100:
Radio
Originally aired 04.24.1998
For the 100th episode of This American Life, a radio show about the pleasures of radio. About what makes radio so great ... and what makes it so terrible.
Ira talks about those ephemeral, thrilling radio moments that you happen to catch in passing on stations far away that you never find again. Flipping through the channels. (7 minutes)
Iggy Scam describes how he searched for an illegal radio station that keeps appearing and disappearing and appearing again in the mist. (11 minutes)
Act Two. The Invisible Leading The Blind.
Jack Hitt talks about a radio station he chanced upon while on a long drive. The station seems to ignore the last six decades of broadcasting history and convention. Jack is the author of Off the Road: A Modern-Day Walk Down the Pilgrim's Route into Spain. (10 minutes)
How the science of radio enabled V103 to become tied for number one in the Chicago market. And how it cost DJ Ida Hackele her job. (18 minutes)
Now in exile, Jose Ramos Horta spent two decades as the leading international spokesman against the invasion of his country by Indonesia. He won a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts. And one day when peace finally comes to his country, East Timor, he will move on to his next dream: to be a radio talk host, just like Howard Stern. (10 minutes)
