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If policymakers are serious about avoiding a society of TV 'haves and have-nots,' they should refrain from policies that favor pay-TV operators over the providers of our nation's only free and local communications system: over-the-air broadcasting.

Network television has been attempting to lure viewers for years with its low-interest programming only to have those viewers discover later that their brains are bankrupt.

There are literally tens of thousands of very good content providers in the world that don't distribute their content through TV channels.

With less and less television being watched live, consumers are enjoying the freedom to record at home or in the cloud, watch locally or on the go, and binge watch entire series that they never had the time to enjoy.

Advertising revenue available for all programmers, all broadcasters is not enough to create quality programming, and subscription revenues are very, very minimal which come to all programmers.

What's happened to broadcasting is that broadcasting really used to be... it used to have a very clear public service quotient. And it's more or less now. And it's been lost.

It's ironic, really, because I've spent the bulk of my career making my living in a very commercial realm: network television. And yet, my sensibilities don't necessarily line up with how I pay my rent.

In day-to-day commerce, television is not so much interested in the business of communications as in the business of delivering audiences to advertisers. People are the merchandise, not the shows. The shows are merely the bait.

Television allows for survival, which is the basic issue for me. You have to decide how much money is enough. You can't get carried away with the hunt for money. But there are times it shows up, and you need to grab it, and that allows you to hunt for a better script.

I don't think people realize the extent to which TV networks are hurt when they carry public broadcasting. I think the estimate is that they lose a half-million dollars for a half day's programming.