Thursday, June 02, 2005

Four links added

An e-mail from Rebecca led to adding the mirror site for Folding Star's A Winding Road. It's near the bottom of the links on the left. I would've grouped it right to next to the mirror site for The Common Ills but Kat's there and had requested to be there when I told her we'd be linking.
Rebecca's point is that if one site goes down, the resources should be there for another site when it exists. Good point.

The other three links are radio: Pacifica and NPR.

A number of members (most vocally Marcia) have been requesting a Pacifica Radio link so it's up. So we've added two links. There's the Pacifica home page that has information and highlights on Pacifica programming as well as links to Pacifica radio stations. "The Peace Resource Page" also provides links to five Pacifica radio stations and has some great resources.

The fourth link is for NPR. Lloyd asked for that and with Ruth covering aspects of it in her Ruth's Morning Edition Report, with NPR under attack yet again, and with about half of the community's membership e-mailing about at least one NPR program they listen to, it made sense to add them.

There's not a link proper to Air America. There's a link to Air America Place where you can listen to any show from the Air America Radio network you'd like to. We also link to BuzzFlash which provideds a link to Air America. I think that covers Air America Radio. (We also note the weekend programing as well as week day shows members enjoy.)

Adding NPR is not an attempt to persuade members who've stated that they've washed their hands of it to rethink their position on it. I understand your sentiments and respect them. As with any permalink or link within an entry, if it speaks to you, utilize it. If it doesn't ignore it.
Also note that linking to NPR is not an endorsement of them. I think they're able to provide perspective that you don't hear (or, sadly, read) elsewhere. That potential isn't always realized.
Lloyd made a sound argument for linking to them and I ran the link by thirty long time members (sixteen of which have no interest in NPR's current fate and have washed their hands of it). I did that because we're a resource/review for the left and NPR is mainstream. All thirty (including the sixteen who feel NPR's on its own in the current battle) approved of the linking due to the potential to provide perspective that NPR has. And, as Kara pointed out, while mainstream, "it's supposed to be in the news business as opposed to the synergy business."

It's also supposed to be "public" broadcasting. So with all that it's supposed to be and can be, Lloyd's strong argument and the fact that I always root for the underdog, we'll go ahead and make it our exception to the rule.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.