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Introduction (1958)
NET_network_1969_logo.png


For those not in the know, NET (National Educational Television) was a TV channel that billed itself as, "the 4th American broadcast network"; it was PBS before PBS, though NET had programs that were fairly controversial. In 1967 The Corporation for Public Broadcasting was created by, and in 1969 PBS was formed, (Though PBS didn't begin broadcasting until late 1970), the Ford Foundation and The Corporation for Public Broadcasting closed NET in 1970 over these controversial programs. This TL (unlike my other unrealistic TL) is meant to be fairly realistic; the TL's POD begins in 1958 with the NETRC getting new management.

My information for this introduction came from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Educational_Television
 
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WNTA (1958)
The year was 1958; this was the year the NETRC moved to New York City, a city that was without public television though many thought this would change in 1958. Newark NJ station WNTA was put up for sale by owner NTA; a group of educators, funded in part by the University of the State of New York, attempted to acquire WNTA. The educational consortium failed to acquire WNTA as the station leadership and NTA feared that the station would lose value, instead WNTA was sold to Ely Landau. New York City would go with out a noncommercial station until WLIW was formed in 1960. However where the University of the State of New York failed another would triumph in their place.



Changes from our timeline: WNTA later IOTL became WNET after NTA sold the station in 1962,WLIW was founded in 1969 ITTL.
 
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Early expansion and a name change (1958-1963)
With the loss of WNTA the NETRC decided to try forming their own station in New York City; the station's name was to be WNDT (other proposed names were WNET, WFNA, and WUSN) however lack of funds and the Ford Foundation worrying about the cost of an O&O station prevented them from going forward with WNDT. However expansion was on the horizon; just the next year on June 12th Channel 17, formerly WBUF Buffalo, began broadcasting under a new name WNED; this new station joined the NETRC to help get new programing and help fill the void of non-educational stations in the US. KUAT in Tucson was founded and joined ERTC in 1959, followed by KVIE in Sacramento, Georgia Educational Television in 1959, and KERA in 1959.

But an important piece of news came in on January 10 1960 it was word from Columbia University; they had gotten approval for a noncommercial educational station, Channel 20..WLIW New York City. John F. White jumped with delight at the news and the other ERTC chairmen were also enthusiastic about it, this was mainly because Columbia was more fiscally stable; the opening of the station on August 22, 1960, the station began broadcasting. Edward R. Murrow announced the beginning of WLIW's broadcast; RCA even gave Columbia University some colour cameras and various other pieces of equipment.

Several other stations began to crop up around the country the notable ones being KAET (for the rest of Arizona, 1961), KVCR (for San Bernardino, 1962), and South Carolina Educational Television (1963). With this expansion in 1963 the NETRC renamed itself to NET which stood for National Educational Television, latter on the E would mean Educational/Entertainment or Edutainment.

Changes from our timeline: NET's New York station first was named WNDT IOTL, WNET is WNDT's (or ITTL's case WNTA) post 1970 name, and CBS gave WNDT and NET the equipment and not RCA
 
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Chnages, the Convention, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and the Pittsburgh Concert (1963-1970)
1963 was the year NET's radio network was renamed to NPR, which stands for National Public Radio; more importantly NET Journal began airing, this series aired controversial documentaries and led to tension between NET and its more conservative affiliates. Some new affiliates joined NET and NPR, the most notable one being KCLA Channel 5 in Los Angeles (Formerly KTLA) which was acquired after the rival commercial stations helped finance Community Television of Southern California's acquisition for KTLA's license; in 1965 WNTA was sold to MGM who changed the call sign to WMGM. In 1966 the Ford Foundation began to defund NET as they tried pulling out of funding what many of the Ford Foundation executives described as a "White Elephant"; NET's executives began looking to various companies to buy them. However help would come from the Johnson administration with the creation of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in 1967; NET was now independent of the Ford Foundation, but other issues needed to be addressed.

The affiliates hated the fact that they had no say over what they could air, or if their shows could be syndicated, they also felt a conflict of interest resulted from NET producing their own programs. To combat and address these issues and concerns John F. White held a convention of NET's executives and affiliate executives; the affiliates wanted control of what programs they aired, they wanted NET to give greater opportunities to affiliates to have their programs syndicated, and they wanted NET to stop producing programs, especially the NET Journal series. At the convention NET made some concessions such as giving affiliates bigger syndication opportunities and ceding broadcasting control to the affiliates they refused to stop producing programs including NET Journal. Mr Rogers Neighborhood aired on NET for the first time.

