Europe (general)

Despite convergence, the impact of new media, digitalisation of satellite and cable and integrationalist policies it is fair to say that TV in Europe is still largely national in character and outlook. Linguistic barriers play a not insubstantial part in continued cultural segregation (although many broadcasters target audiences in other nations via satellite), but beyond this there are some clearly-defined programming tendencies which amount to different paradigms or ‘models’, to which specific areas of Europe adhere.

American imports proliferate across the board nonetheless, whereas in-house cinematic product in most European countries rarely crosses national borders. Co-production finance is available from MEDIA incentives and schemes throughout Europe, but applications for funding have increased in number significantly in recent years, whilst national TV networks have become less experimental in programme choices due to a universal swing towards commercialisation in both private and public television. Put simply, the number of advertisers generally has not kept pace with the proliferation of new channels.

ARTE is the only pan-European channel of interest to eSCape tv, and even then it is only bilateral (French/German) and bilingual. Furthermore its audience and penetration are poor globally, due largely to its omission from many bouquets. BBC World, and BBC Prime and TV 5 may also be worth a look-in from our point of view, along with the Mag on Euronews.

Big Brother (and reality TV in general) are sparked by Endemol’s policy of exporting the format of a successful series in one country to the next, fine-tuning the new product package to suit local linguistic demands and cultural idiosyncrasies (cf. 3-2-1 to Un-Dos-Tres in the 80s).