Changes In Arabic TV System

Posted by The Popular News Today on Saturday, November 10, 2012

By Crystal Salazar


There were and still are cases of government controlling the media. One of the best examples is Arabic TV where there was a case of strong government influence and its ownership. This all happened because television was seen as an important political instrument.

During the late 1950s, people of Lebanon and Iraq were starting to be introduced with broadcasting. It started to be very popular, so it spread to other ten Arabic countries in the next ten years. However, when North Yemen have introduced it, all Arab countries were starting to have their own television stations. That was new emerging trend among Arab people.

However, Arab people have been exposed to television even much before 1950s. The reason for that is a French language, which is widespread in the most of the Arab countries, like Tunisia, Morocco and Algeria. So, one part of the population was able to watch television across the Mediterranean from France. Also, Arabs in Libya who were living near the U. S. Military base were able to watch U. S. Television channels. Other source of television system was Arabian American Oil Company, or ARAMCO, in eastern Saudi Arabia, where some audience was able to watch U. S. Television channels.

To understand this situation of government controlling the media, we need to be familiar with reasons. There are two main reasons. First one, government wanted to strength nation state building and to express nationalism during the period after the World War II. They saw a television as a good tool for doing so because of its influence on the huge number of population. Other reason was the fact that there was not a lot of profit for commercial investors because commercial advertising was limited.

However, in the last several years regional television industry is experiencing huge growth. With this trend, number of television viewers is starting to increase. The natural situation is that there is a competition in the market, so broadcasters are differentiating their programming from that of their competitors. They usually do it with high quality Arabic series because they have the highest viewership and incomes.

Yet, new trends are emerging in Middle East television. So, television channels should provide high quality programming, only to survive in market. Challenging situation are prices which are increasing more and more.

There are three most viewed TV channels. Those are Abu Dhabi TV, Kuwait TV and Saudi Arabian TV. Abu Dhabi TV is known for its high quality Arabic language broadcasted. It offers a lots of television entertainment to Arab Americans in United States. Kuwait TV is popular because of its family programming which provides environment for quality family viewing. Providing great social, political and economical programs is the best side of Arabian TV. Al Quran Al karim and Voice of the Kingdom are also included in the service of Arabian TV. Other popular channels are Dubai TV, Syria Satellite Channel, Jordan Satellite, Ana TV, Iraq TV, Palestinian Satellite, etc.

There are a lot of challenges and opportunities for Arab broadcasters because of the changing trends in Arabic TV. Progressive players with resources and abilities to invest and follow the trends will bring huge benefits. This will be a big challenge for everyone, including the government, audience, producers and commercials.




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