Narrowcasting and Small TV, March 1995

We hear a lot at the moment about "big city" television, with million dollar figures for licences, program deals and national broadcast systems frequently bandied about. But what about "small village" television, new pint-sized "narrowcast" operators, who are also supposed to take part in the communications revolution, bringing new blood and different voices to our screens?

Part of the attraction for the government allowing new satellite and cable television services was to provide Australians with a greater diversity of services. This doesn't just include new broadcast services providing mainstream programs for broader audiences - but also "narrowcast" channels for special education, language and other narrower, "limited" audiences.

How much small television can we find on our screens at the moment? Cynics may say that the ABC and SBS are already narrowcasting, reaching, respectively, roughly 13% and 3% of viewers nationally. Even a new national pay television channel could be considered to be "narrowcasting" while it's still only watched by a small percentage of viewers.

Smaller channels include Australis Media's, Teleltalia, and Mandarin language-based New World Television channels available in Sydney and Melbourne on the Galaxy multichannel service. In most capitals you'll also find community-based television just up the dial from SBS with a mix of programs for special interest audiences. There are proposals and plans for more language, women's, "family", Aboriginal and other channels.

Last, but by no means least, there's television you can make yourself. A few years ago the equipment needed to make television cost millions of dollars. Now, if you're prepared to put up with a slightly more homemade look, you can have the basics for well under $10,000, taking the "persuasive and pervasive" power of television right into your home production studio. Such developments overstimulate the dreams of a horde of Rupert Murdoch and Aaron Spelling would-bes.

Desktop television, bringing under control multiple audio and visual media in one desk-sized computer studio, is duplication the success of desktop publishing and climbing the sales charts. Desktop publishing became popular because it gives a virtual novice the power of a small printing press combining word processing, colour graphics and printing in one package. Similarly, with a desktop television package, you can push around moving and still images, text and sound on video almost as easily as a word processor lets you move text or pictures on the page.

Just what we need, you might say, a Funniest Home Videos channel! But it doesn't all have to be wobbly shots of kids and small animals making a mess of themselves. There are other uses for the videos of the 12% of homes that have camcorders and the growing number with computers that handle video. Remember, the lucky amateur who videoed Rodney King being bashed not only upset the Los Angeles residents and police? - he made a small fortune from royalties from his video being shown around the world.

With such cheap and powerful television systems and so many new channels with a voracious appetite for programs, maybe we'll finally get some fresh, unexpected kinds of television. Look out media magnates, there's some new kids in town.