when you turn on a TV in Germany at 8:00 p.m. you will notice peculiar events as you flip through the channels when I first saw this I felt like I was in a dystopian world where you only had one source of information that everybody followed but as I watched and listened I realized the news in Germany is nothing like I had ever experienced in the US before and it made me question is this a better [Music] way [Music] hey guys and welcome back to our Channel I am Donnie and along with my wife Aubrey we are two Americans currently living in Germany with our baby sharing all of our experiences living and traveling throughout Europe the US is coming up on a presidential election cycle in 2024 and things have already been heating up in the media as we've talked with family back in the States and as we've observed this process from a distance while we live in Germany we've really started to notice more and more differences in how the news in the US and the news in Germany reports on these events of course it's not just limited to politics though in general how the news is reported how people respond to it and where people put their trust is different between Germany and the US and that's exactly what I'm going to talk about today in my video extra extra is the news in America being a little [Music] extra in both the US and Germany you have various sources of news at different levels and using different mediums to distribute information in this video I want to focus on the national Mass television Medias in either country so who am I talking about well in the US The Big Three national news sources are CNN at third place MSNBC in second place and far ahead of the pack as the leader of news in the US is Fox News in Germany the largest national news sources are RTL actuel F and by far far the most watched new source is the tagasa from a and the taga is exactly what I was talking about at the beginning of the video that I initially proceed as almost a dystopian single source of information when I first moved to Germany and before I understood what it was so what is it and why did I have this perception as an American the first time I saw it so the tagasa would translate roughly to Day show or review of the day and every evening at 8:00 p.m. for 15 minutes 10.13 million people in Germany tune into the taga Sha however what channel do you tune into to watch the taga Sha you might ask well it almost doesn't matter because you flipped through the channels and there it is and there it is and there it is and there it is and there it is the taga is a publicly funded news station from the German public service network the shorten name for yeah that's the German language for you the main tagasa program is aired on the channel DOA but simultaneously aired on a a day Affiliated networks like IND a airb SV a VD a ha air drot Etc which are all regional parts of this publicly funded broadcasting network this publicly funded television and radio system in Germany was established after World War II when the Allies divided up Germany into different broadcasting regions those were later merged and then they further based the broadcasting system roughly off the BBC in the UK so that it was completely separate from any government influence or funding to ensure a propaganda arm of the government could never again have control over the flow of information to the masses like what happened under the Nazi regime thus we eventually got the tagasa the main source of news information in Germany and why it airs on so many publicly funded channels at the same time in fact this source of information is so important for the German people that German Prime Time television does not start until after the taga Sha at the bizarre time of 8:15 actually private TV network sat once tried to break the tagasa stronghold and influence on television by starting their Prim Prim Time at 8:00 p.m. but it failed miserably and even though they aren't part of the public broadcasting system they were inevitably forced to push Prime Time back to 8:15 because they just couldn't compete with the tagasa in Germany publicly funded TV is the main form of television and is funded by well the public through a broadcast contribution that nearly every household in Germany must pay the exceptions to who has to pay the current €18 36 per month per household contribution is very RCT and mostly applies to those with low income on welfare or have serious health issues that hinder them from actually being able to use these Services the great irony though of the German vers American television system is that the Americans help set up build and structure the German system yet the American system looks nothing like what Germany has [Music] today now let's compare all of this to the American system first when I say publicly funded news or public Broad broadcasting in general Americans immediately generally think of TV pled drives asking for money on the one single publicly funded TV station in the US PBS however PBS is not purely publicly funded and it does receive some federal government funding and sometimes state government funding but data from 2018 shows it was at a cost of less than $3 per person per year in terms of tax dollars going towards it instead our public broadcasting has well-known tons and pledge drives to raise funds from private donations from citizens or private foundations or companies and they also get funding from Member stations dues or other sources otherwise television news generally will come from private companies that are financed through advertisements or subscription services for example that are all competing for your attention at all hours of the day and night since the news channels all have their own shows you don't have the same experience of flipping through the channels and seeing the same face reporting the news over and over again at one time in the evening like I experienced in Germany in a way one thing that this made me feel was that I have a lot of different options and perspectives that I could watch and piece together what the common threat of Truth was from the different ways a story was reported by the various channels that's why when I saw the tagaell simultaneously being aired on different channels and based on all of my perspectives that all news sources have a bias I thought it looked like Germans were being fed One Singular point of view rather than a plethora so they could get multiple angles