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170 Cards in this Set

  • Front
  • Back
What is a kinetoscope?
Show a short film to one person and turn the crank as the film progresses
What is a vitascope?
Showing a film to more than one person
What are narrative films?
Films that tell stories, first step to making film a mass medium
What are Nickelodeons?
First theatres that showed short, simple, silent slapstick films - first audiences were the urban poor, mainly immigrants (provided cheap entertainment that they could understand)
What happened when it was discovered that Nickelodeons were actually making money?
Wanted to shake low class image, moved theatres outside of the city, theatre palaces developed (also very successful)
What characterized movies during the Golden Age in Hollywood? (1930s-1940s)
1) family entertainment, 2) escape for viewers (from Great Depression), 3) inexpensive, 4) controlled by 5 major studies, 5) created the star system
What impact did TV have on the movies?
1) People like being able to stay at home and still receive entertainment, and 2) TV takes away film's middle-class audience
How did film adapt to TV?
Film began to appeal to younger audiences (teenagers) - 1) made for youthful audience, 2) sex and violence, 3) "horror" films
What are other ways that movies continue to adapt to TV later on?
1) producing movies for cable TV, 2) rental movies for VCR, 3) themes of movies begin to change (realism), 4) rise of independent filmmaking and minority/women filmmakers, 5) blockbusters
What are some other innovations of film after TV came on the scene?
1) product placements in movie (synergy) - ex: FedEx in "Cast Away," 2) merging of Internet and film (movies on the Web), 3) promoting films via websites (ex: "Blair Witch Project")
What are the functions of film?
1) entertainment and escapism, 2) education, 3) persuasian, 4) enrichment
What is visual lag?
Allows us to view things more smoothly (this is why movies do not appear choppy to us since they are just one picture after another)
What is zoetrope?
Putting movements with pictures
What are the 5 major film studios?
MGM, 20th Century Fox, Paramount, Warner Brothers, RKO
What is the origin and foundation of today's broadcast industry (including patterns of ownership and control)?
What programs did radio originate that TV later took?
Genre model of drama and comedy programming
What does radio provide?
An example of how the function and format of a mass medium can change to survive (perhaps the best example of a surviving medium)
What did radio news create?
Created models for newsgathering and electronic journalism (established broadcast journalism)
What are the 3 technologies and inventions that are associated with radio?
1) wires, 2) waves (made cables unnecessary, could transmit messages), 3) discovered that voices could also be transmitted
What was the Wireless Ship Act of 1910?
Designed to protect ship passengers; illustrates government control of radio
What was the Radio Act of 1912?
Put a government entity, the US Department of Commerce, in charge of radio
What was the importance of radio in WWI?
Radio was the central force in formation of broadcasting; Navy seized control of radio in WWI to prevent people from interfering or transmitting messages to the enemy; also made portable radios for the field
What was/is amateur radio?
Home boxes, also known as ham operators, they were shut down during WWI and so they built their own sets (important when connections go down, similar to today's computer hackers)
Who wrote the memo in 1916 detailing an idea for putting radio boxes in people's homes and developing programs?
David Sarnoff - worked for RCA
What was advertising in radio?
Really just sponsorship - served to stabilize programming
Which company aired a program simultaneously on 2 different broadcast stations? Why was this important?
AT&T - first network
What is a network?
The linkage of broadcast stations who share a central program
What is the ancestor of radio?
Who discovered how to transmit voices over a wireless telegraph?
Lee Deforest
To which company did the military give money and patents to in order for the to develop radio?
Radio Corporation of America (RCA)
What role did the Titanic have in the increased government regulation and intervention of radio?
Government did not want the airwaves crowded in case another ship sunk
Who regulates media today?
Federal Communications Commission (FCC)
What was the first political use of radio?
Franklin Roosevelt and his Fireside Chats
What type of programming did early radio contain?
1) News (took it straight from the newspapers), 2) entertainment (comedies, dramas, soap operas, variety shows, big band concerts)
How did radio adapt to TV?
1) format of radio changes - became specialized, targeted (more local) and more musically formatted, 2) technology of transistor (radio becomes portable)
What are some characteristics of radio today?
1) growth of talk radio, 2) continuing to target different communities with programming (Spanish community), 3) headline/bulletin news (during rush hour and peak times), 4) "alternative" radio
