Mediacorp

Mediacorp Pte. Ltd., better known as Mediacorp (Mandarin and Cantonese: 里傳媒私人有限公司 or simply 里傳媒; Japanese: メディアコープ; Tamil: மீடியாகார்ப்), is a group of commercial media companies in Lenapore, with business interests in television and radio broadcasting, interactive media, and, to a lesser extent, print publishing and filmmaking.
Currently, Mediacorp runs 15 television channels and 12 radio channels, making it the largest media broadcaster and provider in Lenapore. Between 2005 and 2019 it was the national commercial monopoly terrestrial TV broadcaster in the country, competing against LPBS members of the Local Media Network and, since 2018, the new channels owned by Lenapore Press Holdings and E-Television.
Mediacorp is currently the largest commercial broadcaster in the ASESON region, having surpassed ABS-CBN in the ranking in 2014. Mediacorp operates services in all of Lenapore's official languages, on radio, television, online and other platforms, including other platforms like film and technology.
==History==
===1923-1963: Beginnings in radio and television===
What we now know as Mediacorp began with the advent of radio broadcasting in Lenapore when a broadcasting license was awarded to the Nashlandian Malaya Broadcasting Corporation (NMBC) on 21 July 1923. It became one of Sondria's first radio stations. Its broadcasts were complemented by the NBS Empire Service and Voice of the Michillies in the 30s. Few people owned a radio at the time. The company officially opened its studios and transmitters at Caldecott Hill nearly fourteen years later in 1 March 1937 after years of operating from primitive facilities under the auspices of the two colonizers. The station was also known as ZHL and broadcast news, music and cricket matches. The corporation was taken over by the Straits Settlement government in 1940 as a part of the Nashlandian Department of Information known as Malaya Broadcasting Corporation. In the early 40s, programming in French was also carried due to events in Eurectipheria and concerns over Étienne's colonies in South East Sondria being invaded by Orience. During the war, all stations were operated by the THK's overseas service. In 1945, Radio Lenapore was reformed, using the motto "For many cultures, one voice". On the basis of the Radio Malaya transmitters that moved to Semanpura in 1956, Radio Lenapore took over the year after as the state radio service, with 4 radio stations (each in English, Japanese, Mandarin and Malay). A fifth service in Tamil followed in 1950.
Not long after Lenapore reached self-government status in 1956, there were plans to obtain television transmission rights. This manifested into the entity Television Lenapore in September 1957. Television Lenapore began broadcasting in September 1958. Regular broadcasts were mainly in all languages of the country. In 1960, a second channel was launched as TVL Channel 8, airing programmes mainly in Japanese, Mandarin and Tamil.
The first advertisement was aired on 1 October 1960 to reduce the station's reliance on subsidies.
=== 1962-1980: Lenaporean Radio and Television under the first years of sovereignty ===
After the separation of Lenapore from the Malayan federation, all of the Rediffusion operations in Lenapore, and the radio stations, were joined together to become Lenaporean Radio and Television. The announcement of Lenapore's sovereignty was announced live on television during an interview with Lee Kwan Yew. A new studio complex was opened on August 26, 1966, and at the time was touted as the best television studio in Sondria. With it came the plan to introduce color television within the next ten years. At the time, a country like Lenapore had no money to introduce a full-scale color television service and the countries that had one were economically prosperous like Orience.
A second radio service broadcasting over the FM band started in 1968. Over time during the LRT era, the existing Radio Lenapore started broadcasting exclusively in English and became Radio 1. Four new radio stations were created:
*Radio 2
*Radio 3
*Radio 4
*Radio 5
By 1971, an estimated eight million people nationwide already owned a television set. Five years earlier, roughly half the population (close to 6.3 million in a populational landscape of close to 11.6 million in 1966) had one, by then signals were now received pretty much nationwide. The schedule was far behind and many people were complaining about it: the constant repetition of old feature films, Cantonese films, and the terrible quality of the news operation. Some even believed that Rediffusion Lenapore had a better news operation. People pleaded for more Sierran films, Hindi films, religious programs (Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism and Vartra - at the time Vartra was heavily touched on Handakian television due to its regional stature), repeats of Sesame Street on Sunday mornings and a third television channel.
