Embedding for All

You don’t need to have a paid PRX account or even have to log in to share work on PRX.org.

Embeddable players are now available to ALL PRX producers, and complete streams of all NEW pieces posted to PRX will now be open for people to listen to without logging in. The Facebook player will also play the full piece rather than 30 seconds.

We know embedding works: Almost all of the most listened to pieces of 2011 were open for embedding and were shared on websites.

See the embeddable player in action on a producer’s website, HuffPo, and Remix.

You’re still in control: Embedding, Facebook streaming, and non-logged-in listening are all part of what we call Open Streaming, which you can turn on or off per piece. Here’s how:

Allow Open Streaming | How to Share | In Our Blog

Top of the Charts

The Zeitfunk Awards for 2011 are here! They show the Most Licensed Producer, Most Listened-to Piece, which stations bought the most, and more — think of them as the PRX Oscars.

Plus, we love helpful stats! Some highlights:

• 8,000 individual pieces were licensed; many of those more than once. The total number of licenses was 17,488 (that’s 4,062 more than 2010).
• 437 individual producers and 176 groups sold pieces on PRX in 2011
• 185 producers sold pieces for the first time!
• Hour-long programs continue to be the best sellers at 9,664 licenses last year.
• In second place, pieces under 5 min. sold 3,184 times.

See all the stats, new categories (like Most Embedded), and fun stuff at the Zeitfunk Awards.

More News

Not just a home for terrestrial stations, PRX has “Outside Purchasers” — internet radio, national shows, podcasts, and more — that license pieces with your permission.

• National show The Story is a big purchaser.
• HCC Radio the Dragon out of Howard Community College in Maryland was one of the most active OPs last year.
• PRX’s own Public Radio Remix is an OP, and licensed 649 pieces last year.

Opt-in and let OPs buy your pieces.

Speaking of Public Radio Remix… The 24/7 channel of pieces from PRX is now on KALW/San Francisco, KUNM/Albuquerque, and WFPL/Louisville.

See all the stations and ways you can hear Remix.

The BBC World Service is looking for documentaries that will show their global audience an America they didn’t know existed. Ideas are due March 2. Get the details.

Producer News

Congrats to the newest Third Coast Festival winners, whose provocative pieces will be featured in the Best of the Best special coming Nov. 17.

Three of this year’s winning pieces are already on PRX. Listen now (and find past winners here):

The Wisdom of Jay Thunderbolt from Love + Radio
(Gold)

The Five Percent Rule from Sally Herships
(Radio Impact Award)

Kohn from Andy Mills
(Best New Artist)

The Tao of Jay

Jay Allison’s benediction at the annual PRPD conference in Sept. — attended by hundreds of station staff and many producers — was eloquent, inspiring, and had important messages for stations about bringing them together with indies. Here are some excerpts (listen to the whole thing here or read the transcript):

“John Barth of PRX tells me when he talks to stations about great new content he hears back, ‘Well, we’re not going to pay for anything.’ …excuse me? Is content not the most important thing to pay for?…Especially in a financial crisis? Isn’t that all our listeners really care about?”

“We can make time to try new things…There are lots of stations making this happen in all different ways…It gives producers hope to have the knowledge that their work, if it’s good enough, will find an audience, because enough stations are giving it a chance.”

From the PRX Factory

Stats Galore

You may already use your stats in your My PRX account info, but, how would you like more detail?

PRX is developing an all-new stats page. You’ll be able to see views, listens, and purchases by piece and by account (yourself, your producer group, or your station, if you work at one).

Plus, you’ll be able to see what sort of PRX member (station staff, other producer, listener) viewed your stuff and where they’re located.

What else has been going on at PRX? See our new monthly update!

Opportunities

Last chance for Localore! More stations are pitching their appeal to AIR’s Localore Station Runway. See which may be the right fit for you and get your application in by Nov. 10.

Localore will provide more than $1 million to 10 producers, who will partner with stations to create projects that transform public media.

And, check out the new partnership between Localore and Zeega (an open-source HTML5 platform for creating interactive documentaries).

