It’s called sarcasm.
*Sesame Street * whored themselves out to their corporate masters a long time ago. Or have you forgotten that episodes were usually brought to you by big companies like the letter C and the number 4?
On a more serious note PBS does get ad revenue. Every time you see a program that is brought to you by whoever it is an ad. NPR does the same thing.
Odesio
Amen, brother, amen. And I remember when TLC really was “The Learning Channel”.
Thank goodness for PBS, CBC, and here in BC, Knowledge Network.
OK. I was not clear about this. That is my fault.
By “quality” I meant programming of a certain type, i.e. programming possessing certain qualities (like community affairs, emergency information, government activities, etc,). Compare that to “quantity” meaning a certain amount of programming. And yes, the owners of the airwaves that those stations have the privilege of broadcasting on can most certainly “force” them to air a minimum of required programming. If they don’t like it, they can surrender their hugely profitable licenses.
And also…
Wrong. Very, very, wrong. Sorry, no offense, but this is really the crux of the whole matter so I’m glad you brought it up. There is no limit to the number of CD’s and MP3’s that can be created and distributed. Therefore there is no need to place any demands on the content of those media (beyond the normal legal prohibitions of libel, slander, etc.) Broadcasting, in contrast, can only be distributed over finite media (electro-magnetic frequencies) so in the United States at least, the rights to use such scarce and valuable resources are controlled by public–not private–interests (i.e. the citizens of the USA).
Private companies are allow to apply for licenses to use portions of the EM spectrum for profit so long as they also provide certain aforementioned public services. While it is true that politicians beholden to corporate interests have weakened the service that licensees are required to provide the public in exchange for the oceans of money they are allowed to make, there still are requirements that broadcast licensees must uphold to keep their licenses.
If by “special interest groups” you mean groups that are especially interested in television being used to educate and inform rather that just serve as chewing gum for the eyes than you make a good point.
As for the public file requirement you mention I will admit I know hardly anything about it. I would guess that it is some bureaucratic paperwork nightmare that is justifiably considered a headache by corporate broadcasting conglomerates. It is possible to eliminate many heavy-handed paperwork requirements IF the media companies are putting forth a real effort to run the education and public service programs that they are required to.
But in general, they don’t. They see the FCC–toothless and corporate-controlled as it is–as a nuisance. Just busy-body eggheads interfering with their God-given right to show Dancing With The Stars or *Hannah Montana *every hour on the hour.
But, you know, a lot of bean-counters and head-honcho types at these companies don’t know much more about the duties of broadcasters than the average American does.
To them it is merely a money making venture and, goddammit, the First Amendment says they have the right to have every time slot jammed full of jiggling titties, and the Invisible Hand says the less regulation, the better.
Those impressions would be wrong, and mostly wrong.
You can’t just program anything you damn well please because broadcasting in unlike just about any other business. Its medium is unique in its clearly limited boundaries. New frequencies can’t just be created or discovered. We’re stuck with what we’ve got.
You said that everyone knows about broadcasting’s public service requirements but you don’t seem to grasp why TV and radio has a unique obligation to serve the public. I have already explained why ad nauseam.
As to regulation, I personally feel that U.S. industry is generally under-regulated and basically overly “laissez-faired” by Congress so that corporations can beat their inflated profit predictions year after year. However, a legitimate case can be made that deregulation is, generally speaking, good economic policy–even though I don’t agree.
In the case of broadcasting, however, while there may be some ridiculous procedures (like stacks of redundant paperwork) put in place by the FCC to ensure compliance, that’s mostly because media companies cry and kick and bitch and scream at any little attempt to have them operate stations as they were intended–to educate and inform the public. And while you can argue that a nice, half-naked, nubile ass is educational and informative, others don’t see it that way. And they have every right to insist that broadcasters uphold their duties not only to titillate, but to enrich. Those are the “special-interest groups” you spoke of, I believe. Hey it’s their right… they own the airwaves.
Now if those same do-gooders complain about you watching that same fine, fine ass shaking on your cable or satellite network… well, fuck 'em. That just shows they know as much about government regulation vis-a-vis the media as most people do. Not much.
