Media of the United Kingdom - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Media of the United Kingdom consist of several different types of communications media: television

Television

Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

, radio

Radio

Radio is the transmission of signals through free space by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...

, newspapers, magazines, and Internet-based Web sites. The UK also has a strong music industry. The UK has a diverse range of providers, the most prominent being principle public service broadcaster, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). The BBC's competitors include ITV plc

ITV plc

ITV plc is a British media company that operates 12 of the 15 regional television broadcasters that make up the ITV Network, the oldest and largest commercial terrestrial television network in the United Kingdom...

, which operates 11 of the 15 regional television broadcasters that make up the ITV Network. News Corporation

News Corporation

News Corporation or News Corp. is an American multinational media conglomerate. It is the world's second-largest media conglomerate as of 2011 in terms of revenue, and the world's third largest in entertainment as of 2009, although the BBC remains the world's largest broadcaster...

, who operate a number of leader national newspapers through News International

News International

News International Ltd is the United Kingdom newspaper publishing division of News Corporation. Until June 2002, it was called News International plc....

such as The Sun and The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...

as well as holding a large stake in satellite broadcaster British Sky Broadcasting

British Sky Broadcasting

British Sky Broadcasting Group plc is a satellite broadcasting, broadband and telephony services company headquartered in London, United Kingdom, with operations in the United Kingdom and the Ireland....

and various other media holdings. Regional media is covered by local radio, television and print newspapers. Trinity Mirror

Trinity Mirror

Trinity Mirror plc is a large British newspaper and magazine publisher. It is Britain's biggest newspaper group, publishing 240 regional papers as well as the national Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and People, and the Scottish Sunday Mail and Daily Record. Its headquarters are at Canary Wharf in...

Audiences

In 2009 it was estimated that individuals viewed a mean of 3.75 hours of television per day and 2.81 hours of radio. The main BBC channels accounted for and estimated 28.4% of all television viewing; the three main independent channels accounted for 29.5% and the increasingly important other satellite and digital channels for the remaining 42.1%. Sales of newspapers have fallen since the 1970s and in 2009 42% of people reported reading a daily national newspaper. In 2010 82.5% of the UK population were Internet users, the highest proportion amongst the 20 countries with the largest total number of users in that year.

Media centres and organisations

London dominates the media sector in the UK: national newspapers and television and radio are largely based there, although Manchester is also a significant national media centre. Edinburgh and Glasgow, and Cardiff, are important centres of newspaper and broadcasting production in Scotland and Wales respectively.

The BBC, founded in 1922, is the UK's publicly funded radio, television and Internet broadcasting corporation, and is the oldest and largest broadcaster in the world. It operates numerous television and radio stations in the UK and abroad and its domestic services are funded by the television licence

Television licensing in the United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom and the Crown Dependencies, any household watching or recording live television transmissions is required to purchase a television licence every year. As of 2010, this costs £145.50 for colour and £49.00 for black and white. The licence is required to receive any live...

. Other major players in the UK media include ITV plc

ITV plc

, which operates 11 of the 15 regional television broadcasters that make up the ITV Network, and News Corporation

News Corporation

, which owns a number of national newspapers through News International

News International

News International Ltd is the United Kingdom newspaper publishing division of News Corporation. Until June 2002, it was called News International plc....

such as the most popular tabloid The Sun and the longest-established daily "broadsheet

Broadsheet

Broadsheet is the largest of the various newspaper formats and is characterized by long vertical pages . The term derives from types of popular prints usually just of a single sheet, sold on the streets and containing various types of material, from ballads to political satire. The first broadsheet...

" The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...

, as well as holding a large stake in satellite broadcaster British Sky Broadcasting

British Sky Broadcasting

Print

The UK publishing sector, including books, directories and databases, journals, magazines and business media, newspapers and news agencies, has a combined turnover of around £20 billion and employs around 167,000 people.

Newspapers

Traditionally British newspapers have been divided into "quality", serious-minded newspapers (usually referred to as "broadsheet

Broadsheet

s" because of their large size) and the more populist, "tabloid" varieties. For convenience of reading many traditional broadsheets have switched to a more compact

Compact (newspaper)

A compact newspaper is a broadsheet-quality newspaper printed in a tabloid format, especially one in the United Kingdom. The term is used also for this size came into use in its current use when The Independent began producing a smaller format edition for London's commuters, designed to be easier...

-sized format, traditionally used by tabloids. In 2008 The Sun
The Sun (newspaper)
The Sun is a daily national tabloid newspaper published in the United Kingdom and owned by News Corporation. Sister editions are published in Glasgow and Dublin...

had the highest circulation of any daily newspaper in the UK at 3.1 million, approximately a quarter of the market. Its sister paper, the News of the World
News of the World
The News of the World was a national red top newspaper published in the United Kingdom from 1843 to 2011. It was at one time the biggest selling English language newspaper in the world, and at closure still had one of the highest English language circulations...

