Television in Germany - Misplaced Pages

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As the world's third largest economy and with the largest population in the European Union, Germany today offers a vast diversity of television stations.

History of German TV

Before World War II

The first regular electronic television service began in Berlin on March 22, 1935, using a 180-line system, and broadcasting 90 minutes three times a week. Very few receivers were ever privately owned, and viewers went instead to Fernsehstuben (television parlors). During the 1936 Summer Olympics, broadcasts, up to eight hours a day, took place in Berlin and Hamburg. The National Socialists intended to use television as a medium for their propaganda, but it was able to reach only a small number of viewers, in contrast to radio. By 1939 and the start of World War II plans for an expansion of television programming were soon changed in favor of radio. Nevertheless, the Berlin station, along with one in occupied Paris, remained on the air for most of World War II.

1950s

After World War II it took several years until a TV program was broadcasted again. Directly after the war, newspapers and radio were the only available mass media and they were under direct control of the Allied government. In the West, the USA, Great Britain and France had founded the ARD, the Arbeitsgemeinschaft der öffentlich-rechtlichen Rundfunkanstalten Deutschlands (Cooperative association of the public broadcasters in Germany). In the East, the Soviet Union founded its own radio and later TV stations, known as Deutscher Fernsehfunk (DFF). Many parts of Germany (particularly the GDR) received both channels.

In 1952 both the ARD and the DFF made their first broadcasts. But at that time, only few West Germans and even fewer East Germans owned a TV set. Radios were still cheaper and a lot more popular. One of the events that enhanced the popularity of TV among the West Germans was the broadcast of the 1954 football world cup finals from Bern, which many followed on TV screens in shop windows.

1960s

In the 1960s TV became much more popular and was finally available for the vast part of the population. In 1963, a second TV network, the Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen (Second German Television) started. In 1967, vice chancellor Willy Brandt started the era of color TV in West Germany. Also, in the 1960s, several member networks of the ARD started broadcasting their own regional television programs, known colloquially as Die Dritten (The Third Networks) In 1969 East Germany started DFF2, and introduced color programming on both channels.

1970s

In 1972, the DFF was renamed, dropping the pretense of being an all-German service and becoming Fernsehen der DDR (GDR Television) or DDR-FS. Its two channels became known as DDR1 and DDR2.

1980s

Until the early 1980s, the average German TV viewer could choose only between usually three TV channels, all of them publicly financed through license fees. These broadcast only in the afternoon and evening and not always in color. In Western Germany this changed in 1984, as the first two privately financed TV networks, RTL plus (short for Radio Tele Luxemburg) and SAT 1, started their programming (previously RTL had transmitted from Luxembourg into southwestern Germany). In contrast to the national public TV services, these new stations were only able to show their programs in the bigger cities via satellite or via broadband cable. But as the new stations introduced some very different kinds of programs (especially RTL plus, which in its first years was known for its erotic programs in the late evening), their popularity increased and more people invested in broadband cable access or satellite antennas.

1990s-2000s

After reunification, the TV stations of the German Democratic Republic were dissolved and the remnants were used to found new regional networks, e.g. the Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk (Central German Broadcasting), as part of the ARD. In addition, more private TV stations opened, becoming available through cable, satellite, and in some cases, over the airwaves.

As the millennium approached, Germany began airing new channels. The second programmes (RTL, ProSieben and Sat 1) gained a huge stake in viewer ratings. The normal ratings chain is: ARD, RTL, ZDF, Sat1. RTL and ProSieben started buying international television series, mainly from the United States and United Kingdom (like Friends, ALF, The Simpsons, Smallville, Grey's Anatomy). ARD and ZDF continued to produce their own content by investing in their own production companies and not buying international shows. In contrast, ARD and ZDF exported some show concepts to the USA, UK and China; for example "Wetten, dass..?". In 2004, a German law (Rundfunkstaatsvertrag) required channels to switch from analogue signals to digital signals by 2010. Many regions can already receive the high-definition signals like Berlin, Lower-Saxony or the Ruhr valley. The programme diversity is by far the largest in Europe; with Germany being in the middle of Europe it can receive satellite channels like BBC World, TVE, Al-Jazeera, RAI, France 1, CNBC Europe and other pan-European or Asian-African channels.

