Fiktiv USA - C-SPAN

Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network (C-SPAN) is an American cable and satellite television network that was created in 1979 by the cable television industry as a nonprofit public service. It televises many proceedings of the United States federal government, as well as other public affairs programming. The C-SPAN network includes the television channels C-SPAN (focusing on the U.S. House of Representatives), C-SPAN2 (focusing on the U.S. Senate), and C-SPAN3 (airing other government hearings and related programming), the radio station WCSP-FM, and a group of websites which provide streaming media and archives of C-SPAN programs. C-SPAN's television channels are available to approximately 100 million cable and satellite households within the United States, while WCSP-FM is broadcast on FM radio in Washington, D.C. and is available throughout the U.S. on SiriusXM via Internet streaming, and globally through apps for iOS and Android devices.

The network televises U.S. political events, particularly live and "gavel-to-gavel" coverage of the U.S. Congress. C-SPAN also televises occasional proceedings of the Australian, British (including the weekly Prime Minister's Questions), and Canadian Parliaments, as well as other major events worldwide. Its coverage of political and policy events is unmoderated, providing the audience with unfiltered information about politics and government. Non-political coverage includes historical programming, programs dedicated to non-fiction books, and interview programs with noteworthy individuals associated with public policy. C-SPAN is a private, non-profit organization funded by its cable and satellite affiliates and does not solicit donations or pledges. The network operates independently, and neither the cable industry nor Congress has control of its programming content.

Brian Lamb, C-SPAN's chairman and former chief executive officer, conceived C-SPAN in 1975 while working as the Washington, D.C., bureau chief of the cable industry trade magazine Cablevision. It was a time of rapid growth in the number of cable television channels available in the United States. Lamb envisioned a cable-industry financed nonprofit network for televising sessions of the U.S. Congress, other public affairs events, and policy discussions. Lamb shared his idea with several cable executives, who helped him launch the network. Among them were Bob Rosencrans, who provided $25,000 of initial funding in 1979, and John D. Evans, who provided the wiring and access to the headend needed for the distribution of the C-SPAN signal. According to a report from commentator Jeff Greenfield on Nightline in 1980, C-SPAN was launched to provide televised coverage of U.S. political events in their entirety. The purpose was to help viewers maintain a thorough view of politics and especially presidential campaigns. This was unlike television newscasts, which "[do] not really inform us about what the candidates mean to do with the power they ask of us."

C-SPAN was launched on March 19, 1979, in time for the first televised session made available by the House of Representatives, beginning with a speech by then-Tennessee representative Al Gore. Upon its debut, only 3.5 million homes were wired for C-SPAN, and the network had just three employees. C-SPAN began full-time operations on September 14, 1982. After C-SPAN was created and began proceedings of the House of Representatives, the Senate wanted the same. After two years of discussion, Majority Leader Howard Baker introduced a resolution to allow cameras into the Senate, but it went nowhere. By 1986, Senator William L. Armstrong convinced his colleagues to allow cameras onto the Senate floor.

The second C-SPAN channel, C-SPAN2, followed on June 2, 1986 when the U.S. Senate permitted itself to be televised. It began full-time operations on January 5, 1987. C-SPAN3, the most recent expansion channel, began full-time operations on January 22, 2001, and shows live/taped public policy and government-related events on weekdays, with historical programming being shown on weeknights and weekends. It has also sometimes served as an overflow channel for live programming conflicts on C-SPAN and C-SPAN2. C-SPAN3 is the successor of a digital channel called C-SPAN Extra, which was launched in the Washington D.C. area in 1997, and televised live and recorded political events from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Eastern Time Monday through Friday.

C-SPAN Radio began operations on October 9, 1997, covering similar events as the television networks and often simulcasting their programming. The station broadcasts on WCSP-FM (90.1 MHz) in Washington, D.C., is also available on XM Satellite Radio channel 120 and is streamed live at c-span.org. It was formerly available on Sirius Satellite Radio from 2002 to 2006.

Lamb semi-retired in March 2012, coinciding with the channel's 33rd anniversary, and gave executive control of the network to his two lieutenants, Rob Kennedy and Susan Swain.

