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It's difficult to know whether Brian Lamb or C-SPAN is the more unique institution. Similarly,
it's hard to know where one starts and the other leaves off. Together, they have become something apart in U.S. television. In this interview with BROADCASTING & CABLE's Don West and Sara Brown, Lamb talks about C-SPAN's new recognition in the field of books and its 18-year track record as the voice of the House, the Senate and the American people.
-SPAN is now about 18 years old, and your Sunday night Booknotes interview series is eight years old and has produced its own book. We thought it was about time we came over here and found out what's been going on.
What's been going on is that we're trying to build a tradition. One, frankly. that can't be taken away from the American people. And that tradition is that this will be a place that can't be bought, can't be merged, can't be traded. It will be a place that, when any of us leaves here, will continue the mission of letting the American people see the political system as it is. without comment or analysis: that will continue the tradition of taking, as best we can, the personality out of this particular kind of television.
Is your tradition contagious? Is there any likelihood of its catching on anywhere else?
Only if the economics of this business continue to change even more than they have already. Because we still don't have a situation in television and radio-we do with the Internetwhere capacity is unlimited. And until that happens, you're always going to have people chasing the same kind of dollar.
Are you committed to cable to the extent that you are exclusive to that medium?
The interesting thing about this little network is that the 39member board-even before Congress passed the program access rule-voted to make these networks available to all different technologies. We were never exclusive to cable. It's a case of where they did the right thing without a great deal of confrontation or difficulty. This industry deserves a lot more credit for doing the right thing than they ever get in a society that's very cynical right now. I have never been a party to...