Television and radio broadcasting in unencrypted form
Free-to-air
(
FTA
) services are
television
(TV) and
radio
services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the
appropriate receiving equipment
to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring a
subscription
, other ongoing cost, or one-off fee (e.g.,
pay-per-view
). In the traditional sense, this is carried on
terrestrial radio
signals and received with an antenna.
FTA also refers to channels and broadcasters providing content for which no subscription is expected, even though they may be delivered to the viewer/listener by another carrier for which a subscription is required, e.g.,
cable television
, the
Internet
, or
satellite
. These carriers may be mandated (or OPT) in some geographies to deliver FTA channels even if a premium subscription is not present (providing the necessary equipment is still available), especially where FTA channels are expected to be used for emergency broadcasts, similar to the
1-1-2
(112) emergency service provided by mobile phone operators and manufacturers.
On the other side,
free-to-view
(FTV) is generally available without
subscription
, but it is digitally encoded and may be restricted geographically.
Free-to-air is often used for
international broadcasting
, making it something of a video equivalent to
shortwave radio
.
Most FTA retailers list free-to-air channel guides and content available in North America for free-to-air use.
Funding
[
edit
]
Although commonly described as free, the cost of free-to-air services is met through various means:
- Tax funding
- Enforced levy of a
licence fee
for transmission and production costs (e.g., the
BBC
)
- Voluntary donation for local transmission and production costs (e.g.,
PBS
)
- Commercial advertising for transmission and production costs and surplus revenues returned to the government (e.g.,
CBC Television
/
Television de Radio-Canada
in
Canada
,
SBS
in Australia and
TVNZ
in New Zealand)
- Commercial sponsorship
- Consumer products and services where part of the cost goes toward television
advertising
and
sponsorship
(in the case of Japanese television broadcasters like
TV Asahi
and
TV Tokyo
which rely heavily on sponsorship, similar to Philippine broadcasters like
ABS-CBN
,
TV5
and
GMA
)
Middle East
[
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]
Israel
[
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]
Up until 2012, Israel had several free-to-air channels. The major ones rating-wise:
Channel 2
,
Channel 10
, and
Channel 1
. The other ones were:
Educational
,
Channel 33
, and
Knesset 99
.
Since 2018, Israel has several new free-to-air channels that replace their older counterparts. The major ones rating-wise:
Channel 12
,
Channel 13
,
Kan 11
, and
Channel 20
. The other ones are:
Kan Educational
,
Makan 33
, and
Knesset Channel
.
Africa
[
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]
South Africa
[
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]
In 1971, the SABC was finally allowed to introduce a television service. Initially, the proposal was for two television channels, one in English and Afrikaans, aimed at white audiences, and another, known as TV Bantu, aimed at black viewers. However, when television was finally introduced, there was only one channel with airtime divided evenly between English and Afrikaans, alternating between the two languages. Test transmissions in Johannesburg began on 5 May 1975, followed in July by ones in Cape Town and Durban. Nationwide services finally commenced on 5 January 1976.
In common with most of Western Europe, South Africa used the PAL system for colour television, being only the second terrestrial television service in sub-Saharan Africa to launch with a colour-only service, Zanzibar in Tanzania having introduced the first such service in 1973. (Tanzania itself did not establish a television service until the early 1990s, similarly concerned about the expense and perceived threat to cultural norms.) The Government, advised by SABC technicians, took the view that colour television would have to be available so as to avoid a costly migration from black-and-white broadcasting technology.
Initially, the TV service was funded entirely through a licence fee as in the UK, charged at R36. However, advertising began on 1 January 1978.
On 1 January 1982, two services were introduced, TV2 broadcasting in Zulu and Xhosa and TV3 broadcasting in Sotho and Tswana, aimed at a black urban audience. In 1985, a new service called TV4 was introduced, carrying sports and entertainment programming, using the channel shared by TV2 and TV3, which ended transmissions at 9:30 pm. In 1992, TV2, TV3 and TV4 were combined into a new service called CCV (Contemporary Community Values). A third channel was introduced known as TSS, or Topsport Surplus, Topsport being the brand name for the SABC's sport coverage, but this was replaced by NNTV (National Network TV), an educational, non-commercial channel, in 1994.
The main channel, now called TV1, was divided evenly between English and Afrikaans, as before. It also became available in
Walvis Bay
, an enclave of South Africa in Namibia, which was itself then under South African administration, with a live feed of the channel broadcast via Intelsat being retransmitted on a local low-power repeater.
