Page 419 - Battleground The Media Volume 1 and 2

| Publ c Access Telev s on

technologies. It proposes a model of television based on need rather than aroused
desire and consumer satisfaction. The direct precursor to public access televi-
sion in the United States was Challenge for Change, a program of the National
Film Board of Canada, directed between 1968 and 1970 by George Stoney,
widely considered the father of public access television. Challenge for Change
held with the basic tenet that film and eventually video can be used to foster
dialogue between citizens and government and thereby facilitate participatory
media. The actual development of public access television in the United States
is often described as an accidental boon when the diverse interests of a fledgling
cable industry intersected with the progressive ideals of media educators, art-
ists, and activists. Organizations like the Alternate Media Center at New York
University, founded by Stoney, and radical video collectives like Raindance,
Videofreeks, Ant Farm, Global Village, and the May Day Collective were active
participants and early innovators in the young medium. Some political activists
viewed new communication technologies as pathways to developing an ad-
versary culture critical of given economic and political structures. Michael
Shamberg of Raindance described how information resources are vital to social
models based on human needs. Manifestos concerned with the appropriation
and reimagination of communication technologies advocated for people to pe-
tition and secure public access channels.

wEak anD DEPEnDEnT: ThE LimiTaTions
oF PuBLiC aCCEss TELEvision

Public access television exists through the precarious arrangement of a con-
tractual compromise between the private, profit-seeking cable companies and
local municipalities often aligned with nonprofit organizations. Since the 1980s,
public access centers have been dramatically compromised as private compa-
nies, operating as commercial ventures, seek to meet the minimal obligations
of their franchises. Access centers are becoming more and more the exception,
while drop-off playback facilities lacking production equipment, facilities, or
staff are becoming the rule. In addition, shifting political winds along with fund-
ing shortages have repositioned independent video from its use as an instru-
ment of social change to more standardized formats. Some charge that once the
emphasis on community within public access is lost, the medium will be little
more than a device of artistic vanity for individuals able to take advantage of ac-
cess channels.

ThE ConTinuaL Erosion oF PuBLiC aCCEss

Public access television continues to be challenged from a number of quar-
ters, particularly the cable industry, that would like to take back channels for
commercial motivations. Recent legislative maneuverings have been successful
at moving authority over public access from local municipalities to state capi-
tals. These structural changes have decreased channel capacity in some states and
limited operating hours in others, further contributing to the ongoing erosion of