you better than light, and safer than a known way.'" For many years, the King's speech came at the end of an hour-long broadcast of greeting from various parts of the British Empire and Commonwealth which typically included interviews with ordinary people of many occupations such as an innkeeper in an English village, a miner in South Africa, and a lifeguard in Australia with the King's speech serving as a bond tying the Commonwealth together. George's daughter and successor, Queen Elizabeth II, gave her first Christmas message to the Commonwealth of Nations from her study at Sandringham House, at 3:07 PM on 25 December 1952, some 10 months after her father's death. Five years later, the message was broadcast on television for the first time. It has been an annual television broadcast every year since, with the exception of 1969: that year, no message was given because a special documentary film, Royal Family, had been produced during the summer in connection with the investiture of the Prince of Wales. It was therefore decided not to do a broadcast at Christmas, but the Queen issued a written message instead. Until 1996, the Christmas broadcast was always produced by the BBC; the monopoly was ended when it was announced that, from 1997, the message would be produced and broadcast alternately by the BBC and its main rival, Independent Television News (ITN), with a biennial rotation. It was reported by The Daily Telegraph that this decision was made after the BBC decided to screen an interview with Diana, Princess of Wales, on its current affairs programme Panorama. This was denied by Buckingham Palace which said the new arrangements "reflect the composition of the television and radio industries today". Beginning in 2011, Sky News was added to the rotation. Sky News recorded the Queen's Christmas message for Christmas 2012, the Queen's Diamond Jubilee year, and for the first time it was recorded in 3D. Buckingham Palace are reported to have explained: "We wanted to do something a bit different and special in this Jubilee year, so doing it for the first time in 3D seemed a good thing, technology wise, to do." Under the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, the themes and direction of the speech were decided by the Queen and the text was largely written by the Queen herself, sometimes with assistance from Prince Philip and her staff. In the later years