Jeremiah Hall's writings on nonprofits, lifestyles and travel

Perspective: Time for Some New Thinking at KQED

So how many pledge drives are there exactly?  Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall.  The occasional Earth Day drive. They do seem to sprout up all over the place. 

You add that to Joe McConnell’s traffic sponsorships, Lieff Cabraser sponsoring segments and the seemingly countless foundations, corporations and individuals sponsoring just about everything on KQED, I’m led to wonder:  so really, if you add up all the sponsorship plugs, pledge drives and otherwise is KQED any different than a for profit radio station?  Sure, I enjoy my Morning Edition, but now really how is much of what I hear any different than advertisement?

Toyota commercials – I mean sponsorships – all but tell me to run out to buy a new Prius.  Just about every law firm is at my immediate disposal and countless firms are ready to hire me; yet I’m still subjected to a seemingly never-ending barrage of day-after-day pledge drives.

And really, does all of this amount to one percent of airtime as this station proclaims?  Have we really calculated all the pledge drives, sponsorship plugs and “made possible bys?”  Can’t we find a better way?  It seems that countless other nonprofits survive without such an – can I say – obnoxious assault. 

While I certainly don’t have the answers, isn’t there a technology that might let me – as a member – stream an uninterrupted and pledge-free version on my computer?  Has KQED ever thought about alternatives?  Have they ever tried finding a fundraising mechanism that was only modestly less obnoxious?

We live in an era where technology and other advances have cleared the way for many so many advances.  Isn’t time for KQED to look inward and rethink the pledge?