In 1986, the SABC's monopoly was challenged by the launch of a subscription-based service known as M-Net, backed by a consortium of newspaper publishers on 1 October. However, as part of its licensing restrictions, it could not broadcast news programmes, which were still the preserve of the SABC, although M-Net started broadcasting a current affairs programme called Carte Blanche in 1988. As the state-controlled broadcaster, the SABC was accused of bias towards the apartheid regime, giving only limited coverage to opposition politicians.
Asia
[
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]
Hong Kong
[
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]
In Hong Kong, the largest and most dominant television channel,
Television Broadcasts Limited
, was the first free-to-air commercial television channel when it commenced broadcasting on 19 November 1967. It may also well be among the oldest and first station to broadcast over-the-air in East and Southeast Asia.
ViuTV
and
RTHK
TV started broadcasting in 2016.
India and South Asia
[
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]
Around 600 FTA television channels and 180 Radio Channel are broadcast from ku-band and c-band transponders on the
INSAT-4B
and
GSAT-15
satellite covering India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, Sri Lanka and parts of Afghanistan, and Myanmar. In India, the channels are marketed as
DD Direct Plus
/
DD Free Dish
by
Doordarshan
, India's national broadcaster and other Indian private broadcaster
ABS Free Dish
from the ABS2 satellite, one can receive free-to-air regional TV channels using small DTH antenna and freetoair set-top box.
South Korea
[
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]
In Korea,
KBS
,
MBC
(the 2 main public broadcasters),
SBS
(privately owned, but available for free to viewers), and
EBS
(including both
TV
and
radio
) are the free-to-air broadcasting stations. They dominate more than 80% of advertisement profits, according to the recent survey from the agency
[
ambiguous
]
.
Due to the recent government's
[
which?
]
decision,
digital television
service for all free-to-air networks would be scheduled before the year 2012, followed by the end of analog television broadcasting.
Europe
[
edit
]
Satellite
[
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]
European countries have a tradition of most television services being free to air. Germany, in particular, receives in excess of 100 digital satellite TV channels free to air. Approximately half of the television channels on
SES Astra
's
19.2° east
and
28.2° east
satellite positions, and
Eutelsat
's
Hot Bird
(13° east) are free-to-air.
A number of European channels which one might expect to be broadcast free-to-air - including many countries' national terrestrial broadcasters - do not do so
via satellite
for
copyright
reasons. (Rights to purchase programs for free-to-air broadcast, especially via satellite, are often higher in price than for encrypted broadcast.) The lack of FTA among public broadcasters are prevalent in countries whose broadcasters tend to use subtitles for foreign language programmes; although Spain's two public domestic channels, La Una and La Dos, are also encrypted despite dubbed foreign programmes being the norm in Spain. However, these channels usually provide a scheme to offer free, but encrypted, viewing with
free-to-view
broadcasts. Certain programming on Italy's
RAI
, and the majority of Dutch channels are covered by such schemes (although in the case of RAI some programming is transmitted without encryption where there are no copyright issues). In
Austria
, the main national networks broadcast free-to-view via satellite; however, all regional and some smaller channels are transmitted free-to-air, and the national public broadcaster,
ORF
, offers a special free-to-air channel which airs selected programming without (i.e. those without copyright issues) via satellite all over Europe.
As Germany and Austria speak the same language and use the same satellite, Austrian viewers are able to receive about 120 free German-speaking channels from both countries.
In general, all
satellite radio
in Europe is free to air, but the more conventional broadcast systems in use mean that
SiriusXM
style in-car reception is not possible.
Cable and satellite distribution allow many more channels to carry sports, movies and specialist channels which are not broadcast as FTA. The viewing figures for these channels are generally much lower than the FTA channels.
Terrestrial
[
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]
Various European countries broadcast a large number of channels via free-to-air
terrestrial
, generally as an analog
PAL
/
SECAM
transmission, digital
DVB-T
/
T2
or a combination of the two.
Croatia
[
edit
]
In Croatia eleven national channels are free-to-air:
HRT 1
,
HRT 2
,
HRT 3
,
HRT 4
(
HRT
being national broadcaster),
Nova TV
,
Doma TV
,
RTL
,
RTL2
,
RTL Kockica
,
CMC
and
SPTV
. There are around 21 local or regional channels. Before June 2020, they used to be transmitted via three
OiV
(state-owned public broadcasting company)
DVB-T
and one
DVB-T2
(
HEVC/H.265
)
MUXes
. As of June 2020, the DVB-T MUXes were switched off and all eleven national channels are now distributed via two OiV DVB-T2 (HEVC/H.265) MUXes.
