Television's Impact on Media: Newspapers, Magazines, Books, and Broadcasting - Prof. M. Sa, Study notes of Communication

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EXAM 3 TELEVISION – CHAPTER 13 QUESTION 1  Newspapers o TV news challenged newspapers (especially evening newspapers) o Major factor in the disappearance of daily newspapers o Forced newspapers to change their visual aspect – television was very visually pleasing and more attractive so newspapers were forced to do that same to compete  Magazines o Forced them to focus on smaller target audiences  Prior to television, magazines were the one media distributed nationwide so national advertising was done this way – television took the national advertisers away from magazines because it was more efficent way to advertise nationally  Books o People stopped reading in their spare time – they watched TV instead o Pastime in the evening was watching TV as a family  Recording industry o Music videos  Movies o Forced them to not just think of their movies on a mass level and only for the big screen - think about their products in a completely different way  not just ticket sales  think of DVD sales and watching the movie at home  reissue to small screen QUESTION 2  Network affiliates – local broadcast television stations that are not owned by broadcast networks and yet transmit network signals and programs on a daily basis; in return, the network promises to compensate the affiliate with a portion of the revenues received from advertisers that have bought time on the network o A network affilate transmits the network’s program feed (the succession of shows) on a daily basis o Many affiliates are part of station groups – collections of broadcast television stations owned by a single company  Independent broadcast station – a broadcast television station that is not affiliated with one of the Big Four networks o Examples: CW, MyNetworkTV and ION affiliates because they air relatively few hours of network programming per week o Practically speaking, independents must find all (or almost all) of their programming themselves  Owned and operated (O&O) – broadcast television stations that are owned and operated by a network that often provides a regular schedule of programming materials for broadcast QUESTION 3 QUESTION 4  In the late 1940s, entrepreneurs realized that coaxial cable could be used to supply broadcast TV signals to communities that had no stations and couldn’t use regular rooftop antennas to pick up signals from faraway signals  Cable television – the process of sending TV signals to subscribers through a wire (usually coaxial cable, but now more fiber optic lines) o Started as a community antenna television (CATV) service for small towns and suburbs that needed better reception QUESTION 7  Primetime access rule (PTAR) – a 1970 FCC rule that forced the networks to stop supplying programming to local stations for a half hour during prime time – 8 to 11 pm (7 to 10 pm central and moutain time zones) six days a week o This was supposed to help new TV companies come up with new ideas for syndicated programming o The ruling actually ended up helping large Hollywood firms get stations to buy their cheap quiz shows, game shows, and gossip programs. o PTAR’s results were far-reaching – they can be seem everyday on the home tube  Financial interest and syndication rules (fin-syn rules) – rules established by the US Justice Department prohibiting ABC, NBC, and CBS from owning most of the entertainment programming they aired, and limiting their involvement in producing shows for syndication QUESTION 8  Cable networks – program channels offered by a cable system beyond what is broadcast over the airwaves in their area (now called cable/satellite networks since they can be delivered to the consumer through cable television systems or via satellite) o benefits from a dual revenue stream  consumers pay to get the service in the first place  money received from subscriptions is far greater than advertisers’ contribution  national advertisers pay to have their commercials shown during programming  they saw these program services as helping them to reach selected audiences in the same way that magazines did  because homes with cable TV in the 1980s tended to be wealthier than those without it so these networks allowed a sponsor to reach upscale people with particular interests (an opportunity the broadcast networks rarely offered)  During the 1960s, the FCC agreed with broadcasters’ arguments that the government had to protect “free” broadcasting in metropolitan areas from cable operators who demanded payment for their signals o As a result, the agency formulated the Cable Television Rules that made it nearly impossible for cable firms to expand their operations to the center and the suburbs of major cities o By the mid 1970s, the forces supporting cable television began to gain more political clout  Realizing that encouraging cable would expand the # of television options available to Americans, the FCC changed its rules to allow cable firms to expand into metropolitan areas (& to compete directly with traditional broadcasters)  Another federal policy that opened up the TV world to competition between technologies was free skies (policy instituted by the US government that for the first time allowed satellites to be used freely for a wide variety of business purposes) QUESTION 9  Criteria used to make program decision o Consumer feedback – conduct surveys of consumers, and executives look at ratings reports that indicate how many people watch different networks o Technological limitations of the system – technological limitations restrict the number of channels that a cable or satellite service can deliver o The amount of money a network demands from exhibitors for carrying the networks lineups in the exhibitors’ cable or satellite systems (license fees) – a channel that charges more than another with the same level of audience popularity will have less chance of getting on a system than one that demands lower license feels o The Exhibitors’ ownership role in the network – if a company has a financial interest in the success of a channel, it would include it; that kind of boost would not be so easily available to independent companies with interesting channel ideas  Format – the collection of elements that constitutes a channel’s recognizable personality, created through a set of rules that guide the way the elements are stitched together with a particular audience-attracting goal in mind  Piolot – a single episode that is used to test the capability of a series  Off-network syndication – a situation in which a distributor takes a program that has already been shown and rents (licenses) episodes of that program to TV stations for local airing QUESTION 10  New avenues for network distribution o The television networks have been especially active in pursuing ways to get viewers engaged with their programming in as many media as possible o The aim is not to replace the viewing of their programming on traditional channels but to allow ways for viewers to connect with shows they enjoy but didnt have time to view or want to view again o Broadcast and subscription networks use four ways to make extra money from their programming:  Insisting on DVR ratings – the main cable and broadcast networks have convinced advertisers that they should determine the ratings of a program not just by its viewing on a particular night and time but should also count when viewers record the show and watch it at a later time. It was agreed that viewers of programs on DVRs up to three days after their airing would be added to the programs ratings.