI Local Station Board meeting is scheduled for Monday, May 22, at 6:30 PM, at 9:00 PM the Board will go into executive session to discuss personnel matters. WBAI Local Station Board meeting will be held at 1199's Bread and Roses Art Gallery, 310 W. 43rd St.(between 8th and 9th Avenue) in Manhattan. Take the 1, 2, 3, 7, or N, R, Q, to Times Square, or A,C,E, to 42nd St. Port Authority, or 4, 5, 6, to 42nd St. Grand Central Station and transfer to the shuttle to Times Square in Manhattan. The location is wheelchair - accessible and public comment is welcome.

Did you know that I've got a brief synopsis of some of the WBAI LSB meetings? Well, I do. And I update them from time to time.

The April 25th, LSB meeting was held in Manhattan. The faction went on a hate binge against the interim General Manager. She layed off the faction leader, not to be confused with the faction boss, and the faction leader is using all of his connections to try to get that paying job back. The entire faction is demanding that he be re-employed. When it's convenient the faction operatives claim that they're so pro-labor, but here we have a situation where numbers of Paid Staff have been layed off or have had their hours cut due to budgetary constraints, and they all have seniority over the faction leader. But since he's the faction leader they want to ignore seniority and keep the patronage system going for him. I can't say just what happened at the executive session at the last meeting, but I can say that it started over an hour late, lasted only twenty minutes and in my opinion was a waste of time. This isn't over.

I have written a statement about the constructive removal of a LSB member and sent it to the PNB, the WBAI LSB and various public mailing lists and bulletin boards. His 6 month “suspension” is now in its 15th month.

WBAI has a program schedule up on its Web site. The site has gotten many of the individual program pages together to provide links and such, so check it out.

There is a new, official stream for WBAI! You can go here and pick which type of stream you want! If this stream isn't working let me know. It was working at 10:44 PM last night.

The Pacifica Foundation, which owns WBAI, has revamped its Web site and now has something called the Pacifica Lounge where you can post messages about Pacifica, WBAI and other Pacifica radio stations. This may be a good thing, and of course there are other, long term fora in which to participate.

WBAI also has a forum on its Web site now. You have to register to post messages, but anyone may read the messages.

WBAI is now archiving the programs! Just go here and you'll be able to listen to the program any time for the next couple of weeks. Unfortunately, Back of the Book is not one of the programs that you can download, you can only listen to it on line. But maybe someone will change that at some point. NOTE: The archives have not always been behaving properly of late. They have been fixed, but we can't guarantee their condition. If Back of the Book isn't archived this time I'll post an archive myself. Also note that they have been calling the Back of the Book archive the Carrier Wave archive. You should go by the date of the program until this gets rectified.

NOTE:The archives are screwed up again so I've posted an archive on another Web site. Just go to this link to download the audio archive of the May 22, 2006, radio program. I've stripped out the music, and I've also cut a lot of the pitching out.

The Pacifica National Board (PNB) is coming to New York City. They'll be meeting here June 2-4, 2006, at the New York Marriott East Side 525 Lexington Avenue New York, New York 10017 Phone: 1-212-755-4000 Fax: 1-212-751-3440 Toll-free: 1-800-242-8684 Sales: 1-212-715-4260 Sales Fax: 1-212-980-6175. Come see if the faction currently in charge at WBAI tries to intimidate the PNB. Come see if the PNB can grow both a collective brain and a spine before the entire Pacifica Foundation implodes!

Our Saddle Pal Uncle Sidney Smith has a blog! Click here to go to Sidney's blog.

Sidney Smith's Timmy Tom T-shirtWe pitched on this program! We had it in writing that the overnight programs were not pitching tonight, but on Friday we were told that we were! So we pitched and raised $753, which is a lot less than we usually do, but then we couldn't let our listeners know ahead of time that we were going to be pitching which is an important part of how we raise money on Back of the Book.

On the right you can see the major part of a graphic from Sidney Smith's Timmy Tom T-shirt. We pitched the T-shirts as a premium and a good number of listeners pledged for them.

Sidney Smith, of course, does the radio program Carrier Wave, which alternates with Back of the Book. Sidney is a pal of ours and listeners to his program have been following the adventures of his fictional character Timmy tom, who is a half angel. Sidney reads the stories on his program.

This is the first-ever premium for one of our programs and Sidney is an artist whose work is quite respected in Europe. Some of the art books Sidney used to sell for $1, or even give away, back in the '70s, are now selling for $250 or more.

So thanks to everyone who pledged to Back of the Book during this 'thon!

Well, we don't know how much we'll get to tonight, but we are going to talk about a starquake that has told scientists about the crust of a neutron star.

There are a lot of issues that are considered hazardous to talk about on the air at WBAI, even now that the gag rule has been lifted. However, there is the Internet! There are mailing lists which you can subscribe to and Web based message boards devoted to WBAI and Pacifica issues. Many controversial WBAI/Pacifica issues are discussed on these lists.

Probably the most popular list that's sprung up is the “NewPacifica” mailing list. This one is very lively and currently includes over 400 subscribers coast to coast.

Being lively, of course, it sometimes also gets a bit nasty. All sorts of things are happening on this list and official announcements are frequently posted there.

You can look at the NewPacifica list here, and you can join the list from that Web page too. If you subscribe to the “NewPacifica” mailing list you will receive, via E-mail, all of the messages which are sent to that list.

There is the option to receive a “digest” version of the list, which means that a bunch of messages are bundled into one E-mail and sent to you at regular intervals, this cuts down on the number of E-mails you get from the list. You will also be able to send messages to the list.

This list also has a Web based interface where you can read messages and from which you can post your own messages.

There is also the more WBAI specific “Goodlight” Web based message board. It is sometimes referred to on Back of the Book as “the bleepin' blue board,” owing to the blue background used on its Web pages. This one has many people posting anonymously and there's also an ancillary “WBAI people” board that's just totally out of hand.

When the computer in Master Control is working we sometimes have live interaction with people posting on the “Goodlight Board” during the program.

And then there is the historic “Free Pacifica!” list, which has been used to help organize resistance to Pacifica Management hijackers since the mid-90s. It's become a low volume mailing list because it's been eclipsed by some of the newer, more technologically advanced, lists. Just click on this link and follow the instructions, and you'll be subscribed. This is a mailing list only, it doesn't have a digest option nor does it have a web interface.

My voice mail number at WBAI is 212-209-2996. Leave a message.

You can also send me E-mail.



WBAI related links

Free Pacifica Web site

WBAI Listeners' Web page

WBAI Management's official Web site


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The contents of this Web page are copyright © 2006, R. Paul Martin.