Producer News

Try Hindenburg…with a Discount! Hindenburg Systems has made it easy to send your audio to PRX with one click from their Journalist Pro audio editing software.

And, they’re even offering $50 off to all Sync subscribers. Transom reviewed the software here.

The Best Storytelling Podcast
Looking for SaltCast? It’s now called HowSound, and has a new home. HowSound is the bi-weekly podcast on radio storytelling produced by radio guru and producer Rob Rosenthal. Subscribe!

Opportunities Galore

Radio Ambulante Needs Stories A new monthly Spanish-language radio program — telling uniquely Latin American stories from across the Spanish-speaking Americas and U.S. — is launching in early 2012.

Think This American Life, but in Spanish, and transnational. They’re looking for pitches for their first three episodes.

• KUOW – Seattle: Talk show producer for Weekday, a program that covers local and national news and cultural issues
• WFCR – Amherst: Morning Edition Host/Senior News Producer and Senior News Editor
• KALW – San Francisco: Producers for City Visions call-in show

Got Multimedia? Youth Media International’s Turnstyle, the online info service powered by creative young adults (18-34), welcomes multimedia submissions.

Let Noah Nelson know what you have via PRX messaging.

Events

Sept. 28 at 1 p.m. ET, everywhere!
Join AIR and NCME for a webinar introducing you to Localore. It’s a fresh opportunity providing significant funding to producers across the country to “turbocharge” invention in journalism at public radio and TV stations. Reserve your spot in the webinar here.

Third Coast Filmless Festival

Oct. 23, 10 a.m. – 9 p.m., Chicago
A day-long celebration of sound, story, and listening. Radio fans gather for themed “screenings” of audio documentaries, producer Q&As, and an awards ceremony honoring the winners of the TCF/Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Competition. Awesome inspiration!

Producer News

Remixing Seattle Public Radio Remix, our 24/7 stream of PRX producers’ pieces, is now on the air overnight in Seattle on KUOW2 91.7!

KALW in San Francisco uploads tons of stories that are great for Remix and for second-run broadcast on stations across the country. PRX’s Emily Corwin spoke to KALW News Director Holly Kernan about their priorities and process.

“…we are looking for great stories…That’s one of the things that we constantly drum into people’s heads: don’t give me an issue. Tell me a story.”
-Holly Kernan | read the full interview

Walk the Virtual Red Carpet Remember our Zeitfunk Awards this spring? We honored the most successful producers and pieces of 2010, plus gave you stats like what lengths sell the most.

Now, one of our favorite parts is here — the Awards Ceremony! Check out fellow producers’ fun trophy photos and speeches.

Stream and Share with the World

Start embedding! Producers who have are seeing huge increases in listens and exposure by putting a player that looks like this in blogs and websites:

With one checkbox in piece creation (here’s how), you can:

• Enable an embeddable player (above) that plays the full piece on websites and blogs.
• Allow the Facebook player to play the full piece.
• Let visitors to the piece on PRX.org (including those without PRX accounts) listen to the full stream. Get a short URL for tweeting and bringing people to the piece.

Watch how it works in this video.

And, see the player in action on Maximum Fun’s site (scroll down) and KFAI’s station website.

Opportunities Galore

The annual competition honoring the best audio documentaries is on! Upload your entry here.

Essential Public Media in Pittsburgh is looking for a general assignment reporter, Morning Edition host, and more. Check out their job list.

Story Workshop: Oct. 3-Nov. 18 Transom is offering a seven-week workshop for new producers on Cape Cod this fall. Limited to eight, you’ll get plenty of individual attention and learn a ton about audio storytelling. Get more info and apply by July 25.

AIR’s next Sounds Elemental intensive is coming up this Dec. in NYC. Experiment with unconventional approaches to storytelling and benefit from attention from renowned sound artists. Apply by Sept. 26.

And the winners are…

Here are several of the Zeitfunk first-place winners for 2010 (each will soon receive a trophy that is way more fun than an Oscar).

Many more of you placed;
check out the full list.

