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Media Decoder

Programs on Demand, Just for PBS Members

The service, which is being referred to as M.V.O.D., for Member Video On Demand, is not expected to start widely before next spring.

As television viewers increasingly turn to video on demand to watch shows when they want, PBS and its local stations plan to follow them, but with a twist: They are creating a streaming video service that will be available only to members of local PBS stations.

The service, which is being referred to as M.V.O.D., for Member Video On Demand, is not expected to start widely before next spring. It will not replace the free on-air channel or the free online replays that PBS offers at PBS.org and on its Roku channel.

But after the free viewing period, archives of past seasons of some of PBS’s general interest programs are expected to move to the streaming service. PBS will also continue to license some shows to paid services. Local stations will offer the programs they produce on the M.V.O.D. service, as well.

Jonathan C. Abbott, chief executive of WGBH Boston, which has helped develop the project, said M.V.O.D. will be a deep library for members “that is basically a benefit of their support, their membership,” and will reinforce the idea that members are investors in PBS programming. It will also make it more convenient for members to watch on their own schedules, he said.

The service is unlikely to obviate the traditional, and not-always-beloved, on-air pledge drives that public television stations have used for years. But with additional options, viewers can more easily avoid the drives.

“That traditional model of putting on a pledge drive and presuming that you’re reaching a large swath of your audience and making your case, that is of diminishing and diminishing impact,” he said, adding that stations “face an imperative of finding new ways of connecting with audiences where they are and making the case for support.”

Ira Rubenstein, PBS’s general manager of digital, said many details of the service were incomplete, including how it will confirm who is a member. Individual stations probably will set the donation level for access to the service, he said.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section B, Page 10 of the New York edition with the headline: Programs on Demand, Just for PBS Members. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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