Many U.S. radio listeners are dissatisfied with the programs that commercial radio gives them, but don't like the idea of Government-controlled broadcasting either. In recent years a group of well-fixed pioneers (among them: Adman-Diplomat William B. Benton, Economist Beardsley Ruml, Educator Robert M. Hutchins) have been proposing another alternative: Subscription Radio (TIME, Nov. 20, 1944).
The war nipped SR's development in the blueprint. But this week in the Saturday Review of Literature, Dr. Rolf Kaltenborn, son of Radiorator H. V. Kaltenborn and SR's most active convert, reported that Subscription Radio was about to have a "Pioneer Network . . . of ten regular broadcasting stations." Kaltenborn claimed to have "sufficient funds" to get his network started.
Subscription Radio is a scheme for listeners to subscribe to radio programs just as they subscribe to newspapers and periodicals. For a proposed 5¢ a day ($18.25 a year) subscribers could tune in on three types of FM broadcasts, all without advertising: 1) continuous classical music; 2) continuous popular music; 3) news, dramatic and educational programs. A broadcast "pig squeal" would prevent nonsubscribers from listening in; a device to silence the squeal would be attached to subscribers' sets.
Radiomen who like radio the way it is have an outraged squeal of their own ("Narrowcasting!") at the whole idea. "This plan," they charge, "destroys freedom of the air! . . .It introduces a poll tax into radio." To which one SRadioman has replied, "On the contrary. . . . Those who don't wish to pay 5¢ a day will have their full share of advertising-sponsored programs. . . . The greater the choice afforded the listener the greater the freedom of the air."