Most Licensed Producer by REMIX
Nate DiMeo (more)

Most Licensed Producer
Phil Nusbaum (more)

Most Licensed Producer Group
Vinyl Cafe (more)

Most Licensed Debut Producer
Stephen R. Webb (more)

Most Licensed Debut Producer Group
Loyola Productions (more)

Zeitfunk is also a great resource of what’s selling and who’s buying it, including stats like the piece lengths that stations buy most.

Useful News & Views

PRX 3.12 was released a few weeks ago; here are some highlights:

• Improved UI on your My PRX page, plus more accurate statistics. Coming soon is a new page with even more stats, broken down by piece.
• When you publish a piece, you will see a Share tab with a short URL that’s perfect for tweeting.
• The ability to post your piece with an audio player on Facebook. See our Facebook for examples.

And, our embeddable audio player for your blog and other sites is currently being tested. Learn more about PRX 3.12 and other improvements coming soon.

PRX’s developers recently released the TAL app on iPad.

And, our TAL app for iPhone is in the running for a People’s Voice Webby Award. Please vote!

PRX’s own John Barth shares his observations from last month’s Listening Institute at the Center for Documentary Studies.

Generation PRX surveyed youth producers and teachers to see where they think their pieces are heard the most. See the results and get suggestions on how to make youth radio groups more effective.

Opportunities

AIR is holding the next Sounds Elemental intensive this summer in NYC from June 13-17. Experiment with unconventional approaches to storytelling and benefit from individualized attention from renowned sound artists. Apply by May 6!

Snap Judgment is looking for stories for its new season. From spacemen to cheaters, see what they need and check out their flowchart to see if your story is right for Snap.

WFIU in Bloomington, Indiana has two open full-time journalism positions.

The annual competition honoring amazing radio will accept entries May 4 through July 14.

Cool and Useful

Our next free quarterly webinar, PRX 101 for Producers, is Feb. 24 at 1 p.m. EST. We’ll teach you all the essentials, like how to get noticed on PRX. Sign up.

We recently updated our page about what you can’t say on the radio. Get all the juicy details and see what’s been x-ed out in this graphic.

Coming this spring, you’ll be able to embed your PRX pieces in your blog or website. We’ll also give you a short, tweetable URL every time you publish a piece.

Spend an hour with Ira Glass, The Kitchen Sisters, and Jay Allison in this special recorded by AIR at a live event in Boston last fall. Reality Radio: Telling True Stories in Sound peels back the curtain on how these producers learned to make amazing radio. Plus, hear some of their favorite pieces.

170 Million Americans for Public Broadcasting is a grassroots effort against potential public media funding cuts. Learn more about the movement and sign up to get notified about congressional moves and the actions you can take.

Opportunities

REMIX Radio is our 24/7 showcase of pieces from PRX, and can be heard around the world on XM 136 and remixradio.org, plus on KPBZ 90.3 in Spokane. Check out our new page about how to get your work on REMIX.

Congrats to producer Eric Molinsky, whose Star Trek Generations is the 1,000th piece to appear on REMIX!

The Story with Dick Gordon is a national program that airs daily on some 100 stations, and they’re now buying pieces on PRX.

They’re interested in first-person storytelling: narrative and non-narrative, short and long — ideally stories that have not aired extensively. Got something? Send your piece links to Katie Davis.

To make sure The Story can buy your pieces, log into PRX, head to My PRX > Outside Purchaser Preferences, and opt-in.

Turnstyle is an online info service powered by creative young adults (18-34). Take a look at their website and their pieces on PRX.

They welcome multimedia submissions including slideshows, audio features, short-form videos, commentary, and print articles with accompanying photos. Let them know what you have.

Events

Say hi to PRXers in Austin March 10-15 and catch our IMA panels: Beyond the Stream: Mobile Apps That Matter and Going Mobile Without Going Crazy… or Broke. Plus, Our Media: Building An API For Public Media at SXSW.

Brings producers from across the globe to Durham, NC March 17-20 for three days of listening and learning with documentaries submitted by the participants.

