Broadcasting in Germany
Another posting from Butler Cain on broadcasting in Germany.I was introduced to the German broadcasting industry through
the RIAS exchange program. It’s for American and German journalists who are
interested in learning how the broadcasting industry works in each
country. RIAS – which stands for Radio
in the American Sector – began broadcasting in 1946 to counteract the rise of
Communism in Eastern Europe. After the Berlin
Wall fell and Germany
reunified, the RIAS Berlin Kommission changed its mission to one of exchange.
It’s based in Berlin
and is online at http://www.riasberlin.de.
In Germany,
private agencies are the ones who wield authority over programming decisions.
There are 14 licensing agencies there (compared to one – the FCC – in America). The
idea has historic ties. After Hitler concentrated governmental power (and we
know what happened as a result), Germany is very careful to avoid
giving significant authority to any one organization.
All households in Germany (with some exceptions) are
required to pay approximately 17 Euro per month to support public broadcasting,
which gave public broadcasting a roughly 7 Billion Euro budget during the past
fiscal year. This mandatory support is a typical funding model in Europe. But, it’s very different from the American model,
where public broadcasting is supported primarily by voluntary contributions.
This has created lots of consternation among members of Germany’s
private broadcasting industry, which has only been around since 1984.
Commercial broadcasters complain that they have difficulty competing with
public broadcasters because of the massive budget disparity. Unlike in America, Germany’s
public broadcasting system has the financial advantage over the commercial
industry.
And here’s a quick note about the king of Germany’s TV
programs. “Tagesschau” is a nightly news program that airs between 8 and 8:15 PM. The public broadcaster is located
in Hamburg. It
has such a dominant hold on that country’s TV viewers that other channels
program their schedules around “Tagesschau.” I’m not kidding.
If you’re interested, here’s a short narrated video of a few
of my trip highlights. It’s at http://streams.ua.edu/aprnews/RIAS_Project.mp4.
Next time, I’ll share what I’ve learned about broadcasting during
a visit to the Czech and Slovak
Republics.
Butler
Cain