YleYle Yle Yleisradio Oy (Finnish, literally "General Radio Ltd." or "General Broadcast Ltd."; abbr. Yle ; ), translated to English as the Finnish Broadcasting Company, is Finland's national public broadcasting company, founded in 1926. It is a joint-stock company which is 99.98% owned by the Finnish state, and employs around 3,200 people in Finland. Yle shares many of its organizational characteristics with its British counterpart, the BBC, on which it was largely modelled. For the greater part of Yle's existence the company was funded by the revenues obtained from a broadcast receiving licence fee payable by the owners of radio  sets (1927–1976) and television sets (1958–2012), as well as receiving a portion of the broadcasting licence fees payable by private television broadcasters. Since the beginning of 2013 the licence fee has been replaced by a public broadcasting tax (known as the Yle tax), which is collected annually from private individuals and corporations together with their other taxes. By far the largest part of the Yle tax is collected from individual taxpayers, with payments being assessed on a sliding scale. Minors, as well as persons with an annual income of less than €7,813 are exempt. At the lower limit the  tax payable by individuals amounts to €50 per annum and the maximum (payable by an individual with a yearly income of €20,588 or more) is set at €140. The rationale for the abolition of the previous television licence fee was the development of other means of delivering Yle's services, such as the Internet, and the consequent impracticality of continuing to tie the fee to the ownership of a specific device. Yle receives no advertising revenues as all channels are advertisement-free. Yle has a status that could be described as that of a non-departmental public  body. It is governed by a parliamentary governing council. Yle's turnover in 2010 was €398.4 million. In 2018 Yle's annual budget was about €530 million . Yle operates three national television channels, 13 radio channels and services, and 25 regional radio stations. As Finland is constitutionally bilingual — around 5.5% of the population speaks Swedish as their mother-tongue — Yle provides radio and TV programming in Swedish through its Swedish-language department, Svenska Yle. As is customary in Finnish television and cinemas, foreign films and TV programmes, as well as segments of local programmes that feature foreign language  dialogues (e.g. news interviews), are generally subtitled on Yle's channels. Dubbing is used in cartoons intended for young children who have not yet learned to read; off-screen narration in documentaries is also frequently dubbed. In the field of international broadcasting, one of Yle's best known services was Nuntii Latini, the news in Latin, which was broadcast worldwide and made available over the Internet. Yle was one of 23 founding broadcasting organisations of the European Broadcasting Union in 1950. Yle hosted the Eurovision Song Contest 2007 in Helsinki. History. "Suomen Yleisradio" (Finland's General Radio) was founded in  Helsinki on 29 May 1926. The first radio programme was transmitted on 9 September in that year, and this is the date generally considered to be the birthday of regular broadcasting activities in Finland. However, it was not until 1928 that Yle's broadcasts became available throughout the country. After this the broadcasting network was developed and by the beginning of the 1930s, 100,000 households were able to listen to Yle programmes. In 1957, Yle made its first television broadcast tests, and the following year regular TV programming was started under the name "Suomen Televisio" (Finland's Television), which was  later renamed Yle TV1. The popularity of television in the country grew rapidly. In 1964, Yle obtained TES-TV and Tamvisio, which were merged to Yle TV2. In 1969, the Finnish Broadcasting Company began broadcasting television programs in colour, but due to the high cost of technology, virtually all programs appeared in colour only in the late 1970s. On May 1, 1977, "Tv-uutiset" (~ TV-news) and TV-nytt switched to colour. In the 2000s, Yle has founded a number of new radio and television channels. In 2007 there was a digital television switchover. A completely new digital channel , "Yle Teema" (~ Yle Theme) was introduced, and the Swedish-language FST ("Finlands Svenska Television," ~ Finland's Swedish Television) was moved from reserved analogue channel time to its own digital channel YLE FST5, which was later renamed to Yle Fem. In addition to these four channels (TV1, TV2, Teema, and Fem), a fifth channel, called YLE24, was launched in 2001 for 24-hour news programming. However, this channel was replaced by YLE Extra, a channel attempting to cater to the youth, which was in turn decommissioned in 2007. Until 4 August 2008, the fifth channel was used to broadcast  Yle TV1 with Finnish subtitles broadcast on programmes in foreign languages (without having to enable the TV's or digital set-top box's subtitle function). Television. As of January 2014, all of Yle's TV-channels except TV Finland are available in high definition. Yle phased out digital audio broadcasts by the