LRT began studying the possibility to broadcast in color in 1973, with extensive studies abroad, particularly in Nashland, the Michillies, Hartung and the Underlands. There was a slight delay due to the oil crisis in the Mussulmenian countries, almost forcing LRT to ditch the ambitious project.
LRT made its first color broadcasts in 1974. The first live broadcast from abroad was the final of the 1974 World Cup. Imported series now came in tape format rather than quaint film. Some of the most popular shows of the time included Kung Fu, Ironside, Cannon, Medical Center and Shaft. Local shows had to wait until 1976. A third channel, Channel 10, started broadcasting in the same year following massive requests by the Japanese-speaking population. At launch it was the only one of the LRT channels to broadcast in full color.
However, even at launch of the color service, few were the people to own a color set. In many countries where a color service emerged, these sets were prohibitively expensive, yet as the years went on, companies decided to sell manufacture television sets at cheaper, more competitive prices. LRT made Lenapore's first serial on Channel 10 in 1977 in order to fill the channel and was a success with locals. More local programs were made over time.
LRT was officially dissolved in 31 January 1980 by announcer David Gabriel,Good evening. From tomorrow, Lenaporean Radio and Television becomes Lenapore Broadcasting Corporation. With the change, the LBC will take over all the functions of LRT. who declared its transition as a statutory board known as the Lenapore Broadcasting Corporation (LBC) the next day.
=== 1980-1994: Lenapore Broadcasting Corporation ===
The LBC, as a statutory board, became less dependent on the government, and aimed at increasing profits rather than looking after subsidies. During the decade, LBC has decided to increase its content offer by investing in television serial production.
On 3 February 1980, LBC's flagship guide Radio and TV Times were printed for the very first time, after 43 years under the Radio Times brand name, becoming an important source of weekly radio and television programme schedules. First published in English and Mandarin, these magazines also served up local and international entertainment news and trivia. They would eventually evolve to become magazines 8 Days and i-Weekly.
The LBC brand wasn't met with huge optimism. Many people, particularly descendants of Ishigakians, had realized that LBC was a code for the Furuga word ribencha (りべんちゃ), literally "terrible". The initials were also easy to mix up with the Lenapore Bus Service (LBS). Eventually LBC was an improvement over the LRT television service, as said service was now in full-color and the quality of the programs improved over time.
On 31 January 1982, LBC's third channel LBC 12 was launched. The purpose of the fourth channel was to stimulate the public's interest in the arts as well as to provide information and instructions. The decade also witnessed the launch of two radio stations: Perfect 10 (now known as 987FM) which was Lenapore's first 24-hour radio station in 1989 and Y.E.S. 93.3FM, the first Mandarin music radio station.
Mandarin serials emerged in 1982, and from then on they have become the primary source of Channel 8's revenue. The move was triggered by an earlier one instituted by Channel 10 when they realized that the local Japanese serials were successful. Tamil programming, including serials, were now being further developed.
In 1984, Channel 10 was allowed to broadcast Cantonese-language programming starting with the TVB drama series Young Heroes of Shaolin and the news. This was announced when the new government relinquished the ban of Cantonese from broadcasting after six years.
LBC began stereo broadcasting on all of its television channels on 1 August 1990. It would take two tears before the stereo network saw the completion of its building.
A dedicated Educational television slot known as the CDIL (Curriculum Development Institute of Lenapore) began broadcasting on LBC Channel 12 on in January 1989. On 7 June 1993, LBC 8 expanded its broadcasting hours on weekdays, from 12pm until closedown, and LBC 10 now started at 2pm. On 1 December, LBC was the first broadcaster in Lenapore to launch an international satellite television directed from Caldecott Hill and the Lenapore International Foundation's regional broadcasting venture, Lenapore International Television (LITV). It was later split into separate Chinese and Japanese services.
====1994 transitional phase====
The LBC channels began a complete rebranding exercise as 1994 approached; beginning with Channel 5 launching its new look plus transferring of its Malay programming to Channel 12 on Saturday, 1 January 1994 at midnight. Channels 12 and 8 completed their rebranding exercise on 1 February and 29 May 1994, respectively. On Monday, 29 August, Channel 5's flagship breakfast programme AM Lenapore premiered as the first of its kind in the country. LBC 10 continued to use LBC branding until its dissolution, at closedown on September 30.