C-SPAN continues to expand its coverage of government proceedings, with a history of requests to government officials for greater access, especially to the U.S. Supreme Court. In December 2009, Lamb wrote to leaders in the House and Senate, requesting that negotiations for health care reform be televised by C-SPAN. Committee meetings on health care were broadcast subsequently by C-SPAN and may be viewed on the C-SPAN website. In November 2010, Lamb wrote to incoming House Speaker John Boehner requesting changes to restrictions on cameras in the House. In particular, C-SPAN asked to add some of its own robotically operated cameras to the existing government-controlled cameras in the House chamber. In February 2011, Boehner denied the request. A previous request to Speaker Designate Nancy Pelosi in 2006, to add C-SPAN's cameras in the House chamber to record floor proceedings, was also denied. Although C-SPAN uses the congressional chamber feed cables, the cameras are owned and controlled by each respective body of Congress. Requests by C-SPAN for camera access to non-government events such as the annual dinner by the Gridiron Club have also been denied.

On June 22 and into June 23, 2016, C-SPAN took video footage of the House floor from individual House representatives via streaming services Periscope and Facebook Live during a sit-in by House Democrats asking for a vote on gun control measures after the Orlando nightclub shooting. This needed to be done because—as the sit-in was done out of formal session and while the House was in official recess—the existing House cameras could not be utilized for coverage of the event by rule. Although the use of electronic devices to create the Periscope feeds by House Democrats violated House rules that prohibit their use on the floor, C-SPAN did not state why it chose to broadcast those feeds. The network ran disclaimers on-air and on their official social media feeds noting the restrictions.

Since the late 1990s, C-SPAN has significantly expanded its online presence. In January 1997, C-SPAN began real-time streaming of C-SPAN and C-SPAN2 on its website, the first time that Congress had been live streamed online. To cover the Democratic and Republican conventions and the presidential debates of 2008, C-SPAN created two standalone websites: the Convention Hub and the Debate Hub. In addition to real-time streams of C-SPAN's television networks online, c-span.org features further live programming such as committee hearings and speeches that are broadcast later in the day, after the House and Senate have left.

C-SPAN began promoting audience interaction early in its history, by the regular incorporation of viewer telephone calls in its programming. It has since expanded into social media. In March 2009, viewers began submitting questions live via Twitter to guests on C-SPAN's morning call-in show Washington Journal. The network also has a Facebook page to which it added occasional live streaming in January 2011. The live stream is intended to show selected well-publicized events of Congress. In June 2010, C-SPAN joined with the website Foursquare to provide users of the application with access to geotagged C-SPAN content at various locations in Washington, D.C.

In 2010, C-SPAN began a transition to high definition telecasts, planned to take place over an 18-month period. The network provided C-SPAN and C-SPAN2 in high definition on June 1, 2010, and C-SPAN3 in July 2010.

As part of the network's 40th anniversary, C-SPAN instituted the second logo change in the network's history on March 18, 2019.

The C-SPAN network's core programming is live coverage of the U.S. House and Senate, with the C-SPAN channel emphasizing the United States House of Representatives. Between 1979 and May 2011, the network televised more than 24,246 hours of floor action. C-SPAN2, the first of the C-SPAN spin-off networks, provides uninterrupted live coverage of the United States Senate. With coverage of the House and Senate, viewers can track legislation as it moves through both bodies of Congress. Important debates in Congress that C-SPAN has covered live include the Persian Gulf conflict during 1991, and the House impeachment vote and Senate trial of President Bill Clinton in 1998 and 1999 as well as the impeachment proceedings of President Trump in 2019 and 2020. When the House or Senate are not in session, C-SPAN channels broadcast other public affairs programming and recordings of previous events.

The public affairs coverage on the C-SPAN networks other than the House and Senate floor debates is wide-ranging. C-SPAN is considered a useful source of information for journalists, lobbyists, educators and government officials as well as casual viewers interested in politics, due to its unedited coverage of political events. C-SPAN has been described by media observers as a "window into the world of Washington politics" and it characterizes its own mission as being "to provide public access to the political process". The networks cover U.S. political campaigns, including the Republican, Democratic, and Libertarian presidential nominating conventions in their entirety. Coverage of presidential campaign events are provided during the duration of the campaign, both by a weekly television program, Road to the White House, and at its dedicated politics website. C-SPAN also covers midterm elections.

