Television in Porowon

Television arrived late to Porowon, through a mixture of government meddling and lack of infrastructure. Despite the late introduction of television, the Porowonian industry managed to grow very easily without the need of external help, thanks to a series of measures imposed by the government in the late 60s. The first broadcast was held on December 4, 1975.

All terrestrial television is controlled by the government through a state-run enterprise, MCP, created in 2018 following a restructuring of the former TCP/RCP, who in turn was the former PHK.

History

Prelaunch

Radio, the base for television, did not arrive to Porowon until 1941, when the Oriencian Empire annexed the country. During the war years, the THK Porowon station broadcast a mix of propaganda and cultural programs, all in Japanese. By the end of the war, when Orience surrendered, there were plans for the new government to dismantle the station, but listeners were used to the service, as a result the station was handed over to the new government.

On the other hand, the first known mention of television plans for Porowon dates back to 1965, when the government secretly initiated a plan to introduce television, with the help of the Reitannan Broadcasting Corporation. However the plan was denied and RBC settled on the Charisma Islands to build a local television station, whose broadcasts commenced in 1968, but were later suspended.

Taro Nishimoto, the so-called "minister mentor" of Porowon, thought that television was "a machine that corrupted the minds of the viewers with imported programming". However, by the time he got deposed in 1968 (to Northulia), an independent company sought after the establishment of a regular television channel. In the years that followed, successive governments modernized the country. A Television Task Board (TTB) wasn't set up until June 1972. This manifested into the private entity known as Porowon Television (PTV) in June 1973. With limited equipment and capability to broadcast one channel (in black and white), all was set for a launch in time for the 1974 World Cup.

1974-1994

PTV Channel 4 started broadcasting on January 13, 1974. The channel started at 7:30pm with a film about Porowon's plans for 1974, followed by imported cartoons and a news item at 8:20pm. Up until 8:30 that evening, programming was in English. There followed a local adaptation of an Oriencian kabuki that was plagued for its poor technical quality. By 9:45pm, the broadcast was in English again where a news reader was doing a news update, followed by a woman saying "I hope the second day will be better than the first", a reading of the programs and the national anthem. It is reported that on the first night, only twenty television sets, imported from Northulia (who was switching to color broadcasts by then) were made available to the general public. Televisions were a luxury item until 1980, with the bulk of its programming consisting largely of Sierran imports.

After the dictatorship returned in 1980, strict rules were imposed on all media services.

In 1985 an illegal UHF television station launched, reportely airing delayed recorded content from Television Great Scorria's two channels.

1994-2001

Another change to the government's structure in 1993 had effects on the broadcasting industry. The former PHK was dismembered into three separate broadcasting divisions: all radio stations were under the Radio Corporation of Porowon, mainstream television under the Television Corporation of Porowon and niche television under Porowon Channel Eleven. The TCP channels were restructured: Channel 4 was now in English, Channel 7 in Japanese and Channel 9 in Mandarin. Niche programming, as well as Porowonian and Bengali-language television, moved to Channel 11, whose primetime had to be in English. In the next year, Channel 11 was divided into an ethnic channel and a premium English channel, a contrast to the mainstream English Channel 4.

2005-2019

The shutdown of TVI brought Porowon its television monopoly back. This time the company was restructured as the Media Corporation of Porowon (MCP). Democratic policies managed to boost television production again, but following the start of censorship measures to foreign programming and the acceleration of censorship shortly before and during the Wangjia administration, television is losing its relevance. A number of signal intrusions in 2019, coupled by one of Wangjia's relatives on the killing spree in Kotaro, as well as comments against Muslims, had led to a very high sharp fall of television standards. MCP now produces one or two series a year, as many topics have since become taboo.

2019-present

A Porowonian-led attack in Kotaro has led to increased nationalist practices by the television channels of the MCP.

On September 1, 2019, Porotel's IPTV service became the only subscription television service in Porowon with a new, reduced channel lineup.

In January 2021, during the Eternal State of Emergency, the Porowonian government limited the number of channels to 4, 7 and 9. In August 2021, only Channel 4 was authorized to broadcast. Channel 7 is set to resume operations in 2022.

Channels

Currently all local television channels (except for in-house channels from Porotel) are owned by MCP.

• Channel 4 (English)
• Channel 7 (Japanese)
• Channel 9 (Mandarin)
• Akowara (Porowonian)
• Channel News Porowon (English)

Former channels

• Zone (English)
• Ekushey (Bengali; shut down due to ban on Islamic content and the Bengali language in general)
• Channel 7 (Japanese) (suspended)
• Channel 9 (Mandarin)
• Akowara (Porowonian) (suspended)
• Channel News Porowon (English)

Regulation

National television channels are subject to high moral regulations. Certain topics, including LGBT rights, references to meat, excessive violence, death, vice and somewhat more trivial topics are not allowed to be broadcast on television, and foreign content shown on MCP channels cuts out the supposedly "offending" material. In 2016, a len-dorama was put under fire by MCP's Channel 7 due to it censoring a lesbian couple's romance. Foreign channels broadcast on Porowonian pay-TV networks usually replace the offending content with slides saying "Due to legal restrictions, this scene is not allowed to be broadcast in Porowon".

These regulations were tightened even further in the 2010s. These have helped decrease the number of domestic television productions. Local actors say that these measures "exist for the sake of new policies and that make us unable to show our storylines to the public".

As of September 2019, the former international cable and satellite list was replaced by a new, shortlisted offer of Porotel-"sanitized" channels.

After 2019, sign language and subtitles, regardless of language, were banned.

Television commercials were banned in 2021.