, had the highest circulation in the Sunday newspaper market, and traditionally focused on celebrity-led stories until its closure in 2011. The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...

, a centre-right broadsheet paper, is the highest-selling of the "quality" newspapers. The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...

is a more liberal

Liberalism in the United Kingdom

This article gives an overview of liberalism in the United Kingdom. It is limited to liberal parties with substantial support, mainly proved by having had a representation in parliament. The sign ⇒ denotes another party in that scheme...

"quality" broadsheet and the Financial Times
Financial Times
The Financial Times is an international business newspaper. It is a morning daily newspaper published in London and printed in 24 cities around the world. Its primary rival is the Wall Street Journal, published in New York City....

is the main business newspaper, printed on distinctive salmon-pink broadsheet paper. Trinity Mirror

Trinity Mirror

operate 240 local and regional newspapers in the UK, as well as national newspapers such as the Daily Mirror and the Sunday Mirror
Sunday Mirror
The Sunday Mirror is the Sunday sister paper of the Daily Mirror. It began life in 1915 as the Sunday Pictorial and was renamed the Sunday Mirror in 1963. Trinity Mirror also owns The People...

.

Scotland has a distinct tradition of newspaper readership (see list of newspapers in Scotland). The tabloid Daily Record
Daily Record (Scotland)
The Daily Record is a Scottish tabloid newspaper based in Glasgow. It had been the best-selling daily paper in Scotland for many years with a paid circulation in August 2011 of 307,794 . It is now outsold by its arch-rival the Scottish Sun which in September 2010 had a circulation of 339,586 in...

has the highest circulation of any daily newspaper outselling The Scottish Sun by four to one while its sister paper, the Sunday Mail
Sunday Mail (Scotland)
The Sunday Mail is a Scottish tabloid newspaper published every Sunday. It is the sister paper of the Daily Record and is owned by Trinity Mirror and as such has a left-wing outlook which in turn tends to guide Scottish political debate in that direction.The Sunday Mail is read by over one million...

similarly leads the Sunday newspaper market. The leading "quality" daily newspaper in Scotland is The Herald
The Herald (Glasgow)
The Herald is a broadsheet newspaper published Monday to Saturday in Glasgow, and available throughout Scotland. As of August 2011 it had an audited circulation of 47,226, giving it a lead over Scotland's other 'quality' national daily, The Scotsman, published in Edinburgh.The 1889 to 1906 editions...

, though it is the sister paper of The Scotsman
The Scotsman
The Scotsman is a British newspaper, published in Edinburgh.As of August 2011 it had an audited circulation of 38,423, down from about 100,000 in the 1980s....

, and the Scotland on Sunday
Scotland on Sunday
Scotland on Sunday is a Scottish Sunday newspaper, published in Edinburgh by The Scotsman Publications Ltd and consequently assuming the role of Sunday sister to its daily stablemate The Scotsman...

that leads in the Sunday newspaper market.

Magazines

A large range of magazine

Magazine

Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles. They are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...

s are sold in the UK covering most interests and potential topics. British magazines and journals that have achieved worldwide circulation include The Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...

, Nature
Nature (journal)
Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...

, and New Scientist
New Scientist
New Scientist is a weekly non-peer-reviewed English-language international science magazine, which since 1996 has also run a website, covering recent developments in science and technology for a general audience. Founded in 1956, it is published by Reed Business Information Ltd, a subsidiary of...

, Private Eye
Private Eye
Private Eye is a fortnightly British satirical and current affairs magazine, edited by Ian Hislop.Since its first publication in 1961, Private Eye has been a prominent critic and lampooner of public figures and entities that it deemed guilty of any of the sins of incompetence, inefficiency,...

, Hello!
Hello!
Hello is a weekly magazine specializing in celebrity news and human-interest stories, published in the United Kingdom since 1988. Hello is sister magazine to ¡Hola!, the Spanish weekly magazine launched in Spain in 1944...

, The Spectator
The Spectator
The Spectator is a weekly British magazine first published on 6 July 1828. It is currently owned by David and Frederick Barclay, who also owns The Daily Telegraph. Its principal subject areas are politics and culture...

, the Radio Times
Radio Times
Radio Times is a UK weekly television and radio programme listings magazine, owned by the BBC. It has been published since 1923 by BBC Magazines, which also provides an on-line listings service under the same title...

and NME
NME
The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...

.

