World Broadcasting

Not too many years ago nearly every developed country around the world were active in broadcasting their message and culture around the world. This not only allowed them to keep people from their country informed while they were overseas but it also gave those countries a way of promoting their country and its way of life to the world. And although it was sometimes used by some countries as propaganda over the years it did allow the listeners to gain insight into those countries.   

 

Another thing that broadcasting allowed to the free counties of this world was to spread the news in an impartial way as they could, something your own BBC was famous for around the world. People in counties where the press was censored would tune into the BBC to listen to the news about their part of the world. It gave them another view of stories that were twisted or left untold and gave them the reason to make up their own mines. Work that the BBC is finding harder and harder to do today with cut after cut to its world broadcasting budget.

The BBC is not the only broadcaster that has suffered from cut and changed the way they deliver their message to the world. Unlike times past the short wave bands these broadcasters use to occupy have largely fallen silent. Even the greats of the past have gone and stations like Radio Moscow are no more, just broadcasting in digital using a system that hardly anyone can listen to without special radios that aren't widely available. Of course other great nations have stop broadcasting too and transmitters around Europe in particular have been mothballed and in many cases scrapped altogether.

In many cases the stations still exist and the majority of counties still have world broadcasting programmes, but these are now transmitted over the internet or by satellite, or just left to websites to relay the message in text. That sounds fine until you think in times and areas of conflict that the internet might not available to the many and that they might not be the power to use satellite equipment. For people in situations like that only the old short wave broadcasting methods might be the best way of get news to the people that is unbiased and reliable. Also in this time of strain with Russia it import the news they get is fair, because that doesn't seem to be happening at home.

Culturally it is a bad thing too as it makes other cultures less fearful of your own while giving you insight into the cultures of others. You just have to look situation the world faces today with extremists able to preach and radicalise young people with lies because the truth isn't out there for everyone to hear. And other cultural elements are important too such as music, arts, literature, history and the heritage of nations too. It gives you an insight in to a nation and its people and you hear it first hand.    

We will never go back to the old days of crowded short wave bands of the past in Europe, but in another parts of the world it is still going strong, but with maybe less hours of broadcasting by any one broadcaster than ever before. In the end time will see these off and old radio bands of the past will fall silent and those old short wave radios will become a curiosity of the past.