All three channels televise events such as congressional hearings, White House press briefings and presidential speeches, as well as other government meetings including Federal Communications Commission hearings and Pentagon press conferences. Other U.S. political coverage includes State of the Union speeches, and presidential press conferences. According to the results of a survey after the 1992 presidential election, 85% of C-SPAN viewers voted in that election. The results of a similar survey in 2013 found that 89% of C-SPAN viewers voted in the 2012 presidential election. In addition to this political coverage, the network broadcasts press conferences and meetings of various news media and nonprofit organizations, including those at the National Press Club, public policy seminars and the White House Correspondents' Dinner. While C-SPAN does not have video access to the Supreme Court, the network has used the Court's audio recordings accompanied by still photographs of the justices and lawyers to cover the Court in session on significant cases, and has covered individual Supreme Court justices' speaking engagements.

Occasionally, proceedings of the Parliament of Australia, Parliament of Canada, Parliament of the United Kingdom (usually Prime Minister's Questions and the State Opening of Parliament) and other governments are shown on C-SPAN when they discuss matters of importance to viewers in the U.S. Similarly, the networks will sometimes broadcast news reports from around the world when major events occur – for instance, C-SPAN broadcast CBC Television coverage of the September 11 attacks. C-SPAN also covers lying in state in the Capitol Rotunda and funerals of former presidents and other notable individuals. In 2005, C-SPAN covered Hurricane Katrina through NBC affiliate WDSU in New Orleans, as well as coverage of Hurricane Ike via CBS affiliate KHOU in Houston. C-SPAN also carries CBC coverage during events that affect Canadians, such as the Canadian federal elections, the death and state funeral of Pierre Trudeau, and the 2003 North America blackout. During early 2011, C-SPAN carried broadcasts by Al Jazeera to cover the events in Egypt, Tunisia, and other Arab nations. Additionally, C-SPAN simulcasts NASA Space Shuttle mission launches and landings live, using video footage and audio sourced from NASA TV.

With its public affairs programming, C-SPAN intends to offer different viewpoints by allowing time for multiple opinions to be discussed on a given topic. For example, in 2004 C-SPAN intended to televise a speech by Holocaust historian Deborah Lipstadt adjacent to a speech by Holocaust denier David Irving, who had unsuccessfully sued Lipstadt for libel in the United Kingdom four years earlier; C-SPAN was criticized for its use of the word "balance" to describe the plan to cover both Lipstadt and Irving. When Lipstadt ended media access to her speech, C-SPAN canceled coverage of both.

The network strives for neutrality and a lack of bias; in all programming when on-camera hosts are present their role is simply to facilitate and explain proceedings to the viewer. Due to this policy, C-SPAN hosts do not state their names on television.

C-SPAN covers floor proceedings of the House of Representatives, while C-SPAN 2 covers floor proceedings of the Senate. Although many hours of programming on C-SPAN are dedicated to coverage of the House, the network's daily programming begins with the political phone-in and interview program Washington Journal from 7:00 to 10:00 a.m. Eastern Time. Washington Journal premiered on January 4, 1995 and has been broadcast every morning since then, with guests including elected officials, government administrators, and journalists. The program covers current events, with guests answering questions on topics presented by the hosts, as well as questions from members of the general public. On weeknights C-SPAN2 dedicates its schedule to Politics and Public Policy Today (9:00 p.m. – midnight for the East Coast primetime, replayed immediately for the West Coast primetime), which is a block of recordings of the day's noteworthy events in rapid succession. On the weekend schedule, C-SPAN's main programs are: America and the Courts, which is shown each Saturday at 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Newsmakers, a Sunday morning interview program with newsworthy guests; Q&A, a Sunday evening interview program hosted by Brian Lamb, with guests including journalists, politicians, authors, and other public figures; and The Communicators, which features interviews with journalists, government officials, and businesspeople involved with the communications industry and related legislation.

On weekends C-SPAN2 dedicates its schedule to Book TV, which is 48 hours of programming about non-fiction books, book events, and authors. Book TV was launched in September 1998. Booknotes was originally broadcast from 1989 to 2004, as a one-hour one-on-one interview of a non-fiction author. Repeats of the interviews remain a regular part of the Book TV schedule with the title Encore Booknotes. Other Book TV programs feature political and historical books and biographies of public figures. These include In Depth, a live, monthly, three-hour interview with a single author, and After Words, an author interview program featuring guest hosts interviewing authors on topics with which both are familiar. After Words was developed as a new type of author interview program after the end of production of Booknotes. Weekend programming on Book TV also includes coverage of book events such as panel discussions, book fairs, book signings, readings by authors and tours of bookstores around the U.S.