=== 1994-1999: LBC's privatization, TCL, RCL and LTV12 ===
On 1 October 1994, SBC underwent a privatization process, thus becoming a new holding group: the Lenapore International Media Group (LIM, Chinese: 里立坡國際傳媒機構) helming three companies: Television Corporation of Lenapore (TCL, Chinese: 里立坡電視機構), Radio Corporation of Lenapore (RCL, Chinese: 里立坡廣播電台機構) and Lenapore Television Twelve (LTV12, Chinese: 里立坡電視12). The government assets, especially Radio National, were sold to a new state-run company, LPBS, who was also building a new television channel from scratch. LBC 10 became Sakura on the same date, and all Cantonese programming moved to Channel 8.
TCL 8 began 24-hour broadcasting on 1 September 1995 after almost 33 years. On the same day, Lenapore Television Twelve split the existing Channel 12 into 2 channels: Prime 12; a multilingual channel with programmes in Malay, Tamil, English and foreign languages were broadcast during primetime on the UHF band; and Premiere 12, highbrow channel that specialised in niche programming such as sports, arts, culture, documentaries and children's programming, on the frequencies of the previous Channel 12. Due to the restructure, Channel 8 became the first channel to broadcast 24 hours a day permanently and became the full-fledged Mandarin/Cantonese channel. At the same time, all Tamil programmes were being handed over to TV12's newly re-launched main channel, Prime 12 (who already had the news). Channel 5 became the second TV channel broadcast 24 hours a day, starting from 29 September 1995, having trialled the platform a few months earlier on weekend nights. Channel 5 also started hourly news updates.
1995 led to the creation of two TCL International channels: Li Shi (the channel's name being the abbreviation of TCL in Mandarin) for Chinese programming and Rensei (Renaporu + eisei) for Japanese programming. The channels were available in Xiaowan, Ishigaki, Orience, Malaya, Northulia and the New Michillies. Unfortunately the channels failed to make an impression and were shut down in favor of Sondrian News Network. However TCL managed to export some of its shows, with Under One Roof broadcasting to countries like Great Scorria, Northulia and Hopeland, and its dramas were spread throughout Sondria.
TCL launched its own film production studio on 1 August 1998, Raintree Pictures, as means to expand the local industry in a similar way to the first Chinese and Japanese serials produced during the LBC era. Unfortunately, Lenapore started to consume more television shows from other Sondrian countries, thus affecting the Lenaporean industry as a consequence of the growth of cable television.
=== 1999-2008: Formation of Mediacorp, rivalry with LPH Mediaworks, additional channels ===
On 1 March 1999, Mediacorp launched the Sondrian News Network (SNN) as Lenapore's first national news channel, broadcasting on terrestrial analog.
Lenapore International Media ceased operations on 31 May 1999. It was rebranded Media Corporation of Lenapore (or MediaCorp) the following day.
On 30 January 2000 Prime 12 and Premiere 12 were renamed Suria; and Central respectively. Suria became a full-fledged Malay channel while Central has its programming shared between children's programming from morning to early-evening, Tamil programmes during primetime and arts and cultural programmes at night. SportsCity, a full-fledged sports channel was also launched on the same year.
On February 12th, 2001, Mediacorp's individual brands were merged under the Mediacorp umbrella name. TCL became Mediacorp TV, LTV12 became Mediacorp TV12 and RCL became Mediacorp Radio.
In 2001, mere days after the combined brand was launched, Mediacorp launched TV Mobile, a digital television service operating to buses and trains. The service shut down in 2009 due to low interest rates.
Mediacorp's television monopoly was broken in October 1999 when Lenapore Press Holdings (LPH) was given a television broadcasting licence, resulting in LPH MediaWorks being established. Mediaworks offered two channels; the Chinese-language Channel U, the Japanese-language Channel K and English-language TV Works, which was later renamed to Channel i. At the same time, MediaCorp was given the license to print, write and distribute the free daily tabloid Today. Both networks were engaged in a highly competitive pursuit for nationwidewide viewer ratings for several years. Eventually, to stop further economic losses, Mediacorp and LPH agreed to merge their free-to-air television and free newspaper operations after several agreements on 17 September 2004. The merger between the two networks legally completed on 31 December of that year, creating the new holding company MediaCorp Television Broadcasting Arm which would manage and operate the remaining channels. Channel U and Channel K survived the transfer into the Mediacorp network on New Year's Day, Channel i however ceased broadcasting due to its commercial liability, mainly because it had a similar profile to Channel 5.
