1.
China Central Television
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China Central Television, commonly abbreviated as CCTV, is the predominant state television broadcaster in the Peoples Republic of China. CCTV has a network of 50 channels broadcasting different programmes and is accessible to more than one billion viewers. Most of its programmes are a mixture of news, documentary, social education, comedy, entertainment, and drama, as of present, there are 50 television channels, and the broadcaster provides programming in six different languages. CCTV broadcast its first program on 2 September 1958, due to increasing demands, it soon launched its second channel in 1963 and third channel in 1969, followed by the first simultaneous satellite broadcasts nationwide in 1972. The network changed its name to CCTV on 1 May 1978, until the late 1970s, CCTV held only evening broadcasts, usually closing down at midnight. During the summer and winter vacations, it occasionally transmitted daytime programming for students. In 1980 CCTV experimented with news relays from local and central television studios via microwave, by 1985, CCTV had already become a leading television network in China. In 1987 CCTVs popularity soared due to the adaptation and presentation of Dream of the Red Chamber, the 36-episode TV series—the first Chinese television drama to enter the global market— still remains popular in the international market. In the same year, CCTV exported 10,216 programmes to 77 foreign television stations, initially, the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China Central Committee issued directive censorship of programs. During reform in the 1990s, the Party adopted new standards for CCTV, affordability and acceptability, on 2 September 2008 the new CCTV Headquarters was opened on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of CCTV. In July 2009 CCTV expanded its coverage and target audience by launching CCTV-العربية, today, CCTV has 24 channels, most of them airing 24 hours a day. On 17 June 2013, CCTV announced General channel, News channel, China Central Television falls under the supervision of the State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television which is in turn subordinate to the State Council of the Peoples Republic of China. A Vice Minister of the council serves as chairman of CCTV. The organisation has relationships with television stations run by local governments. The organization is considered one of the big three outlets in China, along with the Peoples Daily and Xinhua. In 2011, former newspaper editor Hu Zhanfan was appointed the head of CCTV, in 2015, Nie Chenxi was appointed the new head of CCTV. China Network Television is a broadcaster of China Central Television which launched on 28 December 2009. CNTV offers six foreign languages services, including English, French, Spanish, Russian, Korean, from 1979 to 2001, the CCTV logo consisted of two crossing ellipses, and was designed by Zhang Desheng, a former CCTV employee
2.
576i
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576i is a standard-definition video mode originally used for broadcast television in most countries of the world where the utility frequency for electric power distribution is 50 Hz. Because of its association with the colour encoding system, it is often referred to as simply PAL, PAL/SECAM or SECAM when compared to its 60 Hz NTSC-colour-encoded counterpart. The 576 identifies a vertical resolution of 576 lines, and the i identifies it as an interlaced resolution and its basic parameters common to both analogue and digital implementations are,576 scan lines or vertical pixels of picture content,25 frames per second. Digital information not to be displayed as part of the image can be transmitted in the lines, teletext and other services. Analogue television signals have no pixels, they are rastered in scan lines, in digital applications, the number of pixels per line is an arbitrary choice as long as it fulfils the sampling theorem. Values above about 500 pixels per line are enough for conventional broadcast television, DVB-T, DVD and DV allow better values such as 704 or 720. The video format can be transported by major digital television formats, ATSC, DVB and ISDB, and on DVD, when 576i video is transmitted via baseband, most of the differences between the one-letter systems are no longer significant, other than vertical resolution and frame rate. Digital video uses its own separate space, so even the minor colour space differences between PAL and SECAM become moot in the digital domain. When 576i is used to transmit content that was composed of 25 full progressive frames per second. This is the opposite of NTSC, motion pictures are typically shot on film at 24 frames per second. When telecined and played back at PALs standard of 25 frames per second and this also applies to most TV series that are shot on film or digital 24p. Depending on the system in use, it also slightly increases the pitch of the soundtrack by 70.67 cents. More recently, digital conversion methods have used algorithms which preserve the pitch of the soundtrack. Conversion methods exist that can convert 24 frames per second video to 25 frames per second with no speed increase, however image quality suffers when conversions of this type are used. This method is most commonly employed through conversions done digitally, and is employed in situations where the importance of preserving the speed of the video outweighs the need for image quality. Many movie enthusiasts prefer PAL over NTSC despite the formers speed-up, because the results in telecine judder. States the majority of authorities on the subject favour PAL over NTSC for DVD playback quality, also DVD reviewers often make mention of this cause. For example, in his PAL vs. NTSC article, the founder of MichaelDVD says, Personally, I find all but intolerable and find it very hard to watch a movie on an NTSC DVD because of it
3.
1080i
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1080i is an abbreviation referring to a combination of frame resolution and scan type, used in high-definition television and high-definition video. The number 1080 refers to the number of lines on the screen. The term assumes a widescreen ratio of 16,9, so the 1080 lines of vertical resolution implies 1920 columns of horizontal resolution. A1920 pixels ×1080 lines screen has a total of 2.1 megapixels and this format is used in the SMPTE 292M standard. The choice of 1080 lines originates with Charles Poynton, who in the early 1990s pushed for square pixels to be used in HD video formats, within the designation 1080i, the i stands for interlaced scan. A frame of 1080i video consists of two fields of 1920 horizontal and 540 vertical pixels. The first field consists of all odd-numbered TV lines and the second all even numbered lines, 1080i differs from 1080p, where the p stands for progressive scan, where all lines in a frame are captured at the same time. In native or pure 1080i, the two fields of a frame correspond to different instants, so motion portrayal is good and this is true for interlaced video in general and can be easily observed in still images taken of fast motion scenes. However, when 1080p material is captured at 25 or 30 frames/second, it is converted to 1080i at 50 or 60 fields/second, respectively, in this situation both fields in a frame do correspond to the same instant. The field-to-instant relation is more complex for the case of 1080p at 24 frames/second converted to 1080i at 60 fields/second. Both field rates can be carried by digital television broadcast formats such as ATSC, DVB. The frame rate can be implied by the context, while the rate is generally specified after the letter i. In this case 1080i60 refers to 60 fields per second, the European Broadcasting Union prefers to use the resolution and frame rate separated by a slash, as in 1080i/30 and 1080i/25, likewise 480i/30 and 576i/25. Resolutions of 1080i60 or 1080i50 often refers to 1080i/30 or 1080i/25 in EBU notation, 1080i is directly compatible with some CRT HDTVs on which it can be displayed natively in interlaced form, but for display on progressive-scan—e. g. Most new LCD and plasma TVs, it must be deinterlaced, depending on the televisions video processing capabilities, the resulting video quality may vary, but may not necessarily suffer. For example, film material at 25fps may be deinterlaced from 1080i50 to restore a full 1080p resolution at the frame rate without any loss. Preferably video material with 50 or 60 motion phases/second is to be converted to 50p or 60p before display, worldwide, most HD channels on satellite and cable broadcast in 1080i. This also allows local newscasts on these ABC affiliates to be produced in the resolution to match the picture quality of their 1080i competitors
4.
Chinese language
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Chinese is a group of related, but in many cases mutually unintelligible, language varieties, forming a branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family. Chinese is spoken by the Han majority and many ethnic groups in China. Nearly 1.2 billion people speak some form of Chinese as their first language, the varieties of Chinese are usually described by native speakers as dialects of a single Chinese language, but linguists note that they are as diverse as a language family. The internal diversity of Chinese has been likened to that of the Romance languages, There are between 7 and 13 main regional groups of Chinese, of which the most spoken by far is Mandarin, followed by Wu, Min, and Yue. Most of these groups are mutually unintelligible, although some, like Xiang and certain Southwest Mandarin dialects, may share common terms, all varieties of Chinese are tonal and analytic. Standard Chinese is a form of spoken Chinese based on the Beijing dialect of Mandarin. It is the language of China and Taiwan, as well as one of four official languages of Singapore. It is one of the six languages of the United Nations. The written form of the language, based on the logograms known as Chinese characters, is shared by literate speakers of otherwise unintelligible dialects. Of the other varieties of Chinese, Cantonese is the spoken language and official in Hong Kong and Macau. It is also influential in Guangdong province and much of Guangxi, dialects of Southern Min, part of the Min group, are widely spoken in southern Fujian, with notable variants also spoken in neighboring Taiwan and in Southeast Asia. Hakka also has a diaspora in Taiwan and southeast Asia. Shanghainese and other Wu varieties are prominent in the lower Yangtze region of eastern China, Chinese can be traced back to a hypothetical Sino-Tibetan proto-language. The first written records appeared over 3,000 years ago during the Shang dynasty, as the language evolved over this period, the various local varieties became mutually unintelligible. In reaction, central governments have sought to promulgate a unified standard. Difficulties have included the great diversity of the languages, the lack of inflection in many of them, in addition, many of the smaller languages are spoken in mountainous areas that are difficult to reach, and are often also sensitive border zones. Without a secure reconstruction of proto-Sino-Tibetan, the structure of the family remains unclear. A top-level branching into Chinese and Tibeto-Burman languages is often assumed, the earliest examples of Chinese are divinatory inscriptions on oracle bones from around 1250 BCE in the late Shang dynasty
5.
Beijing
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Beijing is the capital of the Peoples Republic of China and the worlds third most populous city proper. It is also one of the worlds most populous capital cities, the city, located in northern China, is governed as a direct-controlled municipality under the national government with 16 urban, suburban, and rural districts. Beijing is the second largest Chinese city by population after Shanghai and is the nations political, cultural. It is home to the headquarters of most of Chinas largest state-owned companies, and is a hub for the national highway, expressway, railway. The citys history dates back three millennia, as the last of the Four Great Ancient Capitals of China, Beijing has been the political centre of the country for much of the past eight centuries. Beijing was the largest city in the world by population for much of the second millennium A. D, the city is renowned for its opulent palaces, temples, parks, gardens, tombs, walls and gates. Its art treasures and universities have made it centre of culture, encyclopædia Britannica notes that few cities in the world have served for so long as the political headquarters and cultural centre of an area as immense as China. Siheyuans, the traditional housing style, and hutongs, the narrow alleys between siheyuans, are major tourist attractions and are common in urban Beijing. The city hosted the 2008 Summer Olympics and was chosen to host the 2022 Winter Olympics, many of Beijings 91 universities consistently rank among the best in China, of which Peking University and Tsinghua University are ranked in the top 60 universities in the world. Beijings Zhongguancun area is known as Chinas Silicon Valley and Chinas center of innovation. According to the 2016 InterNations Expat Insider Survey, Beijing ranked first in Asia in the subcategory Personal Finance Index, expats live primarily in urban districts such as Dongcheng and Chaoyang in the east, or in suburban districts such as Shunyi. Over the past 3,000 years, the city of Beijing has had other names. The name Beijing, which means Northern Capital, was applied to the city in 1403 during the Ming Dynasty to distinguish the city from Nanjing, the English spelling is based on the pinyin romanisation of the two characters as they are pronounced in Standard Mandarin. Those dialects preserve the Middle Chinese pronunciation of 京 as kjaeng, the single Chinese character abbreviation for Beijing is 京, which appears on automobile license plates in the city. The official Latin alphabet abbreviation for Beijing is BJ, the earliest traces of human habitation in the Beijing municipality were found in the caves of Dragon Bone Hill near the village of Zhoukoudian in Fangshan District, where Peking Man lived. Homo erectus fossils from the date to 230,000 to 250,000 years ago. Paleolithic Homo sapiens also lived more recently, about 27,000 years ago. Archaeologists have found neolithic settlements throughout the municipality, including in Wangfujing, the first walled city in Beijing was Ji, a city from the 11th to 7th century BC
6.
