Television
Slovak TV market works on a dual principle which, on the one hand, introduces a public service TV funded from public sources (broadcast license fees and advertising) and on the other one provides for the existence of a number of commercial stations limited by technical possibilities (frequency bands) and market demand.

Publicly funded television
Position of the public TV in Slovakia is weakened by frequent replacements of managements depending on the support of political parties ruling the country. The supervisory body of STV – Council of STV – is composed of representatives of parliamentary political parties; general director of STV is elected by the National Council of the Slovak Republic which, compared to other European countries, is unique. It results in the fact, that every parliamentary election brings a new TV management. Over the last four years the situation has somewhat improved, however, without changing the relevant legislative regulations, it can hardly be called a lasting solution.
By de-politicizing the STV Council and changing the process of General Director election – if, for example, it became the province of the TV Council with members appointed by NGO’s and professional organizations – the ties between STV and political parties would become more relaxed which, in turn, would result in curbing the influence of political parties on STV, especially on news and publicist programs. At the same time, however, it would presuppose a more generous amendment to the Law on STV, which would conclusively solve the problem of funding STV and help the beleaguered TV station cope with the generally unfavorable financial situation. It is obvious that economic dependence goes hand in hand with political dependence.
Generally speaking, STV receives three types of income: broadcast license fees, proceeds from the sale of advertising time and subsidies from the state budget. In recent years there have been numerous proposals (especially on the part of commercial media operators/owners) calling for STV to stop deriving income from the state budget and advertising. Thus it would end up with broadcast license fees as a sole source of its income, which would extricate it from dependence on advertisers.
The Law allows a public service TV to reserve 3% of its broadcast time for advertising (with the addition of Tele-shopping, it amounts to 10% of its daily broadcast time) whereas in prime time, from 1900 – 2200, commercial messages should not exceed 8 minutes per hour of broadcast time. Commercial TV station can use 15% of their broadcast time for advertising per day, which, together with Tele-shopping, increases the quota to 20% of broadcast time per day. As opposed to STV, licensed operators are allowed to interrupt programs with commercial messages.
If STV is to be deprived of proceeds from the sale of advertisement it is necessary to provide for such an amendment to the Law which would grant STV a sufficient coverage of its cost of operation – and that especially with respect to the inflation – and apply stricter rules to exacting broadcast license fees. As long as the parliamentary parties remain divided over the necessity to raise television license fees and enact its indexation, the debate about withdrawing advertising from STV is absurd because such TV would instantly go bankrupt or become a puppet in the hands of politicians. It would be at their discretion to allow an occasional raise of fees, depending on whether the TV is “obedient” or not.
As an allowance organization, STV is directly linked to the state budget in which it has an individual budgetary chapter. It behaves as a state-owned company owning nothing but running a state property. By using extraordinary subsidies from the state budget, through which it solves its annual crises, STV calls into question its public character and increasingly assumes a role of a state, if not directly governmental media outlet (as a truly “governmental” media outlet STV behaved during the last Meciar’s administration between 1994 – 98, when it stooped to cooperate with secret services in an attempt to discredit then president Michal Kovac).
A strong politico-economic influence on STV has an adverse effect not only on the decision-making process of the management but also on the rank-and-file employees of STV. For instance, news editors are constantly criticized by both coalition and opposition parties for broadcast time allocated to individual political entities. However, neither the Law nor the Council does stipulate how the broadcast time should be divided. Prior to the last parliamentary election, the 1/3 pattern, introduced by the current management, (1/3 of politically relevant broadcast time is dedicated to the government, 1/3 to opposition and 1/3 to coalition) became ineffectual because the political powers became extremely divided and the difference between coalition and opposition faded out.
The public TV is further threatened by recurrent thoughts of privatizing the STV 2 channel, which offers a possibility of terrestrial coverage of 90% of the entire territory of Slovakia, thus becoming a very savory “appetizer” for commercial TV operators. Above all, it is TV Joj, which sounds out possibilities of gaining access to STV 2 transmitters and reaches a much larger public than it is capable of at present. STV itself thus instigates thoughts as to whether its broadcasting on two nationwide channels is legitimate or not.
In this context it is necessary to make it clear that if STV loses one of its channels while remaining a public service TV (which involves ensuring broadcasts for minorities, the handicapped, etc.) it would have to reduce broadcasting for a majority viewer. Therein it would lose its position on the market and would become more or less uncompetitive (a question remains, whether public TV stations should compete with commercial ones).
A significant problem is posed by a great over employment in STV. The TV employs around 2 000 and is hardly capable of using such a potential. The commercial TV Markiza employs about 1/5 of that number and solves a number of its projects through external contracts, thus showing a much greater efficiency than the public TV.

