Shared Global Moments on Radio and Television

Satellite television created events that hundreds of millions could watch at the same moment. On 25 June 1967, the programme Our World linked broadcasters across several continents in the first live global satellite broadcast, featuring the Beatles performing All You Need Is Love. In July 1969 an estimated 600 million or more people watched the first Moon landing. In 1985, the Live Aid concerts in London and Philadelphia raised money for famine relief in Ethiopia and reached an audience often estimated at well over a billion.

These moments gave many people a sense of belonging to a single world community. Yet critics noted that such broadcasts were shaped by wealthy Western countries, and that portrayals of Africa as a place of disaster could reinforce stereotypes. Shared viewing showed the power of global media to unite attention, and also its power to frame how distant peoples are seen.