Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site decwrl.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxj!houxm!whuxlm!akgua!sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!hplabs!hpda!fortune!amdcad!decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-mother!hughes From: hughes@mother.DEC (Gary if I could walk that way Hughes - CSSE uVAX Systems) Newsgroups: net.tv.drwho Subject: Government funded TV Message-ID: <156@decwrl.UUCP> Date: Tue, 8-Jan-85 08:50:49 EST Article-I.D.: decwrl.156 Posted: Tue Jan 8 08:50:49 1985 Date-Received: Mon, 14-Jan-85 05:02:52 EST Sender: daemon@decwrl.UUCP Organization: DEC Engineering Network Lines: 24 In Australia, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (equivalent to the BBC) is government funded and is supposed to operate free of government intervention. For the most part, this works very well. However, the ABC is answerable to nobody. Some years ago they announced that they intended to provide programming that was 'culturally uplifting' and that they 'would not pay attention to ratings' when choosing material. In the same announcement they added that they were not going to buy ANY more Dr Who because 'it wasn't rating well enough'. This was in the series that ended with 'Revenge of the Cybermen'. Of course they used to schedule Dr Who in a dead slot on Sunday night, change the show time without preannouncing or preempt it for World Championship Lawn Bowls just to help it along. Although I loathe the PBS grovelathons, I prefer the concept of being able to contribute a relatively small sum of $$$ towards seeing programs that I want to see rather than have my tax dollars spent on something that a non-elected Head of Corporation wants to see. Gary Hughes UUCP: ...{ decvax | allegra | ucbvax }!decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-mother!hughes ...!dec-godzla!hughes ARPA: hughes%mother.DEC @decwrl.ARPA hughes%godzla.DEC @decwrl.ARPA reality?: DEC, ZKO1-2/C07, 110 Spit Brook Rd, Nashua NH 03062