Brief History of Philippine Media

The development of media in the Philippines has had both local and foreign roots as well as foreign-
brought predecessors.

A. Pre-colonial Traces
 Like the early ancestors of humankind, our ancestors also developed a system of communication and
information dissemination.
 When there is a system of oral communication, it follows that a system of written communication
also existed.
 alibata or baybayin most notable discovery of which is the ancient alphabet.
 Ancient Filipinos also used materials existing in their environment to jot down and record their
experiences using such a language system. Oral systems of handing down information, literary
creations such as folk tales and epics were also predominant.
 In ancient times, the role of the town crier was to go around the barangay or their small towns and
announce important information. In other historical accounts, the umalohokan was a person needed
to settle arguments within the baragay.

B. The Print Industry and Filipino Freedom

 The very first newspaper in the country, Del Superior Govierno, was established in 1811, it
was intended for the Spaniards only, so it was written in Spanish.
 La Solidaridad was the most popular of these nationalistic newspapers published in 1889.
We all know how our National Hero, Jose Rizal, also wrote his two famous novels that
criticized the Spanish rule: Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo . This proves that the pen
could also be mightier than the sword, and both could work together to topple an
oppressive regime.
 It was during the American period when some of the long-running newspapers we have in
the country were established, namely The Manila Times (1898) and Manila Bulletin (1900) .
 Underground media operated during that time until the country was liberated from
Japanese rule.
 Martial Law in 1972 .President Ferdinand Marcos’s first moves were to suppress press
freedom, forcing our brightest journalists underground, and even jailing some of them.
 Bright and bold luminaries included Jose Burgos (WE Forum) , Felix Bautista and Melinda
Q. De Jesus (Veritas) , Raul and Leticia Locsin (Business Day now known as Business World),
Eugenia Apostol and Letty Jimenez Magsanoc (Inquirer now known as the Philippine Daily
Inquirer), and Joaquin “Chino” Roces who ran The Manila Times during this period.
 Prior to establishing Inquirer, a particular women’s magazine, Mr. and Ms., was also run by
Apostol. Since it was deemed as a lifestyle publication for women, anti-government
watchdogs didn’t take it seriously at first.
 1987 Philippine Constitution that media should also be protected and should remain free.
A section in the Bill of Rights guarantees the freedom of the press as well as the freedom of
expression of all Filipinos up to today.
 The most notable magazine empire in the early 1900s was established with the publication
of Liwayway Magazine , a Filipino language magazine composed of serialized novels and
short stories, essays, news items, photos, lifestyle and entertainment features, as well as a
comic strip section. Published by Ramon Roces, it was a reworking of his father, Don
Alejandro “Chino” Roces’ earlier magazine called Photo News , an effort that didn’t go well
 with the public because it was a magazine that featured three languages (Spanish, Filipino,
and English).
 In the 1970s and 1980s, notable publications also came out which featured music lyrics and
chords through the Jingle chordbook magazine .
 American comics arrived in the 1940s.
 Tony Velasquez (the Father of Philippine Komiks with his character creation of
Kenkoy), Mars Ravelo (creator of many famous superhero stories like Darna, Dyesebel,
Captain Barbell, and many more), Larry Alcala and a host of others. The latest National
Artist for the Visual Arts, Francisco Coching , is considered as one of the leading
personalities of Philippine comics.

C. The European Film Import

 Another European import is film.
 The Lumiere brothers' cinematographe film camera and projector invention made its way to
Philippine shores via a Spanish soldier named Carlo Naquera.
 Filipinos were already accustomed to the stage theater-originated musical shows such as the
"zarzuela" through the 1800s and early 1900s. The very first Filipino-produced film, Jose
Nepomuceno's Dalagang Bukid (1919), was actually a movie adaptation of a popular musical stage
play.
 The film ushered in another dimension to Dela Rama’s illustrious career as she would star in many
more, as the film also designated Nepomuceno the title “Father of Philippine Cinema.”
 The most popular of such films was Dawn of Freedom (1944) which highlighted the World War II aim
of the Japanese to have an “Asia for the Asians:’ It was co-directed by another pioneer of Philippine
Cinema, Gerardo de Leon, and starred Fernando Poe Sr. plus other Japanese and Filipino actors.
 From the rubble of destruction, the Filipino film industry was able to rise, and the so-called "Golden
Age of Philippine Cinema" emerged.
 Back home, the "Big Four" film production studios dominated the entertainment industry with
homegrown classics.
 Thus, another era of the Filipino emerged to reflect the predominant youth subculture of the 1960s
and the 1970s.
 But as with the print industry, things changed during the Marcos dictatorship.
 After the 1986 EDSA Revolution, the Philippine film industry became freer again, and the early
independent studio producers blossomed into the leaders of film production today.

D. The Broadcast Industry

 The introduction of the broadcast industry in the Philippines started with the introduction of the
telegraph and telephone system in the country.
 Thus, in 1890, the first telephone system of the country began its operations, and the whole
archipelago enjoyed this system of information and communication exchange.
 When the Americans took over the colonial rule, they also took over the operations of these
telephone and telegraph systems until they handed it to the local colonial government during
the early 1900s.
 Riding with these systems, early radio broadcast experiments thus began in the 1920s.
 Americans were primarily pivotal in bringing the broadcast industry to the Philippines .
  Since radio is a nationwide pop culture favorite, it was tapped by the government to further
educate the Filipino public through the establishment of the Philippine Broadcast System (PBS).
 Another characteristic of the early broadcast industry was the simultaneous airing of programs
on television and in the radio.
 Similar to press history, Philippine broadcast industry was put to a halt by the dictatorship of
Marcos.
 Media freedom truly suffered a blow during the dictatorship.
 But media, especially broadcast media, was also pivotal in gaining back the freedom denied the
Filipino people by Marcos.

E. Local Online Media

 The Philippines officially connected to the world of the Internet on March 1994 through the
efforts of PHNET or Philippine Network Foundation, a consortium of various academic
institutions, private companies, and government agencies.
 On August 1994, the first commercial Internet service provider was launched by Mosaic
Communications or MosCom, making it possible for Filipinos to go online.
 However, there were earlier efforts to have the Philippines interconnected virtually since the
late 1980s.
 The FidoNet people also began email exchanges.
 Because of such efforts, as well as having the desire to further the country's information and
communication access online, the Philnet project was commenced in 1993, which eventually
became PHNET.
 Most of the country's Internet access before was enjoyed through the existence of Internet
cafés.
 The Internet's popularity, especially in accessing it this way, was catapulted by the need for
Filipinos to contact their loved ones abroad.
 Indeed, the Philippines has enjoyed the various benefits of being connected to the world's
global village in merely 20 years of the Internet's existence in the country.
 Filipinos have also been highlighted in the online world, especially with our heavy usage of social
media.
 In fact, the Philippines was named as the "social media capital of the world" in 2011 as 93.9% of
the population area are heavy Facebook users.