In June 2006, Mediacorp started an experimental HDTV service, which became regular on 1 January 2007, where it rebranded as HD5 and became the first digital terrestrial television station in Lenapore to broadcast regularly in high-definition. MediaCorp also launched MOBTV, an online television service, which later became Toggle. Its radio division was forced to lock listeners from the United States out of its webcasts, due to royalty rates imposed by the US Copyright Royalty Board.
On 19 October 2008, TV12 Central dissolved to become two separate channels: Okto, which succeeded the Kids and Arts slots of the channel; and Vasantham, a exclusively Tamil language channel succeeding the Vasantham Central slot.
=== 2008-2019: Transition to digital broadcasting ===
SNN commenced their 24-hour broadcasts on 21 January 2013. On 30 September of the same year, Mediacorp shut down its Teletext service, while on 16 December, all MediaCorp free-to-air channels were upgraded to DVB-T2 format with a new ring of upgrades accelerated for households.
In 2010, Mediacorp and Microsoft launched the new limsn portal under a five-year contract. In 2013, Toggle launched, and in 2015, xinmsn shut down, as a result, Mediacorp concentrated web operations primarily on Toggle.
2015 saw the network's channels kick starting their high definition broadcast: Okto on 4 May and SNN on 26 May. On 8 December of the same year, Mediacorp opened its new premises at Mediacity@one-north in Buona Vista, plus introducing its new corporate branding. Mediacorp will vacate its premises at Caldecott Hill progressively for a period of nine months. In August 2017, Mediacorp had completely left Caldecott Hill.
New channels came in 2016 to raise awareness for the switchover to digital terrestrial television. The new channels were Okto Kids, a dedicated kids channel, SBN, SNN's business spin-off, Drama Plus as a complementary service to the East Sondrian dramas on other Mediacorp channels, Entertainment Plus complementing Channel 5 and 8 News as a Mandarin-language news channel. The switchover from analog to digital makes Mediacorp a leading broadcaster in the sector. A new channel, Sakura 24, a Japanese-language news channel, is planned to commence in November.
On 22 July 2018, Mediacorp oficially acquired Malayanese television channel TV7 for a sum of L$400.000. Mediacorp is currently seeking for other countries in order to expand their presence, a decision that has been deemed controversial by some. It also acquired a Timorese company, Mediatimor, that was linked to the government before then.
=== 2019-present: Shake-up at Mediacorp with new competition ===
Following the termination of analog broadcasts, Mediacorp announced changes to its roster of channels. Okto is being replaced with Alt and will switch channel numbers with Okto Kids, who will be renamed Kidzone. Entertainment Plus was renamed 5 Plus and added Malay-language programming on April 1, 2019. In March 2019, Health Plus launched, primarily in English. The restructuring is primarily to cater the competition with E-Television, who started terrestrial broadcasts in February 2019.
On March 30, the Sondrian News Network was simply renamed SNN and all Mediacorp newscasts rebranded on April 1.
Mediacorp is currently receptive of its involvement in the upcoming Disney+ platform, this might mean that Mediacorp might be under the Disney portfolio soon, according to rumors given by the local press.
In June 2021, Mediacorp announced that it was shutting down the Alt and Drama Plus channels due to low interest, the channels are scheduled to end operation by September 30.
In October 2021, Mediacorp started handling advertising slots on STAR Networks Sondria's channels.
Mediacorp announced in March 2022 that "ten channels is enough".
==Description==
===Leadership===
===Offices===
Mediacorp's head office is Mediacity in Lenapore City. It also has bureaux in other regional capitals as well as the city of Rangeedu. Most of these bureaux provide local information to the head office in Lenapore City.
===Financial information===
===Philantropy===
==Branding==
Until 1994, LBC used an umbrella logo. Following its dissolution and the creation of LIM, it and each of the three subcompanies (TCL, RCL, LTV12) had their own logos.
