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Sveriges Television

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Sveriges Television (SVT)
Company typePublic broadcasting
Founded1956
HeadquartersSweden
Websitewww.svt.se

Sveriges Television (SVT) is a national publicly-funded television broadcaster based in Sweden. The Swedish public broadcasting system is in many respects modelled after the one used in the United Kingdom, and Sveriges Television shares many traits with its British counterpart, the BBC.

Sveriges Television is a public limited company, owned by an independent foundation, and funded through a licensing fee, which is allocated by the Swedish Riksdag. It is now separate from, but was initially part of, Sveriges Radio, which is the public radio broadcaster. Its status could be described as that of a quasi-autonomous non-government organisation.

Sveriges Television maintained a monopoly in domestic terrestrial broadcasting from the start in 1956 until the privately held TV4 started broadcasting terrestrially in 1992. Until the launch of the Swedish language satellite television channel TV3 in 1987, Sveriges Television provided the only Swedish television available to the public.

History

When radio broadcasting was organized in the 1920s it was decided to adopt a model similar to the one of the British Broadcasting Company in the United Kingdom. The radio would a monopoly funded by a license and organized as a limited company, Radiotjänst ("Radio service"), owned by the radio industry and the press. The transmitters were owned by the state through Telegrafverket and the press would have a monopoly on news casts through Tidningarnas Telegrambyrå.

TT lost it's monopoly on news casts de jure in 1947 and de facto in 1956, but otherwise the same model would be applied to television.

Test transmissions of television started in 1954 from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.

In 1956, the Riksdag took the decicided to introduce television broadcasting. Transmissions were officially started in Sweden by Radiotjänst on September 4 the same year using the new Nacka transmitter. A television license for those owning a television set was introduced in october. Since 1957 the broadcasts are regular.

SR Clock in the 1960s.

In 1957, the company was renamed Sveriges Radio (SR) and it's ownership changed. The people's movements and the press would have equal 40 percent shares, while the enterprise would own 20 percent (1967, the people movements increased their share to 60 percent at the expense of the press).

In 1958, the first newscast, Aktuellt, was broadcast.

During the 1960's a second tv-channel was frequently discussed. The discussions resulted in the start of TV2 December 5, 1969. The first channel was named TV1 and the two channels were supposed to broadcast in stimulating competition within the same company.

TV2 in the 1970s.

1970 saw the start of the first regional programme, Sydnytt from Malmö.

When TV2 started the news programmes were reorganised. Aktuellt was axed and replaced with TV-nytt, who were in charge of the main 7:30 bulletin in TV1 as well as news updates on both channels. In addition, the two channels would get one bulletin each. TV2 got Rapport and TV1 got Nu.

In 1972, the news were reorganised once again. Rapport was moved to the 7:30 slot on TV2, Aktuellt was revived and would broadcast at 6 and 9 on TV1. Those timeslots would mostly stay unchanged for the following decades.

In 1966, the first colour broadcast was made. In 1970, regular colour broadcasts were introduced.

Teletext started in 1978.

At the end of the 70s SR was reorganised. Sveriges Radio would be the mother of four companies: Sveriges Riksradio (RR), Sveriges Lokalradio (LRAB), Sveriges Utbildningsradio (UR) and Sveriges Television (SVT). SVT would provide all television broadcasting, except for educational programming which was the responsibility of Sveriges Utbildningsradio. The abbreviation SVT is said to have been chosen since STV was already occupied by Scottish Television in the EBU.

The two channels were re-organised in 1987. TV1 was renamed Kanal 1 and was the channel for Stockholm-made programmes and TV2 showed programmes from the rest of Sweden. Broadcasts in Nicam Stereo where made permanent in 1988. This year also saw the launch of TV4 in southern Finland, broadcasting content from SVT for Finland-Swedes. The channel is known as SVT Europa since 1997 when it started broadcasting to all of Europe through satellite.

In 1992, the Riksdag decided that Sveriges Radio would reorganised once again in three companies (with RR and LRAB merged). From 1994, they would be owned by three independent foundations. The three foundations would later change into one foundation.

In 1990, broadcasts would usually start at 4 PM and finish before midnight. The 1990s saw an increase in broadcasting time with reruns in the afternoon, a morning show and lunch-time news bulletins. SVT also met competition from the young commercial broadcasters. In 1994, TV4 passed TV2 in the overall ratings and became the nation's most viewed channel.

In 1996, the channels were once again reorganised. The previous organisation and competition between the two channels disappeared. Kanal 1 and TV2 were renamed SVT1 and SVT2. The first edition of Expedition: Robinson was shown in 1997.

The first digital terrestrial television-broadcasts (DTT) took place in 1999. SVT started six new channels, the news channel SVT24 and five regional channels.

2000 saw the reorganisation of the news desks. Aktuellt, Rapport and SVT24 were merged into one central news desk.

In 2001 a new logo and new programme schedules among other things were introduced. This made SVT1 the broader mainstream channel with higher ratings and SVT2 the more narrow channel. The main news bulletins at 7:30 and 9 switched channel with Aktuellt now shown on SVT2 and Rapport on SVT1.