end of 2005. Three channels continued to be available as DVB audio services. DVB audio services were shut down on 30 June 2016. Yle tax. Until the end of 2012, Finnish citizens paid Yle a license fee for the use of a television, set at 252 euros  per year in 2012. The license fee was per location, which could hold several sets (e.g. in a living room as well as a bedroom). The public broadcasting tax, also known as the Yle tax, replaced the license fee in 2013. The tax ranges from 50 euros to 140 euros per person and per year, depending on income. Minors and persons with low income are exempt from the tax. Controversies. In radio, Yle was a legal monopoly until 1985, when local radio stations were permitted, and maintained a national monopoly until 1995, when national radio networks were allowed. In the  past, Yle has been seen in Finland as a "red" or leftist medium. This was true especially in 1965–1969, during the term of Director-General Eino S. Repo, who got the position with the backing of the Agrarian League and President Kekkonen (who was a member of the Agrarian Party), as he was Kekkonen's personal friend. He was accused of favouring leftist student radicalism and young left leaning reporters with programs critical of capitalism that demanded reforms to bring Finland closer to the Soviet Union, and Yle was given the nickname "Reporadio". After his resigning, he was demoted to  the position of director of radio broadcasting, on the communist-led People's Democratic League mandate. Repo resigned in 1969, but according to Yle, the "political mandate" remained, as Erkki Raatikainen was named director directly from the Social Democratic Party office. Subsequently, all directors after him until 2010 were Social Democrats. This was ended by appointment of the right-wing National Coalition Party's Lauri Kivinen as director in 2010. During Finlandization and the leftist radicalization of the 1970s, Yle contributed to Kekkonen's policy of "neutrality" by broadcasting the programme "Näin naapurissa" about the Soviet Union. This programme was  produced in cooperation with the Soviets and as such, supported Soviet propaganda without criticism. The appointment of Lauri Kivinen in 2010 received much criticism as he was previously head of Nokia Siemens Networks, which had sold monitoring equipment to the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence, allowing them to arrest political dissidents throughout the protests in the fall of 2009. English-language newscaster Kimmo Wilska was fired on 13 August 2010 - after pretending to be caught drinking on-camera following an alcohol-related news story on "Yle News". Wilska's stunt was not well received by Yle management who fired him that  same day. Wilska received a lot of support after his termination. Yle has been criticized for buying many HBO series. Yle has responded to criticism emphasizing suitability of series to channels with no ad breaks, quality and low price of HBO programming and stating that American programs even with HBO form only 7% of Yle programming. Decision to close shortwave. The broadcasts on shortwave from Yle were closed at the end of 2006. Expatriate organisations had been campaigning for a continued service, but their efforts did not succeed in maintaining the service or even in slowing the process. The decision  also affected a high-powered medium wave on 963 kHz (312m). A smaller medium wave covering the Gulf of Finland region (558 kHz, 538m) remained on air for a few more years. Parliamentary question about shortwave. In November 2005, MP Pertti Hemmilä (N) submitted a question in Parliament about the plans of Yle to end its availability on international shortwave bands. In his question, Hemmilä took up the low cost of the world band radio to the consumer travelling or living abroad. In her response the Minister of Transport and Communications, Susanna Huovinen (S) noted that Yle would  now be available via other means, such as satellites and the Internet. She also underlined the fact that Yle is not under government control, but under indirect parliamentary supervision. YLE Gate 2017. The Council for Mass Media in Finland criticized Yleisradio for restricting news reports about Prime Minister Juha Sipilä's investments and business in 2017. The chief editor of Yle threatened that Yle would resign from the Council. PM Sipilä had been angry over Yle reports on the Talvivaara mine and Ketera Steel (a company owned by relatives of Sipilä). Several reporters were barred from publishing stories about of  political connections between Sipilä and companies owned by his relatives, and state financing of the Talvivaara mine (Terrafame mine). Yle Yleisradio Oy (Finnish, literally "General Radio Ltd." or "General Broadcast Ltd."; abbr. Yle ; ), translated to English as the Finnish Broadcasting Company, is Finland's national public broadcasting company, founded in 1926. It is a joint-stock company which is 99.98% owned by the Finnish state, and employs around 3,200 people in Finland. Yle shares many of its organizational characteristics with its British counterpart, the BBC, on which it was largely modelled. For the greater part of Yle's existence the