Kadiwa
Broadcasting, Radio and Television
I. Introduction
Broadcasting, Radio and Television, primary means by which information and entertainment are delivered to the public in virtually every nation around the world. The term broadcasting refers to the airborne transmission of electromagnetic audio signals (radio) or audiovisual signals (television) that are readily accessible to a wide population via standard receivers.
Broadcasting is a crucial instrument of modern social and political organization. At its peak of influence in the mid-20th century, national leaders often used radio and television broadcasting to address entire countries. Because of its capacity to reach large numbers of people, broadcasting has been regulated since it was recognized as a significant means of communication. (For more information, see the section "The Regulation of Broadcasting.")
Beginning in the early 1980s, new technologies–such as cable television and videocassette players–began eroding the dominance of broadcasting in mass communications, splitting its audiences into smaller, culturally distinct segments. Previously a synonym for radio and television, broadcasting has become one of several delivery systems that feed content to newer media.
II. The Emergence of Broadcast Communication
Throughout history, long-distance communication had depended entirely upon conventional means of transportation. A message could be moved aboard a ship, on horseback, by pigeon, or in the memory of a human courier, but in all cases it had to be conveyed as a mass through space like any other material commodity.
A. Radio Broadcasting
The story of radio begins in the development of an earlier medium, the telegraph, the first instantaneous system of information movement. Patented simultaneously in 1837 in the United States by inventor Samuel F. B. Morse and in Great Britain by scientists Sir Charles Wheatstone and Sir William Fothergill Cooke, the electromagnetic telegraph realized the age-old
I. Introduction
Broadcasting, Radio and Television, primary means by which information and entertainment are delivered to the public in virtually every nation around the world. The term broadcasting refers to the airborne transmission of electromagnetic audio signals (radio) or audiovisual signals (television) that are readily accessible to a wide population via standard receivers.
Broadcasting is a crucial instrument of modern social and political organization. At its peak of influence in the mid-20th century, national leaders often used radio and television broadcasting to address entire countries. Because of its capacity to reach large numbers of people, broadcasting has been regulated since it was recognized as a significant means of communication. (For more information, see the section "The Regulation of Broadcasting.")
Beginning in the early 1980s, new technologies–such as cable television and videocassette players–began eroding the dominance of broadcasting in mass communications, splitting its audiences into smaller, culturally distinct segments. Previously a synonym for radio and television, broadcasting has become one of several delivery systems that feed content to newer media.
II. The Emergence of Broadcast Communication
Throughout history, long-distance communication had depended entirely upon conventional means of transportation. A message could be moved aboard a ship, on horseback, by pigeon, or in the memory of a human courier, but in all cases it had to be conveyed as a mass through space like any other material commodity.
A. Radio Broadcasting
The story of radio begins in the development of an earlier medium, the telegraph, the first instantaneous system of information movement. Patented simultaneously in 1837 in the United States by inventor Samuel F. B. Morse and in Great Britain by scientists Sir Charles Wheatstone and Sir William Fothergill Cooke, the electromagnetic telegraph realized the age-old