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Chapter 9: Television: Broadcast and Beyond
Test Bank
Multiple Choice
1. Sinclair Broadcast Group ______.
A. owns a collection of more than 170 local television stations
B. owns a liberal cable news channel
C. owns several regional sports television networks
D. owns the second largest Spanish-language television broadcast network
2. Philo T. Farnsworth invented which of the following?
A. the phonograph
B. the basic technology for television
C. the FM radio transmitter
D. digital cable service
3. When you watch a modern situation comedy on television that is filmed or taped
before a live studio audience using multiple cameras, you are seeing the influence of
which of the following?
A. I Love Lucy
B. The Ernie Kovacs Show
C. the Fox Network
D. technology developed for the moon landing
4. All U.S. television broadcasting became digital in which year?
A. 2007
B. 2009
C. 2010
D. 1999
5. Network affiliates are which of the following?
A. promotional partners who do product placement on network shows
B. partner cable networks that carry reruns of network programming
C. local broadcast stations that carry network programming
D. the people who work at broadcast networks
6. Which of the following created the Public Broadcasting System?
A. Telecommunications Act of 1996
B. Television Act of 1939
C. Public Access Act of 1955
D. Public Broadcasting Act of 1967
7. PBS attracted its first significant audiences with which of the following programs?
A. Sesame Street
B. Barney
C. Masterpiece Theatre
D. Arthur
8. The major company doing television ratings in the United States is which of the
following?
A. Warner Media
B. Nielsen Media Research
C. SRI Consulting
D. DBS Inc.
9. Over the past 30 years, the Big Three television networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC)
have done which of the following?
A. They have dramatically increased their share of the viewing audience because of
innovative hit shows.
B. They have kept a steady audience.
C. They have lost one third of all their viewers to cable, syndicated programming, and
independent stations.
D. They have shared the same owner at least once.
10. The show Scandal is notable for which of the following?
A. It’s the first prime-time network series in four decades to be led by an African
American woman.
B. It’s the first prime-time network show to have a character who is openly gay.
C. It’s the first network show to feature product placement during the opening credits.
D. It has 20 min of commercials per hour of programming.
11. The popular children’s educational program Sesame Street made the switch from
public television to HBO in 2015 for first-run episodes because they would ______.
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A. be able to produce approximately twice as many episodes per year
B. be paid more to produce the episodes for HBO
C. be better able to distribute their programs to mobile devices
D. all of these
12. What is the fifth-highest-rated television network in the United States?
A. Fox Broadcasting
B. Telemundo
C. Univision
D. Pax
13. What are telenovelas?
A. Spanish-language action–adventure shows
B. short course auto races
C. children’s stories on Spanish-language television
D. Spanish-language television soap operas
14. In the 1960s, television programs were not allowed to show which of the following?
A. men and women kissing
B. characters drinking alcohol
C. characters smoking cigarettes
D. a married couple sharing a bed
15. Nielsen Media Research measures television audiences in terms of ______.
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A. Live only
B. Live + SD
C. Live + 3
D. all of these
16. The so-called V-chip is designed to do which of the following?
A. tell parents what websites their children have visited on the Internet
B. mute the sound of a television set during commercials
C. allow car radios to receive Direct Broadcast Satellite signals
D. stop children from seeing offensive programs on V-chip equipped TVs
17. As of 2017, approximately ______ of U.S. homes had at least one HDTV set.
A. 33%
B. 50%
C. 64%
D. 79%
18. The show I Love Lucy was controversial when it first came out for which of the
following reasons?
A. It showed Ricky and Lucy sharing a bed.
B. It showed Lucy pregnant.
C. It had the White Lucille Ball married to the Cuban American Desi Arnaz.
D. It showed Desi Arnaz shaking his hips during dance numbers.
19. Cable television was initially developed as a way of doing which of the following?
A. providing uncensored movies in the home
B. delivering broadcast television signals to communities with poor reception
C. increasing revenue for the NCAA basketball tournament
D. delivering networks like TNT, CNN, and MTV
20. When HBO first went on the air in 1975, the broadcast networks made which of the
following responses?
A. They largely ignored it.
B. They saw it as a threat and worked to get it banned.
C. They saw it as a great opportunity and partnered with it to produce programming.
D. They used its creation as an excuse to invest in new, innovative programming.
21. Which of the following statements about premium cable channels is true?
A. They are the channels that get the highest commercial rates.
B. They are those channels that cable systems consider “must have,” such as ESPN
and MTV.
C. They are the channels that you pay extra for and that do not carry commercials, such
as HBO and Showtime.
D. They are the channels with “elitist” content, such as BBC America or Bravo.
22. The rise of LGBTQ programming streaming services like Netflix ______.
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A. is part of the growth of long-tail programming
B. is part of the mainstreaming of queer culture
C. is objected to by people who would prefer not to see such material and wish they
could block it from their homes
D. all of these
23. Why are cable networks such as ESPN and Fox News more profitable than the Big
Four broadcast networks?
A. Cable networks receive revenue from advertising and subscription revenue.
Broadcast networks only receive advertising revenue.
