Institution research

By Simisola Saraki

Channel 4• Channel 4 is a British public-service television

broadcaster which began working on 2November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA), the station is now owned and operated by the Channel Four Television Corporation, a public body established in 1990, coming into operation in 1993. With the conversion of the Wenvoe transmitter in Wales to digital on 31 March 2010, Channel 4 became a national TV channel for the first time.

• The channel was established to provide a fourth television service to the United Kingdom that would break the duopoly of the Television licence-funded BBC's two established services and the single commercial broadcasting network, ITV.

• Channel 4 enjoys almost universal coverage in the United Kingdom and some neighbouring countries and a significant audience share, despite having seen new competition with the growth of cable, satellite and digital services

Channel 4 programming • Channel 4 is a "publisher-broadcaster",

simply means that it commissions• or "buys" all of its programming from

companies independent of itself, and was the first broadcaster in the United Kingdom to do so on any significant scale. This had the consequence of starting an industry of production companies that did not have to rely on owning an ITV licence in order to see their programmes air, though since Channel 4, external commissioning has become regular practise on the numerous stations that have launched since, as well as on the BBC and in ITV (where a quota of 25% minimum of total output has been imposed since the 1990 Broadcasting Act came into force). Ironically, having been the first British broadcaster to completely commission its core product from third parties, and after 25 years in-house, Channel 4 will now become the last terrestrial broadcaster to outsource its transmission and payout operations (to Red Bee Media).

Televisions • Channel four has so

many TV channels such as 4od. 4music,channel 4 HD, box television, more 4 and many more