I saw a discussion string in another dept. and felt compelled to reply. Since my responce was not really in line with the subject area I felt that I should step back and post it here. At any rate, the problem dealt with PBS’ programming choice during their annual fundraising time of year. I enjoy watching Norm, Steve, Tom, Rich (TOH, ATOH, NYW) & Roy (Woodwright’s Shop), and have for many years, but these programs seem to take a back seat during the fundraising season. PBS still seems to want donations from the woodworking community even in light of their programming decision. I am not familiar with this type of advertising.
I know that some folks may disagree but I feel that these shows have a definate place in our culture. All I am trying to say is that for the folks who do like seeing these programs year round but become frustrated when fundraising season hits this posting is for you.
I have asked my local PBS affiliate why these programs seem to drop off the face of the earth (for me during the months of Feb. & Mar.) and have met with either vague comments or no responce to emails & phone calls when asking the question. The little bit of information that I did get was that we (all of us who enjoy these shows) need to let our local PBS affiliates know of our discontent. Maybe if PBS hears from enough of us they will rethink their programming choices during the next fundraiser.
Replies
Woodmike,
It's always seemed to me that PBS makes some really bad choices during their beg-a-thons. They take off the shows that drew people to watch PBS in the first place and instead show programs that don't usually appeal to the same people.
One of my local PBS stations (KLCS in Southern California) was the only local station that showed The Woodwright's Shop--but they aired it at 3:30 a.m. on Wednesday mornings! Worse, about three-quarters of the time (not hyperbole) they would preempt it to show, of all things, the meetings of the Los Angeles School Board! The one and only PBS program I regularly watched wasn't shown just so they could show the school board windbags from gavel to gavel. About the only time TWS was shown was when the board didn't meet.
I suppose some people are interested in watching the board meetings. But I doubt anyone set their VCR or stayed up until three in the morning to watch--because they replayed the entire meeting on Sunday afternoons! (But they did not ever show TWS at another time.)
I e-mailed them several times, and snail-mailed them twice. I never once got a response of any kind. When I e-mailed the production home of TWS I got a very prompt reply. KLCS did not behave as though they wanted or needed my support.
KLCS did, however, solve my problem: they no longer show The Woodwright's Shop.
Needless to say I am not sending any money to PBS.
Alan
I don't think I have ever seen a pledge drive on KLCS as they are funded by the L.A. Unified School District. And believe me the district can afford it when they can embark on and then halfway through abandon the most expensive high school construction project in U.S. history. So I'm not terribly surprised by the station's unresponsiveness to you; they only answer to board members and as long as they broadcast the board meetings, their existence is ensured.
The "special" programming shown during pledge week (or more accurately, pledge month-and-a half) is, in my opinion, not supposed to draw in new viewers but instead designed to hold hostage regular programming until regular viewers ante up. Ironically, pledge periods seem to occur more frequently because targets aren't being met, but the special programming at best confuse and at worse drive away regular viewers who seem most likely to contribute, thus requiring even more pledge periods, and so on.
As was already said, it's not just the woodworking shows that drop out of sight during the pledge drives -- nearly all standard evening and weekend (i.e., highest viewership) PBS programming is swapped out during the drives, replaced by so-called "specials" that will hopefully draw in more than just the regular PBS viewers. They follow the commercial networks "sweeps" philosophy -- and sadly, most of the programming during sweeps months are nearly as awful as the PBS pledge programming.
The only exceptions to this rule, generally, are those series that produce hour-long special features that can be used during the pledge drives. I personally am not a big fan of Rick Steves, the travel guy, but he's masterful when it comes to pledge-a-thons. His team produces special shows for pledge weeks, they create companion DVDs and videos as pledge gifts, and then he shows up to the local production facilities during the airings of his shows, hawking himself and PBS at once.
Perhaps we shouldn't be writing the PBS stations, asking them to keep their regular programming during pledge weeks. Perhaps we should be contacting the producers of our favorite shows, asking them to create special episodes that can be shown during those time slots.
David
"The world that was not made is not won by what is done" -- Mundaka Upanishad
Your complaint should be directed to your local PBS station, not to PBS nationally. Each station picks/chooses what it want to broadcast and even when/if it presents certain programs. I'm fortunate to pick up PBS outlets in several TV markets and there is considerable variation in what they broadcast. You can count on Masterpiece Theater on Sunday nights and a few other stalwarts but the rest is local. Let them know of your dissatisfaction.
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