Letter to the Editor: WDXU fulfilling its mission

 I would like to clear up a few misconceptions about the station that Tammy Tieu had in her recent column.

According to the station's mission statement, WXDU "exists to inform, educate, and entertain both the students of Duke University and the surrounding community of Durham." Additionally, the station "aims to provide the listener with an alternative viewpoint untainted by commercial interests."

In order to provide this alternative viewpoint while both educating and entertaining, regular playlist DJ's (such as myself) are required to play six tracks of new music from our playlist every hour.  This music, while not too generally be seen on MTV or heard on any station above 90 on the FM dial, is far from "extreme" as Tieu asserts.  Rather, it is often from genres poorly served by those other outlets; punk rock, hip-hop, dance music, etc.

Additionally, DJ's can play other music during their shows beyond the playlist requirement.  Frequently, DJ's choose music about which they are passionate and extremely knowledgeable.  By playing this music, the DJ's are fulfilling the requirement that they both entertain and educate.

It might be easy to increase the number of listeners of WXDU by playing music that Duke students are familiar with and that they know they want to hear, but the station would be failing in it's mission.  

And, I would assert, Duke students would miss out on a chance to learn something new about the world, which I thought was the whole point of their time here.

Ken Gentry
Graduate School of Engineering '06