Mass media in Greece
[3] Art.15 states that "protective provisions for the press are not applicable to films, sound recordings, radio, television or any other similar medium for the transmission of speech or images.
[3] Commercial radio and TV stations were allowed with the Law 1866/1989, which emerged from the collaborative government between conservatives and communists in the "Catharsis" period in reaction to Koskotas scandal.
The state monopoly was finally abolished with Law 2328/1995, which conditions the granting of licenses by NCRTV for commercial channels to whether they would serve a public interest.
[2] Deregulation is deemed to have increased the choice menu of viewers, but also to have promoted ownership concentration of press, TV and radio outlets in the hands of few large organisations.
At the same time, law in Greece has been ineffective, e.g. in license regulation, leaving the market be dominated by few big interests, which regulatory authorities have proved only superficial and ambivalent in the work.
The closure of ERT left Greece without a broadcaster with national reach, and deprived the country of a voice that, although seen as promoting the government line and having a state-appointed board, also aired opposition views and employed competent and professional journalists.
[2] The loss of job security for almost 3,000 permanent and temporary employees was a big blow, forcing professional Greek journalists to accept work under deteriorated conditions in private media.
Established state-run and commercial TV networks broadcast nationally and compete actively against each other, and hundreds of thousands of viewers subscribe to satellite pay-TV services.
Domestically made variety programmes, comedies and game shows dominate the peak-time TV schedules and are highly popular and widely shown in Greece.
[4] Notwithstanding the dire financial conditions of many enterprises in the sector, media have been able to secure loans even during bank recapitalisation and selective lending periods.
The end of the decade brought the system back to stability, with increasing circulation for a pluralistic and critical press, although linked to parties' partisanships.
This also affected employment, with journalists driven to accept lower work conditions and to resort to self-censorship to preserve job security.
[4] Examples of new models of journalism included the Editors' Newspaper (Efimerida ton Syntakton), the magazine Unfollow, such as the online Press Project and Parallaxi.
The major chainstores were Papasotiriou, Eleftheroudakis, Ianos, Protoporia, Kosmos-Floras, Leader Books, Hellenic Distribution Agency / Newsstand, Fnac, Public.
It is organised by the National Book Centre of Greece in cooperation with HELEXPO S.A., the Hellenic Federation of Publishers and Booksellers, and the city of Thessaloniki, and has the Greek ministry of culture as its patron.
[4] Rising utility costs and prohibitive music licensing fees led to many radio stations facing large unpaid debts by the end of 2014.
In 1931, Orestis Laskos directed Daphnis and Chloe (Δάφνις και Χλόη), contained the first nude scene in the history of European cinema; it was also the first Greek movie which was played abroad.
The NCRTV is the main regulator for private and public broadcast media, established by the Law 1866/1989 as an independent authority whose action is only subordinated to the courts.
[4] The terms of several NCRTV members, included its president, expired in 2012, but they have remained in their position despite the Council of State's 2013 declaration of unconstitutionality of the status quo.
The rise of the Internet has added a concentration problem as the highest-visited websites include those of the mainstream publishing groups like DOL, Pegasus and also MEGA channel.
[25] Also, the Constitution affirms that the law "may specify that the means of financing newspapers and periodicals should be disclosed"[26] In recent years a number of measures have been undertaken to increase transparency of the media.
[2] The regulator is also responsible for collecting and keeping records and shareholders information on media outlets and media-related enterprises, such as press agencies, advertising, etc.
[2] Article 6 of the Presidential Decree 109/2010 which incorporated the EU Audio-visual Media Services Directive sets forth rules for enhancing transparency in the audiovisual sector by obliging providers to make public information such as company name, address, contact details, etc.
Under this Transparency Program Initiative, all government institutions are obliged to upload their acts and decisions on the Internet with special attention to issues of national security and sensitive personal data.
The law permits any prosecutor to order the seizure of publications that insult the president, offend any religion, contain obscenity, advocate for the violent overthrow of the political system, or disclose military secrets.
[54] Reporters Without Borders signaled negatively the attempt to meddle in DOL, one of Greece's most prominent newspaper groups,[55] by appointing a former SYRIZA MP in charge for its rescue.
An August 2014 law stripped NERIT of its administrative independence and entrusted the government with the power to name its supervisory body, which in turn selects the public broadcaster's president.
[4] NERIT has been accused repeatedly of political bias, including after blocking the airing of Syriza opposition leader Alexis Tsipras at the Thessaloniki International Fair, while giving ample space to Antonis Samaras' campaign.
According to former ERT employee Nicos Tsibidas, this left Greece with "a stern state broadcaster", controlled by the government, and "private media oligarchs".
[4] Politicians and other actors launched several proceedings and lawsuits against journalists and media workers, especially after the beginning of the Greek economic and financial crisis and using defamation charges.
