More details are coming out about how “This American Life” came to the decision to self-distribute come July 1.
Public Radio International has been distributing the noncommercial program for 17 years. Chicago Public Media produces the program, hosted by Ira Glass, which will be distributed by the Public Radio Exchange.
Glass tells the New York Times there were five distribution suitors, including NPR and SiriusXM; the latter asked “how much money it would take to get us to quit public radio completely, to abandon terrestrial radio the way Howard Stern did, and play exclusively on SiriusXM. So flattering! But of course, no chance of that happening,” the Times reports Glass wrote affiliates in a letter.
Self-distribution, according to Glass, would possibly allow it to raise and keep more money.
The change means the show now shifts from satellite to Internet distribution, we’ve reported.