C-SPAN 3 covers public affairs events, congressional hearings and history programming. The weekday programming on C-SPAN3 (from the morning (anywhere from 6:00 to 8:30 a.m.) to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time) features uninterrupted live public affairs events, in particular political events from Washington, D.C. Each weekend since January 8, 2011, the network has broadcast 48 hours of programming dedicated to the history of the United States, under the umbrella title American History TV. The programming covers the history of the U.S. from the founding of the nation through the late 20th century. Programs include American Artifacts, which is dedicated to exploring museums, archives and historical sites, and Lectures in History, featuring major university history professors giving lectures on U.S. history. In 2009, C-SPAN3 aired an eight-installment series of interviews from the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics at the University of Kansas, which featured historian Richard Norton Smith and Vice President Walter Mondale, among other interviewees.

In addition to the three television networks, C-SPAN also broadcasts via C-SPAN Radio, which is carried on their owned-and-operated station WCSP-FM (90.1 FM) in the Washington, D.C. area with all three cable network feeds airing via HD Radio subchannels, and nationwide on XM Satellite Radio. Its programming is also livestreamed at c-span.org and is available via apps for iPhone, BlackBerry and Android devices. C-SPAN Radio has a selective policy regarding its broadcast content, rather than duplicating the television network programming, although it does offer some audio simulcasts of programs such as Washington Journal. Unique programming on the radio station includes oral histories, and some committee meetings and press conferences not shown on television due to programming commitments. The station also compiles the Sunday morning talk shows for a same-day rebroadcast without commercials, in rapid succession.

C-SPAN archival video is available through the C-SPAN Video Library, maintained at the Purdue Research Park in West Lafayette, Indiana. Unveiled in August 2007, the C-SPAN Video Library contains all of the network's programming since 1987, totaling more than 160,000 hours at its completion of digitization and public debut in March 2010. Older C-SPAN programming continues to be added to the library, dating back to the beginning of the network in 1979, and some limited earlier footage from the National Archives, such as film clips of Richard Nixon's 1972 trip to China, is available as well. Most of the recordings before 1987 (when the C-SPAN Archive was established) were not saved, except for approximately 10,000 hours of video which are slated to be made available online. As of August 2020, the C-SPAN Video Library held over 261,000 hours of programming, and they have been viewed over 253 million times. Described by media commentators as a major educational service and a valuable resource for researchers of politics and history, the C-SPAN Video Library has also had a major role in media and opposition research in several U.S. political campaigns. In addition to the programming available in the C-SPAN Video Library, all C-SPAN programming is available as a live feed streamed on its website.

C-SPAN is operated by the National Cable Satellite Corporation, a nonprofit organization, the board of directors of which consists primarily of representatives of the largest cable companies. Early chairmen of C-SPAN include Bob Rosencrans, John Saeman, Ed Allen and Gene Schneider. C-SPAN does not sell commercials or solicit donations on air; instead, it receives nearly all of its funding from subscriber fees charged to cable and direct-broadcast satellite (DBS) operators. As of 2012, C-SPAN received 6¢ of each subscriber's cable bill for an annual budget of $60 million. As the network is an independent entity, neither the cable industry nor Congress controls the content of its programming.

As of January 2013, the network has 282 employees. C-SPAN is led by co-CEOs Rob Kennedy and Susan Swain. Founder and former CEO Brian Lamb serves as the executive chairman of the board of directors. The majority of C-SPAN's employees are based at C-SPAN's headquarters located on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., however in 2003 television studios were opened in New York City and Denver, Colorado. These studios use digital equipment that can be controlled from Washington.

C-SPAN also maintains archives in West Lafayette, Indiana at the Purdue Research Park under the direction of Dr. Robert X. Browning.

The C-SPAN networks are available in more than 100 million households as of 2010, not including access to the C-SPAN websites. More than 7,000 telephone callers have participated with discussion on Washington Journal as of March 18, 2009. There are no official viewing statistics for C-SPAN because the network, which has no commercials or underwriting advertisements, does not use the Nielsen ratings.