Our palindromic narcissist is completely correct about the law, the legal philosophy underlying it, and the theoretic requirements. The hgh seas and the electromagnetic spectrum are the two resources I know of that are governed, at base, by international law (since broadcast signals have the inconvenient habit of not stopping at internatiional borders). Under treaties dating back to the early 20th century, allocation of frequencies for various uses (Joe’s taxi service, the county sheriff’s patrol, Fred the ham operator, etc.) – and what frequencies may be used in what countries with what power is governed by these treaties. Within individual countries, frequenceis are allocated for various uses by the governments, In the U.S., the job is done by the F.C.C. In Canada, it is the C.R.T.C. (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission).
To receive allocation of a frequency, an applicant must guarantee that if will be used for the purpose intended, that it has or can show intent to obtain the necessary equipment to use those frequenceis, and comply with specified rules for use of the frequency. (For example, both broadcasting stations and ‘private’ radio (such as taxi and police dispatch) are required to make an hourly station identification – in the case of a taxi company I once worked with, there was a short Morse identifier triggered every hour on the hour. Many TV stations convert “station identification” time into a brief compliance with the law (“WPDK-TV, Podunk”) and a series of commercials surrounding it.
However, though vitiated by the 1996 law, stations are required to perform certain acts in exchange for their license to use that particular portion of the public airwaves. They are free, within the usual limits on public speech and conduct, to do what they wish to make a profit when not fulfilling those requirements – some of which may be converted to money-makers. For example, local programming may be complied with by a good local news department, which can then be used to leverage higher ratings and hence higher ad rates. (Locally-owned channel 5 in Raleigh has an exceptionally good news staff and programming, which they market for all its worth.)
However, the idea that the FCC is an extrinsic thing imposing onerous gummint reg-you-lations on the fine upstaning broadcasting businessmen, is so much garbage. The stations are businesses which have bought transmitters and built towers and sought out broadcast licenses from the FCC because they believe they can make money at it – and the FCC has the right to tell them what they may and may not do in exchange for that license.
Please do me the favor not to tell me what I grasp and don’t grasp. The public owns the airwaves collectively, not individually. It’s the same way that the public owns the White House, but I still can’t crash there some night I lose my keys and can’t get home? Remember, while the Parents Television Council are members of the public, so are people who like to see “a nice, half-naked, nubile ass”. So how are the TV stations, for example, going to figure out what the public wants them to broadcast? They do it by seeing what shows get good ratings and what shows people generally watch. If the networks want to “have every time slot jammed full of jiggling titties”, it’s because they know people want to watch “jiggling titties”.
You say that:
But that’s not right. They own the airwaves in the same way that I do. And if I say a nice, half-naked, nubile ass is educational, and others don’t see it that, that’s not something that can be solved by saying, “the public owns the airwaves.”, because the public disagrees.
Too often when people start preaching about a broadcaster’s duties to educate and enrich, what they really mean is “Isn’t it a shame that the average TV watcher is too uncivilized to enjoy good programming. Let’s mandate that broadcast channels have to show Nova, to give the proles some culture.”
And, while the broadcast spectrum is limited, it’s just recently gotten less so. The digital transition has multiplied the number of potential broadcast TV stations in a market by seven.
You left out the step, “and they paid a large sum of money to the FCC for the use of that license.” And nobody here’s arguing that the FCC shouldn’t regulate. But just because the FCC has a right to regulate doesn’t mean that every regulation is a good thing. You can say both that the FCC has the right to regulate and also that certain specific regulations are wrong-headed or should be changed or abolished. You can even say that the FCC has the right to regulate but that it’s overregulated the industry and more deregulation in general is needed.
The 1996 Act, on balance was a good thing. It opened the airwaves up to competition and innovation, and is one of the things responsible for the communication revolution of the last decade. If you like the fact that you’re able to surf the internet from your cell phone, or that you can buy a package giving you combined Verizon Internet, telephone, and FioS service, thank the 1996 act and the changes that it led to.
On the other hand your defense suggests all day long game shows, and Hee Haw are justified because that is what most people want. That means people who desire better programs should be completely ignored. They don’t have the demographic that sponsors want, so screw them.
Doesn’t the government do that all of the time? For example, if you use your money to pay for furthuring your education, then that is tax deductible. If I use mine to pay for lap dances and cheap booze, that is not.
