Web is music to the ears of Philly radio station

(Telephony) Public radio station WXPN listeners in Philadelphia have a relatively painless way of showing the station their support: they can use the station as their Internet Service Provider (ISP), and a portion of the subscription fee goes back to fund the music they love.

XPN--as its known to its 300,000 or so listeners in Philadelphia, Harrisburg and Allentown, Pa. and Baltimore--has an arrangement with Philadelphia-based ISP DCANet to provide private-labeled Internet service. What started as dial-up service about 18 months ago has expanded into DSL, as XPN has been using a series of announcements recruiting NorthPoint orphans.

“The rate is about $50 a month. I don’t remember exactly what comes back to us; it’s between $5 and $10 a month,” said general manager Vincent Curren.

The University of Pennsylvania-connected station’s listeners can sign up for the service through XPN’s Web site, which links them to the DCANet Web page.

“They work with both Covad and Verizon; check out the availability of facilities in your area, and, if facilities are available, get your address, go ahead and put the order in,” Curren said.

XPN then gets a monthly statement showing its cut of the revenue.

So far, Curren says XPN has “less than a dozen high-speed subs (and) about 300 normal dial-up subs.” The arrangement provides another way to pad the eclectic station’s annual $5 million budget, he said.

“We have about 20,000 contributors, people who make tax-deductible contributions to us,” Curren said. “People like to support us in different ways.”

Those who opt for the high-speed access don’t receive tax breaks “because the service we’re providing is a market-rate service,” he said