Die BBC ist die größte brit. Rundfunkgesellschaft, mit selbständiger Verwaltung u. Programmgestaltung; 1927 als öffentl.-rechtl. gemeinnützige Institution mit königl. Charter gegr., löste die private British Broadcasting Company (1922) ab. Die BBC sendet 4 Hörfunkprogramme u. eine Reihe engl. Regionalprogramme sowie 2 Fernsehprogramme. Die BBC sendet in vielen Sprachen Auslandsprogramme für Europa u. Übersee; sie darf keinen Werbefunk betreiben [1].
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British Broadcasting Corporation or BBC, first and biggest broadcasting organization in
the United Kingdom.
The scientific origins of broadcasting are over 100 years old. It took 20 years and a
world war to develop technologies enabling signals to go to masses of people
simultaneously, rather than to individuals, so it was not until the 1920s that the major
broadcasting institutions grew up.
Systems of broadcasting reflect local geographic and social conditions. The United States developed a competitive, entertainment-led arrangement, financed from advertising revenue; in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) a centralized, politically controlled system, financed by the government, was devised. The United Kingdom favoured a "public service", with some government control, a mixed programme output, financed mainly from a licence fee paid by owners of radio receivers.
The BBC, set up in 1922, comprised the radio manufacturers, who were given a broadcasting monopoly. Company profits were limited and strict control was exercised over the operation, especially regarding controversial output. Revenue from the licence fees, some of which was kept by the government, was supplemented by royalties on the sale of receivers. John Reith, a Scottish engineer, was appointed the first General Manager and became the architect of "public service broadcasting" in which the profit motive plays no part. Independence from political and business control, provision for minorities, impartiality, and respect for broadcasting as a serious cultural force became its hallmarks.
Having weathered the political difficulties of the United Kingdom's General Strike in 1926 the Company became a Corporation in 1927, with a remit to "educate, inform, and entertain" the public and with a new freedom to consider controversial issues. It obtained its authority through a renewable Royal Charter and with a Board of Governors, representing the public interest, appointed by the government, which also set the level of the licence fee.
Under Reith's strict control the BBC rapidly gained a reputation for high standards. Drama, music of all kinds, including the Promenade Concerts (the "Proms"), children's programmes, news and current affairs, and religious programmes were soon all obtainable by the great mass of the British public, backed by the Radio Times (from 1923), a highly successful programme magazine. Educational broadcasting began in 1924, a regional service, planned from 1926, offered choice, and experiments with television started in 1929 using the system invented by another Scottish engineer, John Logie Baird. A full television service ran from 1936 to 1939, but Baird's mechanical system was dropped in favour of a more sophisticated electronic version. One of Reith's greatest achievements was the start of overseas broadcasts in English, through the creation of the Empire Service, now called the World Service. During the 1930s, described as "The Golden Age of Radio", the BBC was, however, forced to recognize the power of competition, when the public began listening to lighter fare from commercial stations transmitting from France.
In 1939 World War II forced the closure of the television service and, under necessary censorship conditions, BBC Radio sought to provide as accurate a picture as possible of the war's progress whilst maintaining the morale of the beleaguered population. A special Forces Programme was created in 1940 and the output lightened in tone with entertainers such as Tommy Handley in his famous ITMA programme, Vera Lynn, the "Forces' Sweetheart" singer, and the new Desert Island Discs series-still going strong-with its original format of talk and music centred on a celebrity. Serious programming also flourished, with classical music more popular than ever, the Radio Doctor giving advice on health and fitness, J. B. Priestley delivering his famous controversial Postscripts to the 9 o'clock evening news and Mr Middleton dispensing advice on gardening, especially on growing vegetables. The Empire Service underwent huge change, and expanded from 1938 as foreign language broadcasts began with Arabic, soon joined by most European and South American languages.
From 1940 onwards the BBC became the sole conveyor of some kind of truth and a source of hope to many European resistance movements. The Victory Campaign evoked a huge emotional and practical response with its "V for Victory" slogan, causing the enemy much concern. Many Allied leaders, including General de Gaulle, sent messages to their people from the BBC studios in London. As D-Day approached, coded messages were sent to men and women in the "underground", planning to help the Allied invasion whilst the German Service, headed by Hugh Greene, a later BBC Director General, sent warnings to the German people whose broadcasting system he helped to reorganize in the postwar period.
The BBC had expanded greatly during the war and the problems of reconstruction were formidable. The television service restarted in 1946 and became a great success, especially following the outside broadcast of the 1947 wedding of Princess Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II) and the Duke of Edinburgh. On the radio, the Forces Programme became the Light Programme and in 1946 the Third Programme was devised to provide serious music and cultural programmes. The BBC thus had three distinctive radio channels alongside its regional output from Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, and its major centres in England. By 1950, 30 hours of television and 260 hours of radio were broadcast each week. As transmitters were built, half the population was soon able to receive television pictures.
Expenditure on television soon began to overtake that on radio, and audiences moved increasingly to the new medium, live coverage of the 1953 Coronation of Princess Elizabeth being a major turning point. By the time the BBC monopoly was broken by the arrival of Independent Television (ITV) in 1955, over 90 per cent of the population could see television in their homes. The age of competition began and the BBC had to fight for survival. At first it failed badly and its share of the audience slumped to 28 per cent in 1957.