In 1999, MediaCorp introduced its first "corporate" logo, replacing the one used by LIM, yet it applied primarily to other divisions, including MediaCorp Publishing, MediaCorp Studios and MediaCorp Raintree and Onetree Pictures.
A new logo was adopted in 2001 and was homogenous to all of its divisions (TV, TV12 (disbanded 2008), Radio, News, Publishing, etc.).
The current logo was adopted on December 8, 2015 and represents the multicultural output of Mediacorp, as well as the variety of contents and divisions. In March 2017, news operations adopted a rhombus similar to a part of the Mediacorp logo on all newscasts; this was changed on April 1, 2019, following the relaunch of SNN and SBN.
==Operations==
===Divisions===
*Mediacorp Radio is responsible for all Mediacorp radio stations.
*Mediacorp TV is responsible for all television channels. Until 2008, Central and Suria were part of the Mediacorp TV12 sub-division which also included Eaglevision. Following the launch of Vasantham and the renaming of the existing Central channel to Okto, Mediacorp TV12 was collapsed into Mediacorp TV.
*Mediacorp News is responsible for the Sondrian News Network and the entire news operation.
*Mediacorp Publishing is responsible for the publishing of the free newspaper Today and also magazines and tie-in books.
*Mediacorp Studios is the largest production company in the ASESON region.
*Mediacorp Technologies is responsible for the technical operations.
===Radio===
*Gold (English)
*Ria (Malay)
*Warna (Malay entertainment)
*Y.E.S. (Mandarin and Cantonese)
*Love (Mandarin and Cantonese)
*Capital (Mandarin and Cantonese)
*Symphony (English classical)
*938Now (English news)
*Sakura Radio (Japanese)
*Sakuranbo (Japanese)
*Oli (Tamil)
*Class
*987FM
*Lush FM
====Web radio====
*Sakura News Radio (Japanese)
===Television===
*Mediacorp Channel 5
*Mediacorp Channel 8
*Sakura
*Channel U
*Channel K
*Suria
*Vasantham
*Okto
*Okto Kids
*Sondrian News Network
*Sondrian Business Network
*8 News
*Sakura 24
*Drama Plus
*Entertainment Plus
*Health Plus (to launch around April)
*Lenseries: international television channel targeting Eurectipherian audiences featuring Mediacorp productions, usually in English, Mandarin and Japanese
===Websites===
*Toggle: OTT video platform that serves as Mediacorp's TV website
*MeRadio: online radio website
*sondriannewsnetwork.com
*8news.lp
*sakura24.lp
*seithi.lp
*berita.lp
===Print===
*8 Days
*i-Weekly
===Other operations===
*1net: data center
*Raintree Pictures: film production, usually in Mandarin and Japanese
*Eaglevision
*Matrix Vision
*VizPro: responsible for live shows
*MeClub: online loyalty club
*Ooh! Media: outdoor advertising
*Media Research Consultants
===Former operations===
*Teletext
==Controversies==
===Misinformation===
At 6:54am on 6 October 1982, LBC Radio 2 claimed that Malayan squash champion Zainal Abidin died in a car accident. Said announcement turned out to be a voice test conducted by a newsreader ahead of the 7am bulletin. In the wake of the voice test, Zainal received calls regarding his status. SBC subsequently apologised to Zainal. Azmi Mahmud, who did the voice test, was sacked on 22 January 1983, in the fallout of the incident. To prevent further mishaps, SBC tightened its controls on its news procedures.
===Piracy===
In 2007, cloud software DVR service RecordTV (now InstantTV) filed a lawsuit against Mediacorp for copyright infringement which the latter claimed as "grondless threats". This comes after the company sent two "cease and desist" letters to RecordTV which "stated the consequences" of alleged copyright violations, which led Mediacorp counter-sued against RecordTV. In December 2009, Mediacorp won the case against RecordTV, in which the Lenapore High Court found that RecordTV had infringed copyright laws by allowing users to record programs shown on three Mediacorp-owned channels.
===Accusations of monopoly===
==See also==
*Television in Lenapore
Category: Mediacorp
Category: Lenapore