Privately owned televisions
The Slovak media scene has been dominated by three private TV channels TV Markiza; TV Joj, and a specialized news channel TA3. However, by all means, the strongest position is held by Markiza, the first nationwide TV station in the country (broadcasting since 1996) enjoying a lasting popularity with more than a half of the entire population. As yet, any attempts to compete with it have failed (whether it was the satellite VTV, which went on air earlier than Markiza, or the intellectually oriented TV Luna).
Presently, the only competition for Markiza comes from TV Joj whose broadcasting in March 2002 replaced TV Global, a network of regional TV stations.
The strong position of TV Markiza is based on good penetration (the station “inherited” its frequency band from a former public channel TA3 – correspondence with the name of the TA3 news channel is merely coincidental), an unusually large portion of the advertising cake (about 80% of all advertising expenditures goes to Markiza) and unique position this TV station assumed during the last administration led by Mr. Meciar when it, more or less, replaced a public service TV. It was the inability to compete of STV that contributed to that over a relatively short period Markiza became a very strong media outlet with no match on the Slovak market.
The position of TV Joj, the other full-format TV is rather complicated. An effort to create an alternative option to TV Markiza in which TV Joj decided to employ a successful know-how used in the most watched Czech TV Nova, has not yet paid off. The new channel, receivable in much fewer households than TV Markiza, started with offering its viewers old shows from TV Nova archives and sensationalist news visibly inferior in quality to that offered by the competition.
After 6 months of broadcasting, the market share of TV Joj amounts to less than 10% and although the programs it broadcasts keep improving it will probably hardly increase any time in the foreseeable future. TV Joj is troubled by the reputation of being a “garbage can” of TV Nova in Slovakia and although the proportion of old programs produced by Czech TV stations is on a decrease, the viewers are disappointed.
TA3 went on air in September 2001. This first news channel in Slovakia is constrained by the way it distributes its signal – the license only allows it to broadcast via satellite and cable. On the other hand, it has to be said that a high penetration of cable TV in Slovakia (approx. 40% of households) and the interest of cable companies enabled its reception not only in big cities but also in outlying regions. According to the diary surveys of audience share, although not accepted by TA3 management, the TV station has achieved approx. 1% market share.
As yet, Slovakia has no unified system of measuring audience share guaranteeing objective data neither for operators nor for advertising agencies and advertisers. There are two competing diary surveys one of which is provided by the Department of Media Research of the public Slovak TV and the other one is conducted by Visio company (for TV Markiza). Both surveys play into the hands of their respective clients and more often than not their surveys differ widely (in the event of Ice Hockey World Championship final won by the Slovak national team, the difference was almost 1 million viewers).
The situation in the second half of 2002 improved once the representatives of the three commercial TV stations and STV agreed on the conditions of introducing people meters to assess audience share. The unified electronic system should be introduced sometime in 2003. The joint project relies on establishing a professional agency associating all TV operators in Slovakia will advertise a public competition for an operator of the people meter panel of about 300 households.
Shortly before the last parliamentary election, Slovak private media operators brought up the issue of emancipating commercial and public broadcast media in term of political advertising, allowed by the Law only in the STV and Slovak radio. Private stations` operators, especially those of the dominant TV Markiza, regard this clause as discriminatory and seek such an amendment to the law which would provide for broadcasting political advertising by all TV stations and radios.
The ban of political advertising imposed on broadcast media also implies a significant interference with program structure of commercial TV stations over the period of official election campaign. Although the law explicitly bans all political advertising, it fails to provide a definition of the term. It is apparent that even political debates with individual candidates normally broadcast by all TV stations could be labeled as political promotion. Only thanks to the regulatory body, the Council for Broadcasting and Retransmission, the private broadcast media were allowed to continue broadcasting the debates during the election campaign and shortly before the Election Day.
The last parliamentary election in Slovakia brought up a huge problem consisting in the links of Pavol Rusko, the co-owner of Markiza, the most popular commercial TV, to the political party of Aliancia Noveho Obcana (ANO – Alliance of a New Citizen – now a coalition party holding the office of the Minister of Culture, among other things responsible for the media). The emergence of Pavol Rusko, founder and chairman of ANO, in active politics was accompanied by unusually extensive broadcast time allocated to this political party in the politically relevant news of TV Markiza. At the same time, these news items were positive or neutral and completely lacked the critical tone typical of reporting on other parties of the Slovak political spectrum.
The fact that TV Markiza has been continuously promoting Ruskol`party ANO has been repeatedly criticized by MEMO 98 as well as the Council for Broadcasting and Retransmission which on several occasions imposed high fines on the station operator. After the election, in which ANO gained 8% and became member of the coalition, Pavol Rusko sold his stake in the licensed company Markiza-Slovakia to the entrepreneur Frantisek Vizvary. At the same time he resigned as a member of the Board of Owners of TV Markiza and the position of the factor of Markiza-Slovakia Ltd. However, the non-standard relationship between TV Markiza and ANO continues – it has been corroborated by the fact that ANO leadership consists of a number of “Markiza faces” (Lubomir Lintner, the former news editor, Jozef Heriban, the former PR manager, Eva Cerna, the former host and others).
The Law contains no provisions applicable to such a situation, which means that to TV Markiza it is very indulgent. From his position of the chairman of an influential coalition party, Pavol Rusko may not only affect broadcasting of TV Markiza but also that of the public STV which, to a great extent, depends on the will of political parties, especially the ruling coalition. Parliament appoints and recalls the supervisory body of the STV ad the general manager, it decides about the amount of television license fees and the way of financing the public TV. ANO has already declared its determination to change the STV Law with its representatives asserting that STV should lose proceeds from advertising, thereby playing into the hands of the private sector and Markiza, which, to a great extent, provided for the election success of ANO.

