Cutting Back 20 Percent

I've written much about the Dr. Laura Program on this blog.

I remain a fan of the program and the woman who hosts it, even though there are a few serious things with which I disagree. I think she mostly gets things right.

Sometime last year, Dr. Laura started taking one day per week off, almost always on Friday. "Best of" recordings are played on Friday or whichever day she takes off, and offered for the podcast listeners.

This means a 20-percent reduction in new content, since it is a weekday program.

Actually, that's not entirely accurate because often, during the four live programs, previously aired calls are played, and not just when there are technical problems. Dr. Laura tends to confirm to the audience when there were technical problems and thus recordings were played.

No, these previously aired calls are slipped in without any acknowledgement that they are previously aired calls, perhaps due to a lack of people calling in or Dr Laura needing to handle something (she works from her home).

Some podcast subscribers, who are paying, are asking if the price will be reduced or not. Asking that question on the program's social media might result in a ban.

The reduction in new, live content must be fine with SiriusXM, because she signed a new contract with them late last year and the days off and the repeat calls have continued.

This reminds me of how Howard Stern cut back on his live shows (I know Dr. Laura hates to be mentioned in the same place as him, but this is strictly about schedules.) I remember when Johnny Carson, in later years of hosting The Tonight Show, in addition to all the weeks he took off, would work Tuesday through Thursday. Jay Leno did the Monday shows and repeats were aired Fridays, or Carson would record two shows on Thursday.

As I was writing this, another ongoing thing occurred again: Someone botched the podcast. The podcast is supposed to be the program that aired that day, uploaded as one recording for each hour, with the breaks removed. Sometimes a segment gets repeated (thus replacing a segment), sometimes the hour get cut short (for example, it will be 37 minutes instead of the 48ish it normally is), and sometimes, like this time, the wrong hour gets uploaded. This time it was especially noticeable because instead of being an hour from a couple of weeks ago, it was the second hour of yesterday's program being uploaded again as the third hour. Mistakes happen. But when they aren't corrected, and asking about them on the program's social media can result in being blocked, that's not a good look. Will this latest one get corrected? Based on experience... It might. It might not. [UPDATE: It was fixed.]

Like me, you might find it is still worth it to pay for the program. Bit understand you're getting four programs per week, not five, and some of the four new programs contain content you'll start to recognize as having aired before.