CPB allots $14 mil to assist PBS online video for kids 6-8
CPB will spend $14 million over the next three years to help PBS develop a free broadband Internet video service based on its Kids Go! program block, CPB President Pat Harrison said last week. The corporation first mentioned the Go! proposal in its 2008 budget (article, Aug. 27). PBS’s estimate of the total budget was not available at Current’s deadline last week.
PBS Kids Go! programs, such as Arthur and Cyberchase, are designed for kids ages 6 to 8.
PBS originally aimed to launch a Kids Go! channel for multicasting on stations’ DTV channels last year, but abandoned the plan when too few stations showed interest in supporting it (article, July 17, 2006).
The broadband service will incorporate streaming clips, shorts and full-length episodes into the existing Kids Go! website, says Sara DeWitt, senior director for PBS Kids and Parents interactive. The ultimate goal, she says, is to create “a virtual playroom” with clips, sounds and games that kids can modify and share online.
“We’ve always created games and activities that specifically extended the educational goals of the TV programming,” DeWitt says, “and now we’ll be able to deliver these connections in the same space.”
PBS will begin integrating the video as part of a redesign of pbskidsgo.org, slated for the second quarter of 2008. Stations will be able to feature and customize the Kids Go! video player on their local sites, DeWitt says.
Web page posted Nov. 25, 2007
Copyright 2007 by Current Publishing Committee
