First live, international, satellite television production, 1967
Our World - 1967
Our World was the first live, international, satellite television production, which was broadcast on 25 June 1967. 14 countries participated in the production that was transmitted to 24 countries with an estimated audience between 400 to 700 million people. The program was coordinated by the BBC in London. The Soviet Union and several other Eastern bloc countries pulled out a few days before the broadcast to protest the west's support for the Six-Day War. The signal is carried by four satellites 23,000 miles above the earth, the Intelsat I (Early Bird) and The Intelsat III (Canary Bird) satellites over the Atlantic Ocean and NASA's ATS-1 and The Intelsat II (Lani Bird) satellites over the Pacific.
The two-and-half-hour event had the largest television audience ever up to that date: an estimated 400 million people around the globe watched the broadcast. Today, it is most famous for the segment from the United Kingdom starring The Beatles. They sang their specially composed song "All You Need Is Love" to close the broadcast. Read more