History of ITV

The history of ITV, the United Kingdom "independant telivision" commertial network goes back from 1954.
It was launched to prevent any individual company obtaining a monopoly on commertial Tv which was previously BBC.
They first broadcasted on 22nd sep 1955 at 19:15. AS the BBC had known about the launch they put on a dramatic scene in their weely soap, this was seen as a ploy to keep the loyal viewrs to keep on watching BBC programes and not the launch of ITV.
1976- colour was available to all viewers in all areas.

Accusations of "Dumbing down"
Many commentaters believe that ITV has been "dumbed down" in recent years because they are showing more reality TV shows and soap operas rather then current relations and documentaries.

ITV is watched on average by 45 million people every week. It has the largest programme budget of any commercial channel in Europe, currently at around £1 billion, which is spent on a mixed genre schedule made up of a range of high quality programmes.

WhO OwNs ITV?
It wasn’t until the mid 1990s that changes started happning. It was the decade that Sky pushed their satellite service in earnest throughout the country. And it was the decade that consolidation within ITV really began to gather pace. Within a few years, three companies – Carlton, Granada and United News & Media – owned most of ITV. Not long later, three became two and finally, in 2004, Granada and Carlton combined together to become ITV plc.

1)ITV began funding through the advertisements that were shown between programs.

2) from 1955-1968 ATV (franchise) provided weekend service for ITV and AR (assosiated rediffusion-franchise) provided for the weekdays.

3)ATV also held the Midlands ITV franchise (weekdays only until 1968) up to 1982 when ATV essentially reinvented itself as Central.

4)Granada Television is the longest surviving of the ITV companies (since 1956) and now owns all of the ITV franchises for England and Wales.It is famous for several programmes, especially Coronation Street.

5)Thames was formed for the London weekday ITV franchise in 1968.

6)Westward Television was the first of the "second wave" of ITV franchises to start broadcasting in 1961.

7)following on from the previous batch of franchises which had included Southern and Tyne Tees as well as the pioneers Associated-Rediffusion and Granada.

found this link very helpfull.....!

http://freespace.virgin.net/mymail.athome/channels/itv/itv.html

Itv remains the only mainstream TV company physically unable to broadcast 24

the breakfast slot of 6-9:25am remains owned by a separate franchise. Completely different companies run its services outside England and Wales from those within.
It is one of only two commercially-owned TV networks (the other being Five) that are forced to show programmes deemed to be of a public service nature – arts, news and religion for example. It’s the only commercial TV network that has to provide regional programming.

The small ownership of the network is slowly fading away. In October 2004, ITV increased its stake in breakfast franchise owner GMTV to 75% – requiring it to offer to purchase the shares of the remaining shareholder, Disney. If Disney accepts the offer, ITV will for the first time be able to run a 24/7 service on its channels.
ITV network expanded with the addition of more regional franchises covering various parts of the United Kingdom.


Granada Television (which originally served the North-West of England and Yorkshire) is the longest surviving of the ITV companies (since 1956) and now owns all of the ITV franchises for England and Wales.
It is famous for several programmes, especially Coronation Street (a long-running soap opera) and World in Action.

Television (ATV), which was the company that held the London ITV weekend franchise until 1968. ATV also held the Midlands ITV franchise (weekdays only until 1968) up to 1982 when ATV essentially reinvented itself as Central.