Yleisradio Oy, abbreviated as Yle, translated into 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 organisational characteristics with its British counterpart, the BBC, on which it was largely modelled.
Yle Fem was Yle's Finland-Swedish national television channel, providing television programmes in the Swedish language in Finland. It was a public-service channel principally intended for Finland's Swedish-speaking minority. Creating understanding over the language and culture border was also one of the channel's recognized objectives.
MTV3 is a Finnish commercial television channel owned and operated by the media company MTV Oy, originally launched in 13 August 1957 as a programming block, becoming its own channel on 1 January 1993. It had the biggest audience share of all Finnish TV channels until Yle TV1 took the lead. MTV actually stands for Mainos-TV, due to the channel carrying advertising for revenue. Number 3 was added later, when the channel was allocated the third nationwide television channel and it generally became known as "Channel Three"—Finnish Broadcasting Company's Yle TV1 and Yle TV2 being the first two—and also to distinguish it from the later MTV Finland, which is a Finnish version of Paramount's MTV channel. From 1957 until 2001, the channel's logo was a stylised owl, changed to an owl's eye after an image renewal in 2001, which was then used until 2013. MTV3 has about 500 employees. It is also known as Maikkari. From 1986 to 1993, Kolmoskanava was a precursor to MTV3. It was shut down at midnight on December 31, and MTV3 immediately started broadcasting.
Television was introduced in Finland in 1955. Color television started in 1969 and was introduced gradually, with most programs in color by the late 1970s. All terrestrial analogue stations stopped broadcasting on 1 September 2007 after the introduction of digital television; cable providers were allowed to continue analog broadcasting in their networks until 1 March 2008.
SVT2, is one of the two main television channels broadcast by Sveriges Television in Sweden.
Yle TV2 is a Finnish television channel owned and operated by Yle. TV2 was launched in 1965 as the successor to the former television channels TES-TV (Tesvisio) and Tamvisio, and broadcasts public service programming, sports, drama, children's, youth, and music programmes. With Yle TV1, it is one of the three main television channels of Yle.
Finland has participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 57 times since its debut in 1961. The Finnish participant broadcaster in the contest is Yleisradio (Yle), which has often selected its entrant with a national final, since 2012 known as Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu. The country won the contest for the first – and to date only – time in 2006 with "Hard Rock Hallelujah" performed by Lordi. The country's best result before then was achieved with "Tom Tom Tom" by Marion Rung in 1973, which placed sixth.
YLE24 was a Finnish language TV channel broadcast by Yle. The unit was founded in 2000, and it was active from 2001 to 2007.
Finland was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 2005 with the song "Why?", composed by Mika Toivanen, with lyrics by Steven Stewart, and performed by Geir Rönning. The Finnish participating broadcaster, Yleisradio (Yle), organised the national final Euroviisut 2005 to select its entry for the contest. 24 entries were selected to compete in the national final, which consisted of four semi-finals and a final, taking place in January and February 2005. Six entries competed in each semi-final and the top three from each semi-final, as selected solely by a public vote, advanced to the final. Twelve entries competed in the final on 19 February where votes from six regional juries first selected the top six to advance to a second round. In the second round, votes from the public selected "Why?" performed by Geir Rönning as the winner with 30,648 votes.
Ajankohtainen kakkonen was a Finnish current affairs television series broadcast in Finland on Yle TV2 from 1969 to 2015. It aired every Tuesday at 21.00 EET.
Finland was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 2002 with the song "Addicted to You", composed by Maki Kolehmainen, with lyrics by Janina Frostell and Tracy Lipp, and performed by Laura. The Finnish participating broadcaster, Yleisradio (Yle), organised the national final Euroviisut 2002 to select its entry for the contest. The broadcaster returned to the contest after a one-year absence following their relegation from 2001 as one of the bottom six entrants in 2000. Yle selected twelve entries to compete in the national final on 26 January 2002 where votes from six regional juries first selected the top six to advance to a second round. In the second round, votes from the public selected "Addicted to You" performed by Laura as the winner with 70,580 votes.
Finland was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 2004 with the song "Takes 2 to Tango", composed by Mika Toivanen, with lyrics by Jari Sillanpää, and performed by Sillanpää himself. The Finnish participating broadcaster, Yleisradio (Yle), organised the national final Euroviisut 2004 to select its entry for the contest. The broadcaster returned to the contest after a one-year absence following their relegation from 2003 as one of the bottom five countries in 2002. 20 entries were selected to compete in the national final, which consisted of two semi-finals and a final, taking place in January 2004. Ten entries competed in each semi-final and the top six from each semi-final, as selected solely by a public vote, advanced to the final. Twelve entries competed in the final on 24 January where votes from six regional juries first selected the top six to advance to a second round. In the second round, votes from the public selected "Takes 2 to Tango" performed by Jari Sillanpää as the winner with 98,987 votes.
Finland was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 1994 with the song "Bye Bye Baby", written by Kari Salli and Markku Lentonen, and performed by the duo CatCat. The Finnish participating broadcaster, Yleisradio (Yle), organised the national final Euroviisut 1994 in order to select its entry for the contest. Ten entries were selected to compete in the national final on 5 March 1994 where votes from the public selected "Bye Bye Baby" performed by CatCat as the winner with 25,834 votes.
Finland was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 1998 with the song "Aava", composed by Alexi Ahoniemi, with lyrics by Tommy Mansikka-Aho, and performed by the group Edea. The Finnish participating broadcaster, Yleisradio (Yle), organised the national final Euroviisut 1998. Yle returned to the contest after a one-year absence following its relegation from 1997 as one of the six entrants with the least average points over the preceding four contests.
Finland was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 1996 with the song "Niin kaunis on taivas", written by Timo Niemi, and performed by Jasmine. The Finnish participating broadcaster, Yleisradio (Yle), organised the national final Euroviisut 1996 - Euroviisut ja Emma in order to select its entry for the contest. Yle returned to the contest after a one-year absence following its relegation from 1995 as one of the bottom nine entrants in 1994.
Finland participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2011 with the song "Da Da Dam" written by Axel Ehnström. The song was performed by Paradise Oskar, which is the artistic name of singer Axel Ehnström. The Finnish broadcaster Yleisradio (Yle) organised the national final Euroviisut 2011 in order to select the Finnish entry for the 2011 contest in Düsseldorf, Germany. 15 entries were selected to compete in the national final, which consisted of three semi-finals and a final, taking place in January and February 2011. Ten entries ultimately competed in the final on 12 February where votes from the public selected "Da Da Dam" performed by Paradise Oskar as the winner.
Erkki Pohjanheimo is a Finnish television producer and director.
Finland was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 1966 with the song "Playboy", written by Ossi Runne, and performed by Ann-Christine. The Finnish participating broadcaster, Yleisradio (Yle), selected its entry through a national final.
Yle Teema & Fem is a Finnish free-to-air television channel owned by Finnish state-broadcaster Yle. It was launched on 24 April 2017, after Yle Teema and Yle Fem merged to this channel.
Tesvisio was the first television channel in Finland. It began regular broadcasts on March 21, 1956 and continued broadcasting until March 1965, when it was turned into Yle TV2.
