We live in an insular society where you can't even walk into a cafeteria/confectionary shop to buy chocolate-covered nut bonbons and pastries without having almost all the clientele, whose underarms presumably smell sweet and sweat-free, gawking at you.
And then, as soon as you leave, the pop psychologists, pundits, poseurs and assorted other pests let rip.
How refreshing it is, therefore, to see that P&D Communications has risen above all this and brokered a deal with Melita. Lifestyle channel Wedding TV, however, will be exclusively available on Melita's digital television packages L and XL. This will enable the company to "be a bridge between the station and viewers", as Pierre Portelli recently told me.
"We will organise competitions, through which Maltese brides-to-be will be on their programmes, all the while aiding local entrepreneurs in the tourist industry to get the best advertising packages. Wedding TV will be the only foreign channel with which Maltese viewers will be able to interact and participate."
Just for the record, this station reaches millions of subscribers annually; so the market for advertisers is potentially much wider.
Being an agency with an exclusive contract to represent a foreign television channel is an innovative way to work in Europe rather than just for the local market - apart from approaching managements of establishments where filing for local drama is done, intimating at 'publicity' and asking for 'subsidies' - or hoping that Euronews will decide to include local coverage in its bulletins.
Malta did feature on a couple of Homes That Cost a Million of late - one of them was in Qawra, and the other "in Gozo". Malta was also the topic of a brilliant documentary about the Sovereign Order of St John of Jerusalem Knights of Malta, The Ecumenical Order, last Sunday night, on EWTN - and also the subject of some questions on different editions of Who Wants to be a Millionaire? (American series).
Of course, it remains a pity that Wedding TV and Calypso Music TV are not available to people who do not take out specific packages.
This is the ideal modus operandi, perhaps - look at what had happened to Max Plus, and what will happen come March to Bob Geldof's Kent TV. This was a controversial web television station that had launched in September 2007 on a two-year pilot - funded with approximately £1.6 million of taxpayers' money.
That is why we have to look to Favourite Channel for a change from dreary regurgitated topics such as politics, sports, (what passes for) news, and so forth.
This week we had an entertaining sparring match between Jason Micallef and Peppi Azzopardi that would not have happened, probably, had the discussion been held on any other station, for reasons too many to mention.
It is not the first time, ironically, that people who have been on panels, as well as presenters themselves, tell me what they did not say on a particular issue.
Last Monday's Xpress, hosted by Manwel Micallef had 'Local television today' as a topic. Guests were Karl Bonaci, Charles Xuereb, Pierre Portelli, Noelene Miggiani, Charles Foca and Silvio Scerri (as organisers of the Vodafone Malta Television Awards) and the aforementioned Micallef and Azzopardi, who reiterated that we ought to adopt - heaven help us - the praxis of BBC, specifically on PBS for starters, which was far too commercialised. He also said, without ample explanation, that "all stations were broadcasting as if they were the State broadcaster".
Portelli went for the populist view, as in "a programme is good only if people watch it" (oh, really?). That, and only that, ought to be the criterion for the selection of programmes on State television. Then the exchanges became somewhat personal - which is where I bowed out.
However, it is worth quoting Xuereb, who said viewership is not tantamount to quality, and a live microphone in one's hand does not automatically bestow television presence. Many of our self-styled 'personalities', I am sure, would not agree.
• Sponsorship of a programme on English-language television is dotted by overly-enthusiastic declarations that '...this programme is being brought to you by...' In Maltese, the present continuous does not sound right. Instead of a continuous, flat '...dan il-programm qed jiġi miġjub lilkom...' I would suggest the simple 'miġjub'.
• It would seem that I am not the only person irritated by the amateurish website that highlights the stations of the nation. Yet my queries elicited the fact that it was not simply a question of an IT whizz volunteering to do it during his work-break, or even from home.
Since PBS is the State broadcaster, to quote, "There are government procedures that need to be followed." I vote we unravel the red tape, give the said rules and regulations an airing, and give the project the go-ahead. Then, and only then, might the 'advertise here' boxes be utilised by businesses who would assume it would be profitable to advertise on the site.
• The Malta Eurosong Final 2010, being held on Saturday, will include Winter Moods, Chiara, Mary Spiteri and Chasing Pandora as guest artistes.
• Despite the fact that the Ministeru Tal-Edukazzjoni, Kultura, Żgħażagħ u Sport has changed to Ministeru Tal-Edukazzjoni, Xogħol, u l-Familja, PBS remains under the aegis of Minister Dolores Cristina.
television@timesofmalta.com