Analysis of the Quality of the Websites of Regional Public Television Networks in the European Union: Comparative Study Between Spain, Germany, and Belgium

Abstract

The justification and legitimacy of autonomic and regional public television networks are traditionally built upon proximity content and their advocacy of the cultural identity of the regions where they conduct their activity. However, the economic crisis of 2008 caused and is still producing negative consequences when providing these public audiovisual services, a trend that impacts the complete European continent and, specifically, the countries following the Mediterranean model (Hallin and Macini, Comparing Media Systems: Three Models of Media and Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004; Marzal Felici and Zallo Elguezabal, Comunicación y sociedad, 29(4), 1–7. https://doi.org/10.15581/003.29.4.1-7, 2016). In the European Union, the regional public television networks show significant differences of governance, resources, and funding, but they all have in common their function of proximity public service in an uncertain context, where large private operators threaten to occupy the whole audiovisual space. Considering this starting point, the quality of the websites of regional and proximity Public Service Media of the EU are analyzed: Spain (FORTA and CEXMA), Belgium (VRT, RTBF, and BRF—despite its recent loss of autonomy), and Germany (ARD).