History of television in Germany

Despite many technical improvements to camera technology, allowing for higher resolution imaging, by 1939, and the start of World War II, plans for an expansion of television programming were soon changed in favor of radio.

Immediately after the war, newspapers and radio were the only available mass media and they were under direct control of the Allied government, and were more likely to be in English or French than in German.

This initial service lasted two hours a night (transmitting 8-10 p.m.) and included news, variety shows, films, and television plays.

[2] Other regional networks also started to launch television in their own areas; HR and SWF in June 1953, and BR and SDR in November 1954.

The companies in the American occupation zone were more determined to promote TV as a "window to the world", rather than mere "pictured radio", an attitude NWDR shared with its role model, the BBC.

This success and new, unused frequencies motivated West German chancellor Konrad Adenauer to increase his influence by opening a second channel called Das Freie Deutsche Fernsehen (The Free German Television), to be financed by the industry with the central goal of presenting government opinions.

NWDR had initially been awarded service of West Berlin simply because its main transmitter was in the British sector of that city.

However, the East German uprisings in the summer of 1953 brought about the need for West Berlin to have its own ARD member station.

Unlike ARD, which was regionalized and had its roots in radio, ZDF was a centrally organized channel devoted solely to television.

The ZDF did not yet have enough journalists to reach ARD's news standards, so it concentrated on entertainment in order to gain a larger audience.

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.

In regions bordering neighboring countries, however, viewers were typically also able to get foreign stations via antenna, e.g. those being broadcast from East Germany or the Netherlands.

In contrast to ARD and ZDF, these new stations were only able to show their programs in the bigger cities via satellite or via cable; additionally, in some urban agglomerations like the Greater Hanover area, they could be picked up by antenna.

But as the new stations introduced some very different kinds of programs (especially RTL plus, which in its first years was known for its unconventional afternoon quiz shows and late-evening erotic films), their popularity increased and more people invested in broadband cable access or satellite antennas.

[3] RTL and ProSieben started buying international television series, mainly from the United States (like Friends, ALF, The Simpsons, Smallville, Grey's Anatomy).