GLOBALVISION’S HOPES. CIRCA l990
CYCLES OF A LIFE
CONFESSIONS OF SECRET AGENT

It was 20 years ago today, well maybe not today but in this rapidly fading month of November that two network refugees and TV wannabee change agents launched Globalvision as an independent TV company. We were on a mission from our own consciences and consciousness. We had tried the network “thing” and it left us financially solvent but often spiritually undernourished. We want to marry money and meaning, and cover issues that were being neglected. Neither Rory O’Connor or myself were businessmen. Most of our colleagues wished us well but believed in their hearts that it wouldn’t work and that we would be back.

I plan to run some reminiscences about our work not just for the nostalgia of it all, but because we still believe in what we are doing and encourage others to join us. Our world needs a strong independent media. It also needs media about a changing world an we need to hear critical voices from all over the world that are often not heard.

And we need progressives to support our work and keep its spirit alive.

In the summer of 1990, when we were based in a ratty walk up office in Soho, thanks to the goodwill of our colleague Hart Perry, I was asked to spell out our hopes and media analysis for the Utne Reader. This article also appeared in the Electron Press E-Book version of my book News Dissector. It is still available on line.

I dedicated it then as I do now to “all of my co-workers over all these years who have put up with me, stood by me, and helped me do my thing. I may have been the News Dissector—but without them, I’d have been one hand clapping. They were there, in the background and the foreground, prodding me to sharpen it up, cut it down, and restrain tendencies towards self-promotion, self-indulgence, and delusional self-importance.

Oh yeah, and don’t forget Marvin Gaye: “Let’s Get it On.”

Watch Local, See Global (Summer l990)

In April 1990, over half a billion people in 63 countries watched Nelson Mandela speak to a packed stadium of rock fans at a London concert in his honor. The only part of the world not watching was the biggest television market of them all—the United States.

Once again, American television was out of step with the world, isolationist and isolated in an increasingly globalized electronic community. Not one network here, including MTV or PBS, would touch what programmers apparently considered an event that was either too political or not adequately commercial or both. It was the American viewers who lost out this time—but in the long run it will be the folks who run our TV networks who will lose out if they bury their heads in the sands of outmoded thinking and status quo behavior.
American myopia is not new, but strong economic pressures are now reshaping the nature of broadcasting and are likely to force the United States to jump on the emerging global television bandwagon.
Three powerful forces are at work.
First, the three major networks are facing a growing erosion of their viewing audience. Their power and popularity are shrinking, partly because of proliferating competition, partly because they are exhausted—when they are not insulting—as a creative and inspirational force.
Second, the spread of cable and satellite technology—and the penetration of VCRs—gives viewers more choice. The widespread use of remote controls has turned TV viewing into expeditions in “zapping” as viewers dart through the dials looking for something compelling, and usually find little of substance to engage their interest.
Third, production expenses are increasing even as viewership declines, forcing producers to seek less expensive programming methods. “Under the circumstances,” writes Les Brown, one of our most respected writers about television, “there seems little choice for the U.S. networks but to deal abroad, cultivating the kinds of relationships with foreign suppliers they’ve had with Hollywood studios.”
Already the big U.S. communications companies are buying up European production facilities and taking a stake in cable and newly privatized channels. (Japanese companies are also gobbling up U.S. firms.) As Europe approaches economic union in 1992, a vast new market is on the horizon. There are billions in pent-up advertiser demand—with hundreds of hours of new programming needed. Americans want into this market, and Europeans—whose own TV program-making skills have matured significantly—want out. They are asking for access to the American market at the same time that U.S. companies seek to flood Europe with their latest product.
What this could mean is a new era in television—a chance for viewers everywhere to literally tune in the world and be exposed to a diversity of voices, entertainment and points of view. There’s a danger, of course, that in this process cultures could be homogenized into one mushy TV soup by media moguls who see the world as The Deal of Fortune. But there’s also the opportunity for television to realize Marshall McLuhan’s global village aspiration and become a force for the exchange of ideas, fashions, cultural events, and practical problem-solving across all borders and boundaries.
[At the time I wrote these lines, I only had the vaguest idea of what would happen over the next decade, how American made programming would find new markers worldwide and influence similar shows in other languages; how global media companies would buy up or buy into TV outlets internationally, and how fast US pop culture would spread, At the same time, I didn’t fully anticipate the spread of the Internet with its far more diverse offerings. As convergence technologies develop, there will be more outlets for just about everything worldwide. But will they be any better? Stay tuned. DS–2000.]
So far the American market has been resistant to diversity, for all of its talk of faith in free markets and fair trade reciprocity. U.S. programmers would much prefer to monopolize the terms of the international television interchange. American-made TV shows, from pro wrestling to religious pros like Jimmy Swaggart, are already shown worldwide. In contrast, foreign-made programming has a hard time penetrating our living rooms. Last year, only 7 percent of all prime time programming came from overseas—and that figure includes all the British imports on PBS.
This situation is not only unfair in the abstract: it deprives U.S. viewers of a window on the world. Our own parochialism is fed and reinforced by one-note news shows that march in lockstep with government and corporate agendas and by the freeze-out of entertainment, sports, and information from abroad. Our ability to relate to and empathize with other peoples will increase to the extent that we get a feel for their points of view, passions, heroes, humor, and cultural idiosyncrasies. An occasional overseas ambassador or president on Nightline is not enough.
In the age of satellites, the technology exists to crack our cultural isolation and promote a cross-fertilization of ideas. Global programming is now technically feasible and economically viable. “World television” is poised to penetrate an insularity fed by the kind of educational underdevelopment that led to 60 percent of our high school kids not being able to find Japan on a globe and 20 percent unable to locate the United States.
Tuning in to the world need not be sold as something that’s good for you, as some kind of elitist antidote to illiteracy. It can be marketed in the same way we market all TV shows—as worth watching, informative, or just plain fun. Already, broadcasters who are willing to take risks and introduce a more global perspective are getting a good response. Ted Turner has built CNN on the strength of its overseas reach, and he is now making money as a global broadcaster. The Discovery Channel is also doing well with programming with international themes.
The success of Globalvision’s weekly television newsmagazine South Africa Now illustrates the potential for innovative global programming. Hailed by Time magazine for filling a void in news coverage, the show recently won an Emmy award for its coverage, supplied mostly by black South African video teams. South Africa Now is seen on 80 PBS stations and also in the Caribbean, southern Africa, Canada and Japan. It contributes stories weekly to CNN’s World Report.
Globalvision is now developing several other programs on the South Africa Now model, fusing cultural and news segments. They include The Soviet Union Now, produced jointly by Russians and Americans, and Rights and Wrongs, a global human rights show. In the commercial sphere, an international magazine show offering to bring “the best of the world to the rest of the world” is in the final stages of pre-production with a number of international broadcasters and production groups already expressing strong interest. This show will aim to bring a mix of international television into the U.S. TV market in a package attractive for U.S. viewers. It will also provide customized editions for viewers in other countries in their own language.
Companies like Globalvision can’t singlehandedly change the dismal state of TV programming, but they are determined not to leave it the same either. As we approach the turn of the century, as TV thrusts itself on the cutting edge of change from Romania to South Africa to Tiananmen Square, it is no longer a question of whether we will see what the world sees, but when. Soon we’ll be watching local—and seeing global!

This article originally appeared in the UTNE READER, July/August, 1990