The fifth annual conference devoted to media, technology and democracy is in Boston April 8-10.

Sharing Galore: New Piece Features

A holiday gift from PRX: new features coming soon that will take your pieces into 2011 in sharing style.

Opt-into having large or small embeddable widgets that you and others can post on blogs and other websites. (This will be available only to paid PRX members at first.)

The small widget in a WordPress blog

Currently, only logged-in PRX members can listen to your pieces. We’ll allow you to let non-logged in users listen if you want, like this.

When you publish a piece, you’ll be given a short piece URL perfect for tweeting right away to let the world know it’s live on PRX.

News, Tips & Cool Stuff

Stations need you to fill out your content advisories on your pieces. You should also bleep swear words before uploading to PRX. Have questions about what counts? Ask us.

PRX’s own John Barth shares The State of Radio and where we’re headed, from more collaboration to new platforms to bigger audiences, with a need for more risk-taking and crossing of the “great divide”.

January is when we compile our annual list of the most licensed and listened-to pieces on PRX, the Zeitfunk Awards. Get your pieces uploaded by the end of the year to be in the running!

Opportunities

KCRW-Santa Monica’s new program UnFictional highlights work from indie producers, and they get a ton of their content from PRX. They’re looking for documentaries and stories that have a strong narrative. Log into PRX to send the program’s host direct links to your pieces that may fit.

The Association of Independents in Radio and Independent Television Service need indie producers’ perspectives on their short CPB-funded survey.

The survey explores distribution, format, and areas where independents generate income outside of public media and what their prospects may be for the future. The findings will provide the first comprehensive understanding of indie journalists contributing to public radio, television, and online.

Read the FAQ and complete the survey by Dec. 31 at 11 p.m. ET.

KUOW in Seattle seeks an environmental reporter as part of a CPB-funded Local Journalism Center. Production will include news spots and feature-length reports for multiple platforms including online and broadcast. Learn more and apply by Jan. 5.

Third Coastin’

Some of the winning Third Coast Competition pieces are already up on PRX. Their specific awards will be announced at the ceremony Oct. 30, so get a head start listening!

PRX will be the exclusive home of Best of the Best: The 2010 Third Coast Festival Broadcast, coming Nov. 18.

And, we know there are many wonderful pieces out there that didn’t win. If you entered the Third Coast Competition, put your entry on PRX and let us know.

You can use PRX to contact stations about your work? You can promote yourself to the outside world using your profile, playlists, and — coming soon — embeddable widgets?

There are many things that PRX can do that you may not know — stop by our table at Third Coast and ask us anything or let us show you around!

News, Tips & Cool Stuff

This summer, the PRX help staff held our first open webinars, and we had a lot of attendees and great questions. So, we’re doing it again.

PRX 101 for Producers is Nov. 18 at 1 p.m. EST (register) and PRX 101 for Stations is Nov. 16 at 1 p.m. (register).

PRX support staffer and indie producer Emily Corwin talked with a ton of producers at a retreat this past weekend, and has tips based on their questions.

REMIX Radio is an experimental radio stream showcasing pieces from PRX.org. Originally on XM 136, the station is now on KPBZ 90.3 in Spokane, Wash. You can also listen to a free stream on remixradio.org.

REMIX curators are continually looking for pieces on PRX. Make it easy for them to license your work if they want to by adjusting your opt-in preferences.

And, speaking of other great showcases of indie talent…

O’Dark 30 is an exploration of the world of independent audio production on Austin’s KUT, and they get most of the pieces from PRX producers. Each episode has a fun animated promo you can find online along with all the past episodes. They also create playlists of all the PRX producers’ pieces that are in the shows.

Send O’Dark 30 direct links to your best work on PRX.

The PRX-developed This American Life app is now on Android.

Opportunities

Bullying has been all over the news lately. Events across the country demonstrate both the tragic consequences of bullying, and how much more we need to understand it. PRX is looking for your stories on bullying, with an eye towards creating an hour-long special on the issue. Have stories? Working on something? Let us know.