China
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China, officially the Peoples Republic of China, is a unitary sovereign state in East Asia and the worlds most populous country, with a population of over 1.381 billion. The state is governed by the Communist Party of China and its capital is Beijing, the countrys major urban areas include Shanghai, Guangzhou, Beijing, Chongqing, Shenzhen, Tianjin and Hong Kong. China is a power and a major regional power within Asia. Chinas landscape is vast and diverse, ranging from forest steppes, the Himalaya, Karakoram, Pamir and Tian Shan mountain ranges separate China from much of South and Central Asia. The Yangtze and Yellow Rivers, the third and sixth longest in the world, respectively, Chinas coastline along the Pacific Ocean is 14,500 kilometers long and is bounded by the Bohai, Yellow, East China and South China seas. China emerged as one of the worlds earliest civilizations in the basin of the Yellow River in the North China Plain. For millennia, Chinas political system was based on hereditary monarchies known as dynasties, in 1912, the Republic of China replaced the last dynasty and ruled the Chinese mainland until 1949, when it was defeated by the communist Peoples Liberation Army in the Chinese Civil War. The Communist Party established the Peoples Republic of China in Beijing on 1 October 1949, both the ROC and PRC continue to claim to be the legitimate government of all China, though the latter has more recognition in the world and controls more territory. China had the largest economy in the world for much of the last two years, during which it has seen cycles of prosperity and decline. Since the introduction of reforms in 1978, China has become one of the worlds fastest-growing major economies. As of 2016, it is the worlds second-largest economy by nominal GDP, China is also the worlds largest exporter and second-largest importer of goods. China is a nuclear weapons state and has the worlds largest standing army. The PRC is a member of the United Nations, as it replaced the ROC as a permanent member of the U. N. Security Council in 1971. China is also a member of numerous formal and informal multilateral organizations, including the WTO, APEC, BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the BCIM, the English name China is first attested in Richard Edens 1555 translation of the 1516 journal of the Portuguese explorer Duarte Barbosa. The demonym, that is, the name for the people, Portuguese China is thought to derive from Persian Chīn, and perhaps ultimately from Sanskrit Cīna. Cīna was first used in early Hindu scripture, including the Mahābhārata, there are, however, other suggestions for the derivation of China. The official name of the state is the Peoples Republic of China. The shorter form is China Zhōngguó, from zhōng and guó and it was then applied to the area around Luoyi during the Eastern Zhou and then to Chinas Central Plain before being used as an occasional synonym for the state under the Qing
7.
Freeview (UK)
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Freeview is the United Kingdoms digital terrestrial television platform. It is operated by DTV Services Ltd, a joint venture between the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Sky and transmitter operator Arqiva, the service provides consumer access via an aerial to the six DTT multiplexes covering the United Kingdom. In April 2014 it had some 60 DVB-T TV channels,26 digital radio channels,10 HD channels, six services,11 streamed channels. A number of new HD channels launched in 2014, from a new group of multiplexes awarded to Arqiva, the new HD channels were launched in selected areas on 10 December 2013 with a further roll-out during 2014. DTV Services delivery of television and radio is labelled Freeview. Reception of Freeview requires a Freeview tuner, either in a separate box or built into the TV set. Since 2008 all new TV sets sold in the United Kingdom have a built-in Freeview tuner, Freeview HD requires a HDTV-capable tuner. Digital video recorders with a built-in Freeview tuner are labelled Freeview+, depending on model, DVRs and HDTV sets with a Freeview tuner may offer standard Freeview or Freeview HD. DMOL, a company owned by the operators of the six DTT multiplexes is responsible for platform management and policy, including the electronic programme guide. The founding members of DTV Services, who trade as Freeview, were the BBC, Crown Castle UK, on 11 October 2006, ITV plc and Channel 4 became equal shareholders. Since then, the Freeview model has been copied in Australia, with the launch of Freeview other channels were broadcast free-to-air, such as, Sky Travel, UK History, Sky News, Sky Sports News, The Hits and TMF were available from the start. BBC Four and the interactive BBC streams were moved to multiplex B, under the initial plans, the two multiplexes operated by Crown Castle would carry eight channels altogether. The seventh stream became shared by UK Bright Ideas and Ftn which launched in February 2003, the eighth stream was left unused until April 2004 when the shopping channel Ideal World launched on Freeview. There are now 14 streams carried by the two multiplexes, with Multiplex C carrying 6 streams, and Multiplex D carrying 8 and it has recently been announced that more streams are now available on the multiplexes, and that bidding is under way. The Freeview service underwent an upgrade on 30 September 2009. The changes, meant to ensure reception of Channel 5. The Freeview website crashed and the centre was inundated as a result of the problems. The change involved an update to the NIT, which some receivers could not accommodate, many thousands of people could not receive some channels
8.
Jadeworld (Australia)
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Jadeworld is a broadcasting station based in Sydney, Australia that caters for the Chinese community in Australia. It currently consists of 14 channels, with many programs relayed from TVB operations in Hong Kong, the addition of Dragon TV, Hunan TV, Chonqing TV and Phoenix TV in 2006-07 caters for subscribers of Mainland descent. Jadeworld offered an IPPV service to subscribers after an upgrade in 2001. Movies from Hong Kong were streamed in a box-office style interface in a timetabled fashion daily, the variety of movies offered by the IPPV system were limited, and unpopularity with the subscribers led to it being shut down a few months later
9.
Sky Italia
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Sky Italia is an Italian digital satellite television platform owned by Sky plc. It is similar in ways to Sky in the United Kingdom and Sky Ireland in Ireland, which is partly owned by 21st Century Fox. Pay TV services on Sky Italia are encrypted in NDS VideoGuard, the VideoGuard set-top boxes that have been provided since July 2010 are identical to the Sky+ HD boxes used in the UK. Sky Italia was founded in July 2003 by the merger of TELE+, since July 2010 Sky Italia has been giving the Sky Digital Key and the My Sky HD box for free to every new customer. The My Sky boxes launched on 22 November 2005 - based on a new digital receiver with HDD recording capabilities, subsequently, the My Sky HD boxes were added. The My Sky HD service had provided with an extra charge until July 2010. The service is identical to the BSkyB Sky+ HD. On 28 June 2010, Sky Italia changed its brands and logos, Sky Italia offers eight packages of channels, five base-level Channel Packs and three optional Sky Packs enhancements. Sky Primafila has got some similarities to BSkyBs Sky Movies Box Office, the HD service has been offered without any extra charge since 2009. There are 37 HDTV channels so far broadcasting on Sky, due to become 50 by the end of 2011, on 1 October 2010, Sky activated its first 3D channel, Sky Sport 3D, available without any extra cost to the Sport pack subscribers. The very first event Sky Sport 3D aired was the 2010 Ryder Cup, on 25 December 2010, Sky launched another 3D channel, Sky Cinema 3D, airing 3D movies, available for free for Cinema pack subscribers. These channel have been replaced by Sky 3D on 6 September 2011, on many channels, foreign-sourced content is broadcast either with an option to choose between Italian and English language soundtracks, or with Italian subtitles. Sky Italia uses the Hot Bird 6/8/9 satellites at 13. 0°E, Tom Mockridge, the then head of Sky Italia replaced Rebekah Brooks as chief executive of News International after she had resigned on 15 July 2011. Andrea Zappia replaced Tom Mockridge as CEO on 1 August 2011, on 7 October 2011 Sky Italia announced it reached the 5 million subscribers benchmark. The enlarged company would be likely to be called Sky Europe, the sale was announced on 25 July 2014 which was subject to regulatory and shareholder approval. The acquisition was completed on 13 November, March, the European Commission approves the merger between TELE+ and Stream TV. 31 July, Sky Italia is founded, April, Sky Italia abandons SECA encryption system to switch to the NDS, managed by the News Corporation. November, Skys subscribers reach 3 million, may, Sky Italia are awarded the broadcast rights to the 2006 FIFA World Cup
10.
Astro (television)
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All-Asian Satellite Television and Radio Operator is a Malaysian direct broadcast satellite Pay TV service. Astro was granted a license as a sole Pay TV provider by the Malaysia federal government until 2022. Until then, it will be the only DBS provider in Malaysia and its only with their allies is HyppTV, a IPTV service by TM who carry their 5 Astro channels. As of September 2014, astro provided services to four million subscribers. Astro is an owned subsidiary of Astro All Asia Networks plc. Bhd. Astro launched the first High Definition broadcast in Malaysia in December 2009 under the brand Astro B. yond. Following the launch of HD, Astro B. yond PVR was introduced in June 2010 and Astro B. yond IPTV in April 2011 followed by Over-The-Top service, on 18 February 2012, Astro introduced NJOI as an entry-level DTH satellite TV service. It is the first non-subscription-based satellite TV, as of February 2015, NJOI has 24 SDTV channels,5 HDTV channels and all radio channels. Tan Sri Ananda Krishnan, was issued a license in 1995 to operate MEASAT, MEASAT in turn launched ASTRO, Malaysia’s digital direct broadcast satellite service. He is estimated to have a net worth of over US$7.4 billion, Malaysia’s privately owned FM stations exhibit similar ownership patterns as television, and is largely controlled by Ananda Krishnan. Five of the seven stations are owned by Airtime Management and Programming Sdn, Bhd. AMP additionally operates four “FM” services that are available only via digital direct broadcast satellite. AMP is also a division of Krishnan’s ASTRO, not forgetting that Ananda Krishnan also has control over the telecommunication company Binariang Bhd. that owns two satellites Measat-1, Measat-2 and now Maxis Communications Berhad. Astro utilises 11 high powered Ku-band transponders on MEASAT-3 and 6 high powered Ku-band transponders on MEASAT-3A to transmit its signal across Malaysia, MEASAT-3 and MEASAT-3A are owned by MEASAT Satellite Systems Sdn Bhd, a subsidiary of MEASAT Global. Astro and MEASAT Global are related parties, MEASAT-3 was launched into orbit in Dec 2006 at 91.5 degrees east, entered commercial service on 1 February 2007 and has a design lifetime of 15 years. MEASAT-3A, which also has a lifetime of 15 years. Both satellites are controlled from the Measat Teleport and Broadcast Centre located in Cyberjaya, a backup satellite control facility is located at the All Asia Broadcast Centre. On 1 January 2003, Astro Showcase was launched as a channel showcasing Southeast Asian movies. The following year, Season Pass was launched, showing games and these two have now became pay-per-view channels under the Astro Box Office name and new logo was launched, the uppercase Philips ASTRO was changed to the lowercase astro
11.
