Radio and TV

Every day you probably use several different media, with writing, speech, images, and video. But it hasn't always been like that. A hundred years ago, letters were still the most common way to communicate between people who weren't near to each other. If you were really in a hurry, you could send a message via telegraph, send a telegram. When the telephone later became more common, it took over the role of the telegraph for fast messages.

Letters, telegrams and telephone, have in common that they go from one person to another. The daily newspapers were different. They spread information to many people at the same time. You could also go to the local cinema, and watch a newsreel... like a news program but in a cinema.

Watching the news was something entirely new. Now everything didn't have to be explained in words anymore. The viewers could see for themselves how a fire engulfed a house, How soldiers advanced in some war, And how new highrise buildings grew up to the sky in America. Watching moving images engaged the audience in a wholly different way than reading the newspaper. It was as if the world came closer, and as if you were part of the action.

At about the same time as the newsreels, another mass medium was also spreading: The radio. Thanks to a technical innovation, the vacuum tube, radio receivers became cheaper and simpler to use than ever before. More and more radio stations were started, and for the first time, there was a medium that was as fast as the telephone, and that could reach as many people as the newspaper. News reached people fast, and it was suddenly possible to follow big events in the world, hour by hour. There was of course no imagery in radio, but like the newsreels, radio was good at evoking emotional reactions, much more than the newspaper ever did.

When Adolf Hitler rose to power in Germany in the 1930's, he made use of this fact, and broadcast his speeches via radio, evoking emotions of: Nationalism, German unity, Hostility towards foreigners, And desire for revenge, after the stinging defeat in World War I. Sixty years later, during the 1990's, radio would again have a similar role, in the brutal genocide in Rwanda, where the radio was used in a similar way. As many as a million people were murdered during a three month period, following a campaign of hatred, broadcast on the radio. After the radio, came the next big media invention: It had moving images, and it evoked emotions, just like the newsreels. And it reached many people, in their living rooms, just like radio did.

It was of course: television. During the 1950's, television was quickly spreading in homes, first in the USA, and then in Europe. The technology used to broadcast radio and television, was very costly. It required tall antennae and a lot of advanced equipment. It was often the government who implemented this technology, and who ran the early TV channels.

Those government run media companies, that were established then, are often called Public Service companies - that is, media serving the public. The most well known public service company is the BBC - British Broadcasting Corporation, which is still in operation today. Later, new technologies were developed, to broadcast television... ... via satellites, orbiting the earth, sending signals, that can be received using a satellite dish... ... or through cables in the ground, leading up to each house or apartment.

TV channels broadcasting via satellite or cable are almost always private companies. Often they charge a fee for watching, and include commercials. Try this sometime: Pick a few pieces of news from the past week. Find links to how those news items have been portrayed in different media: public service television, cable TV, radio news and daily newspapers... and then compare.

Which uses the most words? Which appeals the most to emotion? Does it seem that the news story is changed in any way by the medium conveying it: TV, radio, or newspaper? Can the medium alter the message?