978-1305580985 Chapter 8

Chapter 8 – Television: Switching Channels

Chapter Outline

• Television Transforms Daily Life

• TV Delivers an Audience to Advertisers

• Visual Radio Becomes Television

• Television Outpaces Radio

News With Pictures

Entertainment Programming

• Quiz Shows Bring Ethics Scandals

• Ratings Target the Audience

• Newton Minow Criticizes TV as a “Vast Wasteland”

• Public Television Finds an Audience

• Satellites Make Transatlantic TV and Live Broadcasts Possible

• Television Changes National and Global Politics

• Mergers Affect Station Ownership

• TV Promotes Professional Sports

• Critics Challenge the Accuracy of TV Ratings

• Cable and Satellite Expand Delivery

• Television at Work

• Audiences Drive TV Programming

The Networks’ Shrinking Role

Demand for Diverse Programming

• Digital Technology Broadens TV’s Focus

Digital Video Recorders

High-Definition Television, 3-D and 4K Screens

• Streaming TV Brings a New Vision

Suggested Activities, Discussions, and Exercises

1. Show a clip of a classic TV program from the 1950s or 60s and a clip from

a more recent program—both the same genre and also addressing the

same issue. Discuss with students the ways in which television

entertainment has changed technically, aesthetically, artistically, and

regarding what can and cannot be discussed.

2. Visit a local television station or ask the general manager of your local

cable system to visit your class to discuss the business of local TV.

3. Review the “Television at Work” section of Media/Impact, Chapter 8, and

ask each student to decide which job in commercial television would be

most interesting and rewarding, and to do some additional Internet

research on that job classification. Ask students to bring their findings to

class for a class discussion or to present in an online forum.

4. Have students research the phenomenon of “cutting the cord”—

abandoning cable or satellite TV service—and “zero TV.” What are the

pros and cons of this approach to TV viewing, and how viable is it today?

How likely are they to do this? How likely are their parents? Have the

students share their findings in class or in an online forum discussion.

5. Ask students to inventory their own television watching for a two-week

period to determine what proportion of their viewing is devoted to what

type of programming—and also where and how they watch TV. Ask

students to bring the results to class for a class discussion or to present

their findings in an online forum.

Activity Pages

Use the following activity pages as class handouts for exercises and to

accompany some of the classroom Ideas described above.

Watching the Issues

Watch a news program on public TV and make notes about the program’s format,

hosts, topics and methods of reporting. Bring those notes on this handout to

class for a discussion about what you observed about public TV news as an

alternative to commercial TV news.

• Name of program:

• Date the program aired:

• Who were the main hosts?

• What topics were discussed? (List at least six.)

• How were the methods of reporting/discussion different from network or local TV

news?

• What were your overall impressions of the show? What, specifically, did you like and

dislike? Why?

Internet Television Analysis

Listed below are some Internet addresses for TV program providers. Using

the Internet, look at three of the addresses below and see what kind of

information they contain. Print the home page for each of three providers.

Then write an essay (word length specified by your instructor), discussing

which features you like best and least about the three program providers

you’ve chosen, including the kinds of features that make these sites

particularly usable. Attach the copies of the three home pages to your

essay.

American Movie Classics

www.amctv.com

Arts & Entertainment

www.aetv.com

Black Entertainment Television

www.bet.com

The Discovery Channel

www.discovery.com

The Disney Channel

www.disneychannel.com

ESPN

www.espn.go.com

Home Box Office/Cinemax

www.hbo.com

Lifetime Television

www.lifetimetv.com

Logo

www.logoonline.com

MTV, Inc.

www.mtv.com

USA Network

www.usanetwork.com

Television Guest Speaker

Visit a local television station and tour the facility. Or invite a local broadcaster to

visit your class. Make sure that you learn the following information about the

station and be prepared to discuss what you’ve learned in class.

What is the proper spelling of your name and job title?

• What are the station’s call letters and number?

• How long has the station been on the air?

• Who owns the station? Is it locally owned or held by a national corporation?

• Does the station have a mission statement? What are its broadcasting goals?

• What kinds of programming does it offer during the day? Evening? Name some of the

most popular programs.