What are the pre-TV functions of radio?
1) entertainment, 2) news (live broadcasts, on site reporting, and breaking news)
What are the post-TV functions of radio?
1) entertainment (targeted, music, specialized), 2) social commentary (talk shows, public, political, psychological, advice), 3) informative (news headlines)
What all did TV adapt from film?
1) news - visual style of film reels; could follow along visually, 2) musicals - never did well on TV; "The Monkey" was the only exception, 3) animation - cartoons began to become more geared towards children
What did TV create on its own in regards to programming?
1) action adventure stories, 2) medical programs, 3) legal dramas, 4) prime-time soaps, 5) game shows that use visual and dialouge, 6) reality programs, 7) news/magazine shows
What are the characteristics of the audience of network TV?
1) national audience, 2) segmented according to viewing preferences and programming times, 3) demographics have changed (women are now the largest primetime audience and biggest group of consumers)
What are the 4 big players of network TV?
What are the characteristics of the audience of cable TV?
1) potentially a national audience, 2) can pay for more types of programming, 3) seek variety of programming and diversity, 4) can be segmented and targeted (narrow audiences)
What are the characteristics of the audience of public TV?
1) potentially a national audience, 2) want quality programming, commerical free, educational, 3) also free
What are the characteristics of the progamming of network TV?
1) orignially divided into day-time, prime-time, and limited audience, 2) network affiliates, off-network syndication and direct (first-run) syndication, 3) "broadcasting", 4) variety of types of shows: entertainment, news, public affairs, advertising
What is direct (first-run) syndication?
Shows that are made to be sold and shown on other stations
What are the characteristics of the progamming of cable TV?
1) variety with more opportunity to pick and choose types of shows/services that you want, 2) Basic/Standard; Tiering Services; Movie Channels; superstations; pay-per-view, 3) "narrowcasting", 4) some stations/cable channels are associated with a particular demographic group or type of programming
What are the characteristics of the programming of public TV? (public TV = PBS and its affiliates)
1) educational/children's programming/international programming, 2) no ads, 3) pro-social programming, 4) sometimes controversial programming (b/c of no ads)
Who pays for network TV?
Advertising, affiliates (network-affiliate relationship)
Who pays for cable TV?
Advertising and subscribers (original intent was to have no ads)
Who pays for public TV?
Viewer (audience) donations, government, and corporate donations
What are the functions, purposes and praise, and criticisms of network TV?
1) offers variety entertainment - a national medium (replaced film), 2) available to everyone, 3) said to promote a national community, 4) said to promote and encourage unity and moderation/adherence to a middle point (moderation), 5) alternative viewpoints may not be covered due to emphasis on middle ground, 6) promotes stereotypes
What are the functions, purposes and praise, and criticisms of cable TV?
1) not regulated like network TV, 2) ability to have access to TV on a small scale, 3) diversity in programming; opportunities for increased perspectives, 4) cable stations serve smaller populations of shared interests, 5) may be too extreme in some cases, 6) not available everywhere, 7) fragments the sense of national community, 8) only rich can afford the diverse offerings and perspectives
What are the functions, purposes and praise, and criticisms of public TV?
1) bring progamming that would not be seen anywhere else, 2) serve the public b/c they are not trying to make profit, 3) provide controversial perspectives, 4) becoming increasingly dependent upon corporation donations
What are the controls/constraints on media?
1) law and regulations, 2) denying or limiting access to information and events, 3) protecting the "community", 4) protecting the individual, 5) self-control, 6) audience/public control
What is prior restraint?
The attempt to prevent publication - not used or supported in the US, used in colonial newspapers
What is libel?
Defamation of character in written expression
What is slander?
Defmation of character in verbal expression
How is libel law decided?
Set by precedent in Supreme Court
What are defenses against libel charges for the media?
1) truth - in some states, an absolute defense, 2) reporters' privilege - a qualified privilege, there are restrictions, 3) opinion and fair comment - cannot be sued for commentary in role as a critic
What was the Sullivan or Times Rule in 1964?
This ruling made it more difficult for public officials to sue for libel - public officials must prove: falsehood, damages, negligence, and actual malice
What do private individuals have to prove when suing for libel?
Falsehood, damages, and negligence (NOT actual malice)
What are the two categories of public figures?