1969 came and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting was fed up with NET especially after Nixon cut their budget; the Corporation for Public Broadcasting began talking to several companies and organizations, i.e. Transamerica, Exxon, and the Carnegie Corporation, to fund a new public broadcasting network known as The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). Upon hearing this John F. White called another convention; this time a compromise was reached being that NET would produce programs but they would compensate the affiliates for each NET program they aired, NET would be the only one financing the programs they produced, NET would continue producing NET Journal but they would give stations the option to edit the program as they saw fit. This made the affiliates happier thus staving off PBS; 1969 marked a new program that would air on NET which was marked by the fact that it was turned down by NBC, ABC, and CBS and represented a new era of American television. Sesame Street is an educational program produced by the Children's Television Workshop that had its puppets designed by Jim Henson; despite being banned for a short time in Mississippi, the series was a massive success. NET received an increase in funding after 1969 from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and they received an increase in private donations and Sesame Street was the cause.

1970 came and NET branded themselves as the public television network, however 1970 became famous for the Pittsburgh Concert; on December 25, George Harrison played several songs from his album All Things Must Pass as well as some songs from his Beatles days at a WQED fundraiser that was hosted by Fred Rogers. The event raised $118,000 dollars for WQED and NET, and it was broadcast nationwide on NET stations. The Pittsburgh Concert was the result of Fred Rogers and George Harrison talking earlier in 1970 about Harrison appearing on the series; Rogers would preform several songs during the Concert for Bangladesh in 1971.


Differences from OTL: CTSC had attempted to acquired KTLA's license IOTL.
 
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New Shows, The Concert for Bangladesh, and a new logo (1971-1972)
1971 was a new year for NET with new series launched; the first was All in the Family, a series that just like Sesame Street was turned down by NBC, CBS, and ABC, it was about a New York family who would live life and would encounter issues in their daily lives. The issues on All in the Family would usually reflect an issue of the 70s; CBS was the closest to picking the series up but the BBC executives made a deal that would end any chance of this happening, the deal would give the rights to Death Till Us Part and Doctor Who to CBS for $80,000 and CBS could develop versions of these shows exclusively for an American audience. CBS took the deal and turned down All in the Family, a move CBS would regret and a move that would go down in history as one of the worst deals ever made especially since the CBS versions of Doctor Who and Death Till Us Part would only last for 2 years and would be poorly received, NET affiliate WLIW then picked it up and the series aired it first episode on January 12 1971; the series would later air nationwide on June 21 1971 after staying exclusive to the New York City/Newark area for its first season. All in the Family helped boost NET's ratings and earned many donations for WLIW and NET; WGBH's Masterpiece Theater, which is an anthology series that would play drama, mystery, and comedy series and serials from the BBC, though later on serials from ITV and other companies would air, the first serial to air was The First Churchill's. Electric Company would also air; it was produced by The Children's Television Workshop, the same company behind Sesame Street, it would run until 1977. Aside from programing, The Concert for Bangladesh lasted for one week, August 1st to August 8th, and took place in Austin, New Orleans, New York, and Pittsburgh; George Harrison, Ringo Starr, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Billy Preston, Leon Russel, Badfinger, Ali Akbar Kahn, Ravi Shankar, and Fred Rogers would play at all the venues with the Jackson Five playing at the New Orleans and New York legs, Fats Domino and B.B. King playing at the Pittsburgh leg, and Wings playing at the Austin leg. In a preview of later events Jackson Five singer Michael Jackson and George Harrison both sang the songs Got To Be There and Ani't No Sunshine as a duet, they would later preform both songs as part of the Traveling Wilburys on Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1 they also did some collaborations before the Traveling Wilburys was formed. The Concert was successful and raised 3 million dollars for Bangladesh; NET affiliate WLIW introduced a new logo that utilized Scanimate,
this logo but with WNET replaced with WLIW.

1972 was the year Sanford and Son aired on NBC, after NET turned it down, Ultra Seven, also turned down by NET, aired on ABC to compete against CBS' Doctor Who; NET picked up Are You Being Served, Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, Great Performances, and Maude. Are You Being Served was a British sitcom set in a department store; Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids was an animated series by Filmation centering around kids in North Philadelphia who hangout in a junk yard and learn lessons; Great Performances is a series meant to highlight performances, this series was partially inspired by The Concert for Bangladesh's success and the episodes of Sesame Street and Mr. Rogers that centered around said concert; Maude was a spinoff of All in the Family centering around Maude Findlay. All these shows would be successful; M*A*S*H* also aired this year on CBS, along with The Super on ABC. NET's executives wanted a new logo around this time, they commissioned Ravi Shankar and George Harrison to make the score and Saul Bass to design the logo; The score at first was a rock song with jazz and raga influences, however NET's executives didn't like the score and asked for a rework. Harrison saved the early score, it would later become the song Simply Shady on the Dark Horse album, but came back with a blues/rock song with raga influence and it was accepted; as for the logo's visuals the first idea was to stack the words National, Educational, and Television on top of each other then to have the words disappear leaving only the letters NET behind however this was rejected. The accepted idea was called the three stars logo; we see a black screen, then multiple stars (coloured Red, White, and Blue) make up the out line of the US (Including Alaska and Hawaii) with the out line drawn three stars appear inside the outline, on the first star we see the letter N, on the second the letter E, and the last the letter T. An announcer the says,(1974-1974 though Mr. Roger's Neighborhood used this variant until 1980) "NET, The Public Television Network", (1974-1980) "NET, America's Public Television Network", (1976-1977) "The All American Network", (1980-1987) "APT, American Public Television". The announcer would vary depending on the show.