DStv
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DStv has around 8 million subscribers, with the majority being in South Africa and Nigeria. 1986, Pay-television came to South Africa when an analogue, single-channel service, for almost seven years, all M-Nets operations were handled by a single company. 1993, Naspers created a company, Multichoice, which was to handle the business arm of M-Net, such as decoder sales, subscriber services. 1995, Multichoice announced that it was launching a new digital, satellite service in South Africa and, on 6 October 1995,2000, Launch of W4 Eutelsat satellite with Ku-band services to sub-Saharan Africa and the Indian Ocean Islands. 2001, Launch of Indian and Portuguese bouquet,2005, The DStv PVR decoder and DStv Compact is launched. DStv Premium subscribers in South Africa cross the 1 million mark,2006, MultiChoice launches BBBEE Share Scheme, Phuthuma Nathi. 2007, Channel Shuffle on 1 October, moving channels around to 3-digit numbers,2007, Launch of DStv Select and of entry bouquet DStv EasyView. 2008, Launch of DStvs first High Definition decoder the HD PVR, XtraView,2009, HD channels - SuperSport 1 HD, Discovery HD Showcase are launched. 2010, DVB over IP and DStv on Demand service launched, as well as the HD PVR 2P,2011, DStv BoxOffice & DStv Mobile launched. 2011, GOtv, a new pay television offering on digital terrestrial television platforms is established in a number of countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. It also launched a new DStv Family bouquet 2013, DStv subscribers across Africa reach 6.7 million,2014, The new channels, Lifetime, Nicktoons, Nick Junior, Vuzu Amp, M-Net Edge and Glow are launched. BBC Earth HD replacing BBC Knowledge channel 184 and will be available on DStv Premium on 1 September, BBC First as a new channel 119 on DStv Premium on 18 October. Alongside BBC World News and the new additions to DStv Compact BBC Lifestyle,2015, Popular Christian station Emmanuel TV launches on DStv. 2015-2016, The launch of ID Xtra on DStv from 5 January 2016 to replace Investigation Discovery,2016, TBN launches on DStv replacing Rhema tv from 4 March. M-net Movies stars was renamed M-Net Movies All Stars. M-Net Movies Action and M-Net City began broadcast in HD. CBS Drama and CBS Action stopped airing on 20 October, while AMC and True Movies 1 will stop airing on the 11 and 12th of November respectively. DStv MobileX DStv Mobile DVBH and Bomba DStv 20th Century Fox generations DStv has a range of decoders manufactured by Altech UEC, the latest decoders allow subscribers to use XtraView. This allows a subscriber to link two decoders under a subscription fee, to increase the viewing environments. The Standard Decoder is DStv’s entry level HD single view decoder and it has XtraView capability, where it can be linked to itself, the HD PVR or the HD EXPLORA
12.
TrueVisions
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TrueVisions is Thailands leading cable satellite television operator. Now owned by the True Corporation, the company was known as the United Broadcasting Corporation and also known as UBC-True. International Broadcasting Corporation was the first national cable TV provider established in 1989 by Thaksin Shinawatra, after having granted a 20-years concession to provide subscription television service by MCOT, IBC began broadcasting its programmes via super high frequency microwave using MMDS. Its first DTH service began in 1995 after their request for expansion was approved. In 1997, South African-Dutch company, MIH Limited bought 16% stake in IBC, iBC’s content mostly came from other countries such as HBO, CNN and ESPN. UTV began providing its CATV service in Bangkok Metropolitan Areas in September 1995, the service was offered on its high quality hybrid fiber coaxial network which began deploying in 1994. The cable technology allowed a number of channels to be offered, with high quality sound and picture, by 1997 hybrid fiber coaxial cable network passed an estimated 800,000 homes. In 1997 UTV sold the infrastructure component of its business to its sister company Asia Multimedia Company Limited. This allowed UTV to focus on content and subscriber management service delivery, due to an economic crisis since 1997, in February 1998, IBC signed a merger with UTV to form United Broadcasting Corporation in order to survive the crisis by decreased the operation costs. In November 2005, True Corporation announced it would take over UBC plc. It will buy 30. 59% stake from MIH Holdings and launch an offer for the 221 million shares outstanding at 26.5 baht per share. In April 2006, UBC has rebranded to UBC-True following the take over completion, UBC was delisted from SET on 11 April 2006. On April 2,2006, UBC-True announced that it was launching the documentary channels Explore 1, Explore 2, UBC-True also announced the entertainment channels, G-Square and UBC Preview, followed by two music channels, Majung TV and True Music. On 24 January 2007, UBC-True was rebranded as TrueVisions, also known as TrueVisions UBC along with an announcement of its rights to Premier League. After a long fight on piracy, TrueVisions switched its content encryption system to VideoGuard on 12 July 2012 and it also upgrade its video encryption from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4 which can be used with a new HD set-top box which was launched in October 2011. Premier League has been the one of its content for years until it lost the rights to the newcomer, CTH. TrueVisions airs 6 beIN Sports channels after completed a negotiation with the Qatar-based sport network, regular programming was gradually returned to the channels over the course of the next several weeks. On 1 April 2013, TrueVisions dropped Star World along with Channel M from its platform and this was because Fox International Channels no longer offered them on an exclusivity basis
13.
DirecTV
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DirecTV is an American direct broadcast satellite service provider based in El Segundo, California and is a subsidiary of AT&T. Its satellite service, launched on June 17,1994, transmits digital television and audio to households in the United States, Latin America. Its primary competitors are Dish Network and cable television providers, DirecTV provides television and audio services to subscribers through satellite transmissions. Services include the equivalent of local television stations, broadcast television networks, subscription television services, satellite radio services. Subscribers have access to hundreds of channels, so its competitors are cable television service, most subscribers use reception antennas which are much smaller than the first generation antennas, which were typically a few yards across. Advances in antenna technology, including fractal antennas, have allowed a reduction in antenna size across all industries. Receiving equipment includes a dish, an integrated receiver/decoder and a DirecTV access card. Consumers who purchase DirecTV subscribe to various packages of DirecTV programming for which the subscriber pays a monthly fee, additional monthly fees may include a protection plan, DVR, additional receivers, HD channels, and other premium channel packages. A subscriber also can order pay-per-view and video on demand events, all programming distributed by DirecTV is delivered to its broadcast centers in Castle Rock, Colorado, and Los Angeles, where it is then digitized and compressed. The resulting signal is encrypted by DirecTV to prevent its unauthorized reception, DirecTV then transmits these signals to several satellites located in geostationary orbit. As of the quarter ended September 30,2012, DirecTV U. S. had 19.981 million subscribers, for the same period, DirecTV Latin America ended with 9.666 million subscribers and revenues of US$1.577 billion. In addition to serving residences, DirecTV offers service to bars, restaurants, hotels, dorms, the company also offered mobile service for cars, boats, and RVs as well as aircraft in cooperation with Connexion by Boeing. On November 30,2016, DirecTV Now, an internet streaming TV service was launched, in 1953, Howard Hughes created the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, to which he transferred full ownership of Hughes Aircraft. Ostensibly created as a medical research foundation, HHMI was accused of being used by Hughes as a tax shelter. Following Hughes death in 1976, HHMI was incorporated in 1977, in 1984, the court appointed a new board for HHMI, which proceeded to sell off Hughes Aircraft to General Motors on December 20,1985, for an estimated $5.1 billion. General Motors then merged Hughes Aircraft with its subsidiary Delco Electronics to create Hughes Electronics Corporation, the new subsidiary was initially composed of four units, Delco Electronics Company, Hughes Aircraft Company, Hughes Space and Communications Company, and Hughes Network Systems. Stanley E. Hubbard founded United States Satellite Broadcasting in 1981 and was a proponent for the development of direct-broadcast satellite service in the United States. USSB was awarded five frequencies by the FCC, at the coveted 101 degree west satellite location, Hughes Communications, Inc. was also awarded 27 frequencies at the same 101-degree location
14.
Dish Network
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Dish Network is an American direct-broadcast satellite service provider. The company provides satellite television, satellite Internet access, audio programming, as of November 2016, the company provided services to 13.7 million television and 580,000 broadband subscribers. The company has approximately 16,000 employees, the company is headquartered in Meridian, Colorado, though the postal designation of nearby Englewood, Colorado is used in the corporate mailing address. In January 2008, Dish Network was spun off from its parent company EchoStar. The company began using Dish Network as its brand in March 1997, after the successful launch of its first satellite, EchoStar I. That launch marked the beginning of its television services, and EchoStar has since launched numerous satellites. EchoStar continues to be the technology partner to Dish Network. Joseph Clayton became president and chief officer of the company in June 2011. Clayton remained in the position until March 31,2015 when he retired leaving Ergen to resume the post, Dishs main service is satellite television. Its offerings are similar to satellite and cable companies. Viewers can choose from a series of bundles, paying more money for more channels. A la carte programming is available, however limited other than Premium channels, the company is currently working on diversifying its offerings. With its purchase of Blockbuster LLC, it now owns the Blockbuster trademarks and has used its intellectual property agreement to offer streaming, Dish Anywhere is Dishs subscriber-only streaming video service, which includes HBO and Cinemax programming. In May 2012, the American Customer Satisfaction Index ranked Dish second among American television providers and it weighs ten pounds, is protected from weather, and automatically searches for a signal. The only satellites that are compatible with the Tailgater are at Dishs 119,110. In March 2012, Dish began offering a video recorder called Dish Hopper that can automatically record all prime time programming on the four major television networks. The other half is for video on demand, a Hopper feature, called AutoHop, enables customers to view these programs without commercials, subject to time restrictions. AutoHop has attracted enthusiasts, critics, boycotts and legal action, at the 2013 Consumer Electronics Show Dish won an award for their AutoHop feature on the Hopper
15.
Cignal
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Cignal is a subscription-based Direct-To-Home satellite television service provider in the Philippines. Cignal is owned by Cignal TV Inc. a wholly owned subsidiary of the MediaQuest Holdings Inc. under the PLDT Beneficial Trust Fund, for subscribers to receive Cignal broadcasts, they must acquire upon subscription the satellite dish antenna, remote control, and the set top box. Cignal’s prepaid electronic loading system, is powered by the loading platform of Smart Communications. Cignal uses VideoGuard encryption system to protect its content from signal piracy, Cignal TV is utilizing the SES-7 satellite to provide optimal coverage directly to the target markets. As of September 2015, Cignal reached the 1,000,000 subscribers base target, Cignal HD Spikers Cignal HD Hawkeyes
16.
