NPR's Girshman headed to CQ

Peggy Girshman, managing editor of NPR's Newsroom of the Future, has taken a new job at Congressional Quarterly, according to an internal memo posted on Mediabistro. Earlier this month, CQ hired Bruce Drake, former NPR News v.p., to run its consumer publishing business.

Blogger looks for ways to short-circuit the flow of pubradio listeners' contributions

Open Source's appeal for listener donations prompted blogger Doc Searls of Linux Journal to write about the hassles involved in contributing to public media. Searls heads a Berkman Center project that is looking for ways to "short-circuit" the flow of listener contributions through public stations.

'Open Source' passing the e-hat

Open Source, the innovative two-year-old show that melds traditional radio with online interactivity, posted an S.O.S. appealing to fans for financial support last week. "We love what we've built with you here," wrote host Christopher Lydon. "We need your help to keep this community alive." The show lost its major backer, the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, last year and has been struggling financially since, reports the Boston Globe.

Silicon Valley broadcaster Tom Fanella dies

Tom Fanella, president of KTEH in San Jose, Calif., for 19 years, died Monday of heart failure after fighting cancer for a year, Northern California Public Broadcasting said yesterday. He had worked for public TV stations in Pittsburgh and his hometown of Syracuse, N.Y. His stations won the top PBS Development Award six times. Despite his fundraising success and Silicon Valley's wealth, KTEH struggled for revenue in the shadow of the nearby KQED. Fanella and KQED President Jeff Clarke arranged a merger creating NCPB last year.

Gaffney: Moderate Muslims getting "the Rosa Parks treatment"

Frank Gaffney, co-producer of the Islam vs. Islamists, is upset that his doc is not getting national carriage and that its new distributor, Oregon Public Broadcasting, will pair it with a discussion program designed to place it within proper context, according to this Washington Times editorial. CPB commissioned the film for its America at a Crossroads series but supervising producers at WETA and PBS said it was too imbalanced and overheated to air in its current state. Like Rosa Parks, Gaffney writes, the moderate Muslims featured in his film "must know their place, too. And their place is not in prime time, nor national distribution."