It is curious that NPR contrasts itself with commercial radio, despite the native advertising, regular name drops, and references to listeners as their consumers (does active tuning decrease the availability of the signal for others?).
This is not to say that its a bad thing, people are paying into a cooperative because they enjoy it, and they should continue to enjoy it. But public radio, though avoiding corporate advertising, still may have to pander, just on a lesser scale and to in a more democratic manner.
Choosing to compress your audio, or to play classical music instead of jazz is not immoral, at least not as judged by reasonable Americans, so it isn't pandering.
If what you are really getting at, is the idea of the US federal government providing tax revenue to NPR is distasteful to many, that may be true, but it doesn't mean that NPR is pandering to anyone. Similarly, FOX News may or may not be pandering to someone, but their acceptance of federal tax breaks isn't evidence of it.
>By this I mean, consider the leaders of the organization have demographic data on who is most likely to pledge support during their quarterly pledge drives.
By this definition, NPR has admitted to pandering (would only need to establish that NPR consumer === pledge supporter) in this article alone.
A perverse appeal or suck-up.
Trump or Fox News would both be examples of highly successful (and distasteful) pandering.
"Perverse" to you and most HN commenters/readers, maybe.
Trump and Fox News may "pander" to groups who you find distasteful, but they DON'T "pander" to many groups who you don't find distasteful.
Trump was the FIRST PERSON to bring up many issues that had previously been censored by the media. He didn't change his views for the approval of others, he single-handedly SHAPED THE NARRATIVE. Many career politicians started talking differently after he came along. THAT'S pandering.
Though there are other audience segments.
If you listen to the NPR humour programmes and segments, they'll often allude to the whiteness of their audience, and it pretty much always draws a laugh.
(Edit: to clarify: CEB are the demographic, though it's not necessarily who NPR are pandering to. See followup.)
NPR grew out of the public broadcasting movement that was emerging in the 1960s (though its roots go deeper), as well as the Baby Boom generation and the democratisation of higher education which had occurred after the 2nd World War. Stir in the Kennedys, Vietnam, the Apollo program, Civil Rights, and Nixon, and you had much of the initial foment from which the project emerged.
NPR has had its largest followings on the coasts -- Boston, New York, Washington, DC, for obvious reasons, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle. These are all still flagship stations and regions (though there are many others).
There are also, and I say this as someone who's driven across and through the US several times, many local stations and "translators", which serve rural and outlying areas, which are a fantastic relief from what's otherwise the monotony of rural radio: Christian broadcasting, bad country-western, and increasingly, Spanish-language radio.
(And if you think NPR panders to its audience, you should try listening to these for a change.)
The problem of getting a high-concept, intelligence-oriented, limited-budget network to appeal to what have been its underserved communities: African-American, Hispanic/Latino, Native American, and other segments, is difficult, but you're seeing this. There are programs which try to bridge that divide as well as reach out to younger audiences (how successfully is another question). Latino USA, Glynn Washington's Snap Judgement, and The Moth come to mind.
Arguably, Car Talk was a crossover show for a long time, bringing in the shade-tree / garage mechanic contingent (though I feel it overstayed its welcome). I'm aware that that program had a huge draw from an otherwise atypical audience though, which probably explains its longevity even into reruns.
And finally: NPR is freely available to all. In an age of podcasts and iPhones, all you need is a cheap radio to pick it up, no subscriptions, no fancy hardware, no malware, no surveillance (though yes, those are availble through the various NPR, PRI, PRX, MPR, etc., podcasts, websites, and other online experiences). It's far less, IMO, that NPR targets its core audience as that that's the group to which it appeals and is known. The information provided is certainly democratic and would benefit most. And as I've noted, the network (and its public broadcasting kin) are actively seeking to extend both reach and relevance.
Rather than dismiss this with a smear as you have, what would you see done differently, what do you find missing, and why do (or don't) you listen to public bradcasting?
Another example is religion, or lack thereof. America is a religious place, but NPR reports little on religion.
However I might reluctantly grant you that NPR does not "target" its listeners. The truth might be even more concerning: they are not even aware of their upper-middle-class bias, so they think it is perfectly normal for all high school kids to worry about getting into Harvard.
Many public institutions are highly competitive. But I guess "University of Texas" doesn't sound as elitist as Harvard.
This[0] NPR page shows that only about 30% of NPR income is non-commercial. Also note the Nestle advertisement on the page (at least it was omnipresent when viewing on a mobile browser).
[0] http://www.npr.org/about-npr/178660742/public-radio-finances
39% Station dues and fees
23% Corporate sponsorships
9% Distribution and satellite interconnection
-----------------
71% of revenue from commercial activities
>Non-newsmagazine program fees (for example, [show]) make up the next largest component of station dues and fees revenue.
However, If NPR is using excess satellite airtime to carry non-NPR programming, that could be considered commercial activity, yes.
I think corporate sponsorships are different (if they were functionally the same as another category, they would have been aggregated there). For one, corporations get advertisement time.
Commercial radio is not like this.
I used to work at one of the largest NPR affiliate stations. Listener support is hugely important, most of the money we made came from listeners. IMHO, NPR is pretty successful in that they have built a model that supports quality journalism, at a decent scale, without a lot of annoyances for the user. Newspapers and other media orgs could stand to learn a lot.