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AM stations in particular are attracted to network news and information programming as a way of distinguishing themselves from FM, which has captured the bulk of the music audience. Stations often find it both better and cheaper to put on a network show rather than hire a local personality, especially for nights, weekends and other lower-rated radio time slots. Audiences may not even know they are hearing a network broadcast because local phone numbers and recorded promos are sometimes used to maintain a local flavor.
National Public Radio too is rebounding following a financial crisis that necessitated major cutbacks two years ago. Many of the cuts have since been restored. NPR's news and information shows, including the highly regarded Morning Edition and All Things Considered, increased their audience by 15% this year over last, and a new show, Weekend Edition, will be added on Saturday mornings, starting this week. In the meantime, NPR's friendly rival, American Public Radio, has nearly doubled its total programming hours in the past year. (NPR and APR both supply programming to public radio stations; NPR is best known for news and public affairs, while APR distributes a variety of music and cultural fare, including A Prairie Home Companion.)
Despite years of second-class media citizenship, radio has never lost its fervent champions. "We take radio for granted, but it's in our cars, our kitchens, our bedrooms," says Charles Osgood, the CBS Sunday-night TV anchor who also does wry, and often rhyming, commentaries on CBS radio each weekday morning. "If someone told me I couldn't do any more TV, I'd be unhappy. But if I had to choose, it would be radio." Another stalwart of the medium, News Commentator Paul Harvey is a surviving link to an earlier era of network radio. On the air for more than 40 years, he is the most widely heard personality on radio, carried on some 1,100 stations. Dr. Ruth Westheimer, the pixieish sex therapist, was launched to fame by a sex-advice show on New York radio and now also does a national call-in show for NBC, and a TV talk show on the Lifetime Cable Network. "Radio was crucial in giving me the opportunity to talk about sexual matters in an explicit way," she says. "Not only the power of the medium, but the anonymity it provides."
The anonymity often extends to the on air personalities as well. With an average weekly audience of 2,527,000, NBC's Williams is the highest-rated radio talk-show host in America. Yet he could pass unrecognized on any city street, at least as long as he keeps his mouth shut. "Radio is an avocation, fun and games to me," says Williams, 53, who has been involved in a range of entrepreneurial ventures, from insurance and real estate to a car-rental agency and a florist business. Asked eleven years ago to invest in a radio station, he decided instead to learn more about the business from the inside and began doing a local "ombudsman's show" in New Jersey. After a stint at New York City's WMCA, in 1981 he joined NBC's newly created Talknet, a nightly package of talk shows now heard on 238 stations.