on a single story from now I'm not saying that the tagasa is 100 % without bias I don't believe that's possible however what I wasn't taking into consideration at first was a very important difference in the two forms of media and that is how the news is [Music] reported to show the difference just watch these two short clips of the most watched news sources in either country this is a Fox News alert celebrations across Argentina as the libertarian candidate Javier melee secures the presidency in yesterday's election one of my favorite quotes I've seen to describe the tagaell that highlights the main differences between it and American news media is that the news is delivered by news readers not news personalities because of the structure of American news and media all of the private television channels must compete for your attention which leads to them becoming more and more entertainers than informers now again this is also not to say that things are always so dry and purely informative in Germany now the takaa in Germany isn't technically without competition and it's also not that private news stations don't exist in Germany that can get a little more similar to American News Styles but Germans just don't value that kind of news and information the takaa has a 34% share of the audience nearly bettering the combined audience share of all the American networks PBS and cable newscast combined and a lot of that is due to the way that it is [Music] presented besides how the news is delivered there is also a difference in what kind of news is reported on between the top news sources in Germany and the US for example in the taga Sha you don't find any tabloid news no soft news but relevant stories about politics economics culture and less sport but they also were trying to fit the most important stories in that 15minute time frame so they generally focus on the big important stuff well they do have time to fit in other less important stuff from time to time go now later in the evening you do have the tagas team in which a is able to take topics from the 15minute taga Sha and discuss them in more detail in a longer format of show but that's unlike on say Fox News or MSNBC where you have an entire Channel dedicated to reporting news 24/7 and we'll cover maybe slightly less important but more entertaining stories at times as well to get your attention well thank you Mr President shrinkflation now apparently coming for our Oreos but one of the main differences I've noticed in the news is reflected in something that Nathaniel Drew said in one of his videos about the differences in living in the US versus Europe here in Europe there's a steady stream of news coming from the US but when I'm over there it feels like there isn't much talk about what's going on in the rest of the world unless something really big happens like a war most mainstream media barely covers what's going on internationally and unless you're a worldly American and there definitely are some of those out there you don't have a very much of an idea of what's what's going on out there yeah a lot of times in the US you can get the sense that the US is the center of the universe and you can forget that stuff is going on in other parts of the world because American Media just doesn't cover as much international issues as they do American issues to be fair there are factors that play here like the sheer size of the US always giving material to news agencies plus the importance that the US plays on the world stage is simply different from countries that are much smaller and have much less influence on the world politics because of the way that these new sources are funded and the nature of polarizing politics in the US you also don't typically have the issue of news stations being associated with political parties in Germany like you have in the US in the US the idea is generally if you are a republican you turn on Fox News and if you are a Democrat you tune into to basically any other news source or more specifically we could say CNN or MSNBC for example in Germany you have a very interesting different situation those on the left and the right do not differ in regard to the media Source they turn to most for news both those on the ideological right and left site a as their main news source yes there are other minor news outlets that may lean one way or another politically that Germans could seek out if they wanted but for overall information the choice is generally clear for those across the German political Spectrum this polarization in the US politically and seemingly lack of polarization in Germany also produces an interesting result in trust in the media in both countries so we've talked a lot about who Germans and Americans watch if they watch mass media but are these the most trusted new sources in Germany in the US for Germany it should seem obvious even though both the left and right leaning individuals in Germany both watch R day the most for their News Eight in 10 Germans say they trust R day with their news whereas in the US 61% of Democrats say they distrust the largest national news source Fox News while 65% of of Republicans say they do trust Fox News now I mentioned that in this video I wanted to focus on the top national news sources in each country to compare but I do want to point out that overall more Americans have no trust at all in mass media than those that do have trust in mass media regardless of political leanings but 83% of Americans do trust local news stations which are much often much less political and dramatic than national news of course I can't cover all of the differences between the mass media outlets in the US and Germany in one single video and this video also still fails to mention local news social media Independent News or even newspapers and radio therefore be sure to let me know other differences you know of in the comments below to see who made it this far into the video the random question of the week is how do you feel about the app rentable scooters and cities do we like to use them or no thanks so much for watching this video guys be sure to hit those like And subscribe buttons and I'll see you in my next video the tagasa is a publicly funded news station from the German public service network a a day ah they also provide loads of educational and educational no they also provide loads of educational and entertaining programs culture and less and and less sport but