SCHOOL'S BACK IN SESSION

posted to Rappaport's Notebook by Robert Rappaport

Some Tucson-area school districts already have started the new school year, but Southern Arizona's largest district began classes Monday, so be careful when out driving.

Tens of thousands of students in the Tucson Unified School District will be trekking to school and that means you can't drive more than 15 miles an hour and you can't pass other cars while in designated school zones.

Tucson Police usually man these areas closely when school first returns, so be alert and cautious when out driving. You don't want to get a ticket and you certainly don't want to hurt any children.

Between school zones, red light cameras and roving radar speed cameras, if you speed, eventually you'll get caught.

REMEMBERING JOHN HUGHES

posted to Rappaport's Notebook by Robert Rappaport

As you've no doubt heard by now, filmmaker John Hughes died unexpectedly this week of a heart attack at the age of 59. Man, I loved his movies.

While having not seen ALL of Hughes' movies, two stand out above all the rest... Ferris Bueller's Day Off in 1986 and National Lampoon's Vacation in 1983. Thanks to cable television, I've seen each of those movies too many times to count, but lines from them are part of my daily vernacular.

Who among us hasn't at one time or another said "Bueller, Bueller, Bueller?" Sadly enough, I can even quote the "Um, he's sick..." rapid response that comes after it. Matthew Broderick will always be Ferris to me, no matter how many other movies he makes. I was not a big fan of Biloxi Blues. I kept thinking of his character as Ferris in another movie, much like Henry Winkler will always be "The Fonz" to me.

John Hughes (AP, 1984)

Sure, Hughes had those other hits, like Pretty in Pink and Sixteen Candles, which made him wildly popular in the 1980s, but I choose to remember him as the creator of Clark Griswold and Ferris Bueller.

They just don't make movies like that anymore, do they? Why not? Maybe it's a generational thing, but I think the teen angst movies of the 1980s were far superior to the stuff we see these days. Sure, movies today are more polished, but they don't seem to have that lasting effect of the "old days," like the John Hughes movies do. Am I wrong?

Read about Hughes' extensive career at his Wiki page.

COME CELEBRATE NATIONAL PARKS WITH AZPM’S SPECIAL EVENT AUGUST 29TH

posted to From the General Manager by Jack Gibson

This month we begin our special celebration of Ken Burns’s latest documentary series, National Parks: America’s Best Idea. While the series begins on September 27, 2009 – our events start in August with the National Park Family Expo at Centennial Hall on the campus of The University of Arizona, Saturday, August 29th from 2-6 p.m. We have interactive events for all ages, a preview of the National Parks programs, and a Community Conversation roundtable hosted by our own Bill Buckmaster. Panelists for the roundtable include Senator Tom Udall, Congressman Raul Grijalva, and Darla Sidles the new Superintendent of Saguaro National Park. There will be something for everyone at the event, and I would love to see you there.

I hope you had the chance to join us for our coverage of the Judge Sonia Sotomayor Supreme Court Confirmation Hearings. True to our name, Arizona Public Media provided you with options to tune in with whatever media was most convenient for you. Complete coverage of the proceedings and analysis from NPR and PBS included gavel-to-gavel coverage via live webcast on the radio page at AZpublicmedia.org and from our newest television channel, PBS World (KUAS Channel 27-3, Cox 83, Comcast 203), in addition to regular updates throughout the day and special evening wrap-up programs on NPR, KUAZ-FM 89.1/1550 AM and The Newshour with Jim Lehrer. This type of broad content delivery (radio/television/online) is what I believe will be the future of our organization as we work to keep you informed.

On August 9th we begin a week of transmitter power reductions and periodic outages for channels 6-1 PBS-HD, 6-2 V-me, 6-3 Create, and Classical KUAT-FM. These service disruptions are necessary to ensure a safe working environment for tower crews who will be at our Mt. Bigelow transmission site, working to install a new digital television antenna. This will only affect over-the-air viewers who use a set-top or rooftop antenna to receive their television signals, and all classical radio listeners. Our hope it to return all stations to full power by mid-August. Updates on our progress will be available on our website. Please accept my apologies in advance for any inconvenience these service disruptions may cause you.

