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> The rationale is that cultural products are "special" and that if they're not protected, they'll vanish and be replaced by American ones that are inferior by

> The rationale is that cultural products are "special" and that if they're not protected, they'll vanish and be replaced by American ones that are inferior by nature. In fairness to France, other countries have similar laws too. Australia requires TV stations to broadcast 55% Australian-produced TV shows & films during primetime (6pm - midnight). Even 80% of the TV commercials have to be Australian-produced too. But instead of funding lots of culturally significant TV shows, we tend to get repeated news bulletins, low-cost Australian game shows, current affairs shows & soap operas. [Although Neighbours probably counts as culturally significant to Australia.] http://www.acma.gov.au/Industry/Broadcast/Television/Australian-content/australian-content-television http://www.acma.gov.au/Industry/Broadcast/Television/Austral...

vacri 9y ago
If we didn't do that, we'd be completely inundated with American shows flogged off on the cheap. We wouldn't have any local content at all - perhaps not even the news. France has a barrier in that they (proudly) speak a different language, whereas we would just get bargain-basement/afterthought prices for stuff in the same language, no edits required. Our homegrown tv and movie industry was never going to be high quality though, because we're a small market and we've never really been a particularly literary people. I'm curious as to what kind of show you would consider to be 'culturally significant', though. The only staples that you haven't listed that spring to mind are sports (plenty on TV), panel shows (ditto), documentaries (small market everywhere) and sitcoms. What kind of tv show do you consider 'culturally significant'?
- SyneRyder 9y ago
  > If we didn't do that, we'd be completely inundated with American shows flogged off on the cheap Absolutely. I deleted it from my post, but I was going to mention that on non-primary Australian TV stations that don't have the same content restrictions, we get 2 hours of non-stop Big Bang Theory reruns, or endless repeats of Frasier, Sex And The City, Charmed & Becker. > What kind of tv show do you consider 'culturally significant'? Glitch is my favorite recent Australian TV show, started on ABC but apparently Season 2 has been sold as a Netflix exclusive. Back in the 90s it would have been shows like Seachange, Frontline, Kath & Kim. Maybe Offspring & Packed To The Rafters are recent equivalents. (Outside Australia, I'd think of shows like The Bridge, Springfloden, The Killing & Occupied, that have exported Scandinavian culture onto Australian TV.)

vacri 9y ago

If we didn't do that, we'd be completely inundated with American shows flogged off on the cheap. We wouldn't have any local content at all - perhaps not even the news. France has a barrier in that they (proudly) speak a different language, whereas we would just get bargain-basement/afterthought prices for stuff in the same language, no edits required. Our homegrown tv and movie industry was never going to be high quality though, because we're a small market and we've never really been a particularly literary people. I'm curious as to what kind of show you would consider to be 'culturally significant', though. The only staples that you haven't listed that spring to mind are sports (plenty on TV), panel shows (ditto), documentaries (small market everywhere) and sitcoms. What kind of tv show do you consider 'culturally significant'?

SyneRyder 9y ago
> If we didn't do that, we'd be completely inundated with American shows flogged off on the cheap Absolutely. I deleted it from my post, but I was going to mention that on non-primary Australian TV stations that don't have the same content restrictions, we get 2 hours of non-stop Big Bang Theory reruns, or endless repeats of Frasier, Sex And The City, Charmed & Becker. > What kind of tv show do you consider 'culturally significant'? Glitch is my favorite recent Australian TV show, started on ABC but apparently Season 2 has been sold as a Netflix exclusive. Back in the 90s it would have been shows like Seachange, Frontline, Kath & Kim. Maybe Offspring & Packed To The Rafters are recent equivalents. (Outside Australia, I'd think of shows like The Bridge, Springfloden, The Killing & Occupied, that have exported Scandinavian culture onto Australian TV.)