Denmark
[
edit
]
In Denmark, six channels are as of 2020 free-to-air,
[1]
distributed via 18 main transmitter sites and 30 smaller, auxiliary transmitters.
[2]
The six channels (
DR1
,
DR2
,
DR Ramasjang
,
Folketinget
, TV2 Regionerne, and sign language/local programme) come in one
DVB-T2
multiplex
.
France
[
edit
]
In France, there are twenty six national television channels (MPEG-4 HD video) and 41 local television channels broadcast free-to-air via the TNT DVB-T2 service.
Germany
[
edit
]
In Germany there are various free-to-air DVB-T services available, the number of which varies by region.
Das Erste
,
ZDF
,
ZDFneo
,
ZDFinfo
,
3sat
,
Arte
,
KiKA
and
Phoenix
are available throughout the country, in addition to at least one region-dependent channel which is provided by the regional
ARD
member. Additionally, ARD's
EinsFestival
,
EinsPlus
and
tagesschau24
are variously available in some parts of the country, and various commercial channels are available in metropolitan areas.
Ireland
[
edit
]
In the Republic of Ireland, there are nine television channels and 11 radio channels broadcast free-to-air via the DVB-T Saorview service. Analog PAL versions of some of the channels were also broadcast until October 24, 2012, when all analogue television broadcasting was shut down.
Malta
[
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]
All of Malta's National and Political Party Channels are available free-to-air. The National Channels,
TVM
and
TVM2
,
Parliament TV
and the political party channels
NET
and ONE, all are broadcast via the Free-to-air DVB-T service.
Even HD versions of these channels are available free-to-air. The only scrambled channel in Malta is ITV Teleshopping.
Netherlands
[
edit
]
In the Netherlands, 3 national public television channels
NPO 1
,
NPO 2
and
NPO 3
, and 7 national public radio channels broadcast free-to-air via the DVB-T
Digitenne
service. The television and radio channels of the regional public broadcasters are also free-to-air via the DVB-T service.
United Kingdom
[
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]
In the UK, the five main free-to-air television networks are
BBC One
,
BBC Two
,
ITV
,
Channel 4
and
Channel 5
. Around 108 free-to-air television channels and 30 free-to-air radio channels are available terrestrially via the Freeview DVB-T service. Seven HD channels are also broadcast via a public service broadcast multiplex and a commercial multiplex, both DVB-T2.
The informal term "council telly" is sometimes used for free-to-air television in the UK, evoking a basic service accessible to all.
[3]
[4]
North America
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]
There are a number of competing systems in use. Early adopters used C-band
dishes
several feet in diameter to receive analog microwave broadcasts, and later digital microwave broadcasts using the 3.7-4.2
GHz
band. Today, although large C-band dishes can still receive some content, the 11.7-12.2 GHz
K
u
band
is also used. Ku-band signals can be received using smaller dishes, often as small as under a meter (3 feet, 3 inches) in diameter, allowing FTA satellite to be picked up from smaller spaces such as apartment balconies (note, however, that these dishes are not quite as small as those commonly used for commercial services such as
Dish Network
,
DirecTV
,
Bell ExpressVu
,
Shaw Direct
, etc. Dishes intended for those services may not deliver an adequate signal on Ku-band). The European-developed
DVB-S
and
DVB-S2
standards are the most commonly used broadcast methods, with analog transmissions almost completely discontinued as of mid-2014.
The most common North American sources for free-to-air DVB
satellite television
are:
- NHK World
HD on
Intelsat 9
(58°W)
- Retro TV
,
Heartland
on
AMC 9
(83°W)
- LPB
Louisiana
PBS
channels LPBHD, LPB2, and LPB3 (Create) on
SES 2
(89°W)
- NASA TV
Multi-channel (NASA TV Public-Education, NASA Media, NASA TV UHD) on
Horizons-1
(aka Galaxy 13) (127°W)
- Eternal Word Television Network
on
Galaxy 17
(91°W)
- My Family TV
,
CGTN
on
Galaxy 3C
(95°W).
- AMGTV and
BYU Television
(BYUtv) on
Galaxy 19
(97°W)
- English and foreign language broadcasters
RT (TV network)
,
Ebru TV
,
IRINN
,
Al Jazeera English
and more up-linked by
GlobeCast World TV
on
Galaxy 19
(97°W)
- Christian broadcasters such as
The Word Network
,
Emmanuel TV
,
Daystar Television Network
,
JCTV
,
Trinity Broadcasting Network
,
The Church Channel
,
3ABN
,
The Hope Channel
,
Amazing Facts
Television,
God's Learning Channel
are broadcast from the
Galaxy 19
(97°W) satellite for
Glorystar
and Spiritcast Satellite Systems TV.
