The public broadcasting newspaper Current (5/18/11) reports that public television—you know, the non-commercial outlet—will start airing more commercials:
The move could be controversial for the network, which has traditionally prided itself on offering uninterrupted programming over its 40-year history.
PBS will begin breaking into programs with underwriting and promo spots four times per hour on an experimental basis beginning this fall, it told station members at the PBS National Meeting here.
PBS corporate communications official Anne Bentley issued a response that actually begins, “We are always looking at ways to improve the viewer experience.” It goes on to say that “It is all about the viewer,” and—perhaps most bizarrely—claims, “Initial testing showed that viewers didn’t really notice the change.” Really? People didn’t notice a commercial in the middle of a PBS show?
In other PBS news, some stations are apparently considering leaving PBS altogether, according to a report in the New York Times (5/22/11). The main complaint seems to be about money—the stations think they’re paying too much to air the national programming.
There is, of course, a possible silver lining in all of this. One could imagine public TV stations breaking free from PBS and seeking out more independent programming to fill out their schedules. (Democracy Now! instead of the NewsHour—how does that sound?). It’s a long shot, perhaps, but one can at least imagine a brighter future for public television stations that doesn’t necessarily involve airing the conventional PBS programming.
Peter, I can see why folks might not notice an ad in the middle of a PBS “news and public affairs” program, insofar as much of the actual content wouldn’t differ discernibly from the commercial, would it?
I don’t watch PBS anymore, anyway, since most of the programming on the local channel in my area is filled with “shows” that are really long infomercials, peppered liberally with breaks for donation requests.
PBS = Privatized Broadcasting System.
I have one word for PBS lovers – Pacifica
Find Pacifica radio stations online and listen to real non-commercial news and programs. Nothing more ridiculous that PBS’s current nature programs underwritten by oil companies or history programs underwritten by a Koch brother. This is propaganda under the banner of Public TV.
Democracy Now and Pacifica.. sadly, not available in San Diego, just as MSNBC is not available in parts of Louisville, KY. PBS, with all its flaws and ever greater corporatizing, has been the best alternative we have for TV news. The thought of commercials upsets me, because it creates even greater pressure for PBS to pander to the corporate advertisers ; to kill stories advertisers don’t like.
Sadly, Pacifica is showing the same type of interference with the programming, staffing and content of the individual stations (or at least toward KPFA, in Berkeley, where I listen and donate). The basic support functions of common legal, accounting, uber-management, and licensing that make rational, the notion of a corporate headquarters, for the five stations of Pacifica, have been subsumed by an over-reaching corporate, green eyeshade mindset, that has fired workers, cancelled programs and replaced some of the most popular on-air personalities, all of which has resulted in staff and audience chaos, anger and deep, deep bitterness.
There is something about a corporate headquarters that can turn pacifists/socialists into union busting bullies. It happened at Pacifica; it’s the history of PBS (and NPR). It seems a shame that the power that we listeners/viewers have, in numbers, is undone by the superior attitudes taken by those whose power is derived by such union, and the resulting madness, as that power is recklessly exercised.
Lord Acton’s thoughts on power and corruption are as reliable as gravity.
PUBLIC Broadcasting…… Can’t you see that replacing NewsHour with Amy G. would be a bad idea… Making it the Liberal station it is accused of being. Amy IN ADDITION to NewsHour is feasible (like decades of William Buckley opinions) in addition to objective, unreported news, investigative journalism, without celebrity scandals or bloody crimes. Do people actually watch PBS? If you don’t like Exxon on Nature, you should have objected during the first Reagan attack on PBS. If you don’t care what your kids see, or aren’t interested in the amazingly good homeshooling materials, or presenting Science (physics) so average folks can understand it, well, screw you! Go back to your average blood and guts criminal lessons and your porn and reality shows, and good luck with all-corporate propoganda and product broadcasting for empty minds. I am resigned to loosing PBS along with collective bargaining, organic food, bees, my (not liberal) beloved Congresswoman, freedom, and any hope of intelligence or soul from spoiled, selfish and stupid Americans.
Martha H
Democracy Now! is available, free, on the internet, streaming so that each day’s show (and many older ones, as well) are available within 3 or 4 hours of their broadcast. Go here to watch (and contribute after you’ve got the DN! habit): http://www.democracynow.org/
Worse yet, our local outlet, WGBH in Boston, once a scrappy innovator (about forty years ago!) now boasts David Koch on its board of trustees and has been busy busting its union – a mostly low key group representing a broad spectrum of the employees. But, echoing, Carol H. above, there’s no longer much to watch and almost nothing originating locally. After 11pm , it’s mostly audiences of graying boomers watching graying gurus talk about preserving the mental health, cash and spiritual purity of the owning class.
These are not commercials. It think it is illegal for PBS, NPR and CPB to have paid commercial advertising or “commercials”. So the media spin doctors at PBS call them “corporate sponsorship underwriting announcements”, to get around the law. Ah, the wonders of “newspeak” “1984” and the “Brave New World” has arrived and we don’t even know it. What else can they do when the Republicans and the Tea Party want to de-fund them and put them out of existence. After all, the CPB, PBS and NPR are not mentioned in the US Constitution, so despite the “general welfare” clause, we can’t have public broadcasting paid for by the taxpayers. At least the citizens who pay their fair share of taxes.
