The channel was launched on 1 October 1967 as part of an exercise which saw the ORF's radio output reorganized into three numbered services, the other two being the regional stations grouped as Ö2 and the pop music channelÖ3. Earlier, in 1964, there had been a petition for a national referendum, whereby more than 800,000 citizens declared themselves against ideological appointments of key positions within the public broadcasting service by the Austrian grand coalition government of Chancellor Alfons Gorbach and Vice-Chancellor Bruno Pittermann according to the Austrian Proporz system. Two years later, a legal regulation of a nonpartisan broadcasting was passed by the National Council parliament, entailing a relaunch of the ORF radio stations. Ö1 was designated to comply with the public educational mandate and to offer a broadly cultural program for an artistically inclined audience. One focus is on news broadcasts like the one-hour Mittagsjournal and Morgenjournal, launched in the course of the coverage of the 1968 Prague Spring. Beside established programmes such as Du holde Kunst, first aired in 1945, Ö1 since the 1970s has also broadcast radio documentaries, music programmes beyond the strictly classical canon, and several recurring reports on everyday life in a feuilleton style like Der Schalldämpfer by Axel Corti. Similar to other classical music radio stations, Ö1 has to bear with the tension between an elitist "Hofrat widow broadcaster" and a "Classic FM" popularisation, with the station's style and scheduling a matter of ongoing debates.
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Ö1 broadcasts from Funkhaus Wien on Argentinierstrasse in the Wieden district of Vienna. The current station identification was composed by the jazz musicianWerner Pirchner in 1994, the sloganÖ1 gehört gehört—a pun on "to be heard" in German conforming with "ought to"—was created by the author Wolf Haas. The interval signal of Ö1 is a three-note chord, played on a viola. There were two earlier versions of the signal: first one was played by harpsichord and the second one by a synth. Since 2010 a 75-minute altered block of programming is broadcast every morning on the shortwave frequencies of former Radio Österreich International as Ö1 International. Ö1 internet radio can also be listened to live on the ORF website through streaming audio, the programmes can also be heard for a week after broadcast at no charge. Several are available as downloads and podcasts. Ö1 runs the RadioKulturhaus venue in Funkhaus Wien including the KulturCafé coffee house. It also participates in the annual Donauinselfestmusic festival.
