ITV (TV network)

ITV is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network. It is branded as ITV1 in most of the UK except for central and northern Scotland, where it is branded as STV. It was launched in 1955 as Independent Television to provide competition to BBC Television (established in 1936). ITV is the oldest commercial network in the UK. Since the passing of the Broadcasting Act 1990, it has been legally known as Channel 3 to distinguish it from the other analogue channels at the time: BBC One, BBC Two and Channel 4. ITV was, for decades, a network of separate companies that provided regional television services and also shared programmes among themselves to be shown on the entire network.