WBUR promotes WSJ (a good thing)

[lglavin@lycosmail.com]

There have been a few comments lately about the 
"near-commercials" one encounters on Public radio 
and TV.  The underwriting messages on "The Newshour
with Jim Lehrer", "Wall $treet Week" and some other
PBS shows greatly resemble portions of the companies'
TV commercials.  The underwriting messages on WBUR
FM&AM by comparison are closer to the spirit of 
FCC rules: short, mention the sponsor and maybe just the
address, 800# or URL, etc.  The one for Nina's of
Wellesley does not inflict the guy with the whiny voice
on us like their commercials!  All of this leads up to
my observation concerning the equivalent of a 
commercial for the Wall Street Journal's New England
insert that airs on WBUR FM&AM Wednesday mornings.
Every Wednesday, the WSJ carries a few pages of 
business news focusing on New England;  and nearly 
every Wednesday, Bob Oaks, Ted O'Brien or Dolores
Handy does a five-minute interview with the reporter 
who wrote the story that day.  It's a good and useful
feature for WBUR FM&AM and it alerts listeners to
the station that the WSJ has this section.  I
find no fault with the arrangement but I wonder if
the station annotates its program log in any way.
(And yes, I write "WBUR FM&AM" in response to a thread 
from a few days ago.)

Laurence from Methuen

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