Radio and Television in Germany

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Radio and Television in Germany
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Radio

• Guglielmo Marconi, 1885/6, sending and receiving
  signals
• 1917 Hans Bredow, music and lectures on the
  Western Front
• Post-1918 governmental control
• 1923 Hans Bredow granted licence
• Reichsrundfunkgesellschaft
• Apolitical, rather than neutral, in the Weimar
  Republic

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The Volksempfänger

• From late 1933, NS government makes cheap radios
  available to the masses.
• Listening to the radio the duty of every citizen

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The Volksempfänger

• From 1939, it was forbidden to listen to foreign
  stations people were executed for this offence

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Radio after 1945

• The British model Anstalten des öffentlichen
  Rechts - public corporation
• Some transregional stations (Deutsche Welle)

• Each Land has its own radio station
• Governed by a Rundfunkrat (broadcasting council),
  consisting of members of socially-significant
  groups who monitor content
• Allied stations were also popular AFN in the
  1950s and 60s

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Television

• First public showing of television University of
  Leipzig, 1923
• An early highlight 1936 Olympic Games broadcast
  to 150,000 people in public assembly halls in
  Germany

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Television after 1945

• In conjunction with radio stations, regional
  television stations licensed in Allied sectors.
• 1950 First test picture broadcast
• 1954 ARD founded (Arbeitsgemeinschaft der
  öffentlich-rechtlichen Rundfunkanstalten der
  Bundesrepublik Deutschland)
• Officially begins 1.11.1954
• The year West Germany wins the World Cup, a
  televisual and radio national experience

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Television as a mass medium

• A mass medium? First programme (1951), Goethes
  Faust high culture or popular culture
• In 1957, one million viewers
• ZDF (Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen) founded 1963
• 1964 The Third Stations

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Television and Technology

• 1974 SPD government sets up a commission to
  investigate satellite and cable television
• Helmut Schmidt (1979) Cable is more dangerous
  than nuclear power
• First cable systems in 1984 and 1985

• Private stations begin broadcasting - SAT1 and
  RTL
• Questions of finance advertising time limited

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The Dual Broadcasting System

• Licence fees 20 of ARD budget, 37 of ZDF budget
  
• Established November 1986
• Providing basic broadcasting systems services to
  the public
• De-regulate the private sector
• Legally enshrined 1.12.1987
• Private stations 20 of broadcast time
• Public stations 20 minutes between 18.00 and
  20.00
• ZDFs Mainzelmännchen

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Television and Radio in the GDR

• Limited programmes on offer
• Watching West German television, frowned upon but
  not forbidden
• Tal der Ahnungslosen
• Ready acceptance of new media post-1989