One of my most boring college classes was the Study of Public Broadcasting. We went through the whole history and the meaning of it all. The amount of good PBS alone has produced for the whole world, not just USA, is being thrown in the trash. Having access to PBS does so much for poor and working class communities that we take for granted everyday. The amount of cooky shit you can find on public TV is just gonna vanish like a fart in the wind. Fuck this administration for taking away an American staple.

[–] djdarren@piefed.social 25 points 5 days ago (1 children)

The same is true of the BBC. Yes, the news arm of it is a problem, but the arms that educate and entertain have done untold good over its near 100 years. Even now, the BBC does more to keep all of British broadcasting honest than most people realise.

But it costs us, and has been under fire from conservatives for at least my entire lifetime as little more than a stealth tax. £170 a year (per household that accesses it) is a small price to pay for the good it does, but I fear that'll come to an end sooner rather than later.

[–] HubertManne@piefed.social 1 points 4 days ago

Its sorta funny to. Like I wonder how much british shit is sold due to bbc shows playing abroad and japanese shit from anime playing abroad. I mean it feels like it should almost pay for itself.

[–] HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 4 points 4 days ago (1 children)

So, remember public access tv? I know PBS doesn't do Public Access, but was that a Corporation for Public Broadcasting thing? I just know the local churches liked to broadcast their services on sundays on public access and i'm queueing up a leopard meme.

[–] JakoJakoJako13@piefed.social 3 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

Yeah. CPB is a government non-profit corporation. Basically a shell to put taxpayer money into for keeping a spectrum of broadcast waves open to everyone. IIRC when TV was invented they had to update the 1934 communications act to account for TV waves. Instead of amending that act directly they passed the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 which created the CPB. It was supposed to be educational but they were pretty loose on those rules. They set aside a bunch of broadcast waves because they knew the spectrum to be used for all broadcasting could grow exponentially with time. There was so much free space early on that they designated a bunch of bands for public use. Anybody could get a slot and put something on air as long as it followed FCC rules. Again it's a taxpayer operated corp, so anybody can use it if they have the means.

[–] HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 3 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

i had so much fun on public access back in the day. we did some, uh, let's call it high school quality stuff. i looked it up and there are still a few stations, but if it goes for good that'll be sad. i guess youtube has taken its place.