The providers of 'cable' tv are required to provide a channel or channels
for local content.
Perhaps you didn't appreciate that public-access tv was a way for
shy or crazy folks to get on tv, and try stuff to boost their confidence, or learn a trade.
Dan Akroyd and Tom Green started there.
I did it for a while. You'll never see that shown here, but anyway, it
just goes to show you, they'll let anybody do a show if he's got a decent idea,
or if they've got time. The poor quality of most of it proves that 'they're just doing what the law asks for,' and nothing more. It's more democratic than democracy.
It's not that hard to get on, because it takes a certain personality (weird or very driven). Kinda like the blogs of their day, for neurotic people to present sh*t that nobody sees.
Most normal folks would find it weird being on tv that nobody watches, with no production values.
Check this one out, from 1994. Bill Hicks, the great comedian who is no more,
visited a public access show in Houston, his home town.
No news magazine was ever as good as this show.
Set: two lousy chairs, one table with phone, two guys.
[My blog has better production values]
Notice the heavy metal nerd interviewer
(he does the 'Metal show'- d-uuuh).
Set: two lousy chairs, one table with phone, two guys.
[My blog has better production values]
Notice the heavy metal nerd interviewer
(he does the 'Metal show'- d-uuuh).
Bill discussed:
Being kicked off the David Letterman show
because of the God-squaders and pro-lifers not liking his
rather mild Eastern Bunny/Cross/Jesus jokes and his pro-life joke.
He attacks Letterman's desire to keep the advertisers happy
by avoiding controversy, so that he could continue
to make money for NBC and himself.
Bill concluded that he was silenced because of commercial interests.
In fact, Bill was on public access tv because it was the only place
where he could freely denigrate commercial tv.
By the way, at the time, Bill was dying of pancreatic cancer.
-Cos67 ¬(%^D>
Being kicked off the David Letterman show
because of the God-squaders and pro-lifers not liking his
rather mild Eastern Bunny/Cross/Jesus jokes and his pro-life joke.
He attacks Letterman's desire to keep the advertisers happy
by avoiding controversy, so that he could continue
to make money for NBC and himself.
Bill concluded that he was silenced because of commercial interests.
In fact, Bill was on public access tv because it was the only place
where he could freely denigrate commercial tv.
By the way, at the time, Bill was dying of pancreatic cancer.
