Media in Wa-Daisho is as prevalent there as it is in any modern culture. This includes commercial radio, television programming, news papers, magazines, and advertising through various other medias, such as billboards, clip on signs on walls of buildings, and on street lamps, and similar. This section will cover some of these subjects, and their influence on the people of Wa-Daisho.
Over all however, Wa-Daisho is a free nation - where the level of government control on the media is very lax. The only events in which the media is controlled to any degree, is when national safety is at stake. That is a very broad definition which was very misused by the Pre-RIFTS American Empire, BUT in Wa-Daisho this encompasses almost exlusively matters pertaining to Wa-Daisho's military, and to the military forces of the Allied Nations. This isn't to say that the people of Wa-Daisho are completely in the dark, only that they are usually kept informed of situations after the fact - as led by the elected Supreme Commander.
Radio in Wa-Daisho is composed of three stations. The first of which is called "Harsh Tunes" which specializes in a style of music called Techno-Slam. Techno-Slam is a very volatile style of music, with a great deal of electric guitar, insertion of audio clips, keyboard, synthesizers, and similar high tech effects. The style of lyrics is usually brutally honest, and can include everything from rather cynical ways of looking at love and really brutal opinions of various things, all the way to national pride songs that involves stories of heroism, and similar. No less than 19 songs have been written in Wa-Daisho about Nyan Tamya himself, and his heroic exploits across North America. Once a week Harsh Tunes has a special radio show that is called, "Death Metal", that has the newest Coalition Propaganda songs on there, with a couple of REALLY goofy radio DJ's ad libbing, and making fun of the Coalition through out the hour. They also have the newest reports of CS Brutality on the radio as well, from a variety of sources across North America. Needless to say, this is one of the most listened to radio programs in Wa-Daisho.
The second radio station is called, "Melodies of Peace", which specializes in a style of music called "Info-Jam". This is a much more soft, and flowing music style that can be composed with any number of types of instruments, from violins, to flute, to clarinets, and even keyboards. These songs are oftentimes about history, heroes, children, innocence, nature, and especially love and peace. Although many warrior types consider this music to be too feminine, SOME warriors listen to this music to escape the harsh feelings of war, hatred, and the rigors of the world. Their most popular radio show is called "Healing the Wounds", which is really a cross between a news report, and a talk show. People call in from Wa-Daisho to give their stories, and then they either dedicate songs to the person calling in, or the person calling in dedicates a song to someone. They also record these radio shows, and send them to other free cities, such as Desert Star, Lazlo, and similar. (Special Note that Tolkeen does not allow Wa-Daisho radio programs.) The radio speakers of this station, encourage people from these other cities to send them disks with recorded messages as well, and they will play the message, and the song dedicated accordingly. Then later these people who send in the message will hear their message and dedication played on their local radio station, when it arrives in their nation.
The third station is exclusively a news and reports station, sort of like CNN on the radio. News reports are made constantly concerning the weather, wind, storm reports, precipitation reports, sea conditions, news on current events in Wa-Daisho, and on foreign events. During storms, which are very common in the waters surrounding Wa-Daisho, the weather related reports are those most commonly repeated - usually for the benefit of vessels that might be coming in. Note that a pair of specially equipped CSN Mk.IV Hurricanes skirt the broadcast range of this station to keep track of events in Wa-Daisho, and report weekly to a specially outfitted unmarked XM-270 Mosquito west of Wa-Daisho.
Television programming in Wa-Daisho, is divided up into three different channels available. The first of which is an all news channel, that goes over current events in Wa-Daisho including weather, political, shipping, agricultural, traffic, construction, and similar news. In foreign affairs it also deals with ambassadorial interviews, foreign events news, updates on events concerning war, trade details, and similar. They typically have a 2 hour news report recorded in the morning, and then at the top of every hour, they have a five minute report of anything new that may have come up, as well as a weather update as well. They record new reports at 6 AM, Noon, and 6 PM.
The second channel is a syndicated channel, meaning that it has a variety of television shows that it plays. The schedule typically goes as follows;
6:00 AM 1/2 hour Live News Broadcast.
6:30 AM 1 hour Puppet Show.
7:30 AM Cartoon Hour.
8:30 AM Cooking Hour.
9:30 AM Hour and a half Educational Shows (Similar to Nova & Discovery Channel. Archeology and history shows are highly regarded.).