Radio

Radio in the United Kingdom is dominated by the BBC, which operates radio

BBC Radio

BBC Radio is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927. For a history of BBC radio prior to 1927 see British Broadcasting Company...

stations both in the UK and abroad. The BBC World Service

BBC World Service

The BBC World Service is the world's largest international broadcaster, broadcasting in 27 languages to many parts of the world via analogue and digital shortwave, internet streaming and podcasting, satellite, FM and MW relays...

radio network is broadcast in 33 languages globally. Domestically the BBC also operates ten national networks and over 40 local radio stations including services in Welsh on BBC Radio Cymru

BBC Radio Cymru

BBC Radio Cymru is BBC Cymru's Welsh-language radio station, broadcasting throughout Wales from studios in Cardiff, Bangor, and Aberystwyth on FM since 1977. At the time of its launch it was one of the few FM-only radio services in the UK...

, Gaelic on BBC Radio nan Gàidheal

BBC Radio nan Gàidheal

BBC Radio nan Gàidheal is a British radio station, broadcasting in Scottish Gaelic. It is operated by the BBC as part of its portfolio of television and radio services broadcasting to Scotland....

in Scotland and Irish in Northern Ireland. The domestic services of the BBC are funded by the television licence

Television licence

A television licence is an official licence required in many countries for the reception of television broadcasts...

. The internationally targeted BBC World Service Radio is funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office, commonly called the Foreign Office or the FCO is a British government department responsible for promoting the interests of the United Kingdom overseas, created in 1968 by merging the Foreign Office and the Commonwealth Office.The head of the FCO is the...

, though from 2014 it will be funded by the television licence. The most popular radio station by number of listeners is BBC Radio 2

BBC Radio 2

BBC Radio 2 is one of the BBC's national radio stations and the most popular station in the United Kingdom. Much of its daytime playlist-based programming is best described as Adult Contemporary or AOR, although the station is also noted for its specialist broadcasting of other musical genres...

, closely followed by BBC Radio 1

BBC Radio 1

BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...

. Advances in digital radio technology have enabled the launch of several new stations by the Corporation.

Rather than operating as independent entities, many commercial local radio stations are owned by large radio groups which broadcast a similar format to many areas. The largest operator of radio stations is Global Radio

Global Radio

Global Radio UK Ltd. is a British commercial radio company, the largest in the country following acquisitions of Chrysalis Radio and GCap Media.The company's Chief Executive Officer is Stephen Miron, while the Group Chairman is Charles Allen...

, owner of the major Heart

Heart Network

Heart is a radio network of 17 adult contemporary independent local radio stations in central & southern England and north Wales. Each station broadcasts local breakfast and drive time shows and simulcasts network programming at all other times...

and Galaxy radio brands. It also owns Classic FM

Classic FM (UK)

Classic FM, one of the United Kingdom's three Independent National Radio stations, broadcasts classical music in a popular and accessible style.-Overview:...

and London's most popular commercial radio station, 95.8 CapitalFM. Other owners are UTV Radio

UTV Radio

UTV Radio is a UK media company, and owner of several radio stations in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland. It is a growing branch of UTV Media....

, with stations broadcasting in large city areas and Bauer Radio, holding radio in the North of England. There are also regional stations, like Real Radio

Real Radio

Real Radio is a network of adult contemporary independent local radio stations in England, Scotland and Wales and is operated by . Each station broadcasts local breakfast through to drive time shows and network programming in the evening and through the night...

and the Century Network, broadcasting in some main parts of England, Wales and Scotland, and a number of licensed community radio stations which broadcast to local audiences.

Television

Analogue terrestrial television

Television

Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

in the United Kingdom is made up of two chartered

Public broadcasting

Public broadcasting includes radio, television and other electronic media outlets whose primary mission is public service. Public broadcasters receive funding from diverse sources including license fees, individual contributions, public financing and commercial financing.Public broadcasting may be...

public broadcasting companies, the BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

and Channel 4

Channel 4

Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...

and two franchised commercial television companies, (ITV

ITV

ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...

and Channel 5). There are five major nationwide television channels in the UK: BBC One

BBC One

BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...

, BBC Two

BBC Two

BBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It covers a wide range of subject matter, but tending towards more 'highbrow' programmes than the more mainstream and popular BBC One. Like the BBC's other domestic TV and radio...

