International Radio and Television Organisation

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The International Radio and Television Organisation (official name in French: Organisation Internationale de Radiodiffusion et de Télévision or OIRT (before 1960 Organisation Internationale de Radiodiffusion (OIR)) was an East European network of radio and television broadcasters established in 1946 with the primary purpose of exchanging productions amongst its members. The television network of OIRT was established in 1961 and was called Intervision (Russian Интервидение, Bulgarian Интервизия, Polish Interwizja, Hungarian Intervízió),

The members of the OIRT were Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Finland, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the european republics of USSR. From 1950 onwards, its headquarters were located in Prague. Finland as a neutral country was also the member of EBU and also Austria, which was the corresponding West-European organisation and used Western FM bands instead of Eastern OIRT FM bands in broadcasting.

Between 1977 and 1980 the OIRT organised four contests of the Intervision Song Contest in Sopot, Poland, in an attempt to emulate the highly successful Eurovision Song Contest.

On January 1, 1993, it merged with the European Broadcasting Union (which runs the Eurovision Network).

For more information on the history of Intervision click here [1]