WNYC -- Podcasting Pioneer and On-Demand Audio Leader -- Introduces “WNYC Studios”

(New York, NY – October 13, 2015) – Starting today, all national productions from WNYC - including a significant slate of new programs - will bear a new label: WNYC Studios. The launch of WNYC Studios is the next step in the evolution of WNYC’s national programming and distribution investment, which has been increasing steadily over the last 15 years and has been accelerated by the growing popularity in podcasts.

WNYC Studios will incubate and produce new national programs – both podcasts and radio shows – as well as distribute select programs to the public radio system for terrestrial broadcast. This new national division is being supported through a multimillion-dollar investment in content development. Currently, $2 million has been raised toward a targeted $15 million to establish a revolving fund that will seed new projects and use revenue from successful projects to incubate additional shows.  WNYC Studios will also capitalize on WNYC’s unique, diversified funding model and expertise in philanthropy, crowdfunding and sponsorship.

WNYC currently produces 17 podcasts and national radio shows. With this new investment, WNYC Studios will accelerate the production and launch of new programs - many with new partners - and anticipates an increase in production output by 25% in the first year. WNYC Studios will focus on new voices, new forms, and new technologies, all imbued with the distinctive quality and creativity that its programs, including Radiolab and Freakonomics Radio, are known for.

“Traditional media businesses have been threatened by digital media, but that’s not the case here,” said Laura Walker, President and CEO of New York Public Radio, which includes WNYC Studios.   “We fully embrace podcasting and on-demand audio.   Furthermore, we believe that narrative audio has to continue to evolve to stay relevant, and we are looking forward to leading the way.”

“For listeners - especially new, young, and mobile audiences – on-demand is the way to meet them where they are,” Walker added.  “For creative partners, we pair the experience and credibility of an established mission-driven non-profit with the entrepreneurial spirit, raw creative drive, and quick-paced agility of a start-up.  The significant financial investment we’re committing to allows us to build upon our innovation in narrative audio podcasting and radio, reach new and broader audiences, and keep producing the kind of excellent audio programming that sets industry standards and touches people’s lives.”

The team behind WNYC Studios has created some of the most critically-acclaimed and popular podcasts and radio shows of the last decade, including Radiolab, Freakonomics Radio, Here's the Thing with Alec Baldwin, Death, Sex & Money, On the Media and The Takeaway. WNYC Studios productions regularly occupy multiple spots on the iTunes Top 10, including Only Human, a new podcast about the quest for health,  debuting at number 6 this past week. 

Today’s announcement unveiled two new projects from WNYC Studios:

• The New Yorker Radio Hour – a national radio show and podcast co-produced with the legendary magazine and hosted by its editor David Remnick, debuting Saturday, October 24
• Radiolab's first spinoff - a new podcast looking at American democracy and life through the lens of Supreme Court cases, launching in 2016

WNYC Studios will extend and expand WNYC’s capacity for collaborating with both established and emerging talent and partnering with like-minded media brands.  New pilot collaborators include:

• VICE News
• Jessica Williams (Correspondent with Comedy Central's The Daily Show) and Phoebe Robinson
• Roxane Gay (Author, The New York Times bestseller Bad Feminist)
• Sara Schaefer (Comedian and Host and Writer of Lies and Nikki & Sara Live)

Snap Judgment, the inventive and popular storytelling podcast and public radio show hosted by Glynn Washington, is now a co-production of WNYC Studios.

“We’ve built our success on two ideas.  First, that listeners want to hear things that create meaning and delight, connecting them with others. And second, that you can’t deliver that level of quality without being a superior home for creative people,” said Dean Cappello, Executive Vice President and Chief Content Officer at WNYC and the Head of the New WNYC Studios.  “The WNYC Studios label will be a mark of distinction, assuring listeners that what they hear will be original, intimate, dazzling to the ear, and made by people with unique voices and points of view.  We’ve blazed trails with work like Radiolab and Death, Sex & Money.  We want to continue in that spirit by expanding and diversifying our creative community with a range great partners and personalities.”

WNYC Studios content is available on all major digital platforms, including its own suite of websites and apps, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, TuneIn and iHeart Radio, as well as on over 500 terrestrial public radio stations around the country and other partners globally. 

ABOUT WNYC STUDIOS

WNYC Studios is the premier producer of on-demand and broadcast audio. Born from the team that created some of the most critically acclaimed and popular podcasts of the last decade, WNYC Studios is leading the new golden age in audio with high quality storytelling that informs, inspires and delights millions of intellectually curious and highly engaged listeners across digital, mobile and broadcast platforms. WNYC Studios creates some of the most acclaimed and beloved audio series, including Radiolab, Freakonomics Radio, Death, Sex & Money, Here's the Thing with Alec Baldwin, Note to Self, On the Media, The Takeaway, and Studio 360.  Our programs include personal narratives, deep journalism, interviews that reveal, and smart entertainment as varied and intimate as the human voice itself. For more information, visit http://wnycstudios.wnyc.org.

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