Radio
Radio market, much like the TV one, is divided into public and commercial stations. Besides the public service radio, comprising a number of channels funded through broadcast license fees and advertising, there is a great number of commercial stations.

Public service radio
From the legislative point of view, the public radio is in a situation similar to the one of the public TV. As an allowance organization it is directly linked to the state budget, it doesn’t own any property and its general director is elected by the Parliament on the basis of nomination submitted by the Council of Slovak Radio. Nevertheless, it can be said that the position of the public radio is much better than that enjoyed by STV. To a great extent it is conditioned by the fact that, compared to STV, the public radio is much less in the political and professional spotlight.
The history of the Slovak Radio was not as turbulent as that of the Slovak TV. At the time, when STV was the mouthpiece of Mr. Meciar’s administration, the Slovak Radio managed to remain more or less independent. This fact was taken into consideration by the new government of 1998 by not replacing the general director, Jaroslav Reznik (Meciar’s supporter).
The Radio, too, has to cope with prolonged financial hardship, which can only be dealt with owing to extraordinary subsidies from the state budget. Although the debt of the Slovak radio is not as bad as that of the Slovak TV, the frequent interferences of the state, however, induce serious thoughts about changing the way in which this public institution is subsidized. Much like STV, the Slovak Radio has not changed broadcast license fees for years, although proceeds from advertising and broadcast license fees are hardly sufficient to pay for the cost of its operation. The losses are much lower than in STV, nevertheless, they shouldn’t be played down.
As opposed to STV, the public radio maintains its position of a market leader, and it doesn’t seem it will lose it anytime soon. It is conditioned by the fact that a great number of households own receivers for medium waves and the Slovak Radio is the only radio station broadcasting in this band. Generally speaking, the Slovak Radio audience comes from the middle-aged and senior citizens, especially those living in the regions and small towns. More often than not these people only own receivers supporting radio broadcast on medium waves. Situation in large cities is rather different, e.g. in Bratislava the most listened to radio is the commercial news station Radio Twist.
Traditionally, the Slovak Radio is the most trustworthy media outlet in Slovakia. From both qualitative and quantitative point of view it holds a long-term leading position. This is particularly true about its first channel – Radiozurnal – acting as a modern, public news station. Rather questionable is the position of Rock FM` channel which, although being part of the public radio, behaves like a commercial radio. To a certain extent this station can be labeled as anomaly, repeatedly criticized (and to a great extent justly) by commercial radio operators.
Generally speaking, while the STV goes through a strong internal decline, the Slovak Radio managed to completely avoid this process and expects the necessary legislative changes, which would extricate it from the sway of political parties and bring a solution to financing this public institution.

