Regional TV: complete “digital”?..

Somehow the news went unnoticed that Prime Minister D. Medvedev signed a decree on holding a competition for participation in the second television multiplex... This means that by 2015, according to the government’s plan, Russians will have about 20 digital television channels. Where are regional TV channels in this scheme? Nowhere. The supreme power pretends that this phenomenon does not exist in our country.

Today no one understands how regional TV channels will exist in the era of digitalization. The current economic model of their operation is clear: local companies mainly exist as network partners of well-known federal networks, having their own regional windows for local news and programs. Since local companies, as a rule, have licenses to broadcast in a particular region, the feds need them.

After the introduction of digital, the situation will change. It is assumed that local channels will be included in the third multiplex. It is not known when it will be, it is not clear why companies that have been broadcasting for 20 years will again go through the competition procedure, and finally, what will they show? The program content market in Russia has not developed, and local channels simply by definition will not be able to compete with federal ones. Today there is no one to ask all these questions and no one to discuss with.

Last year, we asked the now former Minister of Communications I. Shchegolev a question about the future of regional TV on a direct line to Gazeta.ru. He answered verbatim the following: “Digitalization opens up additional prospects for regional television companies.” In short, he was either making fun of him or doesn’t understand what he’s talking about. The fact that regional TV finds itself in such an unenviable situation is partly to blame for the television workers themselves. The National Association of Television Broadcasters has not represented the interests of the regions for a long time and does not particularly defend them, and we have not created another organization to represent our interests. Is today's government interested in preserving local television? Isn’t the digitalization program a convenient excuse to finally clear out the country’s information field: after all, it is much easier to control a dozen federal TV channels than several thousand regional ones? I don't have a definitive answer to this question. But if regional TV disappears as a result of digitalization, this will deal another blow to civil society in Russia, and ultimately to the government itself. Even now it has very little control over the local bureaucracy and the abuses that occur locally, and if the small amount of independent local TV that remains disappears, then there will be less one more channel for the exchange of information between the authorities and the population.

There are other options for the development of events, but in order for them to become possible, they need to be discussed, it is necessary for the authorities to understand the importance and necessity of the existence and development of private television in Russia. So far, no understanding and no interest in discussing anything has been noticed on the part of the relevant departments.