When creating the comprehensive gallery of station website (and wrote about in my last post), I wanted to encourage a conversation about what makes a good public media websites (c.f. this XKCD comic about university websites). In this first analysis post (which is highly subjective and incomplete), I will draw out some highlights from a quick pass of public television home pages (a radio run-down will come later -- the television corpus is significantly smaller and easier to digest). In general, the sites I liked the most had a mix of good design aesthetic, highlighted local content, and had some element of current-ness (I had the good fortune of capturing television websites on August 31, the night of President Obama's press conference on Iraq, which gives some insight into how connected the website is to programming, outreach, and communication plans.) You can see all the public television station websites in the gallery, and add your own tags and ratings if you register. [EDIT: Also check out my other posts in this series, including a how+why for the technically inclined. ]

Georgia Public Broadcasting

I really liked GPB's schedule and events sidebar on the home page, but they also emphasized local news programming and social media.

KBYU (Provo, UT)

KBYU has an elegant site (with a penchant for rounded corners), with a very nice scheduling widget on their home page and nice promotional spots.

KCET (Los Angeles, CA)

Again, KCET offers a good combination of promotion and programming at the top of their home page, followed by almost exclusively local content (not surprising, in light of the tension between PBS and KCET)

KLRU (Austin, TX)

KLRU has a very clean website, and probably the clearest and most useful notice about pre-empted programming for the Presidential address.

WTCI (Chattanooga, TN)

WTCI has perhaps the clearest support section on their home page, including "Volunteer Opportunities".

Milwaukee Public Television

Finally, although MPTV has put a lot of information on their home page, it doesn't feel overwhelming. The schedule widget emphasizes their different digital channels pretty clearly.