, ITV

ITV

, Channel 4

Channel 4

and Channel 5—currently transmitted by analogue and digital terrestrial, free-to-air signals with the latter three channels funded by commercial advertising. The UK now has a large number of digital terrestrial channels including a further six from the BBC, five from ITV and three from Channel 4, and one from S4C which is solely in Welsh, among a variety of others. The vast majority of digital cable television services are provided by Virgin Media

Virgin Media

Virgin Media Inc. is a company which provides fixed and mobile telephone, television and broadband internet services to businesses and consumers in the United Kingdom...

with satellite television available from Freesat

Freesat

Freesat is a free-to-air digital satellite television joint venture between the BBC and ITV plc, serving the United Kingdom. The service was formed as a memorandum in 2007 and has been marketed since 6 May 2008...

or British Sky Broadcasting

British Sky Broadcasting

and free-to-air

Free-to-air

Free-to-air describes television and radio services broadcast in clear form, allowing any person with the appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring a subscription or one-off fee...

digital terrestrial television by Freeview. The entire UK will switch to digital by 2012.

The BBC

BBC

operates several television channels

BBC Television

BBC Television is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation. The corporation, which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927, has produced television programmes from its own studios since 1932, although the start of its regular service of television...

both in the UK and abroad. The BBC's international television news service, BBC World News, is broadcast throughout the world. The domestic services of the BBC are funded by the television licence

Television licence

A television licence is an official licence required in many countries for the reception of television broadcasts...

. The international television broadcast services are operated by BBC Worldwide

BBC Worldwide

BBC Worldwide Limited is the wholly owned commercial subsidiary of the British Broadcasting Corporation, formed out of a restructuring of its predecessor BBC Enterprises in 1995. In the year to 31 March 2010 it made a profit of £145m on a turnover of £1.074bn. The company had made a profit of £106m...

on a commercial subscription basis over cable and satellite services. This commercial arm of the BBC also forms half of UKTV

UKTV

UKTV is a digital cable and satellite television network, formed through a joint venture between BBC Worldwide, a commercial subsidiary of the British Broadcasting Corporation, and Scripps Networks Interactive, spun off from The E.W Scripps Company in 2008...

along with Virgin Media

Virgin Media

Virgin Media Inc. is a company which provides fixed and mobile telephone, television and broadband internet services to businesses and consumers in the United Kingdom...

.

Channel 4 is similarly chartered to the BBC, with a remit to provide public service broadcasting and schools programs, however it runs commercial advertisements to provide a revenue stream. It produces a single analogue channel, currently branded as Channel 4

Channel 4

.

The commercial operators rely on advertising for their revenue, and are run as commercial ventures, in contrast to the public service operators. The ITV

ITV

franchise transmits the analogue channel known as ITV1

ITV1

ITV1 is a generic brand that is used by twelve franchises of the British ITV Network in the English regions, Wales, southern Scotland , the Isle of Man and the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey. The ITV1 brand was introduced by Carlton and Granada in 2001, alongside the regional identities of their...

(in England, Wales, Scottish Borders, Isle of Man and Channel Islands

Channel Television

Channel Television is a British television station which has served as an Independent Television contractor to the Channel Islands since 1962. It is based in Jersey...

), STV (In Central and Northern Scotland), and UTV

UTV

UTV is a television channel based in the UK region of Northern Ireland. The channel is the Channel 3 or Independent Television licensee for Northern Ireland and is operated by UTV Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of UTV Media.- Terrestrial :* Analogue: Normally tuned to 3 * Freeview : 3...

in Northern Ireland. Channel 5 transmits one analogue channel.

All the major analogue broadcasters provide additional channels on the free-to-air

Free-to-air

Freeview digital television service, and all of these channels can be accessed via a cable or satellite provider, such as Virgin Media

Virgin Media

Virgin Media Inc. is a company which provides fixed and mobile telephone, television and broadband internet services to businesses and consumers in the United Kingdom...

or BSkyB

British Sky Broadcasting

. The entire UK will switch to digital by 2012.

Internet

The Internet country code

Country code

Country codes are short alphabetic or numeric geographical codes developed to represent countries and dependent areas, for use in data processing and communications. Several different systems have been developed to do this. The best known of these is ISO 3166-1...

top-level domain

Top-level domain

A top-level domain is one of the domains at the highest level in the hierarchical Domain Name System of the Internet. The top-level domain names are installed in the root zone of the name space. For all domains in lower levels, it is the last part of the domain name, that is, the last label of a...

(ccTLD

Country code top-level domain

A country code top-level domain is an Internet top-level domain generally used or reserved for a country, a sovereign state, or a dependent territory....

) for Internet in the United Kingdom

Internet in the United Kingdom

The United Kingdom has been involved with the Internet since the latter's creation.The Internet country code top-level domain for the United Kingdom is .uk and is sponsored by Nominet....

is .uk

.uk

.uk is the Internet country code top-level domain for the United Kingdom. , it is the fourth most popular top-level domain worldwide , with over 9.5 million registrations....

. The most visited ".uk" websites are the British version of Google
Google
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...

followed by BBC Online.

Audiences

Media centres and organisations

Print

Newspapers

Magazines

Radio

Television

Internet

See also