- Peace TV English and Peace TV Urdu language which are global Islamic channels, available on Galaxy 19 (97°W)
- DoD News
on
AMC 1
(103°W)
- Jewish Life Television
on
Galaxy 18
(123°W)
- Montana Public Broadcasting Service
and other
PBS Satellite Services
on
AMC 21
(125°W)
- Classic Arts Showcase
on
Galaxy 17
(91°W) and
Eternal Word Television Network
HD on
Galaxy 15
(133°W)
- Football
,
basketball
,
baseball
,
soccer
, and
ice hockey
wildfeeds
on various satellites
- InfoWars
and
Alex Jones
Show broadcasts from
Austin, Texas
, and creates free-to-air 24/7 content on Galaxy 16 99°W
Most of these signals are carried by US satellites. There is little or no free Canadian DVB-S content available to users of medium-size dishes as much of the available Ku-band satellite bandwidth is occupied by
pay-TV
operators
Shaw Direct
and
Bell Satellite TV
, although larger C-band dishes can pick up some content. FTA signals may be scattered across multiple satellites, requiring a motor or multiple
LNBs
to receive everything. This differs from Europe, where FTA signals are commonly concentrated on a few specific satellites.
Another difference between North American FTA and FTA in most of the rest of the world is that in
North America
, very few of the available signals are actually intended for home viewers or other end-users. Instead, they are generally intended for reception by local television stations, cable system headends, or other commercial users. While it is generally thought to be legal for home viewers to view such transmissions as long as they are not encrypted, this means that there are several unique challenges to viewing FTA signals, challenges not present in other areas of the world. Among these are:
- No schedule information is provided with most of the signals; therefore, satellite receivers cannot show a proper
electronic program guide
(EPG).
- Because many of these broadcasts are essentially point-to-point transmissions, the originators often do not follow any international standards when setting various identification fields in the data stream. This causes issues with receivers and software designed for use in other parts of the world, as they may assume that if a channel contains the same ID information as another channel, those are duplicate channels. This may be a valid assumption in other parts of the world, but is almost never valid for North American FTA signals. When such an assumption is made, during a "blind scan" the receiver or software will often fail to correctly insert one or more channels into its database, or it may overwrite previously scanned valid channels (including other channels on the same satellite) with invalid information picked up from another, more recently scanned channel. If the end user does not understand what is happening, they may assume that the receiver cannot receive certain channels or that it is defective, yet if the correct data for those channels can be manually entered, those channels may become receivable. This problem can be mitigated if receivers can be set to ignore channels that appear to be duplicates during a "blind scan", except when such channels are on exactly the same satellite and same transponder frequency (as might occur if the user rescans a previously scanned satellite).
- Channels tend to come and go, or change transmission formats, often without any prior notice other than to their intended recipients. This means that a working channel could suddenly disappear without warning, and may need to be rescanned to become receivable again, or it may be gone permanently.
- Channels that are currently FTA can become scrambled (
encrypted
) with no advance warning. A few channels tend to go back and forth between being "in the clear" (unscrambled) to scrambled at various times, but in most cases, once a channel is scrambled it stays scrambled.
- Historically, it has appeared that broadcasters are more likely to scramble their signals when they become aware that home viewers and other "unauthorized" viewers are watching their signals. Therefore, those who know what signals are available may sometimes be reluctant to share that information in open forums. While sites exist that attempt to list currently viewable FTA signals, most of them are incomplete or do not contain current information. Such sites typically rely on reports of changes by viewers, and if viewers are reluctant to report new FTA signals for fear they might disappear, it becomes more of a challenge for such sites to maintain up-to-date listings.
- What some would consider the most desirable signals, e.g. feeds from broadcast networks, are primarily only available on C-band, which requires a large dish (usually at least 6 feet/1.8 meters in diameter or more, although a few hobbyists have found it possible to receive some C-band signals using smaller dishes and high quality LNBs). Also some of those signals utilize high-bitrate formats that cannot be received by many older receivers, even if those receivers are capable of receiving digital signals, and such signals may require a larger than usual dish for adequate reception. In many areas, local zoning laws and/or homeowner associations forbid the placement of a large dish, therefore such dishes have fallen out of favor since commercial satellite services became widely available. Therefore, very few people have the capability to receive the C-band broadcasts. Another issue is that properly aiming a C-band dish is not something that a typical end-user would know how to do, since it tends to be a somewhat complex procedure (especially when a moveable dish is used with the intention of tracking the visible satellite arc in order to receive multiple satellites), and many of the installers that knew how to set up and correctly aim a C-band dish have exited the business.
