The Center for Emerging Media (CEM) was founded by Marc Steiner in 2000.

The first official function of CEM was to produce shows about the Hubble Telescope; in fact, The Marc Steiner Show was one of the first forums to provide Internet coverage (in the late 90s) of photos from the Hubble. At the time of CEM’s founding, Marc was hosting a daily public interest radio show on WJHU 88.1-FM, the NPR radio station of Johns Hopkins University, which he had hosted since 1993.

Soon after CEM’s founding, in 2001, Johns Hopkins put WJHU up for sale and Marc led the successful effort to keep the station, which became WYPR, owned locally. The effort to build the station (fund raising, creating a news department) consumed most of Marc’s time for the next two years, in his role as Executive Vice President, so he did not create any new projects under the auspices of CEM.

In 2005, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting funded CEM to produce a 6-part radio documentary upon the 30th anniversary of the end of the Viet Nam War, called Shared Weight. In 2007, the Open Society Institute-Baltimore funded CEM to produce a series that told the stories of the working poor in their own voices, called Just Words.

In 2008 Marc left WYPR, and CEM assumed full production of The Marc Steiner Show, eight hours of on-air time weekly, including full responsibility for raising production funds, while continuing to create other projects. CEM currently has a contract agreement with Morgan State University’s NPR station, WEAA 88.9-FM, which covers approximately ¼ of the cost of production of The Marc Steiner Show.