Kristal-Astro
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Kristal-Astro is the sole operator of Bruneis multi-channel pay-TV service. It was officially launched on 24 January 2000, the company is a joint-venture between Kristal Sdn Bhd and Malaysias Astro Television Network System Sendirian Berhad a subsidiary of Astro Malaysia Holdings Sdn Bhd. All channels are customised to ensure that all programmes adhere to Bruneis religious, subscribers will also have access to pay-per-view services, as well as a wide range of interactive services, such as home banking, home shopping and distance learning. Subscribers receive the service using the state-of-the-art Digital Multimedia System. The operations of Kristal-Astro are backed by DST Groups expertise in the areas of marketing, sales, information technology, notes, ^ Radio Televisyen Brunei is a 2-Bruneis state-owned public broadcaster free-to-air terrestrial television stations such, RTB1 and RTB2. ^ Radio Televisyen Malaysia is a 2-Malaysians state-owned public broadcaster free-to-air terrestrial television stations such, TV1 and this package contains all channels from the Gold package and the following channels. These are additional pay-per-view channels for premium contents sold as packages, wakuWaku Japan HD HGTV HD STAR Chinese Channel Nat Geo People HD KEY, Indicates availability as terrestrial FM radio. Astro Malaysia Kristal Astro official website Astro All Asia Networks plc official website Astro service website
17.
Astro NJOI
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Astro NJOI is a Malaysia free satellite television service launched on 18 February 2012 in collaboration with the government of Malaysia and Astro. It was officially announced by Prime Minister of Malaysia, Najib Razak on 20 December 2011, at launch, the service provided 18 television channels and 19 radio stations. However, existing Astro customers may purchase this service through separate account, in mid-2013, the one-time payment was reduced to RM280, and installation remains at RM100. The platform uses prepaid card method where one can pay for the day, the decoders HDMI output is locked out and this leaves users with composite signal and component video output. However, certain decoders with updated firmware are able to use the HDMI output, NJOI launched of its first HD channel, channel 300, on 1 February 2015. In 2016, the retail price has been set at RM285. RM350 would be the new price from 1 February 2017, as told by an insider, njois main competitor would be antenna based DTT service, MYTV. This colour box is for NJOI customers who have HD Decoder to watch HD channels and is not available for NJOI who still using normal Decoder. This colour box is for NJOI customers who have HD Decoder to watch HD channels and is not available for NJOI who still using normal Decoder
18.
Rogers Cable
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In 1980, Rogers purchased Premier Cable, which controlled the system in Vancouver, parts of Ontario, and had investments in Irish cable companies in Dublin, Galway and Waterford. In 1986 Rogers sold their shares of Irish companies to the Irish state broadcaster and state telecoms company, these cable companies are now part of the UPC Ireland network. In 1981, Rogers entered the U. S. cable market, obtaining franchises in Orange County, California, Minneapolis, and Portland, Oregon, and purchased the cable system in San Antonio. These assets were acquired by Paragon Cable in 1989 for over US$1 billion, Paragon in turn was acquired by Time Warner Cable several years later. Rogers continued to buy other operators, the largest such acquisition came with Rogers 1994 acquisition of Maclean-Hunter, through its acquisition of Maclean-Hunter, Rogers has also briefly owned cable systems in the United States, which it promptly sold to Comcast in 1994. In March 2000, Rogers agreed to swap systems with Shaw Communications, exchanging its systems in British Columbia for Shaw systems in Quebec, the deals gave Rogers and Shaw more consistent service footprints in Eastern and Western Canada respectively. In 2008, Rogers announced an offer for Aurora Cable. Shaw argued that the agreement violated unfair competition laws, the suit was quickly thrown out by the Ontario Superior Court, arguing that the non-compete agreement limited competition, and that Rogers claims of future harm were speculative in the extreme. The sale would go through. In January 2013, as part of an exchange of assets between the two companies, Shaw pulled out of Hamilton and sold the Mountain Cablevision business to Rogers. In October 2015, Rogers announced that it would begin to offer 4K-compatible set-top boxes, beginning in Toronto, telecasts of 4K sporting events from Sportsnet and TSN began to be carried on these set-top boxes in January 2016. With the Rogers takeover of Aurora Cable Internet, Aurora, Ontario, over the years, and at various times, Rogers has owned all or part of various cable operators serving areas across Canada, including Vancouver, Victoria, Calgary, and Northern Ontario. All of the systems in Western Canada were traded to Shaw Communications in late 2000, in exchange for that companys assets in Ontario and New Brunswick, and many of the others were sold to Cogeco. Through Rogers Cable, Rogers is the largest shareholder in CPAC, a public affairs and politics cable channel based in Ottawa. CPACs main programming consists of live and delayed coverage of the House of Commons, Rogers Cable previously operated a chain of video rental stores known as Rogers Plus, it launched as Rogers Video in 1988, after which it grew by acquiring smaller chains. The Rogers Video chain and Rogers Wireless retail stores were merged into a chain known as Rogers Plus in 2007. After 23 years in business, Rogers Plus discontinued movie and game rentals in 2011, in the beginning of 1995, Rogers along with several other cable companies, added a number of new cable channels under a negative option billing plan. Subscribers opting out of paying for the new channels stood to lose much of their existing specialty channel programming, a representative for Rogers said that they were replacing WQLN and WPBS for WTVS, as viewers wanted a feed that has a higher-quality reception
19.
Sky Cable
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Sky Cable is a cable television service of Sky Cable Corporation. Since it started community antenna television system operation in the Philippines on January 26,1992, SkyCable provides cable Internet, VoIP services and digital cable TV service. On June 6,1990, SkyCable Corporation was incorporated via 79. 3% stake in Sky Vision Corporation, operator of cable brands, SkyCable and Sun Cable. On April 18,1991, Sky Vision Corporation was incorporated and ventures into television, communication, system, television media, shopping network. It is owned 18. 8% by ABS-CBN Corporation and 78% by Lopez Inc, in 1997, Sky Vision Corporation acquired 47% of Pilipino Cable Corp. operator of Sun Cable for P900 million. In 1997, SkyCable launches its first cable TV branded credit card in the Philippines, the SkyCard MasterCard with SolidBank, in 2001, Benpress Holdings Inc. and Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company signed a master consolidation agreement for SkyCable Corporation to consolidate its interest. Beyond Cable Inc. controls 66. 5% through Benpress Holdings Corp. and 33. 5% through MediaQuest Holdings, on December 7,2001, Beyond Cable Holdings Inc. was incorporated. On May 11,2012, SkyCable bought Destiny Cable Inc, uni-Cable TV Inc. and Solid Broadband Corp. S cable TV and broadband internet assets and subscribers with consolidating value of P3.497 billion, in order to be competitive in the cable TV industry, SkyCable adopts an alternative pricing model for its subscribers. It allows its subscribers to select their own packages or channels, SkyCable also introduces the package-pricing model typically used by other cable television providers in which channels are classified into packages. Select, It is a plan that allows its subscribers to choose channels on top of their preset package. Select plan is available on existing subscription either from Bronze 299,399 and 499, Silver HD, Gold HD or Postpaid HD plans, Bronze 299, SkyCable Bronze 299 package consists of 20 basic channels. However, it offered for new subscribers in the rest of remaining provincial areas. Plus, SkyCable Plus package consists of 50 channels, no longer offered to new subscribers, status of current subscribers uncertain. Bronze 399, SkyCable Bronze 399 consists of more or less than 30 channels, available only in most of regional areas with digital service. Recently, as of November 2014, the plan were currently expanded its service in Metro Manila, but as of October 1,2015, it currently no longer offered for new subscribers. However, status of current subscribers remained unchanged, Bronze 499, SkyCable Bronze 499 package consists of more than 50 channels. But as of October 1,2015, it no longer offered for new subscribers
20.
Destiny Cable
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Destiny Cable is a direct-to-home cable television subscription service based in Quezon City. Destiny Cable is the 2nd largest cable TV provider in the Philippines and it is owned by Sky Cable Corporation. And allowed to provide television services to Metro Manila and nearby municipalities, cities and provinces. Destiny Cable Inc. embarked on marketing promotion through Solid Group Inc. by offering bundled services, in November 2000 Destiny Cable formed a partnership with Global Cable to further strengthen and systematize its cable television ventures. However, it was only on late 2003 that the name was changed to Global Destiny Cable. Global Destiny Cable is perceived to be the closest competitor of Sky Cable the Philippines largest cable TV company in Metro Manila, both have their own associates all over the country and both offer high-speed cable Internet service to its respective subscribers. Global Destiny Cable has been reverted to Destiny Cable after separation from Global Cable, on November 15,2012 Destiny Cable headquarters moved from Solid House Building in Makati City to Sky Cables headquarters in Quezon City. The NTC approved Skys acquisition on December 18,2012
21.
StarHub TV
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StarHub TV is the sole cable television operator in Singapore. A subsidiary of StarHub Limited, when StarHub acquired Singapore Cable Vision in 2001, the company offers cable television services via the cable network which has been in operation since 1991, but now under the name StarHub TV. It also provides service via a wireless network, the Digital Terrestrial Television system. The history of cable TV in Singapore started in 1991 when the then Singapore Cable Vision was licensed to establish a nationwide broadband network to provide pay-TV services. SCTV also had the responsibility of delivering terrestrial free-to-air channels to Singapore households via its cable points. In 1999, SCV completed the construction of its S$600 million network, in 2002, StarHub completed its merger with Singapore Cable Vision which was renamed StarHub Cable Vision. On 2007, StarHub Cable Television was rebranded as StarHub TV, from February 2009, StarHub TV had converted to Full Digital Mode, which meant that all Analogue transmission had cease operation. On 30 April 2010, StarHub TV made changes to all channel numbers accessed from its cable TV platform to enable easy recall for subscribers and they introduced the three-digit numbering system for its over 150 channels carried on its platform. On 1 August 2010, StarHub TV will cease broadcasting the Barclays English Premier League for the 2010/11, 2011/12 and its carriage of Goal TV1, Goal TV2, ESPN, STAR Sports and STAR Cricket will also cease at the same time. Rediffusion Singapore was added in to StarHub TV in October 2010 as RediGold, but due to declining listenership, Rediffusion announced that it will cease transmission on 1 May 2012, and its channel on StarHub TV will also cease at the same time. It is expected to resume transmission in 2013, on 31 May 2011, StarHub TVs Channel 101 made way for ScreenSingapore Channel from Preview Channel from 1–19 June 2011. Afterwards, the channel was returned to Preview Channel, on 29 December 2011, JimJam and JET TV ceased broadcasting on StarHub TV. Playin TV was ceased on 15 February 2012 as well, on 1 October 2012, Cricket Extra and NEO Cricket ceased broadcasting on StarHub TV, leaving TEN Cricket as an a la carte channel for $32. 10/mth until when STAR Cricket was added in. On February 2012 and January 2013, StarHub launched two new channels, Channel 114 and Channel 873 respectively, however not meant for new channels or permanent basis. They are coincidentally right next to the two KBS World channels to inform subscribers about when the channels have their last-day free-to-air and which groups they will be in respectively, Channel 110, the former Sunsilk Academy Fantasia channel, is still unused after October 2012. In February 2013, StarHub launched new packaging for the March brochure, on 9 February 2013, TTV World ceased broadcasting on StarHub TV. In mid-June 2013, MGM ceased transmission, starhub launched TV Anywhere currently consisting of 80 channels to allow viewing of channels on the go. During that period, a design was introduced, which is also seen in the commercial announcing the end of analogue cable transmission on 30 June 2009
22.