1) celebrities, politicians, 2) individuals who have thrown themselves into the public light either voluntarily or involuntarily ("Once a public figure, always a public figure")
What are shield laws?
State laws that protect reporters from revealing their sources (can still be held in contempt of the court!)
Radio and TV are both regulated by what organization?
FCC (est. by the 1934 Communications Act) - notice that the FCC regulates broadcasting, NOT print media
What are the 4 ways that the FCC "controls" the broadcast media?
1) licensing (much harder to lose than to obtain), 2) dirty words and indecent speech, 3) used to have rules limiting the number of stations which could be owned or controlled by a single organization (starting to become deregulated), 4) Section 315: Equal time provision
What is Section 315?
Equal time provision - only part kept from the Fairness Doctrine (which required media to cover both sides of a story); equal time provision states that a broadcaster must provide an equal offer to political candidates running for the same position/office (newscoverage is excluded, as are debates or convention coverings)
What is the Freedom of Information Act?
If you are a member of the public and want to see certain government documents, you must submit an application with your reasons - request must be 1) of public interest, 2) must not do excessive harm, 3) demonstrate a need for the data
What are sunshine laws/open meetings laws?
Cannot close meetings to the media or to the public that concern the public
What are gag orders?
When a judge does not allow people to talk about a particular case outside of the courtroom
What about the issues of cameras in the courtoom?
Cameras used to be banned from courtrooms years ago but reporters were not; cameras are now allowed in select cases, the judge is allowed to choose; fear that cameras effected the trial in some way
What are the 3 criteria for obscenity?
1) the average person, applying contemporary community standards, would find that the material as a whole appeals to prurient (sexual) interest, 2) the material depicts or describes sexual conduct in a patently offensive way, 3) the material, as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value
Who are the "communities" to be protected from obscenity?
1) sometimes defined by regions, 2) sometimes defined by groups (ex: women)
What are the 3 main types of stories that present problems for attorneys? (pre-trial publicity)
1) stories that convey a presumption of guilt, 2) stories that report confessions or conversations previously held with others, 3) stories that report details of a crime that would have an emotional impact
What are the ways of limiting the effects of pre-trial publicity?
Exist in the court system, not as constraints on media - 1) change of venue (change trial to another town/place), 2) change of venire (bring in jurors from another place b/c too expensive to move the trial), 3) gag orders, 4) sequester the jury, 5) questioning of the jurors
What is invasion of privacy?
Addresses a person's right to be left alone, without his or her name, image, or daily activities becoming public property
What are the 3 most common types of invasion of privacy?
1) intrusion (trespassing on your person or property), 2) publication of private matters, 3) appropriation (cannot use your image for commercial gain)
What is the difference between newspaper codes and broadcast codes?
Newspaper codes - pro-active, what newspapers need to do is continue to serve public, express belief in self-righting process, rationality of audiences, committment to maintain and garner public trust; Broadcast codes - negative terms, reactive language, attempts to forestall new government regulation or dealing with existing regulation, reflect industry's emphasis on entertainment, reflect what you should or shouldn't do
What is absolutist ethics?
Believe that it is never right to lie
What is situational ethics?
Believe that there are some severe situations where lying is necessary (ex: investigative reporting)
What is the dilemma regarding invasion of privacy?
Protection of individual privacy vs. public's right to know
What is the problem(s) concerning unnamed sources?
- audience has no way of knowing the validity of the source if unnamed
- making up sources is another issue
What is checkbook journalism?
When reporters pay for a story or an interview
Other issues regarding self-control?
- photographic accuracy
- influence of advertisers on the news
What are some audience or public controls on the media?
1) citizens as watchdogs, 2) media "watch" organizations, 3) audience taste and reaction (if you don't like something, you can respond to it, ex: letter to the editor)
How do we measure the popularity of print services?
Circulation or number of copies sold (Audit Bureau of Circulation)
How do we measure the popularity of film?
Box office/ticket sales
How do we measure the popularity of broadcast media?
Arbitron and Nielsen are the two main broadcast measuring services
What is saturation and penetration?
Saturation - how many people own a TV set

