<HTML><FONT FACE=arial,helvetica><HTML><FONT SIZE=2 PTSIZE=10 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0">In a message dated 10/30/2004 4:49:28 AM Central Daylight Time, MarkwP3096@aol.com writes:<BR>
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<BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">If you like the guy's work, be prepared to pay for it. Everyone's got to eat.</BLOCKQUOTE><BR>
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Absolutely.<BR>
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As far as the comment on "This subscription<BR>
plan is another way to extract a little more cash from his<BR>
ageing fan base"<BR>
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This sounds like there's an assumption, on the part of the guy who wrote that, that Joe made PILES of money in his "salad days"- whoever thinks this has not worked in Public Radio, or in the creative arts in any way. NOBODY in Public Radio makes any money! People in public radio are either volunteers, hardscrabble independent producers, or low-paid staff, aside from a few bigshots at NPR in Washington, DC, and some top management at the bigger NPR stations, who get salaries above $50,000. The average Starbucks worker gets more salary and better benefits than the guys behind the microphones at your local NPR station. I worked in public radio for 13 years, and income of $20,000 (in 2004 dollars) for the producer of a program carried by the network was considered "the big time."<BR>
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As far as Joe being in a "Dry Spell" it's really nothing to do with his creativity or output- it's a lack of SUPPORT. When he was at KCRW they provided studio facilities which otherwise run $50~$100 an hour- and the general rule is that for every hour of material you hear on the radio there's 10-20 hours of studio work involved. I suspect with Joe it was more like 50 hours of studio and editing time for each hour aired. Then, too, Joe had engineering help, typically an audio engineer adds $10-$30 an hour on top of studio costs, then there's acting talent like Larry Block, they have to be paid perhaps a few hundred dollars per segment, and so on. Joe also had financial support from a number of foundations such as the NEA, the Guggenheim Foundation, and so on. Most of that money has dried up in general, foundation money available to support arts of all kinds has declined sharply over the past 20 years.<BR>
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Remember, when you see someone on TV there are commercial sponsors of the TV shows and so talent, producers and other staff of popular programs like "The Apprentice" share MILLIONS of dollars from the network because the sponsors -Coca Cola, Ford, etc., -- pay MILLIONS to run commercials during popular programs. A program like "Somewhere Out There" may have been available to tens of millions of listeners, but National Public Radio doesn't have even 1% of the money flowing through NBC. <BR>
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So Joe has NEVER "raked it in." And now, since KCRW pulled the plug (so it seems) on anything creative that is REMOTELY controversial, I suspect that Joe is hard pressed to pay his bills. He does voice-over work (I've heard him on Discovery Channel docutainment) and so on, which I'm sure is how he makes ends meet. His work is carried by a number of public stations, and the Joe Frank operation probably gets a few thousand dollars a year from that. It's not NEARLY enough support to have the full-time audio production operation going that would be needed to produce a new program each week, like in the old days.<BR>
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So, he's not "going dry"- he's been CAST ADRIFT, the minimal support that used to be offered to this important artist has been JERKED OUT FROM UNDER HIM.<BR>
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For anyone to think that a wealthy Joe Frank is trying to "squeeze a few more dollars" from his "fans" is really not in touch with the bleak financial reality of life in creative radio and the arts.</FONT></HTML>