I'm truly amazed at TV5 (now TV5Monde). It assumes the viewer is intelligent and not simply…read moreinterested in being a couch-potato.
You can watch the previous day's "Le Journal" (news edition, 25 minutes long) on the website:
http://www.tv5.org/TV5Site/info/jt_tv5.php
Not only that, various other programs can be viewed there as well, ones that the viewer might have missed, e.g., "Kiosque," which brings together journalists from around the world, for 90 minutes,for a round-table discussion on the major news events of the past week.
There also appears to be a year's archive of "L'invite," which interviews prominent French public figures, to watch at one's discretion.
One example of this dedication to providing its audience with serious programming was its interview with Dr. Mohamed El Baradei, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) (and recipient of the 2005 Nobel Prize for peace) . It is posted in its entirety here:
http://www.tv5.org/TV5Site/internationales/emission-13-Internationales.htm
In contrast, I turned to www.cnn.org to see what videos were available for viewing. What I found were a bunch of 1.5 to 3 minute snippets.
On www.msnbc.com to watch a 2-3 minute short video, the viewer must wade through about 20 seconds of commercials. CBS's Sixty Minutes, on the other hand, apparently has previous week's programming archived for immediate viewing on its website.
On the half-hour nightly news, NBC, ABC, and CBS have probably have a total of 18 minutes of actual programming, with a total of four commercial breaks.
How is it that the francophone cable television clearly beats any American television network (or its affiliated website) in terms of actual news programming, both in terms of content, quality, and quantity.
(It also should be noted that France, the driving force behind TV-5, has about 1/5 the total population of the U.S., proving the point that size is not necessarily an indication of quality).
Why do Americans have so short an attention span? How can we expect to make wise decisions when our news comes in sound-bites? Why is the upper limit of our tolerance--when it comes to news, at least, no more than 7 minutes?
On the other hand, why do we tolerate so much high-decibel crass advertising thrown in our faces when it only serves to spur the very consumption that are threatening the quality of life on this planet?
Clearly, TV5 is much closer to a PBS affiliate in the U.S. (there is greater variety in the programming).
Now that we have a new Administration, I am wondering if we may see a shift in our priorities as a country, with a larger public sector to counterbalance the private sector that failed us in so many ways during the previous eight years (of George W).