Broadcast History

From people building there own radio sets to multibillion dollar corporations

• AAC sold to CanWest Global

• Shaw

• BCE

• NBC

• Comcast

  • $142 B

• Disney

  • $200 B

• Netflix

  • $374 B

• Rogers

  • $14-16 B

Major Forces that shaped broadcast industry

1. Technological change

   1. You don’t have an industry without the tech to deliver it

   2. Invention of new medium ex. Radio or refinements to those inventions

      1. Get smaller, more efficient

      2. Start to add up

2. Commerce

   1. How to make money off of the technology

   2. Make people pay for the privilege

   3. Profitable

3. Creative aspirations / ego

   1. Something that I want to share with the world

   2. There is a medium that can deliver something to people

4. Societal forces / trend

   1. Outside the industry

   2. Demographic realities

      1. Who can afford the product and service

   3. Baby boom

      1. More demand for TV

   4. Civil rights

5. Governmental policies

   1. Governments in different nations have different ideas of what communication should be and how it should develop

   2. Some countries want public broadcasters that serve the country as a whole

      1. Spends money on programming that isn't widely popular

   3. The free market

Variety Programming

• A show with a mix of acts without a central story

• Acts chosen to appeal a broad audience

• There are recurring elements / running gags / or main character(s) that the show follows

  • Ex. SNL, talk shows, morning show (music, weather, traffic), YouTube

• Something for everyone

• What attracted people to radio and TV

  • First thing a new medium tries

  • Easiest genre to produce

    • Uses preexisting talent / writing

  • Always appears at times of technological change

    • Demonstrates the capacity of a new medium

In the beginning

• Small number of radio stations (1920s) or small number of TV (1940s)

• Economic reasons to appeal to a wide audience

  • At the beginning r&t were an obscure service

  • The programming needed to be able to get through to a larger group so they would buy a station

  • They were full service

    • Music, comedy, weather, news, sports

    • At specific times

Narrow casting (now)

• Sportsnet where they just do sports

• Station that would serve YOUR needs specifically

Early days of radio

• 1901

  • Morse code

  • SOS signals

• 1906

  • Reginald Aubrey Fessenden

    • Canadian (in Massachusetts)

    • Christmas eve 9:00 PM

      • Gives a short speech, reads a Christmas story from the bible, plays the violin, sang

  • The first public radio broadcast

    • There was the telephone already

  • Could only be picked up at by ships at sea listening to morse code

• 1906 impact of the world

  • Silent movies

  • Electricity is a novelty

  • No computers

• 1920s

  • Radio takes off - always takes time for a medium to work out

    • World war one in between, puts a pause on the development

  • Montreal's CFCF on the air in may of 1920

    • First scheduled commercial station in North America

    • Variety formatting

• Typical 1920s show

  • Live music by local musicians

  • Travelling bands

  • Phonograph records (DJS)

  • Local performers not paid

    • Promotion

    • Novelty

• 1930s

  • Radio networks

  • Broadcast programmes across the country

  • Before the 30s musical starts shunned radio (radio didn't pay before)

    • Great depression

      • Less disposable income

      • Radio programming was free one you had a radio

  • Took starts from vaudeville: comedians, singers, preexisting acts

  • 3 main networks in the US

    •  NBC

    • CBS

    • Mutual Broadcasting system

  • UK

    • BBC (1922 Est) (1927 the government reforms as a corporation)

      • No commercials

      • Funded by taxpayers: licence fee to operate radio set

  • Canada

    • Private radio stations as well as public

    • CRBC

      • Government of Canada

    • CBC

      • Public

      • Canadian broadcasting Corporation

      • Hybrid of USA and British model

• Golden age of radio: 1930's and 1940s

  • Main source of home entertainment

  • Diversion from WW2 and depression

  • Develop their own star system

  • Edgar Bergan & Charley McCarthy

    • Ventriloquist radio star

  • CBC's Happy gang

    • 20yrs

    • Banter

    • Corny humour

• End of US radio variety ends when TV comes along

  • US network starts in 1946 Canada in 1952 UK 1960s

• 1950

  • Radio reinvents itself

  • Ad revenue is down

  • Rise of the DJ

    • BBC pioneered the format in the 1920s

  • Radio start to develop rhythm and blues

    • Extremely segregated (into the 80s)