B. Cable networks have larger numbers of viewers than the broadcast networks.
C. Cable networks can charge more for advertising than the broadcast networks.
D. You can’t fool me, the major broadcast networks make much more money than cable
networks do.
24. Broadcast networks are more successful than ever these days for which of the
following reasons?
A. They are attracting the crucial younger audience.
B. They are able to sell more advertising time than ever before.
C. Their audience share is growing.
D. You can’t fool me, broadcast networks are losing audience share and advertisers.
25. Television networks are now showing more diverse programming for which of the
following reasons?
A. It is “politically correct” to do so.
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B. They want to attract a larger audience.
C. Because minority actors tend to be less expensive to hire.
D. The FCC has required them to do so.
26. Critics worry that television has a strong influence on young people because
______.
A. unlike reading a book, watching television takes relatively few skills
B. television can replace the roles that grandparents, parents, and teachers played in
the lives of children
C. television has become the most commonly shared source of meaning in young
people’s lives
D. all of these
27. One outcome of Janet Jackson’s 2004 Super Bowl “wardrobe malfunction” was
which of the following?
A. Fifty local stations cancelled their affiliation with CBs.
B. Jackson was offered a celebrity spot on Survivor.
C. Individual stations became cautious about broadcasting serious programs that
contained nudity, violence, or harsh language.
D. The 2005 Super Bowl halftime show got a TV-M rating.
28. News on the Spanish-language Univision broadcast network tends to _______.
A. focus on longer term stories and less on breaking news
B. be sensationalistic and celebrity oriented
C. take a clear point of view much like broadcasters in Europe and Latin America do
D. you can’t fool me, Univsion doesn’t carry news programming
29. Our definition of what is broadcasting is being changed by the fact that you can now
do which of the following?
A. buy television programs as digital downloads through the iTunes store
B. view television programs after they air as streaming content on the web
C. buy television programs on DVD
D. all of these
30. Legacy broadcasters like CBS, Comcast, and Disney are responding to the threat
by streaming companies like Netflix by ______.
A. refusing to sell their programs to the streamers like Netflix
B. starting their own streaming services
C. trying to sell their broadcast networks to Apple
D. They are doing nothing and pretending that there isn’t a massive change going on in
their industry.
True/False
1. Ed Sullivan came to be known as “Mr. Television.”
2. Cable television has grown steadily in popularity in the United States from 1990 to
2010.
3. Ted Turner helped reinvent cable television by repackaging programming for
distribution over several separate networks.
4. When the VCR first came out, broadcasters and movie studios saw it as a great
opportunity to expand their markets.
5. When the VCR first came out, broadcasters and movie studios saw it as threat and
tried to make home recording illegal.
6. Television networks cannot require their affiliates to carry all of the network’s
programs.
7. Cable television subscribers pay more than US$7.00 a month to receive ESPN, even
if they never actually watch the channel.
8. The Fox Network first went on the air in 1975.
9. A single rating point represents 1% of the total potential television audience.
10. According to Ken Auletta, the “earthquake in slow motion” that shook up the
television industry was when the networks started broadcasting in color.
11. Spanish-language television stations such as Univision can attract nationwide
audiences who approach those of the Big Four networks.
12. Started in 1980 as a local channel in Washington, DC, BET was the nation’s first all-
horse racing cable network.
13. Television content ratings were introduced the same year as movie ratings.
14. On the Dick Van Dyke Show in the 1960s, Mary Tyler Moore and Van Dyke played
a married couple but still had to sleep in separate beds in order to meet the decency
standards of the day.
15. Joshua Meyrowitz believes the very nature of television influences society because
it breaks down barriers.
16. Cable companies are replacing copper wire cable with fiber optic cable.
17. The Internet and television are becoming increasingly separate media.
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18. The ABC show Scandal, when it went on the air in 2012, was one of five network
Essay
1. Who received the first patents for all-electronic television broadcasting?
2. What were the Big Three networks?
3. Name one of the three technologies that have started to replace the VCR in the last 5
years.
4. Why do DVRs scare broadcasters?
5. When did digital television replace all-analog broadcasting in the United States?
6. What are the two formats for digital television broadcasting in the United States?
7. Name two ways that consumers can watch video on demand in their homes.
8. What is a people meter?
9. What are the Big Four networks?
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10. In a brief essay, why are cable networks like Fox News or ESPN more profitable
than the broadcast networks?
11. List two different reasons a child might watch television.
12. In a brief essay, explain what was controversial about Sinclair Broadcast Group’s
“must run” programming provided to their affiliate stations.
13. Media journalist Ken Auletta writes that television has been undergoing an
“earthquake in slow motion.” In a brief essay, explain what Auletta means by that, what
initially caused the “earthquake,” and what keeps it going today.
14. In a brief essay, discuss how television has become more diverse over the past 10
years. What are the reasons that have driven this move to diversity? How have
television networks gone about becoming more diverse in what they present?
15. In a brief essay, explain what it means to you to “watch television.” In your essay,
discuss what your sources of video programming are, what device or devices you use to
watch TV with, and how your understanding of what television is has changed over the
last 5 years.
16. In a brief essay, explain how personal streaming services like Periscope transform
how we can view and receive news. Use examples.
