The ABC’s real issue is that it is doomed

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Nice observation from an MB reader today:

I take a particular interest in the current turmoil around the ABC and SBS, partially because I see precisely the same debate around public service unfolding in two of my previous home countries – the UK (BBC) and Sweden (SVT). The conversations are very similar, with regards to increasing political bias, operational inefficiency and funding.

But I think there’s a more pressing issue at hand. As a parent of kids in their mid-teens and younger, I can confirm that their viewership of ABC and SBS is close to zero, and the same appears to the case across their cohort. Their active viewing time is absorbed by independent YouTubers, Netflix, Stan etc. What’s more, I don’t get any sense that they will gravitate to the ABC in the future. Public Service has failed to “imprint” on this generation in their formative years, the ship has sailed, and the business model is nowhere near fast or capable enough to compete for their time.

This is only a hypothesis, and I’ve tried to disprove it by studying the ABCs annual reports etc. Unfortunately the data on Average Time Spent Viewing (ATV), generated by OzTAM, is not published by age cohort. I’ve also submitted direct requests for data, first by normal correspondence (ignored) and then by FOI request. The FOI was denied on the basis that OzTAM data is received on-line and not available as standard reports. This is a technical out, and I was expecting it.

Nevertheless – this data has the potential to re-frame the debate around pubic service. If my hypothesis is correct, then the ABC and SBS are currently dying a natural (but not very dignified) death, and the conversation should be around how to maintain the transmission infrastructure and core programming required to service rural areas, for disaster response etc., and how to gradually decommission the rest as long-term viewership trends towards zero.

In short, the ABC’s furious snowflakes are just another disrupted and desperate political economy vested interest…

About the author
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal. He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.