    • Black stations played "race" music

  • Alan Freed first US DJ in "white" America to play "race music" he called "rock and roll"

    • Birth of "top 40"

      • Todd Storz

        • Noticed people would pay to play the same records over and over again

        • Commercial need

          • Demand from teenagers (boomers)

        • Creative explosion (helped the record industry)

          • Elvis

          • Motown

          • California sound

      • CHUM Radio (toronto)

• Record companies want their records to be on the top 40

  • Payola scanndal

  • Illegal payments to DJs to play songs "secret commisons"

  • US: FCC investigated and made illegal

    • Freed's career suffers

  • Payola goes underground

    • Record labels BUY stations

Music radio in canada

• Issue with too much US music

  • Canadians couldn’t make a living recording music

  • They move to the US

• CRTC mandates min canadian content: 1972

  • 30% CanCon

    • Buy, written, produced by canadians

British Rock Radio

• BBC had a monopoly challenged by other european radio stations

  • Played top 40 rock

• 1964 to 1967

  • Unlicneed broadcasters offshore just outside of the UK waters

  • Pirate radio

    • Radio carolone & radio london

    • Use US and Canadian DJs

    • John Peel

  • 1967

    • UK government made it illegal to work with radio pirates

BBC experimental TV in the 30s

• 30-line low definition

• Hobbysits who build their own tvs

• Cinema news reel

• Light entertainment

  • Variety

• World war 2 stops UK TV services

  • Resumes in 1945

1930s early US tv

• Only a few thousand TVs in nyc

1939

• World fair, NYC

• Regular US TV service begins

• President FDR becomes the first US president on TV

Post WWII

• Britan stuggles to rebuild after the blitz

• US becomes ahead of britan in terms of the US

NBCs hour glass

• Most ambitious and expensive tv porgram ever produced up to that time

  • $200,000 over nine/ten months

• First show to create its own tv star

• Sponser were standard brands

  • Sponser controls everything (1 sponser)

• Pacing is different from radio than to tv

Texaco star theatre

• US oil company sponsers the show

Milton Berle Show

• Dressed in drag

• Known for liberating, stealing jokes from other comedians

• Sold more tv sets than any advertising campaign

Ed sullivan

• Censorship issues

• Concerned about languege

  • Lyrics changed to be less suggestive

Variety TV in canada

• Starts in 1952

• Canadians near the border typically watch US tv

  • Except Quebec tv (language and culture)

• The Wayne and Shuster hour

  • First important variety starts in Canada

  • Went on ed Sullivan

TV Variety and social change

• 50s and 60s concern with civil rights, counterculture and protest

• African americans are not seen much on TV

Was Fessenden the father of radio

• Disputed

  • US researchers say NO

  • Radio historians say YES

• Who gets the credit AND the money

Rudy Vallee

• Crooning

  • Psychological intimacy of radio

  • Technical dynamic constraints

• Vaudeville lineup brought to radio

• Sidekick announcer

BBC Radio music variety

• Music hall forbids artist from appearing on radio

  • Fear of killing box office

• Lord Reith - first chairman and director of BBC

  • Wanted BBC to be more enlightening

  • Left the BBC in '48

    • Bandwagon

    • Used the US variety format

• WW2

  • Americans are in Britan

    • The Britian's start listening to what the Americans are listening to

Audio Recording and Radio Broadcasting

Radio Tech Today

• Digital music

• Access to music ill all different eras

Music

• Fundemmental human art

  • Drumming

  • Percussion

  • Melody

• Before humans could talk and develop a language

• How can we store music for later playback

250 BC

• Greeks developed an early music notation system

  • Make a notation system so they can note how the music sounded

    • What the notes were to recreate at a later time

8th century Switzerland

• Modern sheet music

Music boxes

• Store simple pieces of music

Home music

• Using sheet music you can lay the popular song on the piano

• Late 1800s the piano is the form of music storage

  • Many homes had a piano and would buy sheet music

• No one could play piano

  • Invent a piano that could play itself

  • Mechanically modified piano that plays mass-produced rolls of paper

  • Henri Fourneaux

    • 1863 "Pianista"