Isn’t that simply a value judgement made by the government about which money use is “better”?
I tend to agree with what you are saying and think it is very condescending for a variety of reasons to say that if left to our own devices we wouldn’t watch anything educational or cultural. There are probably at least 10 stations dedicated to those things on my DirecTV. And, fuck it all, I have that in my home for my entertainment, not as a learning tool. If I want to use it to watch belching contests, then I have paid money for it and expect programmers to put on what I want to watch, not what my masters think I should watch.
But, they tell us what to do all of the time.
The FCC rolled back the Fairness Doctrine. It also allowed a media conglomerate to purchase radio stations and newspapers to a dangerous degree. They are huge conglomerates that can control the information presented too huge areas. They have eliminated competition. Strange but competition is always seen as good for people and business, but business tries to eliminate it as much as possible.
PBS is still outside of the mass media conglomerates reach. They tried to fix that during Bush. They loaded the FCC board and forced through the changes they wanted. They put their own people in charge of PBS and tried to make it more like Fox. It was ugly but even a watered down PBS is seen as a threat by the right.
Defunding is another way to kill PBS. They try that all the time. A lot of people fall for it as this thread shows.
“Why does PBS still exist?”
It still exists because of all the people (like me) who pay for it every year to keep it on the air. Yes, somehow we feel it’s still significantly important to us. And whatever programs you see on PBS are what we have willingly paid for with all of our donations. I’ve heard the government contribution to PBS is pretty low. I know that many years ago government contributed about 50% of PBS’s budget, but I know it’s far, far below that nowadays, and even took another severe hit a few months ago with our current economic crisis. Does anyone have cites for the actual percentage of PBS’s budget that comes from the government?
What’s this “we” business? I only have a small handful. Besides, how much is your monthly payment for 500 channels? I’ve pledged $40 per year to PBS for the last 18 years. Yes, it’s painful to fork it over on my very tight budget, but it’s still quite a bargain considering what I get out of the deal. And I’d gladly give more if I could afford it.
Also, had you considered that those millions of converter boxes were purchased by people who don’t have (i.e. maybe can’t afford) 500 channels?
To those who mentioned reality TV, the PBS versions are Frontier House, Colonial House, The 1940s House, etc.
BTW I rarely watch anything besides PBS. I’d even say that PBS is the only reason I keep a TV at all.
According to the 2008 PBS annual report, less than 9% of their annual revenue comes from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and other government grants.
Yes, PBS has, and has had, some great shows. But I can’t believe nobody ever mentions shows like Benny Hill and Are You Being Served. These are truly horrible British comedies that PBS has chosen to show in the past. They can actually suck the intelligence out of a person faster than Flava Flav(sp?). In spite of what the PBS programmers think, just because the actors speak with British accents doesn’t mean that a show is uplifting and broadening for us unwashed Americans. I just call it “the British channel.” Is it really important for my taxes to help get the word of Benny Hill out to the people?
Should all shows on PBS appeal to you?
Please. The question wasn’t whether I want to watch Benny Hill (and I did enjoy the nekked boobies when I was younger and that was all that was available) but whether I should have to pay for that fine, uplifting program to be brought to America. Benny Hill, and lots of other PBS programming, is the lowest sitcom pap with its only common feature being its foreign origin. If this is PBS’ idea of bringing better programming to the citizens of the US then it’s time for PBS to go. The word “quality” gets bandied about quite a bit by PBS and its fans and I think I that claim is inaccurate and disingenuous. PBS once had a purpose and I think it is a good idea to question whether that purpose is still being served (giggle). All this pointing at bad commercial TV just goes to show how PBS stooped low, earlier than most.
I happen to like Benny Hill. It is entertaining, if not educational. I don’t see why everything on PBS should have to meat your standard of quality. And no, as a matter of fact, I don’t care if you think you all government spending has to meet with your approval. I didn’t approve of the the war in Iraq, but that didn’t stop Bush from spending my taxes on it.
The point is that you don’t NEED government funding to have Benny Hill on TV. Watch him on BBCA. Why should taxpayers have to fund Benny Hill?
For the same reason they fund Fred Rogers or Sesame Street. Or are we back to what meets your standards?