• Does it offer a news program? At what times? Who are the most visible anchors? How

many reporters does it have? Editors? Camera people? How many people does it take

to put the news on the air? How much does it cost? What percentage of the station’s

budget supports the news operation?

• What special promotions does the station do? What kind of events does it sponsor to

be visible in the community?

• What is the station’s target audience? How many people does it reach? What were its

latest Nielsen ratings? (If cable, how does the station determine its audience?)

• Who are the station’s biggest advertisers? How much does a 30–second commercial in

prime time cost? How much does a 30–second spot from 9 a.m. to noon cost?

• What does the station do as part of its public service responsibility?

• What do you think makes this station successful? What do you think it needs to

improve?

• Do you offer any special Internet services or use the Internet for station promotion?

Explain.

* How has the Internet affected your viewership?

• Where do you envision your station heading in the next 10 years?

Chapter 8 Quiz

Multiple Choice

1. The two researchers who played the most significant role in the technical

development of television were:

a. David Sarnoff and William Paley.

b. Lee de Forest and Edward R. Murrow.

c. Vladimir Zworykin and Philo Farnsworth.

d. Lee de Forest and David Sarnoff.

2. The two men who developed network TV and held the country’s largest

interest in radio were:

a. Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite.

b. Philo T. Farnsworth and Vladimir Zworykin.

c. Ted Turner and Rupert Murdoch

d. David Sarnoff and William Paley

3. The only type of television programming that didn’t come from radio is:

a. soap operas.

b. detective stories.

c. quiz shows.

d. talk shows.

4. The quiz show scandals of the 1950s:

a. caused the networks to eliminate advertiser-produced programming.

b. caused many stations to leave the networks to be independents with more

control of their programming.

c. led to an increase in advertiser-produced programming with greater network

controls.

d. brought more quiz shows to television.

5. A rating is:

a. a comparison of an audience for one show to the audience for another show.

b. the percentage of the total number of households with TV sets tuned to a

specific program.

c. an indication of a favorable audience response to a program.

d. the percentage of people in a household watching a program on television.

ANS: B

6. In the last 25 years, the commercial broadcast networks’ (ABC, CBS,

NBC and Fox) share of the prime-time audience:

a. has dramatically increased, thanks to innovative hit shows.

b. has dramatically increased as new owners have bought the stations.

c. has dramatically decreased because of cable and satellite TV and syndicated

programming.

d. has remained pretty much the same.

7. The Telecommunications Act of 1996:

a. allows one company to own TV stations that reach up to 35 percent of U.S.

homes.

b. requires owners to keep a station for three years before selling it.

c. caused a decline in the number of television stations.

d. resulted in an increase in the number of companies that own television

stations.

ANS: A

8. Sweeps, the months in which TV ratings services gather their most

important information, occur during which months?

a. September, December, and May

b. May, August, and October

c. June, October, and March

d. February, May, and November

9. When American political conventions were broadcast for the first time

nationwide, the development that made that nationwide broadcast possible

was:

a. radio announcers adapting to television.

b. AT&T’s national coaxial cable hookups.

c. Edward R. Murrow’s experience with field broadcasting.

d. CBS’s lineup of sponsors for political programming.

10. Network affiliate television stations:

a. pay the network to be an affiliate.

b. are paid by the network to carry network programming

c. are paid a substantial proportion of national advertising revenues the network

collects.

d. are usually owned by the network.

True/False

1. John F. Kennedy was the first president to appear on U.S. television.

2. More than any other media industry, commercial TV exists primarily as an

advertising medium.

ANS: T

3. A ratings “share” compares the audience size of one show with the audience

size of another show.

ANS: T

4. Television licensing fees fund most of the cost of organized sports.

5. A TV station’s production department makes sure all local commercials are

aired when they are supposed to be.

Essay Questions

1. Explain the role that Edward R. Murrow played in the development of

television news.

2. Discuss the development of programming on television in the 1940s,

1950s and 1960s, including reference to its relationship to radio

programming in the 1940s and ways television programming changed as it

developed.

3. Explain how video streaming will continue to affect consumers and the

television industry.

4. Discuss the rise in the competitive power of Spanish-language television

and its effect on English-language networks.

5. Discuss the relationship between organized sports, television

programming, and television viewers, and advertisers.