- While equipment and
software
is becoming available that allows home users to set up a backend system that can deliver received over-the-air
ATSC
signals to several frontend systems (for example, a
HDHomeRun
,
VBox Home TV Gateway
or similar TV tuner, used with
MythTV
or
TVHeadEnd
), a similar system for receiving FTA signals is considerably more difficult to set up. While PCI/PCIe tuner cards and USB tuners for DVB-S and DVB-S2 are available, there are often issues with drivers, or the cards may simply not be compatible with the backend software in use. Therefore, setting up such a system for FTA satellite reception tends to require considerably more technical knowledge, and a willingness to work through issues, than setting up such a system for receiving terrestrial signals.
- Some syndicated programming is being sent as data, similar to the way a
video file
might be sent over the
Internet
. This means that the programming is not sent in a format that can be viewed in real time, as it is being received. Instead, the data must be captured to a
storage device
and decoded for later use. Traditional satellite receivers and even many PC
tuner cards
are not capable of receiving these signals, and even if you have a card capable of receiving such signals, you also need special software to find such data streams and when one is found, to extract the data stream and save it.
The largest groups of end-users for Ku-band free-to-air signals were initially the ethnic-language communities, as often free ethnic-language programming would be sponsored by Multilingual American Communities and their broadcasters. Depending on language and origin of the individual signals,
North American
ethnic-language TV is a mix of
pay-TV
, free-to-air and DBS operations. Today, many American broadcasters send a multitude of programming channels in many languages, spanning many new channels, so they can get National support, which ultimately leads to carriage by
cable
systems, to additionally support the high costs of broadcasting signals in this way.
Nevertheless, free-to-air satellite TV is a viable addition to home video systems, not only for the reception of specialized content but also for use in locations where terrestrial
ATSC
over-the-air reception is incomplete and additional channels are desired.
Oceania
[
edit
]
Australia
[
edit
]
Australia has five major free-to-air networks: the two
public broadcasting
networks -
ABC
and
SBS
, and three commercial networks -
Seven Network
,
Nine Network
, and
Network 10
. Traditionally each network had only a single channel in a geographic area, but with the advent of digital television each network started broadcasting several
SD
multichannels, such as
7two
,
9Gem
,
10 Bold
, and
SBS Food
, as well as at least one
HD
channel. There are also free-to-air
community television
channels in some major cities.
Viewers in remote parts of Australia are able to access many Australian free-to-air channels using the DVB-S2 Optus
VAST
service.
New Zealand
[
edit
]
New Zealand has a number of FTA broadcasters such as
Television New Zealand
's
TVNZ 1
and
TVNZ 2
, as well as
Discovery New Zealand
's
Three
and
Bravo
,
Sky Network Television
's
Sky Open
and the government subsidised the
Whakaata M?ori
and
Te Reo
channels.
Four channels, TVNZ 1, TVNZ 2, Three, Bravo are also broadcast timeshifted by +1 hour on Freeview and Sky platforms.
A broadcast of parliament and a number of local channels were available but since have closed, such as
Cue TV
were also available. Local stations such as
CTV
and Face TV (previously Triangle TV) were free-to-air analogue PAL transmissions prior to CTV migrating to the free-to-air digital DVB-T service and Face TV's terrestrial free-to-air service shutoff from December 2013.
A digital terrestrial version of Freeview was launched in 2008, which, unlike the analogue and free-to-air satellite options, supports
high-definition
broadcasts for TVNZ 1, TVNZ 2, Three and Bravo. While, airing the timeshifted channels also.
[5]
South America
[
edit
]
Brazil
[
edit
]
In
Brazil
the main FTA satellite is the Star One D2, it holds approximately 7 C-band analog channels, including all major networks like
TV Globo
nacional and regional,
SBT
nacional and regional,
Record
,
RedeTV!
,
Band
,
Cultura
,
TV Diario CE
,
Futura
and others, and 24 C-band and KU-band digital
HDTV
channels.
Chile
[
edit
]
In
Chile
the main FTA satellite is the Hispasat 74W-1, it holds approximately 10 KU-band digital
HDTV
channels including all major networks like La Red, Telecanal, TVN, TVN2, C24H, CHV, CHV2, CDTV, TV Senado, La Red Feed, Telecanal Feed and TVN Feed.
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
External links
[
edit
]