Penetration - number of working TV sets
What is the HUT?
Homes Using Television (how many people have the TV on?)
What is a rating?
In TV measurement, a rating is a statistical estimate expressed as a percentage of households tuned to a program in the local or national market being sampled (measurement of whether people are watching your show or doing something else)
What is a share?
Another TV audience measure that is a statistical estimate of the percentage of homes tuned to a program, compared with those actually using their sets at the time of a sample
What has been the influence of technology in entertainment?
- Edison's wax cylinders: analog recording
- Berliner's flat disk: vinyl records
- Magnetic audiotape (Germany)
- Stereo sound
- Compact discs
- Audio DVDS
How did the recording industry and radio adapt to one another?
Hated one another at first - after the arrival of TV recording industry provided free music to radio (radio helped to promote it)
What is the popular music television station?
How did music merge with film?
Soundtracks (among other sound effects)
What did rock music blur the boundaries between?
- high and low culture
- masculine and feminine
- black and white
- north and south
- sacred and secular
What are 3 main things to know about entertainment content?
1) is influenced by audience taste, 2) "reflects" culture and society's view of norms, 3) is one of our most successful exports
What are the five major recording labels?
1)Warner, 2)Seagram (MCA/Universal/Polygram), 3)Sony (CBS Records), 4)EMI (Capitol/Virgin), 5)BMG/RCA Records
Name 3 ways that music has gained support as a form of therapy.
1) experiments have shown our physical responses to musical tempo may be linked to our bodies' own rhythms, 2) music has been used to "reach" autistic and deaf children, 3) music has been used to "calm" the heart rates of cardiac care patients
What was Operation Just Noise?
In 1989, the US Army went into Panama to capture and arrest Manuel Noriega and played rock 'n roll songs at full volume until he surrendered
What kind of reality is news said to be?
A construction of secondhand reality - mediated reality (typically we don't see an event firsthand)
What are the criteria for "newsworthiness"?
1) Timeliness, 2) Proximity (more interested in local news), 3) Conflict, 4) Prominence, 5) Human interest, 6) Consequence, 7) Usefulness, 8) Novelty, 9) Deviant (is it expected)
Regarding organizational factors of news, what did Epstein's early work say?
- network policy
- governmental restrictions
- economic considerations
What did Herbert Gans' study of newsroom culture find in regards to "enduring news values"?
1) ethnocentrism (focus on local)
2) respsonsible capitalism
3) small-town pastoralism
4) individualism (focus on individual triumph, celebrity focus)
What is advertising?
Persuasive communication that is controlled and paid for
What is marketing?
Assessing behaviors and attitudes - promotes product's value in satisfying consumer needs, also deals with product placement/display (eye-level is ideal), also deal with product packaging
When is advertising most effective?
When the need for a product is already present
What does advertising play upon?
Our fears and our insecurities
How do you create product recognition?
1) trademarks, 2) packaging, 3) slogans, 4) testimonials
What is a trademark?
A symbol - verbal or visual, a verbal trademark is usually only one word