• Votey

  • 1895

  • Player piano

  • Plays the current music

1920

• The transition year

• The last year a piece of sheet music would sell a million copies

• The first year a vinyl record would sell a million copies

Recorded Sound

• Invented by Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville (1857)

• Phonautograph

  • Record sound but could not playback

• Edison is the first person to record AND playback sound

  • 1876-77

  • Working on the telephone and accidently makes a record device

  • Runs a strip of wax paper through a mouth piece of a telephone

  • Creates the Tinfoil Phonograph

    • Ediphone

    • Dictation and record keeping NOT MUSIC

      • Business applications

Phonograph

• Move from active music makers to passive listeners

• Replaces piano

  • 1800s composer driven sales of music

  • 1900s performer driven sales of music

    • Performance > composition

Competitors

• Columbia graphophone

  • Cardboard coated wax cylinder

Emile Berliner (1894)

• Disc not a cylinder

• Mass production

  • One recording of the voice and mass produce It

  • Formed Victor

    • RCA: radio corporation of America

  • Gramophone competitor

Jolson, Caruso is the first recording stars

• Caruso

  • 1916 - O Sole Mio

• Jolson

  • Toot Toot Tootsie

Electronics (1924)

• Electrical recording system

• Previously acoustic

  • Now had a microphone

• Crooner sound develops

  • Rudy Valle

  • Bing Crosby

Film sound on disk (record)

• Show a film and play a record at the same time

• The projector was not consistent in terms of speed

The jazz singer (1920s film)

• First sound film with some dialogue

• Saved WB

Vitaphone projector

• 15 reels of film and 15 discs to manage

Sound on film systems

• Sound optically printed on the film

  • Resolves sync problems

  • Grooves can't wear out

• Competing systems

  • Western electric

    • Variable density

  • RCA

    • Variable area

In europe

• Magnetic recording

• Valdemar oiulsen

• Plastic tape coated with layers of iron powder

• Doesn't have the business backing of edison

Bias

• Used in Nazi germany

• To send more code messages

  • Sped up messages that could be decoded

WWII

• Jack Mullin

• Listening to Nazi radio and hears "live" symphony played

  • Heard orchestras recorded on magnetic tape

• Creates a demo for bing crosby (1947)

NBC

• Refused to air a prerecorded shows

• Moves to ABC

Better records

• LP record developed at columbia

• 45 RPM one song on each side by RCA

• Stero records in 1947

Multitracking

• Les Paul

• Build sounds on top of each other

Not just STORAGE OF MUSIC but things that cant be created on stage

Motown multitracking

• Distinctive bass style

• Initial tape on electric bass and overdub the same part on an acoustic bass

Compact Cassette

• Developed by philips in 1963

• 8 tracks

  • Endless loops

• 40-50 mins on one side

Compact disc (CD)

• 1980

  • Phillips and sony

• Holds sound digitally

• 74 mins

Digital revolution

• Mechanical -> electric -> digital

Impact of digital on recording studios

• Death to mid level

Gugliemo Marconi

• Develops wireless telepgraphy in 1895

  • Previoulsy could use telegraphy thought landlines

• Wireless telegraphy

• England to newfoundland in 1901

  • Point to point

Regonald Fessenden

• Discovers AM (Amplitude modulation)

• One to many

Development of radio (3 big players)

• Lee DeForest

  • Good self promoter

  • Took ideas of others

  • Developed the Audion but never understood how it worked

• Edwin Howard Armstrong

  • Developed regeneration

    • Method where some of the tube output is bed back (feedback)

  • Developed FM radio

    • Frequency modulation

    • Higher quality

    • Eliminates static

• David Sarnoff

  • Head of RCA

  • Sold

Radio Station

• Produced programs

• Brand

  • Trademark / niche

  • A person might like the style

Programming -> Spot Ads -> Programming

Broadcasters

• Do not own airwaves

  • Considered a public resource

• Only a certain number of frequencies

  • Some are stronger channels that are easier to broadcast on

Government Regulations

• To ensure clear signals / reception

• Prevent criminal acts

  • Censorship

  • Prevent hate and terror being broadcasted for the public

• Use public airwaves for good

  • Emergencies

• Cultural sovereignty

  • Should we be using airwaves in a way that Canadian culture is integrated

Early Regulations (Canada)