The regional channels were shut down in the beginning of 2002 and was replaced by SVT Extra. In December 2002, Barnkanalen, was started showing children's programmes during day-time. On February 24, 2003 SVT24 and SVT Extra were replaced by 24, a theme channel for news and sports. In 2003, all the SVT channels dropped their encryption in the DTT network.

On June 25, 2003, SVT broadcasted their first programme with 5.1 sound on DTT. The first 5.1-show was Allsång på Skansen. In November 2004, SVT added two audio streams that read the translation subtitles on SVT1 and SVT2.

Kunskapskanalen started broadcasting knowledge programming in September 2004.

The shutdown of analogue transmitters started in 2005 on Gotland. By 2007 all analogue transmissions from SVT will have ceased.

SVT started VODcasting some programs in February 2006. Alltogether three broadcasters competed to be the first onve to VODcast in Sweden. In the end, all three started in the same week.

SVT made their first broadcasts in high definition television during the 2006 FIFA World Cup in a channel operated in co-operation with TV4 AB. Regular high definition broadcasting is planned to start after the World Cup in the SVT HD channel.

Programming

News

Entertainment

Allsång på Skansen.
  • Melodifestivalen, preselection for the Eurovision Song Contest. Very popular in Sweden. The final generally gets more than 4 million viewers.
  • Survivor - Sveriges Television was the first network to broadcast the reality television series Survivor in 1997. The show was named Expedition Robinson, alluding to Robinson Crusoe and was a major hit in Sweden. The show which consistently held high ratings was concluded after its seventh and final year on the network (the final season aired 2003-2004). The popular series is however to be continued on the commercial channel TV3, but with much lower rating.
  • På spåret (1987-present), popular entertainment show based were celebrities answer question related to different locations.
  • Så ska det låta, the Swedish adaption of The Lyrics Board which have scored more than 3 million viewers several times.
  • Allsång på Skansen (1979-) a show based on a crowd singing folk music, broadcast live from Skansen in Stockholm in the summer.
  • Antikrundan, the Swedish version of Antiques Roadshow that often have attracted 2 million viewers.

Drama

  • Rederiet (1992-2002), one of Sweden's most popular soap operas.

Non-Swedish

SVT also broadcasts foreign programmes, primarily from the US and the UK, in original language with subtitles, as is the case on other Nordic TV channels.

SVT co-operates a lot with the other Nordic television companies through the Nordvision. Thus, many Danish, Norwegian and Finnish programmes are shown on SVT, while DR, NRK, YLE, SVF and RÚV show Swedish programmes.

Channels

SVT has five channels broadcasting to Sweden:

  • SVT1 - The main channel with broad content.
  • SVT2 - A channel with slighly narrower and younger programming.
  • SVT24 - News and information channel with much sport in the weekends.
  • Barnkanalen - Literally the Children Channel broadcasting during daytime.
  • Kunskapskanalen - the Knowledge Channel broadcast 18.00-23.00 in cooperation with the UR.

In additon to these channels, SVT has a special events channel called SVT Extra. It is generally unused and was (as of 2006) last used for live coverage during the Olympic Games in 2004.

All channels are available free-to-air in most of Sweden through the DTT and encrypted from Thor and Sirius satellites. Until the september 2005, both SVT1 and SVT2 were available nationwide via analogue terrestrial transmitters. Cable networks are required to broadcast four SVT channels for free in either digital or analogue form.

SVT1, SVT2, SVT24, Barnkanalen and Kunskapskanalen are also available throuh DTT on Åland and can be distributed on Finnish cable networks. In Österbotten, Finland, two transmitters are broadcasting SVT1 and SVT2 in analogue form to the Swedish-speaking population. The signals from the terrestrial transmitters in Sweden can be received in some areas of Denmark and Norway near Sweden. Cable networks there generally re-distribute SVT1 and SVT2.

SVT Europa, a mix of the SVT channels, is broadcast on satellite, and also as a terrestrial channel in Swedish-speaking areas of Finland. For rights reasons, SVT Europa does not show acquired material, such as movies, sport, or English language programming.

The SVT website, svt.se, is considered a channel on its own by the company.

Organisation

Since January 1, 2000, the executive management of SVT is handled by a CEO and a programme officer (PD), appointed by the board. As of 2006, Christina Jutterström is CEO and Leif Jakobsson is PD.

SVT is divided into eight operative programme producing units. Four of these a located in Stockholm, the other four are located around the country and are based on the ten TV2 districts who were merged in 2000. The regional units are:

The four districts produce several types of programmes for national broadcasting as well as ten of the eleven regional news programmes. Several of the news programmes also have local offices in their region.

The Stockholm-based units are:

  • SVT Nyheter & Samhälle, taking care of the national news operations as well as society programming, culture and journalistic documentaries made in the capital and regional news programme ABC.
  • SVT Sport, sports news and broadcasting
  • SVT Fiktion, handling drama production, entertainment, youth and childrens' programmes etcetera.
  • SVTi, takes care of svt.se, the Internet archive service "Öppet arkiv", mobile services, "super teletext" and other interactive services.

See also

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