ITVball

ITVball, also known as Independent Televisionball, is a commercial television channelball in the United Kingdom Previously a networkball of separate regional television channelballs, ITVball currently operates in England, Wales, Scotland and the Channel Islandsballs

He is officially not in the EBU (by himself at least), It's because of his competitors being members, although he aired Junior Eurovision from 2003 to 2005. His colours are dark blue, black, and grey.

Beginnings
The Television Act 1954 was passed by the British government to add another television service. This would be called Independent Television (as it was independent from BBCcubes and would have a different company licenced by ITAbrick in every part of the country. The companies got their licences from 1954-1961 and started broadcasting in the years below: The ITVballs entered EBUball as ITCAball in 1959.
 * 1955: Rediffusionbrick, ATVball London
 * 1956: ABCball, ATVball Midlands, Granadaball
 * 1957: Scottish Televisionball
 * 1958: TWWbrick, Southern Televisionball
 * 1959: Tyne Teesball, Anglia Televisionball. Ulster Televisionball
 * 1961: Westward Televisionship, Border Televisionpotato, Grampianbrick
 * 1962: Channel Televisionbrick, Wales West and North Televisionball

UKball issued the Pilkington Report in 1961, which panned the ITVballs for not focusing on their regions enough. ITAball issued a review of the ITVball contracts in 1964. Meanwhile multiple factors caused WWNball to go bankrupt and their clay was absorbed into TWWball's clay (and WWNball was adopted by the latter), who kept on all of WWN's staff (but not the studios). All the other ITV companyballs stayed on.

1965, the Isle of Man was the last major area to get ITV service, in this case from Borderpotato. In the same year, the Belmont transmitter was put into service with Angliaball to serve the eastern coasts of the Midlands and Yorkshire, which were not covered well by Granadaball.

Franchise changes, colour broadcasting and golden ages
In 1968, a much larger franchise review/round occured and large changes were made to the clays themselves, detailed below: ABCball was a valuable company to the network and so ITAball proposed he merge with Rediffusionbrick, who didn't win his contract back entirely. They did so, and Thames Televisionbrick was born.
 * Granadaball's eastern clay would be handed to a new companyball. Yorkshire Televisionball. Weekend services would be retained in London as a 7-day London contract would dominate hugely over the rest of the network.
 * Granadaball and ATVball would take over weekend services in their regions from ABCball.

TWWbrick was enraged to have lost his contract to Harlechbrick and ultimately left his contract in March, when HTVbrick was meant to launch in August of that year. ITSWWball was set up as an emergency service broadcasting from TWW's old studios until May when HTVball could launch.

Granadaball was very upset to lose more than half of his clay and threatened to report ITAball to the United Nations. However he had to comply and Yorkshire Televisionball won without incident.

ATVball lost his London weekend clay to London Weekend Televisionbrick. While not as initally angered as much as Granadaball, he did not leave the situation in the past as quickly. LWTbrick had been selected for his high-brow (fancy) programming above ATV, but this took a large toll on his ratings, leaving him in financial ruins. ATVball and Thamesbrick were both eager to gain LWTbrick's franchise area if he were to meet the same fate as WWNball did. However after company restructure, LWTbrick finally got good ratings and Thamesbrick eventually gave up on trying to get a full-week contract.

In 1974, a dispute over the Bilsdale transmitter between Tyne Teesball and Yorkshire Televisionball was ended in Tyne Tees's favour. As compensation for the lost viewers, Yorkshire was given the much more valuable Belmont transmitter. This did not just give him the eastern pieces of Yorkshire and Lincolnshire but northern Norfolk as well, which was considered an integral part of Anglia's clay. This angered Angliaball and many of his viewers but to no avail. Angliaball lost half of his profits, but this caused him to focus much more on his viewers.

The 1970s proved to be a golden age for ITVball, many companyballs made many famous programs, many of which are still remarked upon today. ATVball, Thamesbrick, Granadaball, Yorkshire TVball and Angliaball among others were a part of this.

At the same time, VHF broadcasting was phased out in favour of UHF, causing some transmitters to be decommisioned and for inland areas to have proper coverage. This proved valuable for Grampianbrick, Borderpotato and HTVball.

Third and fourth franchise rounds
Another franchise round occured in 1980 with contracts to be expanded from 1982 onwards. Clay changes were the following: Southernball lost to TVSrainbow and threw a huge temper tantrum but at least stuck to the end, and even further than allowed.
 * The South would gain some of London's clay.
 * Angliaball would gain northern Norfolk.

ATVball won on the condition that he abandon all operations outside his region, sell 49% of himself off and rename himself, eventually to Centralball.

Westwardball lost all motivation to keep on going and his successor, TSWball, ended up buying him 4 months before the contract was to end.

TV-ambrick won the franchise for breakfast broadcasting but launched much earlier due to the BBCcubes launching their own service.

In 1989, ITVball launched a generic look but all the other companyballs save for Grampianbrick did not like it.

One more franchise round was held in 1990. TVSrainbow lost to Meridian Broadcastingball, TSWball lost to Westcountry Televisionball, Thames Televisionbrick lost to Carltonball and TV-ambrick lost to GMTVball. This franchise round allowed for ITVballs to anschluss each other, and a race ensued to come out on top.

Although the likes of Meridianball put up a good fight, Granadaball and Carltonball emerged on top. All ITVballs in England and Wales lost their regional identities in stages from 1999-2004. In 2004, the winners of the anschluss race merge to form ITV plcball.

As of 2020, STVball and ITV plc are the only independent ITVballs. UTVball was anschlussed in 2015.

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-- 08:26, 1 September 2021 (UTC)