CATV as Alternative Local Media

Ann Mee-Kyeong(Department of mass communication Graduate School Kaemyeong University)
Supervised by Professor Choi Hyeon Cheol

The activation of local broadcasting as media which gather local people's opinions and develop local cultures becomes new problem before executing local self-government system. In the while politics, economy and culture are overcentralized in Korea. In broadcasting powerful centralized broadcasting system caused the dependency of local broadcasting. So today local broadcastings are not independent of central broadcastings of KBS and MBC but operators such as agencies of them. Local broadcastings have many problems such as scheduling local program, production condition, operating, production man power, equipment and machinery and compilation of the budget. Today local broadcasting can not perform the function of local media which produces local informations, speaks for local citizen's opinions and makes form local cultures.

We can consider CATV as alternative media which solves the problems of local broadcasting in Korea. CATV was generated to solve the problem of seeing and visual. Today the development of CATV enable local peoples spontaneously to take part in and to control local programs. So we can choice various program for a delicate classification and specification of programs. The concept of CATV is undergoing a change. The recent special features of CATV are digested to increase the number of channel, produce bi-directional service and develop the quality of visual screen.

CATV to have advantages has to be activated as local media to be profitable for people. CATV can be owned by big enterprises because they possess broadcasting media. But CATV can be used as local media which makes form local culture to develope various programs which satisfy the needs of local people because it can be established and operated with little funds.

Korean CATV was established as media to relay the national KBS-TV in the end of 1960 and the number of it was suddenly increased after the unification and removal of mass media in 1980. Today Korean government spontaneously converts the policy of CATV because the unsound development of CATV becomes a social problem and its technology is widely supplied and developed in the world. But it is difficult that CATV is activated as local media because the policy of CATV is easy to be profitable for big enterprises and to be centralized. In this paper, I consider that the policy of CATV should cause activation of CATV as local media.

Under this assumption I surveyed actual condition about the present CATV situations and problems in Daegu and studied the present Korean CATV conditions and problems through old papers. The result of survey was digested as a small-scale operating, appearing of multi system operator and low quality of programs. I suggesed the followings to activate CATV with these problems as reasonable local media.

First, total CATV system has to be allowed.

Second, CATV has not to be owned by big enterprises.

Third, a self-governing body has to have the authority of CATV

Forth, the independent film companies have to be brought up.