Class Overheads for Week 8
Impacts of television, 1950-70
New definitions
"Mass" Communications
"The Media"
Forced to adapt:
Radio: From broadcastingt to narrowcasting: Specialized
recorded music formats, beginning with rock, talk.
Magazines: Flight of national advertising to television,
death of Colliers, Look, Saturday Evening Post, Life. Rise of niche
formats
Bankruptcy of Cutris Publising, 1969
Newspapers: Death in the afternoon
Film: Search for new content, technologies, innovative
directors
Measuring audiences
Life, death and ratings
"The Diamond"/CPM
Three-network nation
Early TV: Visual radio
Black and white (not color)
Antenna
Network programming
Live entertainment, drama
'Hear it Now'/'See it Now/
Three-network nation: CBS, NBC and ABC
Public service (news, public affairs) v. profitability
(entertainment, sponsors)
Case study: Edward R. Murrow, "Seeit Now," 1951-57, "Person to
person." Fictionalized in 2005 film: "Goodbye and Good Luck."
World War II radio correspondent, controversial television
commenator and documentarian, celebrity interviewer
Challenges: new medium, political controversy, sponsorship
system.
Characters in video clip:
Fred Friendly, Murrow's producer (Friendly Hall, UO)
Don Hewitt, producer, later to create "60 Minutes."
William S. Paley, CBS President
Milo Radulovich
Sen. Joseph McCarthy
ALCOA (Aluminum Corporation of America), sponsor of "See it Now"
Downfall:
Potential TV viewing audience expands
Increased revenue value of prime-time slot
Low "See it Now" ratings
Political controversy, pressure groups
Loss of sponsors (ALCOA, Pontiac)
Audience captured by "quiz show" format
Rise and fall of TV quiz shows, 1955-62
"The $64,000 Question" (CBS)
"Twenty-one" (NBC)
Names: Charles Van Doren, Herbert Stempel
New York grand jury, 1959
Congress investigates, 1961-62
End of sponsor system. New industry rules:
Networks, not sponsors, control content
Independent production, no longer ad agencies
Advertising spots, not programs