People's Television Network

People's Television Network, Inc. (PTNI / PTV Philippines) (Filipino: Telebisyon ng Bayan, abbreviated PTV) is the flagship government television network owned by the Philippine Government under the helm of the Presidential Communications Operations Office. Its head office, studios and transmitter are located at Broadcast Complex, Visayas Avenue, Barangay Vasra, Diliman, Quezon City.

History

The country's government television network began operations on February 2, 1974 as Government Television (GTV-4) through the National Media Production Center. The government channel was first headed by Lito Gorospe and later by the then-Press Secretary during the Marcos administration, Francisco Tatad.

It was renamed Maharlika Broadcasting System in 1980 under the leadership of NMPC Minister Gregorio Cendana, at the same time the network began broadcasting in full color, thus it was the last national network to transition to color broadcasting. By then, it began expanding with the opening of provincial stations nationwide, including 2 stations in Cebu and Bacolod who once owned by pre-martial law ABS-CBN.

Television network

A television network is a telecommunications network for distribution of television program content, whereby a central operation provides programming to many television stations or pay television providers. Until the mid-1980s, television programming in most countries of the world was dominated by a small number of broadcast networks. Many early television networks (such as the BBC, NBC or CBC) evolved from earlier radio networks.

Overview

In countries where most networks broadcast identical, centrally originated content to all of their stations and where most individual television transmitters therefore operate only as large "repeater stations", the terms "television network", "television channel" (a numeric identifier or radio frequency) and "television station" have become mostly interchangeable in everyday language, with professionals in television-related occupations continuing to make a differentiation between them. Within the industry, a tiering is sometimes created among groups of networks based on whether their programming is simultaneously originated from a central point, and whether the network master control has the technical and administrative capability to take over the programming of their affiliates in real-time when it deems this necessary – the most common example being during national breaking news events.

People's Television

People's Television (PTV) was a Thai satellite television station. It was established by former executives of the Thai Rak Thai party after the 2006 Thailand military coup overthrew the Thai Rak Thai-led government. It launched despite warnings from the Council for National Security, the military junta that seized power. PTV executives insisted that if ASTV (a satellite television station run by anti-Thai Rak Thai activist and media tycoon Sondhi Limthongkul) could operate, then so could PTV.

PTV's inaugural broadcast on 1 March 2007 was stopped because of CAT Telecom's refusal to grant an internet link from Bangkok to a satellite up-link station in Hong Kong. CAT Telecom claimed that it never received PTV's application for internet access. PTV executives claimed that CAT Chairman and junta leader Saprang Kalayanamitr was preventing it from broadcasting for political reasons.

PTV executives led several public protests against the junta's censorship. In a demonstration on 23 March 2007 attended by 1,500-3,000 protestors, thousands of police in riot gear attempted to disperse the protest. The protests caused the junta to request that the government declare emergency rule in Bangkok.