Louisville Public Media is looking for a “seasoned journalist and dynamic leader to develop and nurture a major expansion of our local news effort.”

PRX Sends Help

With more than 20,000 radio pieces on PRX.org, it can feel a little overwhelming. Can I add more people to my group account? How do I get paid? What do I pay to join? How do I get exposure for my pieces?

Sign up for a webinar! No experience necessary — they’re open to new PRX users or seasoned members who would like a review.

PRX 101 for Producers is Aug. 19 at 3 p.m. EST (register) and PRX 101 for Stations is Aug. 12 at 4 p.m. (register).

News & Reminders

In order for us to send you your royalties, we need your SS# on file. Contact Kerri. You can view your royalties from My PRX > Royalty Statements.

Destination DIY is one of PRX’s newest outside purchasers. Producer Julie Sabatier is looking for pieces that take DIY beyond home improvement and crafts, to explore all kinds of ways people work with limited resources to create rather than consume. Be sure to manage your opt-in preferences for Destination DIY and dozens of other OPs at My PRX > Outside Purchaser Preferences.

Generation PRX is our project to support youth radio. We recently redesigned parts of the GPRX network to better connect producers, pieces, resources and ideas. Check it out and share why you love radio with youth producers.

Do you tweet about your radio work? Send us your Twitter account so we can follow you and you can scratch our backs, too.

Events & Opportunities

Got a story about getting busted, breaking in or roughing it? Hot new show Snap Judgment needs stories on these and other themes. Check out their pitch list and send them what you’ve got!

Participate in a single-day un-conference Aug. 21. Come to set the agenda, share ideas, network and lay the foundation for what’s to come in new media.

Sponsored by WBUR and Boston University, the prize honors a young public radio journalist who has produced a news piece of particular significance within the past year. Deadline for submissions is Sept. 17.

If you’re lucky enough to be in Boston on Sept. 21, mark your calendar for an event tied to the book Reality Radio. WGBH and AIR will host author John Biewen and radio creators Ira Glass, Jay Allison and The Kitchen Sisters.

Grab one of 10 slots for AIR’s immersion in NYC Nov. 15-19. It’s a unique way to treat yourself to a deep dive into unconventional approaches to assembling sound and story. Application deadline is Sept. 30.

Big News

We’re thrilled to announce that we’ve won a grant to create PRX StoryMarket, which will allow the public to suggest story ideas, vote on them, and pitch in funds to help them get produced.

What does this mean for you?

Here’s an excerpt from our official announcement:

“If you are an independent producer, StoryMarket is a new source for funding original work…Distinct from PRX.org — an open market for existing work — StoryMarket helps commission new work at professional rates for the best ideas.”

PRX StoryMarket will start this fall in Louisville,
and we hope to have it in at least three other markets next year.

Cool Stuff

Yep, that number in your PRX profile’s web address actually means something:
http://www.prx.org/users/100000.

We were excited to pass the 100,000-member mark this spring, and even more excited to have another talented producer in our midst, Jason Wilber, a musician who has performed on David Letterman and who has a show coming to PRX in July.

A fascinating feature from producer Jake Warga for Transom, How to Embed and Why Not, covers the costs, what to do before you go, and how to navigate while you’re at war — including what acronyms like “HMMWV” mean. An excerpt:

“I suggest wearing something that says PRESS on it; I found that once soldiers know you’re not a contractor they REALLY want to talk to you. I was the first media person most soldiers had ever met.”
Full article

Hear Jake’s pieces about Iraq on PRX.

Events & Opportunities

You gotta enter the Third Coast Competition, honoring the best stories produced worldwide, including those produced for public, independent or commercial radio, plus podcasts, audio tours and installations. Final deadline is July 14.

Work somewhere cool!
We’re hiring a developer and NHPR is hiring producers.

A week-long intensive will be held in NYC in Nov. for mid to advanced level producers. You don’t have to be an AIR member to participate. This opportunity may be especially appealing to those working in traditional radio formats eager to experiment with new approaches to sound and storytelling. Application deadline is Sept. 30.