Private radio stations
Slovakia has more than twenty-four private radio stations. Most of them face grave financial problems; especially those in the regions. As opposed to TV market, there is no single big player among radio owners and the position of strong operators is rather even.
The nationwide radios try to function as music-information stations. In the recent years there have been numerous attempts to create a strong news radio station. Such is Radio Twist, which is about to expand into the neighboring Czech republic (it has acquired broadcast frequencies in Prague and Brno and tries to set up a nationwide network and establish a Czech-Slovak news station). Other attempts to establish a news radio station were made by the nationwide radios Okey (part of media portfolio of companies affiliated with TV Markiza) and Expres (with a reputation of a traffic radio playing a lot of music), which tried to sideline Twist and assume its position on the market, however, without any success.
Regional stations usually play classical pop music. Due to financial strains a number of them merged with stronger operators of nationwide radios. Then they are networked (e.g. Fun Radio, Radio B1 and Radio Rebeka) or – if permitted by the Council for Broadcasting and Retransmission – their frequencies are used by nationwide radios, which extends their coverage and increases their chances of reaching potential listeners.
The radio market struggles with a number of adversities such as funding Radio Express from an EU grant, or adding Radio Okey to the media portfolio of companies around TV Markiza (cross-ownership of media is forbidden in Slovakia – however, the law can be avoided by establishment of a group of companies without apparent ownership links), which gives it a regular promotion not only on the most popular Slovak TV station but also in the daily Narodna Obroda, Markiza weekly, and the eponymous internet portal. Much like TV Markiza, Radio Okey, is completely uncritical to ANO.
Okey is not the only radio in Slovakia promoting a particular political party. Radio Hviezda FM based in the city of Nitra but broadcasting also in Bratislava and Banska Bystrica regularly offers an inappropriately extensive broadcast time to HZDS (Movement for Democratic Slovakia) and its leader Mr. Vladimir Meciar. The former Prime Minister has on this radio his own call-in show. The radio carries on despite the fact that the Council for Broadcasting and Retransmission has repeatedly fined it for violation of the legislative regulation banning political advertising in private media. The close ties of Hviezda FM results from the political affiliation of its owner, Mr. Jan Kovarcik, a HZDS vice-chairman.
An important step towards stabilizing Slovak radio market would be brought by the introduction of a unified system of assessing radio audience share. For the time being, the radio operators depend on the results of diary surveys of audience, which are not very reliable. Moreover, they are not as frequently published as TV surveys. A similar problem also plagues a number of developed democracies because the electronic system of measuring radio audience share (parallel of people-meters) is very expensive and the operators wouldn’t be able to afford it since proceeds from the sales of radio broadcast time are much lower than in TV stations.

Print Media
Behavior of the print media in Slovakia is regulated by the Press Law of 1966, which, despite numerous attempts, has not been amended yet. Periodicals are practically free of any regulation. For example, it is best illustrated by the fact that as opposed to broadcast media, press can publish both paid and unpaid political advertising and with the exception of the regulation applied to publishing election opinion polls and the 48-hour election moratorium it can publish whatever it wishes.
Although the former ruling coalition proposed to establish a national Press Board with authority similar to that of the Council for Broadcasting and Retransmission on the broadcast media market, the proposal failed to pass through the Parliament due to the lack of political support and protests of editors and professional organizations who apprehended political manipulation of this organization. The office whose members were to be elected by the Parliament counted on the possibility of imposing financial sanctions and further restrictions in the business of editing periodicals.
The print media market is dominated by 4 major and 7 minor nationwide dailies. The most influential and best selling are the dailies Novy cas, Sme, Pravda and Narodna Obroda. The editor of Sme, VMV, runs another nationwide daily Praca, published as a mutation of Sme, with a different layout of the front page. The same editor owns another two nationwide dailies: Rolnicke noviny (The Agricultural News) and the daily written in Hungarian Uj Szo (The New Word). The economic newspapers are represented by Hospodarske noviny (The Economic News) and Hospodarsky tyzden (The Economic Week).
A little apart from the above-mentioned newspapers is the daily Novy den (The New Day), characterized as the HZDS party newspaper.
Regional press is more or less dominated by the VMV` company and its Korzar dailies. In the recent years VMV thus gained by far the largest market share among the dailies. Shortly before the 1998 parliamentary election there were talks between VMV and the editor of another nationwide daily Narodna Obroda about purchasing this brand. In this context it is necessary to point to the possible danger of VMV monopoly in daily periodicals. As it is the only competitors are the dailies Novy Cas and Pravda.

Press agencies
There are 3 major press agencies in Slovakia: the state owned Press Agency of the Slovak Republic (TASR), a private Slovak Information and Press Agency (SITA) and the public Czech Press Agency (CTK) which, since the Czechoslovakian times, has been running a strong office in Bratislava.
The status of TASR is exceptional because it is one of the few state-run agencies in Europe. The link of TASR to political power is even stronger than in STV. The general director of TASR is a direct appointee by the Government; every year TASR receives state subsidies allowing it to sell news service below the production price. This fact has been criticized by the commercial agency, SITA, more focused on economic and regional news service.
At the same time SITA points out that TASR receives double subsidies: the direct, in the form of the government and parliament approved allowance and the indirect, generated by the proceeds from the sale of information to news services of state-run companies and institutions. However, compared to other press agencies, TASR is at disadvantage because it is banned from the law to become involved in any commercial activities. These, however, constitute a considerable portion of incomes of both private and public agencies.
Over the last couple of years, both Slovak press agencies became involved in a number of trials concerning mutual service tapping or the monopoly position of TASR on the Slovak market. In one of the trials the Slovak Antimonopoly Office agreed with SITA, the commercial agency, that by its subsidies the administration gives preferential treatment to TASR, thereby undermining the equal opportunities on the market of press agencies.
The quality of service provided by either of the Slovak press agencies is disputable. Generally, it can be said that the state-owned agency provides a better domestic service than SITA, which is performing well in the field of economic news.