Comment by joshuahaglund
19 hours ago
> The actual PBS and NPR shows you're familiar with are generally developed and produced privately
Off the top of my head, two programs I watch that get CPB funding include: Frontline https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/about-us/our-funders/ NOVA https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/funders/
This is one place some sorta "trickle down" economics worked. CPB contributed to developing the content on PBS. Now PBS either has to cut costs by either canceling programs or ordering cheaper content that corporate sponsors like, run more pledge drives, or seek more corporate sponsors. None of those are appealing to me.
Also CPB helps keep rural stations open means all the niche local productions about state history or geology or whatever can happen.
It's a cut to the already strained budget of a wonderful resource. I'd be surprised if there weren't lost jobs and less quality as a result.
Edit to add: Just sentimental but I'll miss hearing "this program was made possible by The Corporation for Public Broadcasting and by contributions from viewers like you!"
I think the cuts are bad and certainly there will be programming losses. It's just not an existential threat to public media in America, which has over the last 20 years become far less dependent on local stations. GBH, which produces Frontline, gets $177MM in revenue from major donors and viewer subscriptions.
I think I am starting to get paranoid but I wouldn’t be too surprised if they went after these donors next.
Yeah, I think you underestimate the structural dependency.
Xkcd comic is closer to reality. There is a base load to public good and we are about to find out
We'll find out, but I think always the bias on HN is towards whichever interpretation of an event is most dramatic.
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They are horrible, and given that we now live in a fascist state run by fascists, I am just waiting for the pendium to reverse, and knock all of them out of existence, AGAIN. (Frontline rocks, NPR, and all of PBS rocks).
I don't know if I'm the only one that finds fault with:
> GBH, which produces Frontline, gets $177MM in revenue from major donors and viewer subscriptions.
Given Frontline is a production for public consumption, for public good, it shouldn't have to be financed by donations, it absolutely should be financed by the federal government.
I find your tone (sorry) offensive, in the sense that you DON'T find it dramatic and just plain terrible that CPB had to cease operations, just because billionaires feel it's a waste of "money that could be in their pocket" and obviously they prefer the greater population to be clueless and ignorant.
Me? I am furious. But what can I do besides the usual? Write my congresscritters, call them, write angry posts on Hackernews, donate?
Frontline is a product, just like all the rest of journalism. The time to have gotten on this high horse was when Craigslist slaughtered local media.