Television Iran with
Habib Sabet on visit to television centre, June 1970 On October 3, 1958, Television Iran (TVI) was established, broadcasting from
Tehran. Its programming included
quiz shows and American programmes
dubbed into
Persian, and appealed to an unsophisticated audience.
Habib Sabet, a
Baháʼí who was one of Iran's major industrialists, was the founder of the first television station. The station manager was an American, A. Vance Hallack, who had previously operated the Baghdad Television Station in
Iraq. Before coming to the Middle East, Hallack had managed
NBC's
colour division. At its launch, TVI had the sponsorship of numerous
blue chip Western companies, such as
RCA,
General Tire,
Pepsi-Cola,
Autolite,
Squibb and
Volkswagen, Sabet having opened the first Pepsi-Cola plant in Iran in 1955. However, by 1963, it claimed to have lost 70 million
rials, and its owners attempted to sell the station to the government, but by then it had already approved plans for its own television network.
National Iranian Television A separate network, National Iranian Television (NITV), was established in 1966. This catered for a more educated public.
American Forces Radio and Television Service Until 1976, the
American Forces Radio and Television Service (AFRTS) broadcast a television service on Channel 7 in Tehran and the surrounding area from its studios in the city. Catering for
US Armed Forces personnel, this was known as AFTV, and was the only television service in the country then carrying programming in English, as all foreign programming on NITV and TVI, including American and British imports, was dubbed in Persian. In deference to Iranian sensitivities, AFRTS avoided carrying programming that might be construed as offensive on political or religious grounds, instead carrying cowboy or detective movies. However, in that year it was decided by the Iranian government that AFRTS should close down its radio and TV services, which it did on October 25. These would be replaced by similar services, operated by the state broadcaster. TVI, meanwhile, had been nationalised at the end of April 1969. By that time, the government had come to consider the privately owned station a competitive threat, and bought out Sabet for the sum of 20 million
toman, against his initial investment of 70 million toman, with the station's building being taken over by the new Educational Television service. The large budget allocations that were provided to NIRT, a reflection of the organisation's role in development, enabled it to use the latest technologies, including microwave delivery systems, to overcome problems of mountainous terrain. Before then, in 1973, NIRT had already established a total of 14 television production centres with 153 transmitters, covering approximately 88 cities and towns in Iran, accounting for 60 per cent of the population. The following year, this had increased to fifteen, including two in
Tehran, as well as one each in the provincial cities of
Abadan,
Ardebil,
Bandar Abbas,
Esfahan,
Kerman,
Kermanshah,
Shiraz,
Mahabad,
Mashad, Rasht,
Rezaiyeh,
Sanandaj,
Tabriz and
Zahedan. By 1974, Iran was second only to Japan in Asia in terms of the development of its broadcasting capabilities.
Colour television broadcasts first began in 1975, although reception was largely confined to affluent people who are able to afford colour sets. Regular colour broadcasts were introduced in 1976. The standard was changed to the French
SECAM in February 1977, resulting in imported television sets becoming unusable. Although NIRT had the facilities to broadcast in colour, and used this when broadcasting the
Asian Games held in Tehran in 1974, full broadcasts in colour were delayed until 1978, on account of the ability of local manufacturers to meet the demand for colour sets. The first NIRT television network, known as the First Program, carried general content, of which only 33 per cent was imported, with the second network or Second Program aiming to show more educational and cultural content, of which 60 per cent of its content was imported. Broadcast for eight and a half hours daily, most programming was in English, with some films and programs in French and German. This appealed to the 60 000
US Army and civilian personnel then stationed in Iran, as well as the wider population of foreign nationals resident in the country.
Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting After the
1979 revolution, NIRT was renamed as صدا و سيمای جمهوری اسلامی ايران
Seda va Sima-ye Jomhouri-e Eslami-ye Iran ("Voice and Vision of the Islamic Republic of Iran"), known in English as
Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB), and under the new Constitution of the Islamic Republic, radio and television were to be "aligned with the course of perfection of the Islamic Revolution and served the promotion of Islamic culture, and to this end benefit from the healthy collision of different ideas and strictly avoid spreading and propagating destructive and anti-Islamic tenets". A notable censorship episode happened in May 1995, when one of its channels cut the feature film
Running 70 minutes in with a black screen. The broadcaster accused the censorship on "technical problems", but the real reason, according to an observation made by the
BBC, was the display of athletes wearing shorts and sleeveless tops. In 1998, Iran changed from using
SECAM to the
PAL system developed in (Germany), and also used in the United Kingdom. ==Satellite television==