11:00 AM Steamy Nights (1 hour Cheesy Soap Opera).
12:00 PM 2 hours of Imported Talk Shows (Alternates between philosophical discussions from Lazlo, to tabloid style talk shows from both Wa-Daisho and foreign nations.)
2:00 PM The Mage Who Could Not Say Cadabra (1/2 hour long Comedy show about a Ley Line Walker in a fictional magic guild who just never seems to get his magic right. Seems to be a cross between Hogans Heroes and Bewitched.)
2:30 PM The Rogues (1 hour long drama series about a group of four operatives who are constantly evading the Coalition States Authorities, and gathering sensitive information for various clients for resale. Many legends about famous such people in the past two decades are reenacted on this television show - great effects, blue screen technology, and real CS equipment used in the recording. VERY popular, and made in Wa-Daisho.)
3:30 PM 2 hours of Cartoons of various types, some action, some kiddy.
5:30 PM Half Hour with Jason Kebrik - an interviewing reporter who usually interviews a Republican Council member, an Ambassador, or with an advisor to one of these every day. The hottest subjects are usually those covered on this show.
6:00 PM 1/2 hour News Update show, with weather reports, updated current events, and similar information.
6:30 PM Big League Game Time. Any number of sports are televised during this two hour time slot. This could be High School Football, played live, motor boat racing, local boxing matches, and similar events.
8:30 PM Half Hour Intermission Show, usually is the directors cut to the prior movie, along with details of the making of. If this is not available, then it is a half hour of previews for the next week's prime time movies.
9:00 PM Prime Time Movies! A two hour movie is chosen as the night's movie two weeks in advance, from among a selection of Pre-RIFTS movies, movies made in Lazlo, and movies made in Kingsdale. Occasionally even CS Movies are shown, but very rarely. They are usually stretched out or shortened to about 2 hours.
11:00 PM Foreign Sports! Imported video of foreign sports, such as Kingsdale and El Dorado Juicer Football, Arena Fights at the Blood Bowl Arena in Desert Star, and similar.
Midnight - goes off the air.
The third channel is exclusively made for children, and runs from 6 AM to 8 PM at night, showing "The Puppet Show", Cartoon Hour, and made for Children movies.
The News Paper of Wa-Daisho is known as "The Wa-Daisho Post", and this paper runs a daily six page news paper, that includes local stories, foreign updates, an advice column, and numerous advertisements from local and foreign businesses. Among business related news, it includes going sale rates for local cash crops, special rate offers for docking - usually made a week to two weeks in advance, tax alleviations, or increases, and similar. It's back page includes a three part work sheet one for elementary school students, one for High School Students, and another for adult trivia and tests. These are often encouraged by the school program, for people of all walks of life to take, to help gauge where their education levels are. It also gives parents something to do with their children, the following day when they purchase the next paper with the answers to the previous day's tests.
Foreign News Papers are imported, including the Desert Star Tribune, the Lazlo Journal, Kyatashiro Post, the Tolkeen Forum, among others. These usually come in with the mail once a week from these locations. The Tolkeen Forum is usually the most controversial of all of the papers, with their Anti-CS propaganda that they constantly try to spread. Once a week on the Half Hour with Jason Kebrik, a Wa-Daisho Intelligence Engineer or a consultant from the Wa-Daisho Post is brought in to discuss the Tolkeen Forum at length, to define any misgivings in the newspaper, and try to explain why the Tolkeenites have chosen to spread the disinformation.
Magazines are commonly produced all over North America, in a myriad of different subjects, many of which are commonly available in Wa-Daisho. A selection of titles available are; "Archeology of the Golden Age" which is a Lazlo produced magazine that deals especially in excavations of Pre-RIFTS cities, and is produced once a month. Another magazine is a yearly publication from El Paso called "Vampire Almanac" which goes into details of the previous year's events concerning vampires, along with yearly published techniques used in Vampire Slaying, new techniques, new technology, and new magical equipment for the purpose of slaying vampires. Northern Gun, S-Mart, Golden Age Weaponsmiths, Wilks, and Wellington Industries each have quarterly magazines that they release, as a form of catalog, and technology demonstrator. In addition to these magazines, they also have those that cater to different nuances of society as well, such as cooking, gardening, crafts, hobbies, computers, and even "adult" subjects as well.