I believe we have slowly seen the erosion of “PBS” inasmuch as what we once counted upon as being unbiased and real news and reporting is all but gone. Even here, where once we knew truth was being spoken. Even here, even here. It saddens me
PBS broadcasting is a dying venture here in Pittsburgh and has been so for some time now. Outside of Frontline, Secrets of the Dead and NOVA, pretty much a wasteland. Those shows can accessed on line. Money always holds the winning hand.
So corporate interests take over PBS… a very sad day for the USA.
Since when have commercials been “all about the viewer”? What they really mean is it’s all about the viewer’s money. Then stations are indicating they are paying too much to air PBS programming? Ho hum, just another day in the United Corporation Of America… and just another reason to not watch T.V.
@susan
Frankly susan unless its a movie on TMC that i want to see, i dont watch television. at all. I dont get my “news” from television because its not news, its flabby,corporate coddling, consensus recieved opinion and propaganda. I am old enough to have complained to my congresscreep about reagan (for all the good it did) but i assume that many readers of this blog are not old enough to have “done something about reagan”. im glad they seem to be doing more than we did. in fact, susan, most people our age voted for reagan and watch fox news and read the daily beast and other such pj orourke trash, when they read at all.
This is crazy. Like the worst of mass media they are putting the sponsor ahead of the viewer. The one thing NPR has going for it is no ads – now it wants to wreck one of it’s best assets.
I have not owned a TV or had one in my house since 1995. With the Internet I find all the news that I want to have. When I occasionally visit family or friends and am exposed to TV offerings, whether PBS, cable, or broadcast news, I once again realize that I am missing very little. More time for reading, quiet, conversations with friends and no money to predatory cable companies. For some fifty years we’ve been hearing about the wasteland of TV but it just seems that more and more people are content to wander aimlessly in those god-forsaken spaces.
Maybe if all of us viewers were members, and members above the $35 a year fee, NPR and PBS would not have to resort to corporate sponsors. But, you can’t produce quality programs without money. Come on, folks, support your local stations the best way you can: with your pocket book.
God what a load of buzzkills. Phony intellectualism and droll cynicism .Tv is still about enjoyment mostly folks.You know turn on Arsenic and old lace(im watching it now)and smile a bit.I notice you laud Democracy Now.I watch it too.But lets admit that some of it is painful.A woman too young to have long course grey hair droning away day after day ,hour after hour in that flat monotone that puts everyone into a coma. But her very painful ability to read the news from the papers stacked in front of her make the news more reliable?Why do i imagine a lot of you looking like your classic maggot infested hair and beard…..birkenstock wearing socialist college profs that daily fill young minds of mush with your claptrap?Ok im riffing here.But why does making a buck( or PBS making a buck) bother everyone so much?As if the very nature of putting something on a paying basis instead of on the government dole makes a going concern automatically compromised.Really how do you climb on that high horse?
Sharri hit it right on the button. Our State (PA) has starved NPR/PBS for years with barely a dime and now
the Congress wants to totally destroy it. Of course the stations have to take desperate measures – even commercials which brings in some cash because enough listeners decline to contribute to keep the stations operating even if they do have flaws. Listen to some of the others some time.
And for “Oldwob” in Pittsburgh, you probably don’t care for WQED (89.3) either because they never broadcast rock, rap or country or report the Steelers’ scores. I’ve recently moved from Erie where they have a really great and very varied NPR in WQLN. I can catch them on my computer (after 3 PM when their classics stops) and if I have heard enough Mozart and Beethoven as much as I love listening.
Sharri hit it right on the button. Our State (PA) has starved NPR/PBS for years with barely a dime and now
the Congress wants to totally destroy it. Of course the stations have to take desperate measures – even commercials which brings in some cash because enough listeners decline to contribute to keep the stations operating even if they do have flaws. Listen to some of the others some time.
And for “Oldwob” in Pittsburgh, you probably don’t care for WQED (89.3) either because they never broadcast rock, rap or country or report the Steelers’ scores. I’ve recently moved from Erie where they have a really great and very varied NPR in WQLN. I can catch them on my computer (after 3 PM when their classics stops) and if I have heard enough Mozart and Beethoven as much as I love listening.
One thing some of us–those who still give money to PBS–could do is to withhold our personal donations as long as they’re getting commercial support. After all, most of us don’t give money to other commercial media, do we?