Digital terrestrial television
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Digital terrestrial television is a technological evolution of broadcast television and an advancement over analog television. A terrestrial implementation of digital television uses a aerial to broadcast to a conventional television antenna instead of a satellite dish or cable television connection. The amount of data that can be transmitted is directly affected by channel capacity, the modulation method in DVB-T is COFDM with either 64 or 16-state Quadrature Amplitude Modulation. In general, a 64QAM channel is capable of transmitting a bit rate. 16 and 64QAM constellations can be combined in a single multiplex, the DVB-T standard is not used for terrestrial digital television in North America. Instead, the ATSC standard calls for 8VSB modulation, which has similar characteristics to the vestigial sideband modulation used for analog television. This provides considerably more immunity to interference, but is not immune — as DVB-T is — to multipath distortion, both systems use the MPEG transport stream and H. 262/MPEG-2 Part 2 video codec specified in MPEG-2, they differ significantly in how related services are encoded. DTTV is received either via a digital set-top box, TV gateway or integrated tuner included with television sets, some set-top-boxes and TV gateways include digital video recorder functionality. This is quite common in the UK, see external links, indoor aerials are even more likely to be affected by these issues and possibly need replacing. Main articles, List of digital television deployments by country, Digital television transition Afghanistan started digital transmissions in MPEG-4 on Sunday,31 August 2014, Afghanistan adopted DVB-T2 system for digital television. India adopted DVB-T system for television in July 1999. The first DVB-T transmission was started on 26 January 2003 in the four metropolitan cities by Doordarshan. Currently the terrestrial transmission is available in digital and analog formats. 4 high power DVB-T transmitters were set up in the top 4 cities, an additional 190 high power, and 400 low power DVB-T2 transmitters have been approved for Tier I, II and III cities of the country by 2017. The Indian telecom regulator, TRAI, had recommended the I&B to allow private broadcast companies to use the DTT technology, so far, the Indian I&B ministry only permits private broadcast companies to use satellite, cable and IPTV based systems. Israel started digital transmissions in MPEG-4 on Sunday,2 August 2009, Israel was the first nation in the Middle East and the first non-European nation to shut down its analogue TV distribution system. The new service which is operated by the Second Authority for Radio, according to government decisions, the system will expand to include two additional multiplexes that will carry new channels and HD versions of the existing channels. In this matter nothing has been decided upon until the end on 2012, on 20 March 2013 it was announced that Thomson Broadcast had won a major contract with The Second Authority for Television and Radio for the extension of its nationwide DVB-T/DVB-T2 network
23.
Cable television
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This contrasts with broadcast television, in which the television signal is transmitted over the air by radio waves and received by a television antenna attached to the television. FM radio programming, high-speed Internet, telephone services, and similar non-television services may also be provided through these cables, analog television was standard in the 20th century, but since the 2000s, cable systems have been upgraded to digital cable operation. A cable channel is a television network available via cable television, alternative terms include non-broadcast channel or programming service, the latter being mainly used in legal contexts. Examples of cable/satellite channels/cable networks available in many countries are HBO, MTV, Cartoon Network, E. Eurosport, the abbreviation CATV is often used for cable television. It originally stood for Community Access Television or Community Antenna Television, in areas where over-the-air TV reception was limited by distance from transmitters or mountainous terrain, large community antennas were constructed, and cable was run from them to individual homes. The origins of cable broadcasting for radio are even older as radio programming was distributed by cable in some European cities as far back as 1924, Cable television has gone through a series of steps of evolution in the United States and Canada. Particularly in Canada, communities with their own signals were fertile cable markets, as viewers wanted to receive American signals. Early systems carried only a maximum of seven channels, using 2,4,5 or 6,7,9,11 and 13, as the equipment was unable to confine the signal discreetly within the assigned channel bandwidth. The reason 4 and 5 along with 6 and 7 could be used together was because of the 4 MHz gap between 4 and 5 and the nearly 90 MHz gap between 6 and 7. Even though eight channels are listed, in systems that maximized 7 channels. As equipment improved, all channels could be utilized, except where a local VHF television station broadcast. Local broadcast channels were not usable for signals deemed to be priority, later, the cable operators began to carry FM radio stations, and encouraged subscribers to connect their FM stereo sets to cable. Before stereo and bilingual TV sound became common, Pay-TV channel sound was added to the FM stereo cable line-ups, about this time, operators expanded beyond the 12-channel dial to use the midband and superband VHF channels adjacent to the high band 7-13 of North American television frequencies. Some operators as in Cornwall, Ontario, used a dual distribution network with Channels 2-13 on each of the two cables, during the 1980s, United States regulations not unlike public, educational, and government access created the beginning of cable-originated live television programming. These stations evolved partially into todays over-the-air digital subchannels, where a main broadcast TV station e. g, many live local programs with local interests were subsequently created all over the United States in most major television markets in the early 1980s. This evolved into todays many cable-only broadcasts of diverse programming, including cable-only produced television movies and miniseries, Cable specialty channels, starting with channels oriented to show movies and large sporting or performance events, diversified further, and narrowcasting became common. By the late 1980s, cable-only signals outnumbered broadcast signals on cable systems, by the mid-1980s in Canada, cable operators were allowed by the regulator to enter into distribution contracts with cable networks on their own. By the 1990s, tiers became common, with customers able to subscribe to different tiers to obtain different selections of additional channels above the basic selection, by subscribing to additional tiers, customers could get specialty channels, movie channels, and foreign channels
24.
UPC Switzerland
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UPC Switzerland LLC, trading exclusively under the brand name UPC, is the largest broadband cable operator in Switzerland. Founded 1994 through multiple mergers between companies, it is part of Liberty Global Europes UPC Broadband division since the end of 2005. In the 1930s the first cable network operators started to broadcast a variety of channels to households via cable. One of these cable network operators was Rediffusion S. A. established in 1931, at the end of the 1950s Rediffusion began to broadcast the first black/white television channels from the Üetliberg antenna tower in Zürich. In 1994 Rediffusion and other independent cable network companies merged to form Cablecom, owned by Siemens, VEBA, Cablecom acquired the successful Internet service provider SwissOnline in 1998. Over the following years the network operator grew by acquiring various cable network companies including, for instance Balcab. These takeovers allowed cablecom to extend its network throughout Switzerland, in 2000 the previous owners of Cablecom sold out to the British-American NTL for a price of 5.8 billion Swiss francs. In the years followed, operative business was sustainably improved. In the wake of financial difficulties NTL sold Cablecom to a group of banks, the owners planned to go public with Cablecom in the middle of October 2005. After Liberty Global Europe, an owned subsidiary of Liberty Global acquired Cablecom for 2.8 billion on 30 September 2005. In the years that followed Cablecom invested in its network development, in 2007 the company launched high definition television. Two years later introduced its first combination deals. In 2010 Cablecom launched the DigiCard enabling customers to enjoy digital TV without having to connect a device to their Television set. Cablecom began offering Video on Demand with HD and 3D content in early 2011, Cablecom was relaunched as upc cablecom in April 2011 with the slogan “More Power, More Joy”. With the upc cablecom brand the company wishes to be perceived on the market as a subsidiary of Liberty Global while retaining its legacy as part of Swiss telecommunications history, in the course of rebranding the red wrench was replaced by a new logo. In June upc cablecom signed an agreement with Orange to keep an option open of offering customers mobile telephony products in the future, at the beginning of 2013 the entertainment platform Horizon was launched onto the Swiss market. Therefore, the television and radio channels differ between the three grids. UPC TV Mini consists of approximately 55 television channels, including 21 high-definition simulcast channels, the channels differ between the three regional grids, with a focus on carrying channels in the regions main language
25.
Shaw Communications
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Shaw Communications Inc. is a Canadian telecommunications company that provides telephone, Internet, television, and mobile services all backed by a fibre optic network. Headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, Shaw provides services mostly in British Columbia and Alberta, with systems in Saskatchewan, Manitoba. Through its subsidiary Freedom Mobile, Shaw provides mobile services in areas of British Columbia, Alberta. The companys chief competitor is Telus Communications, Shaw was founded as Capital Cable Television Company, Ltd. in Edmonton, Alberta, in 1966. The company changed its name to Shaw Cablesystems Ltd. and went public on the TSX in 1983, however, two swaps, in 1994 and 2001, with Rogers Cable have resulted in its assets being restricted to Western Canada and a few areas of Northern Ontario. In 1999, Shaw spun out its media properties into a second publicly-traded company, in February 2003, the Florida systems would be sold to Time Warner Cable, while the Texas systems were sold to Cequel III, as part of its then-Cebridge Connections subsidiary. In 2008, Shaw entered the AWS spectrum auction with the intention of becoming a wireless phone provider. The auction ended July 2008, giving Shaw Communications enough spectrum to build a network in its home provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba. This spectrum ultimately went unused and was sold to Rogers Communications in January 2013, in July 2009, Shaw announced its acquisition of Mountain Cablevision, in September, Rogers sued Shaw to block the sale, citing violations of a non-compete clause. However, the suit was dismissed by the Ontario Superior Court. The purchase was approved by the CRTC on October 22,2009, the acquisition was Shaws first cable property east of Sault Ste. Marie since the 2001 swaps with Rogers and Cogeco, on April 30,2009, Shaw announced a deal to acquire three television stations — CHWI-TV in Windsor, Ontario, CKNX-TV in Wingham, Ontario and CKX-TV in Brandon, Manitoba — from CTVglobemedia. However, it was reported on June 30,2009 that Shaw has backed out of the deal and is declining to complete the purchase. CHWI-TV would remain on the air as is, CKNX-TV would become a repeater of London station CFPL-TV in September 2009, canwests newspapers were not part of the Shaw deal and were sold separately to Postmedia Network. The acquisition was completed on October 27,2010, after CRTC approval for the sale was announced on October 22, the campaign was designed by the Vancouver-based agency Rethink, who were also responsible for Bell Canadas beaver characters Frank and Gordon. In April 2013, Shaw Business Solutions took over Enmaxs Envision subsidiary, the acquisition was completed for $225 Million. In 2014, Shaw partnered with Rogers Communications to launch Shomi,1,600 of Shaws 14,000 employees were affected by the consolidation and cuts. In 2013, Shaw attempted to begin developing an IPTV-based platform for its television services, however, after experiencing issues developing the platform, Shaw took a $55 million write-down in June 2015, and announced that it was licensing Comcasts cloud-based X1 architecture
26.