• 1905 Wireless Telegraphy Act

  • In order to get a station you had to be licensed by the marines radio branch

  • More code

• 1913 Radiotelegraph Act

  • Included voice transmission

  • Point to point medium (one to one)

• 1917 United States

  • No licensing regime

  • Amateur radio competes with commercial radio

    • Anyone could set up a station

    • False SOS signals

Other Canadian Networks

1928: trans Canada broadcasting company

• Modelled on NBC

1930 Canadian Broadcasting system

• Did no las too long

Problems with Canadian broadcast

• Canada is geographically huge with a small population

• Economically difficult

1930/31: Canadian Pacific Railroad

• Does not work

Canadian stations began joining US networks

• CFRB Toronto is a CBS Affiliate

• CKGW Toronto is a CFCF & NBC affiliate

CFRB: Canadas first rogers battery less

• Ernie Bushnell formed broadcast services

• Fired

• CFRB goes to US CBS primetime

  • During the day they were CFRB and at night they were CBS

  • Ad revenue stays in Canada

  • Listen to the Canadian channel instead

The advertiser buys the hour and embeds messages

Advertising: Early USA

• WEAF in NY

• 1922

• 10 min real estate talk

  • Sold two apartments

Sponsorship

Sponsorship controlled programming: owned the whole show

• Chase & Sanborn Hour

  • Charlie McCarthy

• Jell-O

  • Jack Benny

• Harlow Wilcox

Anti-Advertising

• President Hoover

  • If radio becomes dominant by ad the audience would disappear

Canada

• Ads were limited to certain times of the day

• 1926

  • Banned ads

Jingles

• Intended by Ernie Bushnell (maybe)

• Catch phrases

Sponsors control the shows content

• Would hire ad agencies to produce shows

• Ratings were important

Non-sponsored shows

• Prestigious

  • Important programs that might attract people to the network

• Nat King Cole

• Orson Welles and the mercury theatre

  • Got popular enough the Campbell sound sponsored

Today

FM

• Better tech

• Clearer signals

• FM dominants radio

TV comes in the 50s and radio goes away

Satellite radio

• National NOT local

Industry consolidation

• Lots of stations owned by the same company

• Corus 38

• Rogers 52

• Newscap 92

• CTV 33

• Bell now owns CHUM and astro

Public Broadcasting

• Tension

  • Public good vs. commercial interests

  • Left vs. right

  • Public vs. private

• Public

  	Private
  Civic Minded Education Left wing Need	Market forces US shows Right wing Want Private is about commercial interests

• Easier for a network to buy a show than to create new programming

Politics & Government Reg

• The allocation of recourses

  • Airwaves, signals, frequencies

• Allocate it in a way that one entity isn't getting all the networks

• Prevent criminal acts

  • Censorship

• Regulates commerce

  • No monopoly

• Cultural sovereignty

  • Ensure that the culture of the country has a space on the broadcast

Can we rely on commercial to give us what we need

• Providing service to the entire population

• Public broadcasting

  • Nonprofit and non commercial

  • Supported by public funds

  • Provides service to the entire population

• 3 funding models

  • CBC

    • Comes out of taxes

    • Even if you're not listening you're still paying for it

    • Stability

    • The government in power can stop funding

      • Theoretical independence from the government

      • But they can decide to cut / eliminate funding

  • BBC

    • Funded through licences through the radio or tv

    • If u own a radio or tv u pay a yearly licence fee to own and operate

    • Government determines the licence fee

  • PBS

    • In some cases a small amount from government

    • Most from donations

    • Dependence on donations

    • Not stable

      • In economic slow down people aren't going to donate

    • Not as much money

Graham Spry

• Creates the Canadian Radio League 1933

Educational

• TVO

• Usually public broadcasters

• In Canada they are provincial

  • Specific educational mandate

Broadcasting

• Federal

Education

• provincial

Government controlled broadcasts are not considered public

PB entity must have

• Autonomous board

  • Accountable to the public through parliament

Late 20s

• CNR is the closed to a public network

• Private

  • Religious

    • Funded by the church

Key Catalysts

• International bible students association

  • Broadcast the word of god to the Canadian population

  • Attack government and religions

• Leads to public outrage

• 1928

  • Government cancels station licence of owned by the International bible students association

