The scientist who dared speak of science on the radio, Cliff Mass, won’t be giving his weekly weather forecast (and sprinkles of other wisdom) on KUOW this morning. Instead, he has a piece in this week’s paper about his firing and has a post on his blog today about the the troposphere’s local agenda.
But if you want to keep hearing Mass the radio instead of needing to read his words—because, hey, who like reading?—you can go over here and sign a petition to bring him back. “Immediately reinstate Dr. Cliff Mass into Weekday’s regular Friday programming without putting any restrictions on what he is allowed to say on air,” the petition says.
Will it work? It’s worth a shot.
Based on the story they just played on KUOW about the firing, seems pretty clear he’s not going back in that specific role…but hey, who knows.
Does he want to be back on Weekday with Steve Scher? I wouldn’t want to, if it were me.
Shouldn’t the call be to get rid of the pompous windbag first and then reinstate Cliff Mass once there’s a likable, charming and interesting host on Weekday?
I don’t know why the petition’s goal number of petitioners keeps ratcheting upward. I wish I knew if the petition-writer’s goal was just to get signatures without ever sending it. The petition’s been up for close to a week.
They should give Cliff a weekly science and education segment. It would be easier.
Now that he’s not on KUOW it must be impossible for listeners to hear his forecasts.
I mean, if there were another way, some way…any way at all, that a person could put an audio track in a place where say (and here I’m just “imagining”) a person could click on a page and hear it.
I know this is all the technology of the future, and we have no such things…but someone somewhere should invent this idea.
Who cares about KUOW or the radio in general? The worst thing they can do at this point is take him back, because then people who enjoy listening to Mass are forced to listen to their station and its obviously inept management.
He has a blog and he has offers from other stations and he plans on starting a podcast (you can learn all that by reading his blog).
Who needs KUOW? Stop giving them free advertising.
Isn’t this the perfect opportunity to give Mass a short weekly show? It seems that he has a big following and he seems to like to broadly communicate. Give him a 30 minute spot one a week or every other week where he can talk about what he wants and everyone is a winner.
Indeed, “who like reading”?
Is anyone paying attention to what Cliff Mass has been saying? It’s equivalent to the KUOW traffic lady ranting about abstinence-only education or Garrison Keillor ranting about vaccines causing autism during the Writer’s Almanac. His discovery math rants are bizarre and unscientific. There’s a reason the UW math and education departments have been complaining to KUOW.
I don’t understand why The Stranger is so obsessed with this minor issue. I feel bad for Cliff, and enjoyed hearing him, but you’re run, what, seven blog entries and at least one (two?) print articles, and gone on and on and on about this. He was a volunteer. Not paid. He wasn’t fired. Cliff may dispute the history of which producer told him what, but whatever. KUOW can set the editorial terms of what they want to have on their programs, and he doesn’t meet that, then he can be told he’s no longer wanted on the air.
I was a weekly guest covering technology at KUOW for three years. A very enjoyable experience. The station is full of terrific people. Yes, like every office or organization, there are politics. But, no, there’s no agenda. The people there work very hard for very little to try to genuinely inform people and to show the means by which they inform people. I loved the station before being a regular and after. (I was not asked to stop spouting. I ran out of time and things to say! I figured better to not persist at saying nothing. You’re welcome!)
@10: Ken, I have a kid in SPS, too, and have concerns about the curriculum. But the issue here is whether Mass had become an unwelcome guest on the show, rather than whether KUOW does or will cover this issue. I know I’ve heard several programs in the past about this on the station, and I expect the attention will result in more programming in the future, given that listeners are so passionate about it.
I am very happy Mass tried to highlight problems with the curriculum and I trust his sense. However, I think this boils down to a disagreement over the forum in which the comments are appropriate, and Cliff’s relationship with the station for his weather/climate/science segment.
Cliff wants to paint it as censorship, but I think it was a clash of personalities, where he wouldn’t agree to toe the line on what the station wanted for his particular segment. I can understand his frustration, but lashing out like this is counterproductive.
I’m trying to imagine just how insufferable Mr. Mass would become if he were reinstated after a petition drive demanding that he be returned to the airwaves and allowed to say whatever he wanted. Again, I like the guy. I like hearing him talk about the weather and the climate. This other stuff is not as simple as “a scientist talking about science,” though, and you know it. But hey, keeping this whole thing going is good for hits and pageviews and comments (here I am, after all, typing away), so why would you stop?
i heard a new weather guy on the radio this morning, he was great! stop being a bunch of babies.
the new weather guy actually talked about, wait for it…. THE WEATHER
@15 stop posting, Mr. Scher.
Everybody else: Will is on your side. Doesn’t that at least make you stop and think about your position for a sec?
Duh Mass.
I am a UW grad and an engineer/scientist (ret.); I have also contributed financially to KUOW. I can get all the Wx forecasting I need via the Web, so I listen to Mass for the technology info, forecasting background, and collateral info he provides. Intra-office and intra-campus strife bores me; Scher, Mass, and Management should have tried harder to come to terms. If Mass is absent from Weekday, I’ll seek the missing info in some other venue and listen less-frequently to KUOW. Everyone loses from this issue.