IPTV
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Unlike downloaded media, IPTV offers the ability to stream the source media continuously. As a result, a client media player can begin playing the data almost immediately and this is known as streaming media. Although IPTV uses the Internet protocol it is not limited to television media streamed from the Internet, IPTV in the telecommunications arena is notable for its ongoing standardisation process. Historically, many different definitions of IPTV have appeared, including elementary streams over IP networks, transport streams over IP networks and these services may include, for example, Live TV, Video On Demand and Interactive TV. These services are delivered across an access agnostic, packet switched network that employs the IP protocol to transport the audio, video, the term IPTV first appeared in 1995 with the founding of Precept Software by Judith Estrin and Bill Carrico. Precept developed an Internet video product named IP/TV, the software was written primarily by Steve Casner, Karl Auerbach, and Cha Chee Kuan. Precept was acquired by Cisco Systems in 1998, Internet radio company AudioNet started the first continuous live webcasts with content from WFAA-TV in January 1998 and KCTU-LP on January 10,1998. The operator added additional VoD service in October 2001 with Yes TV, kingston was one of the first companies in the world to introduce IPTV and IP VoD over ADSL as a commercial service. The service became the reference for various changes to UK Government regulations, in 2006, the KIT service was discontinued, subscribers having declined from a peak of 10,000 to 4,000. In 1999, NBTel was the first to commercially deploy Internet protocol television over DSL in Canada using the Alcatel 7350 DSLAM, the service was marketed under the brand VibeVision in New Brunswick, and later expanded into Nova Scotia in early 2000 after the formation of Aliant. IMagic TV was later sold to Alcatel, in 2002, Sasktel was the second in Canada to commercially deploy Internet Protocol video over DSL, using the Lucent Stinger DSL platform. In 2005, SureWest Communications was the first North American company to offer high-definition television channels over an IPTV service, in 2005, Bredbandsbolaget launched its IPTV service as the first service provider in Sweden. As of January 2009, they are not the biggest supplier any longer, TeliaSonera, in 2007, TPG became the first internet service provider in Australia to launch IPTV. Complementary to its ADSL2+ package this was, and still is, free of charge to customers on eligible plans and now offers over 45 local free to air channels, by 2010, iiNet and Telstra launched IPTV services in conjunction to internet plans but with extra fees. In 2008, PTCL launched IPTV under the name of PTCL Smart TV in Pakistan. S. Markets with an IPTV service called Prism and this was after successful test marketing in Florida. During the 2014 Winter Olympics Shortest path bridging was used to deliver 36 IPTV HD Olympic channels, in 2016, KCTV introduced the Set-top box called Manbang, claiming to provide video-on-demand services in North Korea via quasi-internet protocol television. According to KCTV, viewers can use the service not only in Pyongyang, stating that the demands for the equipment are particularly high in Sinuiju, with several hundred users in the region
27.
TPG Telecom
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TPG Telecom Limited is an Australian telecommunications and IT company that specialises in consumer and business internet services as well as mobile telephone services. As of August 2015, TPG is the second largest internet provider in Australia. As such, it has over 671,000 ADSL2+ subscribers,358,000 landline subscribers and 360,000 mobile subscribers, and owns the second largest ADSL2+ network in Australia, consisting of 391 ADSL2+ DSLAMs. The company was formed from the merger between Total Peripherals Group, which was established in 1992 by David and Vicky Teoh, TPG provide five ranges of products and services including Internet access, networking, OEM services, mobile phone service and accounting software. In 2007, TPG took a 70 per cent controlling interest in then struggling Adelaide internet provider Chariot, Soul Converged Communications, formally known as Comindico, was an Australian telecommunications company based in Sydney. Souls main activities revolve around telecommunications, with business and home, in April 2005, it bought a 42.9 per cent stake in mobile phone company B Digital. In September 2006 Soul increased its stake in B Digital to 74.6 per cent, on 25 November 2009, following shareholder approval, SP Telemedia Ltd changed its name to TPG Telecom Ltd. The ASX code was changed also from SOT to TPM, in November 2009, TPG, which already owned a substantial portion of PIPE Networks shares, announced it intended to acquire the company. TPG completed its acquisition of PIPE for $373 million by way of scheme of arrangement on 31 March 2010, after shareholders, the acquisition allows TPG to gain full control of PIPE Networks fibre optic network in Australia and the Pipe Pacific Cable, connecting Sydney to Guam. TPG, in a statement released on 14 July 2011, announced it intended to acquire IntraPower for $12.8 million and it was also stated in the statement that the Board of Directors of IntraPower recommended the shareholders of the company approve the transaction. The acquisition was completed on 30 August, allowing TPG to benefit from TrustedCloud, on 9 December 2013, TPG purchased AAPT from Telecom New Zealand for $450 million. The transaction allows TPG to gain control of AAPTs fibre-optic network, which extends across six Australian states and territories, the transaction was expected to be finalised by February 2014. On 13 March 2015, TPG advised of its intent to take over Australias 3rd Largest ISP iiNet at $AU8.60 per share, giving a value of 1. 4Bn. TPG offered $8.60 per iiNet share, on top of the entitlement to the already-declared 10.5 cent interim dividend, the deal was approved by shareholders on July 27, and by the ACCC on August 20,2015. This made TPG Australias second-largest ISP by customer volume after Telstra, on 7 May 2013, TPG won a $13.5 million bid for two 10Mhz spectra of the 2. 5Ghz band. TPG, which operates a virtual network, in a statement. Although TPG did not reveal what the purpose of the spectra would be, the network will be switched on in October 2014. It was also estimated that the cost of the plans would be $69.99 per month, lower than the current price of NBN plans though it excludes initial connection, TPG also include plans and bundles on the National Broadband Network
28.
Verizon Fios
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Verizon Fios is a bundled Internet access, telephone, and television service that operates over a fiber-optic communications network with over 5 million customers in nine US states. The name, Fios, is an acronym for Fiber Optic Service, Fios service began in 2005, and networked areas expanded through 2010, although some areas do not have service or cannot receive TV and phone service because of franchise agreements. Verizon was one of the first major U. S. carriers to offer fiber to the home, other service providers use fiber optics in the network backbone and existing copper or coax infrastructure for residential users. Where available, select Verizon Wireless stores also sell Fios services, similar to AT&T offering DirecTV, the early stages of Fios began when Bell Atlantic was testing its video service Stargazer in 1995. This was the worlds first commercial VOD service, which was tested to 1,000 homes in northern VA, during this time there were talks of developing a fiber optic based service. This service was developed at a headquarters located in Reston, Virginia and this will be folded into our deployment of fiber to the curb, Mr. Townsend said, referring to Bell Atlantics plans to deploy a high-tech fiber-optic system. In September 2005, Verizon Communications, announced the launch of its Fios television service, Verizon aimed to replace copper wires with optical fibers, which would allow greater speed and quality of communication. In 2006, Verizon and Motorola partnered to bring its customers home DVR access, in 2006, The Wall Street Journal speculated, Verizon Communications Inc. is fielding offers for. Verizon also has been shopping a package dubbed GTE North that comprises about 3.4 million access lines in former GTE Corp. territories in Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, in addition to expanding its customer base, Verizon expanded its services in the first few years. Home Media DVR, a video recorder, was released in 2006. Fios updated its user interface in 2007, allowing customers to access widgets for localized content, such as weather, Verizon announced in January 2008 that one million people subscribed to the service. By the end of 2008, Fios offered more than 150 HD channels, price increases were announced in April 2008, when Fios was available to 6.5 million households. In January 2009, Fios was available to 12.7 million homes, as of June 2009, Fios Internet had 3.1 million customers. Estimates on December 31,2009, were 3.4 million Internet customers and 2.86 million for Fios TV, doug Michelson, an analyst at Deutsche Bank, concluded that Verizon has been overspending to acquire Fios customers. Some viewed the halt in expansion as a violation of Verizons agreements with municipalities and states. In New Jersey, Verizon collected an additional $15 billion in fees from customers, the New Jersey government altered the deal in 2014 to allow Verizon to substitute wireless internet access to fulfill its promise instead. Verizon defended itself, claiming that they had spent $13 billion building fiber optics in New Jersey, critics pointed out that wireless internet was slower and less reliable. In April 2010, Verizon announced that three people were subscribed to Verizon Fios
29.
Streaming media
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Streaming media is multimedia that is constantly received by and presented to an end-user while being delivered by a provider. A client end-user can use their player to begin to play the data file before the entire file has been transmitted. For example, in the 1930s, elevator music was among the earliest popularly available streaming media, the term streaming media can apply to media other than video and audio such as live closed captioning, ticker tape, and real-time text, which are all considered streaming text. As of 2017, streaming is generally taken to refer to cases where a user watches digital video content or listens to audio content on a computer screen. With streaming content, the user does not have to download the digital video or digital audio file before they start to watch/listen to it. There are challenges with streaming content on the Internet, as of 2016, two popular streaming services are the video sharing website YouTube, which contains video and audio files on a huge range of topics and Netflix, which streams movies and TV shows. Live streaming refers to Internet content delivered in real-time, as events happen, Live internet streaming requires a form of source media, an encoder to digitize the content, a media publisher, and a content delivery network to distribute and deliver the content. Live streaming does not need to be recorded at the origination point, in the early 1920s, George O. Attempts to display media on computers date back to the earliest days of computing in the mid-20th century, however, little progress was made for several decades, primarily due to the high cost and limited capabilities of computer hardware. From the late 1980s through the 1990s, consumer-grade personal computers became powerful enough to various media. These technological improvement facilitated the streaming of audio and video content to users in their homes and workplaces. The band Severe Tire Damage was the first group to live on the Internet. On June 24,1993, the band was playing a gig at Xerox PARC while elsewhere in the building, as proof of PARCs technology, the bands performance was broadcast and could be seen live in Australia and elsewhere. Microsoft Research developed a Microsoft TV application which was compiled under MS Windows Studio Suite, realNetworks was also a pioneer in the streaming media markets, when it broadcast a baseball game between the New York Yankees and the Seattle Mariners over the Internet in 1995. The first symphonic concert on the Internet took place at the Paramount Theater in Seattle, the concert was a collaboration between The Seattle Symphony and various guest musicians such as Slash, Matt Cameron, and Barrett Martin. When Word Magazine launched in 1995, they featured the first-ever streaming soundtracks on the Internet.4 in 1999, in June 1999 Apple also introduced a streaming media format in its QuickTime 4 application. It was later widely adopted on websites along with RealPlayer. In 2000 Industryview. com launched its worlds largest streaming video archive website to help promote themselves
30.