The first pledge week of the new fiscal year begins on August 1, so I hope you’ll join us for the best that public television has to offer in outstanding music, self-help, news, and entertainment programming. When it’s hot outside – stay cool with us from the comfort of your living room!

Sincerely,

Jack Gibson
Director and General Manager
Arizona Public Media®

NPR'S NEW WEB - PART TWO

posted to Rappaport's Notebook by Robert Rappaport

Apparently, when NPR launched its new Web site several days ago, the network developed a sense of humor.

If you're not familiar with the new Web site and the direction it's taking, please refer to my earlier blog.

You know how you get that dreaded "404/Page Not Found" error whenever you type in an incorrect URL or the link is broken? Well, NPR was prepared for that and provides some entertainment when you end up in the wrong place. Click here to see what I mean. Just make sure you scroll down a bit if you have a tiny monitor.

We here at AZPM have "404" entertainment as well, which you can find here.

Hey, at least you have something to do now when the Web programmers (or you) mess up.

NPR'S NEW WEB

posted to Rappaport's Notebook by Robert Rappaport

Have you seen NPR's new Web site yet? It has changed (more than you may notice on the surface) and here's why:

The network has realized (and rightly so) that people go online for news...not program promotion. An article in the New York Times describes the new site, with quotes from NPR's President and CEO Vivian Schiller, who concedes "We are a news content organization, not just a radio organization."

The article details how the Web site will now make it easier for users to find stories and READ them, rather than just having quickie leads to setup the audio report. NPR previously had been doing this, to some extent, on major stories and that's what we at AZPM are going to do in the not-too-distant (undefined) future.

Admittedly, our front page at AZPM.org does not really serve any purpose other than promotion at this point, even though it may not originally have been intended that way. Sure, you can launch to other pages on our site from there, but why not just go to that site directly? For example, you'll often hear us on the radio side say "Go to AZPM.org and click on radio." It's the best we have at this point, but when we make our changes, expect something similar to NPR. You'll be able to go to our main page and get actual news, rather than just links to other pages.

Accomplishing this task presents another challenge, which we in the Online/New Media Department are trying to overcome. I have the distinction of working both online and as a radio producer, but those lines are being blurred and it's a challenge to convince others that we are not just a TV and radio organization anymore.

We deliver content and it's presented in many platforms, with online being the most immediate. That means we all need to prioritize our time, write full versions of stories (not just intro to soundbites and video clips) and realize what we're now calling "Old Media" is pretty much dead. I'm not sure when you last sat down to watch a half-hour newscast, but I really couldn't tell you the last time I did. I still get all the elements I want...just at my schedule...and I only watch what I want and mentally discard the stuff I don't want. That's why YouTube is so popular these days and old-school network ratings are WAY down. Sure, today's broadcasting is becoming "narrowcasting," but that's what "New Media" is all about. We offer you the broad spectrum of stuff and you pull from it what you want. However, we actually need to have something from which you can pull.

Keep monitoring our sites, as they will change. I'm just not sure when. In the meantime, critique NPR and let us know what you think. Maybe we can learn from it, before we base our model on the new site.

Editors note: AP Stylebook dictates "Web site," rather than "website." It looks weird to me, but that's what I'm using now.

MORE JETS OVERHEAD

posted to Rappaport's Notebook by Robert Rappaport

Get ready for more jets..and more noise...over the Tucson area for the next few weeks.

Here's a news release from DM that explains it all:

Operation Snowbird update

DAVIS-MONTHAN AIR FORCE BASE, Ariz. --

The 188th Fighter Wing based at Ft. Smith, Ark., will deploy eight A-10 aircraft to Davis-Monthan Air Force Base as part of Operation Snowbird.

The aircraft are scheduled to arrive in the Tucson area beginning next week, and are scheduled to depart after the first week of August.

During their brief stay, the pilots will comply with all of the base's traffic patterns, safety procedures and noise-abatement measures.

Visiting units use this unique training in preparation for upcoming deployments. Davis-Monthan and surrounding training sites offer visiting air crews similar conditions they would face in deployed environments, making the base and its assets ideal for combat training.

Operation Snowbird provides support for visiting flying units from U.S. military installations and allied partners needing to train in the optimal weather conditions and ample ranges of Southern Arizona.