Dear Mr. X
I read you reply to Goldie's message concerning NOW WITH BILL MOYERS. You bring up some interesting points that I hadn't really even thought of concering pressure from various groups, etc. Let me assure you that never in my history in public television (I began in 1973 and have worked at KCTS in Seattle and KQED in San Francisco) have I or any station I have worked at caved in to any pressure from anyone. But the point you bring up got me thinking. NOW should have elicited responses from people. The sad part is, it didn't. I guess this only supports the audience figures we get from the Nielsen's rating service. Maybe you have heard of A.C. Nielsen. They are the only television audience measureing service in the U.S. When you hear on the news about "sweeps" months, and "number 1 rated program", they are talking about Nielsen figures.
Also, you mentioned giving the program a try. We did, for six months. And we did promote it. In all of the major markets of the U.S., heavy promotion took place to try to bring an audience to the series, but unfortunately, the efforts failed.
It's unfortunate when a program like NOW is not successful. It's also unfortunate that the team at Public Affairs Television couldn't find the formula to attract a larger audience for the stories they had to tell. Or that PBS, after recognizing the series failure on Friday nights, didn't have the courage to move the series to another night to try and build audience - say Thursday after Frontline.
Again, thank you for writing WNED.
Sincerely Ron Santora Director of Broadcasting
===== Kevin Dean Buffalo, NY ICQ: 8616001 AIM: KDean75206 Buffalo Activist Network http://www.buffaloactivist.net http://www.yaysoft.com
__________________________________________________ Yahoo! - We Remember 9-11: A tribute to the more than 3,000 lives lost http://dir.remember.yahoo.com/tribute