Simplified Chinese characters
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Simplified Chinese characters are standardized Chinese characters prescribed in the Table of General Standard Chinese Characters for use in mainland China. Along with traditional Chinese characters, it is one of the two character sets of the contemporary Chinese written language. The government of the Peoples Republic of China in mainland China has promoted them for use in printing since the 1950s and 1960s in an attempt to increase literacy and they are officially used in the Peoples Republic of China and Singapore. Traditional Chinese characters are used in Hong Kong, Macau. Overseas Chinese communities generally tend to use traditional characters, Simplified Chinese characters may be referred to by their official name above or colloquially. Strictly, the latter refers to simplifications of character structure or body, character forms that have existed for thousands of years alongside regular, Simplified character forms were created by decreasing the number of strokes and simplifying the forms of a sizable proportion of traditional Chinese characters. Some simplifications were based on popular cursive forms embodying graphic or phonetic simplifications of the traditional forms, some characters were simplified by applying regular rules, for example, by replacing all occurrences of a certain component with a simplified version of the component. Variant characters with the pronunciation and identical meaning were reduced to a single standardized character. Finally, many characters were left untouched by simplification, and are identical between the traditional and simplified Chinese orthographies. Some simplified characters are very dissimilar to and unpredictably different from traditional characters and this often leads opponents not well-versed in the method of simplification to conclude that the overall process of character simplification is also arbitrary. In reality, the methods and rules of simplification are few, on the other hand, proponents of simplification often flaunt a few choice simplified characters as ingenious inventions, when in fact these have existed for hundreds of years as ancient variants. However, the Chinese government never officially dropped its goal of further simplification in the future, in August 2009, the PRC began collecting public comments for a modified list of simplified characters. The new Table of General Standard Chinese Characters consisting of 8,105 characters was promulgated by the State Council of the Peoples Republic of China on June 5,2013, cursive written text almost always includes character simplification. Simplified forms used in print have always existed, they date back to as early as the Qin dynasty, One of the earliest proponents of character simplification was Lubi Kui, who proposed in 1909 that simplified characters should be used in education. In the years following the May Fourth Movement in 1919, many anti-imperialist Chinese intellectuals sought ways to modernise China, Traditional culture and values such as Confucianism were challenged. Soon, people in the Movement started to cite the traditional Chinese writing system as an obstacle in modernising China and it was suggested that the Chinese writing system should be either simplified or completely abolished. Fu Sinian, a leader of the May Fourth Movement, called Chinese characters the writing of ox-demons, lu Xun, a renowned Chinese author in the 20th century, stated that, If Chinese characters are not destroyed, then China will die. Recent commentators have claimed that Chinese characters were blamed for the problems in China during that time
31.
Pinyin
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Pinyin, or Hànyǔ Pīnyīn, is the official romanization system for Standard Chinese in mainland China, Malaysia, Singapore, and Taiwan. It is often used to teach Standard Chinese, which is written using Chinese characters. The system includes four diacritics denoting tones, Pinyin without tone marks is used to spell Chinese names and words in languages written with the Latin alphabet, and also in certain computer input methods to enter Chinese characters. The pinyin system was developed in the 1950s by many linguists, including Zhou Youguang and it was published by the Chinese government in 1958 and revised several times. The International Organization for Standardization adopted pinyin as a standard in 1982. The system was adopted as the standard in Taiwan in 2009. The word Hànyǔ means the language of the Han people. In 1605, the Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci published Xizi Qiji in Beijing and this was the first book to use the Roman alphabet to write the Chinese language. Twenty years later, another Jesuit in China, Nicolas Trigault, neither book had much immediate impact on the way in which Chinese thought about their writing system, and the romanizations they described were intended more for Westerners than for the Chinese. One of the earliest Chinese thinkers to relate Western alphabets to Chinese was late Ming to early Qing Dynasty scholar-official, the first late Qing reformer to propose that China adopt a system of spelling was Song Shu. A student of the great scholars Yu Yue and Zhang Taiyan, Song had been to Japan and observed the effect of the kana syllabaries. This galvanized him into activity on a number of fronts, one of the most important being reform of the script, while Song did not himself actually create a system for spelling Sinitic languages, his discussion proved fertile and led to a proliferation of schemes for phonetic scripts. The Wade–Giles system was produced by Thomas Wade in 1859, and it was popular and used in English-language publications outside China until 1979. This Sin Wenz or New Writing was much more sophisticated than earlier alphabets. In 1940, several members attended a Border Region Sin Wenz Society convention. Mao Zedong and Zhu De, head of the army, both contributed their calligraphy for the masthead of the Sin Wenz Societys new journal. Outside the CCP, other prominent supporters included Sun Yat-sens son, Sun Fo, Cai Yuanpei, the countrys most prestigious educator, Tao Xingzhi, an educational reformer. Over thirty journals soon appeared written in Sin Wenz, plus large numbers of translations, biographies, some contemporary Chinese literature, and a spectrum of textbooks
32.
International broadcasting
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International broadcasting is broadcasting that is deliberately aimed at a foreign, rather than a domestic, audience. It usually is broadcast by means of longwave, mediumwave, or shortwave radio, but in recent years has also used direct satellite broadcasting, although radio and television programs do travel outside national borders, in many cases reception by foreigners is accidental. International broadcasting, in an extent, began during World War I. With the severing of Germanys undersea cables, the telegraph station in Nauen was the countrys sole means of long-distance communication. The US Navy Radio Service radio station in New Brunswick, Canada, in turn, Nauen station broadcast the news of the abdication of Kaiser Wilhelm II on November 10,1918. Guglielmo Marconi pioneered the use of short wave radio for long distance transmissions in the early 1920s, using a system of parabolic reflector antennae, Marconis assistant, Charles Samuel Franklin, rigged up a large antenna at Poldhu Wireless Station, Cornwall, running on 25 kW of power. In June and July 1923, wireless transmissions were completed during nights on 97 meters from Poldhu to Marconis yacht Elettra in the Cape Verde Islands. High speed shortwave telegraphy circuits were installed from London to Australia, India, South Africa. The Dutch began conducting experiments in the frequencies in 1925 from Eindhoven. The popular Happy Station show was inaugurated in 1928, in 1927, Marconi also turned his attention toward long distance broadcasting on shortwave. His first such broadcasts took place to commemorate Armistice Day in the same year and he continued running a regular international broadcast that was picked up around the world, with programming from the 2LO station, then run by the BBC. The success of this operation caught the BBCs attention, and rented out a shortwave transmitting station in Chelmsford, with the callsign G5SW, the BBC Empire Service was finally inaugurated on December 19,1932, with transmissions aimed towards Australia and New Zealand. Other notable early international broadcasters included Vatican Radio, Radio Moscow, clarence W. Jones started transmitting on Christmas Day,1931 from Christian missionary radio station HCJB in Quito, Ecuador. Broadcasting in South Asia was launched in 1925 in Ceylon - Radio Ceylon, shortwave broadcasting from Nauen in Germany to the USA, Central and South America, and the Far East began in 1926. A second station, Zeesen, was added in 1931, in January 1932, the German Reichspost assumed control of the Nauen station and added to its shortwave and longwave capacity. Once Adolf Hitler assumed power in 1933, shortwave, under the Auslandsrundfunk, was regarded as an element of Nazi propaganda. German shortwave hours were increased from two hours a day to 18 per day, and eventually twelve languages were broadcast on a 24-hour basis, a 100 kilowatt transmitter and antenna complex was built at Zeesen, near Berlin. Specialty target programming to the United States began in 1933, to South Africa, South America, and East Asia in 1934, German propaganda was organized under Joseph Goebbels, and played a key role in the German annexation of Austria and the Munich Crisis of 1938
33.
Hong Kong
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Hong Kong, officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the Peoples Republic of China, is an autonomous territory on the Pearl River Delta of East Asia. Macau lies across the delta to the west, and the Chinese province of Guangdong borders the territory to the north. With a total area of 1,106 square kilometres. Hong Kong was later occupied by Japan during World War II until British control resumed in 1945, under the principle of one country, two systems, Hong Kong maintains a separate political and economic system from China. Except in military defence and foreign affairs, Hong Kong maintains its independent executive, legislative, in addition, Hong Kong develops relations directly with foreign states and international organisations in a broad range of appropriate fields. Hong Kong is one of the worlds most significant financial centres, with the highest Financial Development Index score and consistently ranks as the worlds most competitive and freest economic entity. As the worlds 8th largest trading entity, its legal tender, Hong Kongs tertiary sector dominated economy is characterised by simple taxation with a competitive level of corporate tax and supported by its independent judiciary system. However, while Hong Kong has one of the highest per capita incomes in the world and it has a very high Human Development Index ranking and the worlds longest life expectancy. Over 90% of the population use of well-developed public transportation. Seasonal air pollution with origins from neighbouring areas of Mainland China. Hong Kong was officially recorded in the 1842 Treaty of Nanking to encompass the entirety of the island, before 1842, the name referred to a small inlet—now Aberdeen Harbour, literally means Little Hong Kong)—between Aberdeen Island and the southern coast of Hong Kong Island. Aberdeen was a point of contact between British sailors and local fishermen. Detailed and accurate romanisation systems for Cantonese were available and in use at the time, fragrance may refer to the sweet taste of the harbours fresh water estuarine influx of the Pearl River or to the incense from factories lining the coast of northern Kowloon. The incense was stored near Aberdeen Harbour for export before Hong Kong developed Victoria Harbour, the name had often been written as the single word Hongkong until the government adopted the current form in 1926. Nevertheless, a number of century-old institutions still retain the form, such as the Hongkong Post, Hongkong Electric. As of 1997, its name is the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the Peoples Republic of China. This is the title as mentioned in the Hong Kong Basic Law. Hong Kong has carried many nicknames, the most famous among those is the Pearl of the Orient, which reflected the impressive nightscape of the citys light decorations on the skyscrapers along both sides of the Victoria Harbour
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Macau
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Macau, also spelled Macao, officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the Peoples Republic of China, is an autonomous territory on the western side of the Pearl River Delta in East Asia. Macau is bordered by the city of Zhuhai in Mainland China to the north, Hong Kong lies about 64 kilometres to its east across the Delta. With a population of 650,900 living in an area of 30.5 km2, Macau was administered by the Portuguese Empire and its inheritor states from the mid-16th century until late 1999, when it constituted the last remaining European colony in Asia. Portuguese traders first settled in Macau in the 1550s, in 1557, Macau was leased to Portugal from Ming China as a trading port. The Portuguese Empire administered the city under Chinese authority and sovereignty until 1887, sovereignty over Macau was transferred back to China on 20 December 1999. The Joint Declaration on the Question of Macau and Macau Basic Law stipulate that Macau operate with a degree of autonomy until at least 2049. Macau participates in international organizations and events that do not require members to national sovereignty. Macau is a city in Southern China, known for its casinos. Its gaming revenue has been the worlds largest since 2006, with the heavily dependent on gaming. According to The World Factbook, Macau has the fourth highest life expectancy in the world, the present Chinese name means Inlet Gates. Macau is otherwise known in Chinese as Haojing or Jinghai, the name Macau is thought to be derived from the A-Ma Temple, a temple built in 1448 dedicated to Mazu, the goddess of seafarers and fishermen. It is said that when the Portuguese sailors landed at the coast just outside the temple and asked the name of the place, the Portuguese then named the peninsula Macau. The history of Macau is traced back to the Qin dynasty, the first recorded Chinese inhabitants of the area were people seeking refuge in Macau from invading Mongols during the Southern Song. Under the Ming dynasty, fishermen migrated to Macau from Guangdong, the Macau native people were Tanka boat people. Macau did not develop as a settlement until the Portuguese arrived in the 16th century. In 1513, Jorge Álvares became the first Portuguese to land in China, in 1535, Portuguese traders obtained the rights to anchor ships in Macaus harbours and to carry out trading activities, though not the right to stay onshore. In 1557, the Portuguese established a permanent settlement in Macau, the Portuguese continued to pay an annual tribute up to 1863 in order to stay in Macau. By 1564, Portugal commanded western trade with India, Japan, but their pride was damaged by the indifference with which the Chinese treated them
35.
