History
WIPR-TV was created as a result of lobbying for public broadcasting in Puerto Rico, beginning in the 1950s. The station went on the air for the first time on Three Kings Day (January 6), 1958 becoming the first educational television station in Latin America.
It was also unique among other government-controlled broadcasters in the Caribbean as it did not show commercials. All other government-controlled broadcasters (with the exception of Cuba and the US Virgin Islands) showed advertising.
The station was one of the few TV stations in Puerto Rico with English-language programming, via a membership with PBS (and an affiliation with National Educational Television prior to PBS' founding in 1970); this ended on July 1, 2011 after WIPR and PBS failed to reach an agreement to renew the station's membership, with money previously allocated to PBS membership dues being invested in the station's extensive local programming. PBS programming remains available on Puerto Rico via WMTJ.
In 1996, WIPR-TV was the first Puerto Rican television station that used streaming media to broadcast programming to the internet.
Read more about this topic: Puerto Rico TV
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