Changes from our timeline: I expanded the Concert for Bangladesh's roster, I also expanded the Traveling Wilbury's roster, I also had Shankar involve himself with Simply Shady (ITTL Rogers also preforms piano for that song), also APT is created earlier then ITTL, Finally I gave All in the Family, Maude, and Fat Albert to NET.
 
1973, 1974, and 1975
1973 was a bad year for CBS, as their versions of Doctor Who and Till Death Do Us Part were canceled and the BBC signed a deal with Screen Gems to distribute the original versions of both shows on US Television whilst selling merchandising rights to Doctor Who to Takara; however CBS would pick up Kojack, Barnaby Jones and The Six Million Dollar Man in 1973, despite turning down Last of The Summer Wine, Star Trek: The Animated Series, and Ultraman Taro all of which would be successful on different networks. ABC would purchase 42% of Tsuburaya Productions on December 24th 1973; Last of the Summer Wine was picked was picked up by NET and Star Trek: The Animated Series was picked up by NBC.

In 1974 Daiei Film was reopened and would be purchased by ABC and a Gamera reboot would begin production, it would have a troubled production; Ultraman Leo would air on ABC this year. In 1974 NET would air NOVA (A science series) and Good Times (A Maude Spin-off); CBS aired Happy Days (ABC passed it up for Little House on the Prairie), Bagpuss (NET turned it down; CBS would extend the series for 3 more years), and Rhoda. ABC aired Ultraman Leo, Little House on the Prairie (NBC turned it down due fears about cost and ratings), Kolchak: The Night Stalker (Universal Television and Tsuburaya Productions produced the series), and Hong Kong Phooey. NBC aired Chico and the Man, High Rollers, The Rockford Files, and Police Woman. CBS and ABC were both playing second fiddle to NET but NBC was the worst off as they began to spend large amounts of money on programs, it would get worse in '75 and '76.

In 1975 ABC renamed Daiei Film to Daiei Pictures; American International Pictures was acquired by ABC on March 10th 1975 AIP was folded into ABC Picture Holdings, which was then renamed to ABC Motion Pictures. The Jeffersons aired on NET as did Himitsu Sentai Gorenger, which was the first and only time that a season of Super Sentai aired on NET as other times Super Sentai would air on NBC or TBS. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer announced its plans to form a network with 20th Century Fox on June 3rd. Faulty Towers aired in syndication, Wonder Woman aired on ABC, Space: 1999 broadcast on NBC, and One Day at a Time aired on NET.



Changes from our timeline: ABC airing Ultraman, ABC buying AIP and New Daiei, ABC owning shares in Tsuburaya Productions, Tsuburaya co-producing Kolchak: The Night Stalker, Little House on the Prairie airing on ABC, Happy Days airing on CBS, and merchandising rights to Doctor Who going to Takara.
 
1976
1976 started with ABC announced two projects, one based on Gamera (With Peter Yates directing) slated for 1978 and a Kolchak film (With Dan Curtis directing) slated for 1977; ABC, NET, NBC, and CBS all planned Bicentennial specials but CBS would be rated number 1, with NBC's at number 4. May 1, 1976 The Beatles would reunite on NBC's Saturday Night Live iwould be the last thing the fab four did, although George and Paul would later produce the soundtrack for Lady!! Lady!! (The US dub used a different soundtrack), Hello! Lady Lyn (The US dub changed the music), and would contribute to the soundtrack for Sailor Moon (The DiC dub would cut their music) though the European versions would retain their music. The Adams Chronicles, The Muppet Show, Dance in America and What's Happening!! would air on NET in 1976; two NET shows would go on hiatus this year, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood and Fat Albert, Fat Albert would move to ABC when it began producing new episodes in 1979. CBS' Cannon would end in 1976, as did ABC's Marcus Webly M.D., and NBC's Gemini Man followed suit.
 
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