Reflecting on changes in children’s television consumption: implications for producers and policy makers

The recent review of the Children’s Television Standards (CTS) by the Australian Media and Communications Authority (ACMA) was intended to position the CTS for the digital future. However when examining the changes in children’s television consumption habits that have occurred during the life of the CTS, the new draft CTS appear to do little to address the challenges facing Australian free to air commercial television and the Australian producers who create its mandated children’s content. Global trends in contemporary child audiences show a drift away from free to air television, to dedicated subscription services, or to the internet, fragmenting advertising revenue in the process. Furthermore the control that children can now exert over their media consumption and the viewing choices they make in the process suggest that ACMA’s construction of the child audience is at odds with the realities of contemporary children’s media lives. If the type of dedicated children’s content envisioned by the creators of Australian media policy is still considered desirable, it may be time to re-think our approaches to policy making and production