Taiwan
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Taiwan, officially the Republic of China, is a state in East Asia. Neighbours include China to the west, Japan to the northeast, Taiwan is the most populous state that is not a member of the United Nations, and the one with the largest economy. The island of Taiwan, also known as Formosa, was inhabited by Taiwanese aborigines before the 17th century. After a brief rule by the Kingdom of Tungning, the island was annexed by the Qing dynasty, the Qing ceded Taiwan to Japan in 1895 after the Sino-Japanese War. While Taiwan was under Japanese rule, the Republic of China was established on the mainland in 1912 after the fall of the Qing dynasty, following the Japanese surrender to the Allies in 1945, the ROC took control of Taiwan. However, the resumption of the Chinese Civil War led to the ROCs loss of the mainland to the Communists, and the flight of the ROC government to Taiwan in 1949. As a founding member of the United Nations, the ROC continued to represent China at the United Nations until 1971, in the early 1960s, Taiwan entered a period of rapid economic growth and industrialization, creating a stable industrial economy. In the 1980s and early 1990s, it changed from a one-party military dictatorship dominated by the Kuomintang to a multi-party democracy with universal suffrage, Taiwan is the 22nd-largest economy in the world, and its high-tech industry plays a key role in the global economy. It is ranked highly in terms of freedom of the press, health care, public education, economic freedom, the PRC has consistently claimed sovereignty over Taiwan and asserted the ROC is no longer in legitimate existence. Under its One-China Policy the PRC refused diplomatic relations with any country that recognizes the ROC, the PRC has threatened the use of military force in response to any formal declaration of independence by Taiwan or if PRC leaders decide that peaceful unification is no longer possible. There are various names for the island of Taiwan in use today, the former name Formosa dates from 1542, when Portuguese sailors sighted the main island of Taiwan and named it Ilha Formosa, which means beautiful island. The name Formosa eventually replaced all others in European literature and was in use in English in the early 20th century. This name was adopted into the Chinese vernacular as the name of the sandbar. The modern word Taiwan is derived from this usage, which is seen in forms in Chinese historical records. Use of the current Chinese name was formalized as early as 1684 with the establishment of Taiwan Prefecture, through its rapid development, the entire Formosan mainland eventually became known as Taiwan. The official name of the state is the Republic of China and it was a member of the United Nations representing China until 1971, when it lost its seat to the Peoples Republic of China. Over subsequent decades, the Republic of China has become known as Taiwan. In some contexts, especially ones from the ROC government
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President of the People's Republic of China
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The President of the Peoples Republic of China is the head of state of the Peoples Republic of China. Under the constitution, the presidency is a ceremonial office with limited powers. However, since 1993, as a matter of convention, the presidency has been held simultaneously by the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China, the current President is Xi Jinping, who took office in March 2013. Since 1993, apart from periods of transition, the top leader of China simultaneously serves as the President, the head of the party. This individual then carries out different duties under separate titles, the office was first established in the Constitution of the Peoples Republic of China in 1954 and successively held by Mao Zedong and Liu Shaoqi. Liu fell into disgrace during the Cultural Revolution, after which the office became vacant. The office was abolished under the Constitution of 1975, then reinstated in the Constitution of 1982, the official English-language translation of the title was Chairman, after 1982, this translation was changed to President, although the Chinese title remains unchanged. The President is limited to serve up to two terms of five years each, according to the current Constitution of the Peoples Republic of China, the President must be a Chinese citizen with full electoral rights who has reached the age of 45. The Presidents term of office is the same as the term of the National Peoples Congress, the President is elected by the National Peoples Congress, Chinas highest state body, which also has the power to remove the President and other state officers from office. Elections and removals are decided by a majority vote. According to the Organic Law of the NPC, the President is nominated by the NPC Presidium, in practice, however, the ruling Communist Party of China reserves the post of President for its current General Secretary. Like all officers of state elected by the NPC, the President is elected from a one name ballot, in the event that the office of President falls vacant, the Vice-President succeeds to the office. In the event that both offices fall vacant, the Chairman of the NPC Standing Committee temporarily acts as President until the NPC can elect a new President and Vice-President, in addition, the President names and dismisses ambassadors to foreign countries, signs and annuls treaties with foreign entities. According to the Constitution, all of these require the approval or confirmation of the National Peoples Congress. The President also conducts state visits on behalf of the Peoples Republic, under the constitution the state visit clause is the only presidential power that does not stipulate any form of oversight from the National Peoples Congress. As the vast majority of powers are dependent on the ratification of the NPC, the President is, in essence. It is therefore conceived to function as an symbolic institution of the state rather than an office with true executive powers. Upon the nomination of the Premier, the NPC convenes to confirm the nomination, to date, it has never rejected a personnel nomination
37.
Yang Shangkun
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Yang Shangkun was President of the Peoples Republic of China from 1988 to 1993, and was a powerful Vice Chairman and Secretary-General of the Central Military Commission under Deng Xiaoping. He married Li Bozhao in 1929, one of the few women to participate in the Long March, Yang attended university in Shanghai before studying Marxist theory in Moscow, making him one of the best educated leaders of the early Communist Party of China. Yang returned to China as one of the 28 Bolsheviks and originally supported the early communist leader Zhang Guotao and he served as a political commissar during the Chinese Civil War and the Second Sino-Japanese War. After the founding of the Peoples Republic in 1949, Yang held a number of political positions and he was purged when the Cultural Revolution broke out in 1966, and was not recalled until 1978, after Deng Xiaoping rose to power. After his return to power, Yang became one of Chinas Eight Elders, Yang promoted economic reform but opposed political liberalization, a position which Deng eventually came to identify with. Yang reached the height of his career after the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. After joining the Communist Youth League in 1925, and the CCP in 1926, later in 1926 Yang traveled to the Soviet Union to study at the Moscow Sun Yat-sen University. Yangs post-secondary education made him one of the best educated early Communist Party leaders, Yang was a member of a group of Chinese students who studied in Moscow and returned to China to take a leading role in the CCP, later known as the 28 Bolsheviks. Before the Long March, Yang served in Zhang Guotaos army, eventually they made it safely to Maos headquarter with these important documents. Yang served as a military commissar throughout the Chinese Civil War, most of Yangs service was in armies commanded by Peng Dehuai, until Peng was removed from active command in the early 1940s. After Peng was purged in 1959 for opposing Maos Great Leap Forward, Yang held a senior position in the CCP Central Committee from 1956 to 1966, giving him a degree of direct control over most important Communist Party affairs. On the eve of the Cultural Revolution Yang was identified as a supporter of Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping, Yang remained in prison until Mao died and Deng Xiaoping rose to power, in 1978. Deng raised Yang to the position of Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission in order to give Yang the authority to complete these reforms, in 1982 Yang was appointed to the Politburo. Yangs experiences with radical Maoism strengthened Yangs support for Dengs agenda of Chinese economic reform, throughout the 1980s, Deng came to agree with Yangs aggressive support for Chinese economic reform and his conservative stand against liberal political reform. The resulting book, Long March, The Untold Story, has been praised by China scholars as an excellent synthesis of first-hand oral sources, within China, many Chinese veterans asked why it took a foreigner to produce such a book. In 1988, Yang was appointed Chinese President replacing Li Xiannian, in practice, party and state leaders still deferred to paramount leader Deng Xiaoping. Yangs role during the Tiananmen protests of 1989 caused a shift in Chinas political structure. Yang was at first sympathetic to the students, and he sided with General Secretary Zhao Ziyang in supporting them, after it became clear that Li was more successful in gaining the support of other senior CCP members, Yang changed his position, and supported Li
38.
Great Hall of the People
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The Great Hall of the People is a state building located at the western edge of Tiananmen Square in Beijing. It is used for legislative and ceremonial activities by the Peoples Republic of China government and it is also the meeting place of the National Congress of the Communist Party of China, which, since 1982, has occurred once every five years. The Great Hall of the People is also an attraction in the city frequented by tourists visiting the capital. The Great Hall of the People was designed by Zhang Bo and it was opened in September 1959, and was one of the Ten Great Constructions completed for the 10th Anniversary of the PRC. The structure was built in 10 months by construction workers and volunteers, the building covers 171,801 square metres of floor space, it is 356 metres in length and 206.5 metres in width. The centre peaks at 46.5 metres, at the eaves of the main gate hangs the national emblem of the PRC. The Great Hall of the People consists of three sections, the central section principally includes the Great Auditorium, the Main Auditorium, the Congress Hall, the Central Hall, the Golden Hall and other main halls. The northern section consists of the State Banquet Hall, the Salute State Guest Hall, the North Hall, the East Hall, the southern part is the office building of the Standing Committee of the Peoples Congress of China. Each province, special administrative region, autonomous region of China has its own hall in the Great Hall, such as Beijing Hall, Hong Kong Hall, each hall has the unique characteristics of the province and is furnished according to the local style. The Great Auditorium, with volume of 90,000 cubic metres, government leaders make their speeches, and the representatives do much of their business. It can simultaneously seat 10,000 representatives, the ceiling is decorated with a galaxy of lights, with a large red star is at the centre of the ceiling, and a pattern of a water waves nearby represents the people. Its facilities equipped with audio-visual and other systems adaptable to a variety of meeting types and sizes, a simultaneous interpretation system is also provided with a language booth. The State Banquet Hall with an area of 7,000 square meters can entertain 7,000 guests, the Great Hall of the People is the political hub of Beijing and home of the National Peoples Congress. The Communist Party of China also holds its National Congress every five years in the Great Hall of the People, the Great Hall has been used for meetings with foreign dignitaries on state or working visits, as well as large anniversary celebrations attended by top leaders. The Great Hall has been used for the funerals and memorial services for several top leaders. Former President Liu Shaoqi was purged during the Cultural Revolution and died in the ensuing struggles and he was posthumously rehabilitated after 1978. In 1982 Liu was granted a funeral held at the Great Hall. The Great Hall also held the funerals of General Secretary Hu Yaobang in 1989 during the Tiananmen Square protests, mao Zedongs funeral ceremony was not held at the Great Hall, it was held at Tiananmen Square
