Today, Flipboard added audio playback controls and a new Audio category to its app:

The section is searchable but comes with recommended SoundCloud users, as well as popular shows from NPR (National Public Radio) and PRI (Public Radio International).

I’ve played with the new Flipboard for a while, and it’s yet another example of why  segmentation matters, and how for public radio, the atomic element is the story.

Radio networks and shows that split their programming up into sharable, spreadable component parts are reaping the rewards of new platforms. And it’s not just Flipboard.

• Audiofiles is a web-based sharing and discovery platform for radio, sorting stories based on mood, type, length, producer, and source.
• NPR’s Infinite Player is like Pandora for public radio, playing a customized stream of stories that listeners can fine-tune as they listen.
• The Super Times is a forthcoming iPhone app that assembles a personalized audio magazine of “the best audio stories from around the web.”

All of these platforms rely on content being broken up into its component parts. Segmentation is a prerequisite.

As of late 2011, Flipboard had 5 million users. That’s the opportunity here — to reach millions of potential new listeners, inside an app they already know and use.

So then, for radio programmers: even if you have the best content in the entire world, if you don’t split it up into easily sharable pieces, you’ll miss out on a whole new wave of new consumption technologies. I’m looking at you, CBC Radio.

Get out your scissors. Quickly.

I look around our public media field and beyond and see a worrisome gap.

As public broadcasting goes through its own turbulent transition to a new Internet and mobile world, the technology talent gap is a risk that looms large. Yes, there are many other challenges: political and policy battles, business model pressures, cultural and structural obstacles, the need for strategic vision and leadership. And there are other recruitment needs across general management, content, fundraising. But the twin coins of the new digital realm are code and design, and with a few notable exceptions, public media is seriously lacking in both.

Spot on, and pitch perfect. This is a huge part of the reason I’m taking a year off, moving to France and teaching myself to be a programmer-journalist.

Here’s hoping they let me start CBC Labs when I get back.

“I really err on the side of openness and inclusiveness,” [CEO of PRX Jake] Shapiro said. Public media, he said, is uniquely suited for this work because of its public service mission — “to make sure content that reflects public dollars is accessible in the most broad and relevant way possible.”

Amen. This open API, or “Public Media Platform” as they’re calling it, brings together American Public Media, PRX, PRI, PBS, and NPR.

Notably (but not surprisingly) absent from this list: a certain large Canadian public media company.

If you’re a public radio geek, it’s really worth a listen, if only to hear Jesse try to contain his obvious man-crush on Ira.

I have a couple, specifically geared towards making money for CBC Radio, which faces a planned cut of $14.4-million from its budget, as part of a plan to make up a $171-million shortfall. Now, these ideas won’t necessarily save CBC, but they could generate some extra cash.

If you ask me, CBC Radio is missing out on some really simple ways to generate revenue online.

Yup, I think we should do that. Make money online. Because as Mark Ramsey said during his keynote at las year’s Public Radio Program Director’s Conference:

It’s a different world online. Don’t go online and create the expectation that this is going to be as non-commercial as offline. Because if you create that expectation you will be held to it. And you will be worse for it. You will be worse for it.

Here then, are three ways off the top of my head that CBC Radio can make some dough, online, right now.

1. Help sell books, take a cut

FACT: CBC Radio puts a lot of authors on air

FACT: Amazon and Indigo are in the business of selling books, and both have affiliate programs that’ll pay referring sites up to 8.5% commission

What could this mean for CBC Radio? Let’s take Canada Reads for example. We know that Canada Reads generates books sales: “sales of Michael Ondaatje’s In The Skin of A Lion increased by 80,000 in 2002, the year of its appearance on Canada Reads. Its publisher, Random House of Canada attributed much of this increase to Canada Reads.”

So, a nationwide bump of 80,000 books. Let’s (optimistically) say you could drive 10% of those books sales (8,000 units) through an affiliate link at cbc.ca/canadareads. The current Amazon price for In the Skin of a Lion is $15.33. So then:

8.5% of 8000 books at $15.33 = $10,424.40

Ten thousand bucks for sending a little traffic Amazon’s way? Consider that Canada Reads picks not just one, but five books every year, and you’ve got a halfway decent way to offset production costs for that show. Set up affiliate links on the Writers and Company and the Words at Large sites, and literary programming might just get a financial shot in the arm. Would a little “Buy at Amazon.ca” and/or “Buy at Indigo” link be that offensive?

2. Help sell music, take a cut

FACT: The CBC Radio 2 site has an incredibly helpful Playlists page that tells you what music was played at what time on what shows

FACT: There’s no way to actually buy any music from that Playlists page

Again, one revenue opportunity is affiliate links. Apple has an iTunes affiliate program that pays 5 cents per song. So write a script that scrapes the existing playlist data and generates iTunes affiliate links. I can’t say I have any idea how many 5-cent drops in the bucket you’d get, but I’m positive it’s more than zero, which is what the Playlist page is making now.

Also, why can’t I buy any music from CBCRadio3.com via iTunes, kicking some dough to both the indie artists and the broadcaster that helped me find them?

3. Sell some freaking podcast ads sponsorhips

Hundreds of thousands of CBC podcasts are downloaded weekly. Smart, connected Canadians listen to those podcasts. That’s a valuable audience, reachable for cheap.

Remember back in 2007 when CBC Radio started running “sponsorship messages” at the beginning of each podcast? Something like “The delivery of this podcast is sponsored by GM” or some such thing. Those messages brought in a large amount of money. They’ve since been replaced with promos for other CBC programs.

Personally, I certainly wouldn’t mind hearing podcast sponsorship messages again, so long as they were sufficiently separated from the editorial content of the shows, and especially if they helped keep shows on the air.

And the CBC could be smarter about how they sell those sponsorships. They could sell them on a show-by-show basis, not just the blanket-style GM ads that ran in 2007. For example, why not sell tech sponsorships on the Spark and Search Engine podcasts?

Also, if I wanted to sponsor a CBC Radio podcast, where would I go? Who would I talk to? I have no idea. Here’s a thought — why not use those 20-second bumpers at the beginning of each podcast to say “Your sponsorship message here!”

What do you think? Should CBC Radio’s online presence be as non-commercial as the radio service, or could you handle ideas like these being put into place to help keep shows on the air?

As you’ll see in the video, Davidson thinks that journalists are too reluctant to acknowledge their own ignorance when approaching complex stories. “The Giant Pool of Money,” on the other hand, felt like a learning process for Davidson and Blumberg as much as their listeners.

Well worth watching.

Present again is Ira’s familiar “taking the tools of journalism and applying them to people whom you wouldn’t normally apply them to” mantra.

Particularly interesting is the explanation for why TAL doesn’t have billboards (or “bills”):

One of the differences between our show and the other shows on the public radio is that the other shows will start their show with a list of what’s coming up on the program, which I feel is a sort of singularly uninteresting way to start something. Actually, on our show we would just start the action going. Like, I feel that if we could draw you into the dream of it, you’ll be inside it before you can even think about why you’re inside it or what it is. And it’s far more irresistible.

You can watch the whole video at the Gel site, or if you’re feeling thieve-y, you can just download the FLV file.

Then, last week, I noticed that people always hang up on my voicemail. So I got some help from a couple of professional voiceover artists (MP3 of the segment).

This week, I plan to solve another problem, and you can hear it on your radio Saturday morning at 10, or online at cbc.ca/listen

Or better yet, if you’re in Toronto, there are still tickets left for the show. And they’re free. So if you like getting up early, come on down and be part of the studio audience. Because it’s fun.

Update: The show went well. Here’s an MP3 of the segment.