TOKYO — A new era of foreign television broadcasting to Japan--something already common in most of the rest of Asia--began Monday with the launch of 24-hour programming from Rupert Murdoch's Hong Kong-based Star TV.
Star TV's entry into the Japanese market--with American and Asian programs dubbed or subtitled in Japanese, plus a few shows purchased from Japanese producers--marks the first wave in what could become a flood of foreign programming targeted at viewers in the world's second-largest economy.
"Now for the first time, Japanese television is under real competition with foreign services," said Reimei Okamura, a professor of international media at Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto. "Star TV is just the beginning of a rush of foreign signals, I believe."
Key to this new opening of the Japanese broadcasting world are technical developments in digital satellite broadcasting that allow a vastly increased number of channels to be carried over a limited number of frequencies.
Another major factor is fear within the Japanese government, especially at the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications, that without rapid deregulation and development of better infrastructure, Japan risks falling behind in the global race to develop and use cutting-edge information and telecommunications technology.
In a sharp break with traditional restrictions, the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications last April granted permission to Star TV and Turner Broadcasting's TNT & Cartoon Network to launch direct satellite broadcasts to Japan and to receive income from that programming. Such broadcasts are expected to boost the growth of both satellite and cable television in Japan.
"Japan is on its way to creating one of the most vibrant and dynamic cable-satellite television industries in the region," Gary Davey, Star TV's chief executive, said Monday at a Tokyo news conference. "We look forward to playing a part in the Japanese satellite television industry. We saw an important opportunity to work with the Japanese cable industry as it grows."
Turner's TNT & Cartoon Network is not yet reaching individual Japanese subscribers, but its pan-Asian signal, carried on a Chinese satellite, now "is available to cable operators who have to make a decision about whether to put it on their systems," Ted McFarland, president of Turner International Asia Pacific, said in an interview.
