what do we have public service broadcasting for?

Why are »Aspekte«, »ttt« and «Druckfrisch« only made for people who get up at noon? Don’t they belong on prime time? Why are literary programs and reviews being scaled back or cancelled altogether throughout the country? Why do the decision-makers take it upon themselves to offer almost nothing but an array of lowest-common-denominator programs, quizzes, mediocre thrillers, and folksy song evenings [which could be taken over 1:1 by private stations]? When was the last time there was a portrait of an author or an artist in the main evening program? Juergen Boos, director of the Frankfurt Book Fair [via live video stream], discusses with the publishers Antje Kunstmann [Verlag Antje Kunstmann], Susanne Schüssler [Wagenbach Verlag], and Tom Kraushaar [Verlag Klett-Cotta] the increasing superficiality of public broadcasting and the significance of critical literary and cultural programs within public broadcasting.

»Public broadcasting sees its task as keeping these people away from the general public, whose existence it denies; it sorts them into a pigeonhole and justifies this humiliation by claiming that the 21st century has just dawned. Against this backdrop, it is outrageous how self-righteously and enthusiastically the media managers of the public broadcaster keep informing German publishers, critics, and intellectuals about the sensational news that, by the way, the digital age has begun.«
[Felix Stephan, SZ, 25.2.2021]

Event language: German