PBS YOU
PBS YOU (the latter word is an acronym for "Your Own University") was founded in the late 1990s as a 24/7 channel/network featuring formal and informal educational programs and college-related fare, largely to take advantage of available rights and satellite transponder space and eager customers for carriage among the satellite-dish and some cable television companies. PBS YOU has also included PBS Adult Learning Service (ALS) telecourses for college credit and foreign language instruction, but as of October, 2005, is dropping these; how-to programs and public affairs programs and news predominate (the Annenberg/CPB Channel remains in place as a source of networked feeds of credit courses; PBS ALS has been decommissioned as of September, 2005).
PBS YOU had long been vulnerable to budget concerns at PBS. In late 2001, YOU was in danger of being shut down altogether, when a deal with New River Media, producers of Think Tank and with the producers of the Standard Deviants educational series for teens helped preserve the channel, which eventually reverted to something similar to its initial mix of programming after a preponderance of programming from those two sources in 2002. In the wake of the closure of companion channel PBS KIDS (in favor of The New commercial partnership service PBS KIDS Sprout), YOU's future was once again in doubt. American Public Television, WGBH, and WNET in partnership are offering a similar national service as an alternative, Create, beginning in January, 2006.
Prior to its cancellation, PBS YOU was carried by 67 PBS member stations (via ATSC subchannels) and select digital cable providers.