ex: Nike swoosh
What is a slogan?
More words than a verbal trademark

ex: "Just do it"
What is a testimonial?
A product is endorsed by a well-known person

ex: milk campaign that uses famous people
What are 3 ways to differentiate your product in an advertising campaign?
1) "unique selling proposition"
2) association
3) participation
What is a "unique selling proposition"?
Something that sets your product apart

ex: separating your brand of PB from others (using plastic jars)
What is association?
Tying your product to some cultural image or experience

ex: "experience" that a Hallmark card gives you
What is participation?
Asks you to add something to the ad, have to figure it out before you understand it (can guess it, can tell a story)
What are 2 ways that consumers are studied and understood?
1) Individual needs and 2), Peer groups/lifestage/lifestyle
What are the levels in Maslow's hierarchy of needs?
Physiological, safety, love, esteem, self-actualization
What are Values and Lifestyles?
Divides consumers into types - the most recent system classifies people by their primary consumer motivations: ideals, achievement, or self-expression
What is another way to understand and study consumers?
Peer groups/lifestage/lifestyle
What are the 2 ways that individual needs are understood?
1) Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, 2) Values (Values and Lifestyles)
What are common peer groups/lifestage/lifestyles that are studied?
- family and peer groups
- demographics
- geographics
- psychographics (attitudes and beliefs)
- lifestage/lifestyle (VALS research here too)
What is a lifestage?
Where you are in your life and what you're spending your money on (different levels of discretionary income, spend it on different things in different lifestages)
What is market segmentation?
Identifying different markets based on consumer needs and wants
Who can be a target market?
Anyone - by demographics, age, gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, lifestyle, lifestage
What are some principles of a "good" target market?
1) consumer power (must have money and discretionary income)
2) identifiable
3) reachable
4) consideration of "consequences" (advertisers tend to be conservative in their views, do not want to offend their viewers)
How are children influenced by TV advertising?
1) shapes product preference, 2) increases awareness of certain products, 3) may contribute to conflicts
What two products are most heavily advertised towards children?
- toys
- food (specifically, cereal)
What kind of conflicts can arise from TV advertising's influence on children?
- if a child requests a product and does not get it
- if the product as it is advertised does not meet expectations in real life
- if the social setting as advertised increases the dissatisfaction in a child's own life
What influences how much "effect" TV advertising will have on a child?
1) individual differences (age, sophistication), 2) parental and sibling mediation, 3) exposure to "critical instructional sequences"
What are "critical instructional sequences"?
Pamphlets and videos that teach children about the techniques used in ad campaigns and makes them aware of their selling intent; helps to increase healthy skepticism in children and increase awareness about the selling purpose of ads
Who are the "publics" in public relations?
1) company's own employees, 2) the media, 3) the public
Who uses/practices public relations?
1) government agencies/military, 2) non-profits/social organizations, 3) politicians, 4) companies/corporations, 5) countries, 6) celebrities (sort of different)
What are 3 main kinds of public relations campaigns?
- campaign development
- issue management
- crisis management
What is a campaign development?
Just to get society to be aware of an issue (long-term development awareness)

ex: fire safety awareness for children
What is issue management?
A response to something that happens; may become a crisis if not address (assessing and responding)

ex: McDonald's response to mafia siphoning money from game
What is crisis management?
A disaster or scandal causing a company or individual to suffer immensely

ex: Tylenol capsules (good reaction), Denny's (bad reaction)
What is socialization?
Learning the norms and what is wrong and right in society