I guess it’s pretty obvious PBS will lose viewer donations with this move. Why would I donate to a station that has advertising to pay their bills? They obviously believe they’ll get more money through advertising from large corporations. and since the economy is in a shambles for most of us, they’re probably right. This should be a huge loss, but unfortunately, given that PBS has gradually moved farther and farther right over the years and becomes less and less willing to take risks and innovate, they become more and more like other channels out there. The rise of cable stations dedicated to many of their niche markets haven’t helped much either. They either have to start marching the corporate line or find some way of offering something we can’t get anywhere else. The only viable option would be to offer real news with controversial (non-corporate) perspectives and they’ve been failing at that for a long time. I always find it amazing that the right wingers who comment have become so extreme they find such corporate fare to be left leaning. The truth is, they haven’t seen a left perspective in a very long time, which is sad. It means there’s no way to have a conversation and no way to find common ground. And believe me, there is common ground for us to have a conversation. We just have to be open to finding it. I know because I’ve done this with republicans on a one on one basis. If we can stop screaming sound bites and names at each other and start listening to each others core wants, needs and goals, we can accomplish something.
Wow, this will help with the obesity problem. We will now have more opportunities to run to the the kitchen for a snack.
NPR and PBS have already lost a lot of credibility with the corporate sponsorships. Should PBS be renamed to Private Broadcasting System? It would be more honest.
steve s -Thanks for the link.
I was shocked in 1980 when WQED started running lightly disguised ads between programs. I was further sensitized by Jerry Starr’s book, Air Wars: The Fight to Reclaim Public Broadcasting (Beacon Press, 2000; Temple University Press, 2001) describing the takeover of my local station WQED in Pittsburgh by the Establishment Republicans who wanted to tilt the station to the ‘center’ and suppress real debate. Populism/progressivism has been effectively suppresed by making public broadcasting operate in the commercial realm and by raising the executive salaries to keep stations continually impoverished and having to resort to fundraisers that turn off so many people. This latest development is just one more slip down the slippery slope.
The big problems with PBS happened (Bush 11) with the near dismantling of the CPB which is supposed to be the firewall between PBS and government propoganda. It was obvious with that ridiculous, skewed progam on George Schultz, Bill Moyer leaving, NOW being canned….. The ombudsman’s replies to my email letters were like those from my Rep Senators -gobligook happy talk without addressing the issue. I got rid of my tv during the last campaign when Jesse Kelly (R, TP) ran lies and hateful disgusting ads against Congresswoman Giffords (and I blame him!). I contribute to my non-corporate internet news services and local PBS station. PBS online will be be lost if PBS goes. As will our internet news if the Right decides to paint them as subversive. I opposed the move to digital -a givaway for new phone apps and increased gov survailance. I don’t think tv is only about entertainment. Glenn Beck boasted he’s ‘been paying attention since 9/11; I’ve been paying attention since 11/63 (if you don’t count duck and cover huddling under desks because the Russians could kill us all). Such a travesty of freedom! of the People’s trust! of Democracy’s ‘informed populace’ – the purpose of a ‘free’ press! Anything that opposes the corporate, aristocratic takeover of this country is doomed -like the natives, the land, the waterways, the animals, ethics, compassion, intelligence, free speech, farmland, real food, fair trade, predictable weather, or a decent life for working hard. Glad I’m old and my daughter moved to Europe. All my ancestors who fought our wars since the Revolution are sobbing in their graves.
I don’t watch the Newhour. Too corporate. And I hate David Brooks. It would be great to see Democracy Now instead and maybe some Al Jazeera coverage and the middle east.
Ellyn…let me weigh this in my head.100% corporatism….. Representing open, robust ,free market capitalism cut loose that is freedom personified or… Democracy now representing- another AMERICA APOLOGIZES tour ,or Al Jazeera representing the Arab world view.Hmmm what shall i do,what shall i do?I know…i will grab the yellow pages and see where it is I LIVE!.
Susan………I think the problem is that you believe this corporatism nonsense.su everyone who owns a business can incorporate.It is simply a legal protective measure.It is not a secret society or the boogie man under the bed ,though every generation needs one- so i guess they are as good as any.Or is it only certain ones that are ruling the secret skull and bones societies?.Take any beautiful thing you can think of ,and I can tie a corporation to it.It is an amazingly silly creation that the left has taken and run with.You also sound like you believe that Europe is in some way superior than the good ol USA. Another canard fostered by the left.
I would recommend you get another Tv ,and enjoy all the wonderful,enlightening,and sometimes frustrating window to the world programming that is available in those hundreds of channels. You don’t stop looking at a field of flowers because it has a few weeds. You don’t hate the ocean because it has angel fish AND sharks. And you don’t walk away from a feast because something tasted bad once.You sound as if you have robbed yourself of enjoyments and taken things beyond your control to heart to an unhealthy degree. I doubt you are old(whatever that means)Remember their are only two kinds of people.Ones on this side of the grass, and ones on the other.Breath deep and laugh hard….even if it is at me and the tea party.
Actual Content – what a concept. Finding some actual content among commercials. Perhaps we should march in goose-step to Chevron’s recent commercial music, “Dum didy dum dum dum dum dumb.”
For all of you who do not watch TV because the media is so corrupt, and get your news off the internet….I advise vigilance. The internet has been on the corporate radar now for some years and so far they have been beaten back to some extent (internet neutrality). But they are intent on tying up all the air waves for their own nefarious purposes, and if you don’t organize to stop that effort, the only thing left to you will be meditation. Not such a bad thing, really, if your legs are still good. If not, you’re going to have to speak up.
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