Wednesday, February 4, 2015

euronewsI would like to share in my fondness for one of united Europe's wonderful products, the one that I use practically everyday - the Euronews channel. Obviously, its idea is to reach a broad audience in their native language, but it is also a real catch for a multilingual European who enjoys switching languages. My TV provider in Lithuania allows to select whether I want to watch it in English, French or Russian. 

Some facts from the Euronews homepage. Euronews has been around for twenty odd years as it was launched in 1993 with only five language services - in French, English, German, Spanish and Italian.  Currently it broadcasts 24/7 simultaneously (simulcast) in 13 different languages, including Arabic, Greek, Hungarian, Persian, Turkish and Ukrainian. The channel has 800 staff, of which over 400 are journalists representing 25 different nationalities. I guess there is quite a number of translators employed, too, as the channel uses the journalists' material across different language services. With these resources the channel reaches an audience of 3.5 billion people in their native language and is a number 1 channel by viewers in the EMEA region (Europe, Middle East and Asia) with almost 300k households (1q 2014 data), followed by TV5Monde and CNN. It is headquartered in Lyon, France and has eleven eidtorial bureaux, e.g. in Kiev, Washington, Cairo, Budapest and Dubai. Hence, its refreshing diversity of current information and opinions. The channel' s shareholders are the national televisions of 21 countries and French local authorities. 

So, a truly multinational broadcaster. Lets keep watching.