- adapting to society's wants
Who and what socializes us?
Family, friends, parents, media, etc.
How do media socialize us?
- media are a part of our everyday lives
- media portrayals may provide a framework by which we judge things or model our behavior (provide models of behavior and portrayal of norms of the behavior or roles we fit)
- media may be our only source of information about something in society, or in the world
What organization conducted the first early study of movies and children?
Payne Fund Studies
What did the Payne Fund Studies find between children and movies?
- children would imitate their favorite characters
- children experienced unintentional learning
- children experienced certain emotions and feelings during films
What have today's studies of children and TV found?
- for the most part, TV functions in the same way as film did
- children use TV to draw family members into conversations and social interactions
- children use TV as a "time-consuming" activity
- children use TV for diversion and escape
- children use TV to provide material for "play" with friends (let's pretend)
What are the 3 main models for models of behavior concerning the media?
1) Cultivation theory, 2) observational learning, 3) desensitization
What are the 3 models of behavior concerning media portrayls that are not very well supported?
1) Catharsis, 2) aggressive cues, 3) reinforcement
What is catharsis?
Purging of emotions - this theory believes that violence in the media purges us of our violent emotions (not very well supported by evidence)
What are aggressive cues?
The theory that someone does not have to be a violent person for violent media images to effect them - violence triggers excitement which leads to learned behavior
What is reinforcement?
Belief that if you are a violent person, violence in the media will only reinforce this violent nature
What is the cultivation theory?
Belief that heavy viewers of TV have a "mean world view" - think that the world is a very harsh place, overestimate your chances of being effected by violence
What is observational learning?
Happens when 1) identify with a model, 2) situation presents itself where behavior is appropriate, 3) imitated behavior is rewarded (this allows behavior to continue)
What is desensitization?
Theory that we become so deadened to violence that we see in the media that it starts to no longer bother us - concern arises if this desensitization carries over to real life
What are the 4 stages of appearance of minorities and who came up with them?
Clark - 1) nonrecognition or invisibility, 2) ridicule, 3) regulatory roles (now in power roles), 4) egalitarian (range of roles available)
What are the 5 ways that studios make money on film?
1) box-office revenue, 2) video and DVD sales, 3) foreign film markets, 4) acting as distributors for independent films, 5) product placement in films
What are some of the conventional persuasive strategies used in advertising?
1) famous-person testimonial, 2) plain-folks pitch, 3) snob-appeal approach, 4) bandwagon effect, 5) hidden-fear appeal, 6) irritation advertising, 7) association principle, 8) disassociation corollary
What is the association principle?
It associates a product with some cultural value or image that has a positive connotation but may have little connection to the actual product
What is disassociation corollary?
Disassociation in advertising links new brands in a product line to eccentric or simple regional places rather than to the image conjured up by giant conglomerates
What is a pseudo-event?
Term was coined by Daniel Boorstein in his book "The Image" - any circusmstance created for the purpose of gaining coverage in the media
What are the 3 elements of friction between journalsim and public relations?
1) the simple notion of facts, 2) sometimes public relations people will block access to key leaders, 3) simple econonmics (if PR can secure news stories for their clients, these clients benefit from the added status that a journalistic context confers)
What are the 4 main ways that journalists present facts in a neutral light?
1) inverted-pyramid style of reporting, 2) careful attribution of sources, 3) the minimal use of adverbs and adjectives, 4) detached third-person point of view
What are the two competing models that have influenced American and European newsrooms since the early 1900s?
1) the informational model, 2) the partisan or European model
What is the informational model?
Emphasizes describing events from a neutral point of view; this model dominates American newspapers today
What is the partisan model?
Stresses analyzing occurrences and advocating remedies from an acknowledged point of view
What is public journalism?
- also known as civic journalism
- moves beyond "telling the news" to a broader mission of helping public life go well
- moves from detachment to being a fair-minded participant in public life
- moves beyond only describing what is "going wrong" to imagining what "going right" would be like
- moves from seeing people as consumers to seeing them as potential actors in arriving at democratic solutions to public problems
What are the 4 models for speech and journalism that have been used to categorize differing ideas underlying free expression?
1) authoritarian model, 2) communist (or state) model, 3) libertarian model, 4) social-responsibilty model
What is the authoritarian model?
- developed in 16th century England around the same time as the printing press arrived b/c the ruling class believed that the largely illiterate public needed guidance
- government criticism and public dissent were not tolerated and censorship was frequent
- printing licenses were issued primarily to publishers who were sympathetic to government and ruling-class agendas
What is the communist or state model?
- puts press control solely in the hands of the government
- believe that the press should serve the common goals of the state
What is the libertarian model?
- the opposite of state and authoritarian systems
- encourage government criticism and support the highest degree of freedom for individual speech and for the press
- many political and alternative newspapers and magazines operate on such a model
What is the social-responsibility model?
- the most popular of mainstream journalism in the US
- usually privately owned (keeps them independent from the government)
- function as the Fourth Estate
What is the Fourth Estate?
Belief that mainstream journalism acts as an unofficial branch of government that monitors the legislative, judicial, and executive branches for abuses of power