For those unfamiliar, OETA is the Oklahoma Educational Television Authority—PBS in Oklahoma. I've discussed OETA before here, focusing on how its brown-nosing to wealthy conservatives leads it to violate the mission of public television every day. That hasn't changed much.

On Tuesday, February 17, OETA made the full switch to digital television. Here in the Oklahoma City market, that meant the digital channels for KETA (13) moved to actual channel 13, instead of channel 32 where they've been since 2003 or so. (Although ATSC tuners support a translation that shows "32-1" as "13-1", the station was on the higher-numbered channel because of interference with the analog broadcast channels. Once the analog broadcasts ceased, the digital channels could move to the "correct" channel numbers.)

With the switch, OETA is now fully broadcasting on 13-1 through 13-4. Except they're not.

Clicking on the link above takes you to OETA's programming schedule. If you get OETA via an over-the-air antenna, you'll notice that you get two channels: 13-1 (the same as the old OETA broadcast) and 13-2. That's "OETA Okla," a digital channel with more focus on the locally produced programs and current events. OETA has rarely broadcast Charlie Rose and Tavis Smiley, but OETA Okla shows them every night.

However, if you scan for channels, you'll also pick up program guide information for 13-3, 13-4, and 13-5. 13-5 seems to be the same as 13-1 for the most part, and I never received any signal for it anyway, so I tend to ignore it.

13-3 is "OETA Create," a channel similar to the now-discontinued "PBS You" national feed. This is a great channel with daily showings of the most popular cooking and art shows. You can see Everyday Food, America's Test Kitchen, Cook's Country, and lots of other really cool public television shows every day on OETA Create.

13-4 is "OETA Kids," a version of what used to be PBS Kids and that may still be similar to Sprout, but I don't know because I don't watch those kinds of shows.

If you have an over-the-air antenna, you'll find that if you get a strong signal on 13-1, you'll also get similarly strong signals on 13-3 and 13-4. And, indeed, back in 2004-2006, I got both of these channels and watched 13-3 regularly, because it's full of good shows.

Yet today, despite the signal strength, attempting to view them shows you absolutely nothing (other than perhaps a TV-generated message like "searching for antenna signal"). And indeed, neither "OETA Create" nor "OETA Kids" shows up on OETA's online program listings by default.

Those last two words are important. OETA broadcasts on-air program guide information for 13-3 and 13-4, and they show signal strength but no broadcast. Try this: go back to the OETA schedule page, and click to edit your "provider." Tell it that you receive Cox Cable in Oklahoma City instead of an over-the-air antenna.

Well, what do you know! Just like that, 13-3 and 13-4 appear in the listings. That's because OETA does provide them, but only to people who pay for Cox Digital Cable. If you pick "Cox Cable, non-digital," you only get the equivalent of 13-1. But if you have Cox Digital Cable, you get all four OETA channels. OETA did broadcast all four channels, and still has signals on all four, but about three years ago, they stopped.

In other words, the state's public television network, funded by the state, answerable to the state, and with the mission of providing educational and informative programs to the public free of charge, has two channels absolutely full of exactly those programs, but stopped providing them free to the public and now only provides them to subscribers of a local, expensive, private digital cable service. Cox Communications isn't even a public company.

You really have to wonder if the people running OETA have any idea that "public" television means "for the entire public." Every one of their actions points to a belief that they're only supposed to serve their donors and those who pay extra fees to them. If you rename "donors" as "advertisers," that's the same as non-public television. Not only does OETA not seem to recognize this difference, the organization seems openly hostile to the ideas and ideals of public television.

Just another reason why people with a broad view of the world tend not to relocate into Oklahoma, or not to stay long when they're here.