Subscription channels

Main article: Arena (pay television network) Main article: Premiere (pay television network)

Also around the millennium was the heyday of Germany's sole subscription channel Premiere. Premiere offered telecasts of Germany's soccer Bundesliga. The "Bundesliga" was Premiere's cash-cow, but they lost the broadcasting rights in 2006 to a newly formed competitor, Arena. Furthermore, Premiere was the brainchild of the former television czar, Leo Kirch. Kirch went into insolvency after a struggling decade of losing viewers from his preceding subscription channel, DF1 (Digital TV 1). The company gained ground with its new manager Georg Kofler and now tries to get viewers back with buying new international shows from overseas and introduce them to the German audience (ABC's Lost was first shown on Premiere). Also Kofler and Kirch bought international movies from American films studios in advance so they can broadcast them one year after their release. Normally, American movies are shown on non-subscription (free-TV) channels after three years of their release, so Premiere benefitted from that advantage. Premiere highlights a combination of multiple channels featuring Animal Planet, Discovery Channel, Disney Channel and several themed channels for music, crime and sport.

Around 2005, several German cable companies created a new challenger to Premiere, ARENA. The participating companies are iesy (Hesse) and ish (TV) (North Rhine-Westphalia) through their combined partnership called "Unity Media". Arena, a rather small company tried to buy the pay-TV rights to the German Bundesliga and won by a decision of the marketing directorate of the DFL. The Bundesliga is a cash-cow on the German television market, so previous rights holders Premiere got a big blow into their concept of broadcasting. Arena holds the rights from 2006 to 2008. In 2008 there will be further negotiations for the broadcasting of the Bundesliga.

ARD - Das Erste

As stated above, the ARD was the first German broadcasting station. It has a very federally oriented structure. Currently, nine regional TV stations cooperate together to produce programs for the TV network known as Das Erste (The First):

NDR - Norddeutscher Rundfunk (North German Broadcasting - Hamburg, Lower Saxony, Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania)
RB - Radio Bremen (Bremen)
RBB - Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (Broadcasting Berlin-Brandenburg - Berlin and Brandenburg)
MDR - Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk (Central German Broadcasting - Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia)
WDR - Westdeutscher Rundfunk (West German Broadcasting - North-Rhine-Westphalia)
HR - Hessischer Rundfunk (Hessian Broadcasting - Hesse)
SWR - Südwestrundfunk (South West Broadcasting - Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate)
SR - Saarländischer Rundfunk (Saarland Broadcasting - Saarland)
BR - Bayrischer Rundfunk (Bavarian Broadcasting - Bavaria)

(The fact that small regions like Bremen or the Saarland have their own broadcasting stations has mainly historical reasons. They only contribute to the nationwide TV program Das Erste and only have limited regional TV programs.)

Das Erste is a network which consists of programming oriented for the whole family. Especially well-known and respected are its TV news, e.g. the Tagesschau, produced by the NDR and broadcast nightly at 8 p.m. The Tagesschau is a national institution since its inception 1952. Until the early 1990s, it was considered taboo by some to call someone else between 8:00 and 8:15, as everybody was supposedly watching the "Tagesschau" then. As of today there is news available around the clock. Other famous programs are Tatort (a crime series, which is located in several different cities and produced by all the partners of the ARD in turn). Das Erste also shows children's programs like Sandmännchen, daily soap operas like Marienhof or Verbotene Liebe, Germany's longest running weekly soap opera Lindenstraße, sport events (though extremely popular sports like soccer or car racing are also shown on the private broadcasting stations) and also TV shows for senior citizens, often featuring German folk music.

The ARD is not only responsible for Das Erste. There are seven regional networks, called Die Dritten (The Third Networks). Only RB and SR do not have their own full-time third networks, but mostly broadcast the programming of the NDR and the SWR, respectively. The third networks feature documentaries, older movies and regional news programs, often shown for only one federal state or only parts of it. For example the NDR every evening at 19:30 stops broadcasting its common program and broadcasts instead regional news bulletins for Schleswig-Holstein (Schleswig-Holstein-Magazin), Hamburg (Hamburg Journal), Mecklenburg-West Pomerania (Nordmagazin), Bremen (Buten & Binnen) and Lower Saxony (Hallo, Niedersachsen!)).

Since the 1980s, the ARD also produces several niche channels. The first one was EinsPlus, which was intended as a culture niche channel and was broadcasted from 1986 till 1993. Afterwards, the ARD co-produced 3sat, in cooperation with the ZDF, the Austrian Broadcasting network ORF and the Swiss Broadcasting network DRS. A second culture niche channel is arte, which is co-produced with the French Broadcasting Service LaSept.