The fight back by radio, in competition with television, and by BBC TV, in competition with ITV, was initiated by one Director General, Sir Ian Jacob, and completed by another, Sir Hugh Greene. By the end of the 1950s the expenditure on BBC television equalled that on radio and, thenceforth, the gap widened dramatically, but the BBC's audience share took longer to recover. Radio continued to excel in many fields, with The Goon Show attracting big audiences and creating new comedy styles, whilst old favourites such as The Archers (started in 1951 and still running) continued its early success. On television an adaptation of 1984 by George Orwell created a stir in 1954, while Panorama, the BBC's current affairs "flagship", Sportsview, and Zoo Quest by David Attenborough set new standards and attracted large audiences. Children's television and television for schools also started in the 1950s, a period of expansion and experiment.
A major reorganization of radio occurred in 1967 with the opening of Radio 1, a response to "pirate radio", and the renaming of the Light, Third, and Home services as Radios 2, 3, and 4. In the same year, BBC Local Radio started in Leicester and within 6 years there were 20 such stations, making special programmes for local communities, for example, those with large immigrant populations.
The late 1950s and 1960s saw the BBC introducing a remarkable number of technical innovations, including VHF and stereo radio, efficient video recording, satellite transmissions, colour television, and a second television channel, BBC 2. In the same period the BBC's great Television Centre was opened in West London, a Radiophonic Workshop set up, and work began on the teletext system Ceefax, which went public in 1972. These all enhanced the quality and range of programmes; stereo sound improved music quality; satellites, such as Telstar, enabled intercontinental broadcasts; BBC 2 offered more choice; and colour added to the enjoyment of drama, sport, light entertainment, and nature programmes. Huge successes such as The Six Wives of Henry VIII, Dad's Army, Civilisation, Horizon, and Omnibus all belong to this period.
In the 1970s and 1980s popular television audiences often reached 20 million and radio 5 million, but troubles began to loom with a worsening economic climate, partly caused by the oil crisis of 1973. Programmes such as "Yesterday's Men" and "The Question of Ulster" were criticized by politicians, with whom the BBC had to deal over the licence fee and other issues. Broadcasting and its effects on vulnerable groups such as children became a subject of hot debate. One outcome was the setting up of the Broadcasting Complaints Commission in 1981. BBC broadcasters were, however, taking their social responsibilities seriously with programmes for deaf and disabled people joining those for blind people, as well as a multimedia campaign on adult literacy. Programmes for the Open University started in 1971. But entertainment, sport, and news and current affairs were the chief ratings battlegrounds, with the BBC and ITV sharing the television audience roughly 50:50.
The late 1970s were dominated by economics and the issues raised by the work of the Annan Committee on the future of broadcasting. Inflation made the period "increasingly gloomy" for the BBC, in the words of the Chairman, Sir Michael Swann. While ITV could control its income partially, the BBC could do little, apart from increasing the relatively small amounts obtained through sales of programmes and books. One indirect outcome of the Annan Report was the creation of the advertising-financed Channel 4, designed to be innovative and experimental. This came on air in 1982, thus completing the television duopoly with the BBC, considered by many as the high-point period of British television.
In a 1978 White Paper the BBC was described as "arguably the single most important cultural organization in the nation". The Shakespeare Project (the televising of Shakespeare plays backed up by explanatory programmes), Life on Earth, Yes Minister, The Boys from the Blackstuff, and Timewatch are just some television examples which testify to this.
The 1980s and 1990s have seen yet more rapid technical change, increased competition and, for the BBC, an ideological shift in government attitudes, very unsympathetic to public service broadcasting. The Conservative Government of 1979 to 1990 under Margaret Thatcher challenged the Corporation's basic principles, while satellite and cable transmission opened up the possibility for more channels and, it is hoped, more choice. The BBC was at first invited to develop two Direct Broadcasting by Satellite (DBS) channels but without any government assistance and a fierce debate developed as to the practicalities. The plan fell through after the expenditure of much effort and money, with the highly competitive, commercial Sky Channel becoming the eventual main provider of satellite television in Britain.
"On the ground" the BBC continued to take the initiative with the start of Breakfast Television in 1983, just ahead of ITV, alongside its by now accepted high-level and wide-ranging existing output, still unmatched.
Challenging programmes such as Tumbledown, reflecting on the Falklands War, and Real Lives: On the Edge of the Union, concerning terrorism in Northern Ireland, angered the already hostile government and 1987 became a cataclysmic year for the BBC. Its headquarters in Glasgow was raided by the police concerning another contentious series and the director general, Alasdair Milne, removed.
In the first half of the 1990s, under a new Chairman of Governors, Marmaduke Hussey, and new directors general, Michael Checkland and then, from 1993, John Birt, the BBC has undergone a rapid and painful transformation. Targets have been set, the staff radically slimmed down and new procedures for programme-making, such as "producer choice", a kind of internal market, put in place. Such changes, comparable to those in other public sector institutions, have proved highly unpopular, particularly with older staff, many of whom have been made redundant. The management can, however, point to a general acceptance, by the present Conservative government, of a continuation of the BBC beyond 1996, when its Charter is due for renewal, along with financing through the licence fee method.
In this climate of internal turbulence and fierce external competition, BBC
programme-makers have striven successfully to survive and prosper. In a world in which
global communication and the interaction of broadcasting and telecommunications becomes
ever more important, the BBC is setting up a number of projects in most continents to
ensure its voices and pictures are heard worldwide, whilst BBC engineers steer the
Corporation into digital broadcasting. Most of John Reith's ideals remain important as the
BBC battles into the 21st century.
Contributed by: John Cain [2]
[1] Quelle: Bertelsmann Discovery 1995
[2] "British Broadcasting Corporation," Microsoft(R) Encarta(R)
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