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PBS sells out (again)

PBS is partnering with Comcast, Sesame Workshop, and HIT Entertainment on a new advertising-supported digital cable channel for preschoolers.

"I don't like pitching products to young children and I never have," said Joan Ganz Cooney, a co-founder of Children's Television Workshop (now Sesame Workshop) and the chairwoman of the executive committee of its board. "But to some degree that is nostalgia for a time that is past.

That, from the person whose past included approving Pfizer's sponsorship of Sesame Street, leading to episodes that ended with, "Pfizer brings parents the letter Z—as in Zithromax."

Meanwhile, PBS is loosening advertising guidelines on its own channel, allowing McDonald's Microsoft and the like to produce 15-minute commercials. For the first time, sponsors can now show people consuming products on PBS -- "as long as they do not appear to enjoy it overtly." (!)

Sesame Workshop suits may consider disgust over advertising "nostalgia"  but only because they don't have a firm grasp on their own history. Children's Television Workshop was founded in 1967, a time when TV programming for kids was scarce because children weren't yet commonly seen as target consumers. Its mission: to produce high-quality, educational programming. Over the years PBS has defended its endless merch-deals and corporate cross-promotions as necessary to maintain high-quality children's programming: without PBS, they argue, there won't be anything decent or educational for kids to watch. But as marketing to children has soared, so have the outlets for children's programming. Many of the programs on Nickelodeon, the Cartoon Network, and the like could be considered as high quality as anything PBS offers, if by "high quality" you mean entertaining and popular. But any attempt to call this stuff educational is surely trumped by the advertising, which is itself a form of education -- a form that often directly competes with parents, teachers, and anyone who sincerely prioritizes a child's interests. CTW once saw itself as a pioneer and as an alternative to commercial television; now it's just another competitor.

PETITION: Tell PBS not to advertise to kids

(Thanks to Yaniv Eidelstein)