Face-to-Face TV

Internews Interactive’s senior staff were instrumental in the creation of two-way satellite dialogues between the US and USSR in the 1980’s. These Emmy Award-winning “spacebridges” contributed to glasnost and helped open the way for independent TV stations across the former Soviet Union. Innovate spin-off formats, like the “Vis à Vis” series on European and American TV channels, were eventually picked up by local producers in the Balkans, Middle East and Ukraine.

Interactive TV History

Beginning in 1982, we began connecting Americans and Russians face-to-face using communication satellites. More than a dozen Spacebridges were produced in association with Gosteleradio (Soviet State TV) culminating in the Capital to Capital series broadcast live on ABC News in 1988-89.

In 1992, our team adapted videoconferencing gear and portable satellite uplinks for the French-American series Vis à Vis , which connected people intimately in their homes, workplaces and neighborhoods — live across continents.

Clips of citizen engagement programs we produced in the US and around the world between 1998 and 2004 can be watched in our Video Archive. Articles about InterAct’s work can be found at the Archive: Articles page.

Besides contributing to the media engagement community’s vital work through conferences and publications, we have produced TV and online programs, including the 2013 Real Dialogues “Work & Wages” project and Digital Citizen youth reporters at the 2012 conventions.