To keep RP alive and well, we need to cover:
- Staff salaries
- Royalties to the artists we play
- Bandwidth & servers
- Rent & other basic operating expenses
- Taxes. Rather a lot of them.
Currently that adds up to around $1.5m per year. Not a trivial amount (not for us normal people, anyway...) but not huge, either.
We've found lots of tricks to keep costs down, and our salaries aren't excessive (actually, a little raise would be nice at some point!).
What makes meeting that goal a bit harder are some of the conditions we place on the process:
- No sponsors
- No underwriters
- No foundations
- No government grants
- No bank or mortgage debt
I know — I mean
know — that the magic would go "poof" the instant we compromised, even a little, on any of those commitments.
So we won't. Because the magic is an essential piece of what we do.
The magic lets us keep our programming free. Every kind of free.
Free from paywalls or subscriptions or restrictions. Nobody gets left out. Everyone gets the same experience, a family without hierarchy.
Free as well from external controlling forces. Like the ones that dictate the content of FM radio (including NPR, CBC, BBC, etc) and Sp**ify playlists.
That write the news you read or watch, and control the "content" you see on social media. Then there are podcasts. OMFG. Podcasts are the worst. Especially the popular ones.
I worked in commercial radio for over 20 years. Many of my most brilliant artistic conceptions were aborted in the
first trimester by the question "What will the sponsors think?". I'm so glad we never ask it here.
Instead, we get to ask these questions, and
only these questions, at every juncture:
- Does it fit my/our artistic vision?
- Will it bring great joy to some/all of the RP family?
These are the values — the deeply
human values — that guide our path.
I have a hunch that as long as we stay focused on what's deeply human, we'll do just fine. At the very least we'll stand out in a sea
of AI sludge and blatant profiteering. And we'll have more fun than if we were just chasing money.
You're still reading? Thanks! I appreciate it. I should write more.
Correction: I
will write more. I have a lot to say, and I really like some of the new tools we're building to bring the RP family closer together,
to have the kind of conversations these times require — and to have some
fun!!! Fun is not optional. All humans require a
generous daily dose of fun in order to flourish. We're on it.
If you've chosen to support RP, we really appreciate you. We also appreciate those of you who are loyal listeners, but have no funds to spare.
And those of you cut you off from the global banking cartel (привет, русские :-).
And, of course, those of you who are still RP-curious. Listening, but not sure about joining our cult. We appreciate you, too.
You're all part of the family. You're all part of the magic.
We're so glad you're here.
Love,
William