Cable was a wide-open medium in , the year Manhattan became the first major metropolitan area to sign a franchise agreement with a cable company. But activists like George Stoney, Theodora Sklover, and others saw a new potential in the technology. With added channels on the dial, New York could diversify programming and open up the field of television production to the general public. Their successful campaign led to the Public Access Cable television mandate in the s franchise: two channels would offer free, nearly uncensored airtime, first-come, first-served.
Over the course of the next decade, time slots on these channels became a hot ticket, as a subculture of independent, no-budget producers emerged, inventing new ones to fit the ephemeral, unspectacular logic of public access. Those pieces have some of the errors endemic to a reliance on secondary sources: names and dates are correct, but some conclusions are wrongly drawn.
In the spirit of correction, this article, culled from nine interviews, tells the same story from the perspective of some of the people who were actually there. Public access has a fundamental PR problem, which one producer summed up with this rhetorical question: "If anybody can do it, who would want to? But these people each of whom I met by chance through the help of someone else I interviewed have some things in common. All are creative, and all seem to have a thick skin and a high threshold for frustration.
None were paid for their shows. Most actually shelled out their own money for studio time. Three admitted to suffering career setbacks later as a result of appearing on public access. They approached their work in television with a level of intensity and passion that only exists in the realm of avocations and came away with uniquely philosophical perspectives on the nature of television.
Show and Soho Television Presents , I could keep my distance from American television; I had no emotional attachment. Later I lived in Paris and didn't watch television there much until the revolution of It was shocking and inspiring to see barricades and burning cars in the streets of Paris, like seeing Marat on TV. Suddenly television was relevant, inspiring, and had something to say in its own language. It was a revelation for me.
