Saturday, January 2, 2021

Public TV Programing Changes Coming

 If you followed German public TV/radio....up to the mid-1980s....TV and radio services basically ended around midnight.  The general idea was that no one was around to listen or watch.

Then at some point when private commercial TV arrived....management began to realize that a whole segment of Germans were insomniacs (up past midnight).  Based on a study from seven years ago, the experts think that 20-percent of Germans have issues falling asleep and are having sleep issues.  

So I noticed this morning....ARD is pulling up some changes, and they are adding another unique feature to after-midnight programing (it won't be just movies or documentary pieces).  It'll what you'd call news-talk-radio....coming on at 10 PM and running 'live' until 6 AM....seven days a week.

The plan?  It'll be run out of NDR (north Germany public TV network).  Content?  News and background info....with some chatter along the way.

The key element of this....if you look through the story....they are tying podcasts into the bulk of this, and it's coming from public TV/radio news people.  It's simply woven into the entire product itself.

Two shifts?  First guy signs on at 10 PM and will be there four hours.  Fresh new guy shows up at 2 AM and goes the rest of the way.

An audience for them?  That's the primary question.  I might agree from 10 PM to 2 AM....there's probably a quarter-million Germans who might listen into this programming situation.  Around 4 AM....a fair number of Germans might be getting up and getting ready for a long ride into work....catching some parts of the news programming.  

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