    • Said it was censorship

  • Royal Commission of Public Broadcasting

    • Go to NY to see the NBC

      • NBC plan is to incorporate Canada into their network

    • Go to Europe to see the BBC

    • Cross Canada hearings

      • PB supporters fear US domination

      • PrB fear loss of independence and profits

    • Commission report 1929

      • Recommends

        • National public radio to advance unity

      • Federally owned network

      • Disband private nations

      • Canadian programming

      • $3 licence fee, government subsidies, and indirect sponsorship

    • GREAT DEPRESSION HITS STALLS THE COMMISION

Canadian Radio League 1930

• Graham Spry and Alan Plaunt

• Want to see a Canadian media industry

• Support from university, newspaper, groups

• Against public radio

  • Ernie Bushnell

Special Parliamentary commission 1932

The conservative government forms the CRBC (Canadian Radio Broadcasting Commission) (1932)

• 3 person board to oversee public radio and be broadcasting authority of public and private

• Private radio stations ALLOWED Private networks NOT allowed

  • Has to be local

• Took over CNR radio

• Ernie Bushnell becomes the program director

  • Works under severe constraints

  • Lacks budget

• Low point

  • Mr. Sage

    • 1935

    • 15 min soap opera

    • Sketches about politics

      • Indirectly sponsered by conservatives

• Political broadcast CANNOT  be dramatized

• CRBC is disbanded

  • 1936

    • CBC is created

    • Moose river mining disaster

      • CRBC was live on the scene

      • Stayed on the scene for days after newspaper reporters left

Public Broadcasting cont.…

USA

• Only major country where public broadcasting is not important

• Does not trust public broadcast

1952

• Federal communication commission sets a small amount of available spectrum on UHF ban for educational tv

  • Most tv does not have UHF

  • Low cost local programming

    • University with a media program

1967

• Grants to some public TV stations operating locally

  • Research and equipment

• Sesame street created

• NPR

  • National public radio

  • Does not own or run any of its affiliate stations

  • Stations can pick up any program they want

  • Funded

    • Grants

    • Universities with media program

    • Pledge drives

    • Sponsors

• CPB

  • Corporation for public broadcasting

  • Scared about the competition of public broadcasting

    • Competition: program with out ads

    • Scared of liberal message

• PBS

  • Nixon tries to abolish CPB

  • Public Broadcasting service emerges (PBS)

    • 200 stations

  • Members pay dues

  • No obligation to carry the programs

  • NY, LA, Boston stations

  • History, science, UK programs

  • Funding

    • Sponsors

    • Federal and state funding

    • 55% $$ is from pledge drive

  • Politics

    • Due to the government money there were attacks from the right

      • Did not like the govt funding

    • Can't take strong stances but has to take a stance

  • Rise of streaming services starts taking some of the pbs programming

  • PBS becomes marginalized

• TVO

  • 1970

  • Educational broadcast is a provincial responsibility not federal

  • Hybrid of educational and non educational

• Private vs public

  • Access Alberta is sold to a private company

No pure public broadcast

• Trying to serve a purpose

• Need to attract an audience

Radio News

• 1920s-30s

• KDKA election coverage

  • 1920

• Read the newspaper on the radio

• When network radio came to the US it was taken seriously

• 1933 Canada

  • Relied on the Canadian press

  • 1200 word summary

  • AFTER the newspaper came out for the day

• 1939

  • Canada goes to war

  • Sent two people over to Britan to report on the war

    • Art Holmes

  • Recorded first ever reports of troops crossing the Atlantic

• 1940

  • CBC launches a news service

• 1941

  • Regular morning noon and night news

  • The national

  • Rules

    • Only news from CBC, CP, British United Press

    • Written with discretion to not alarm

    • Political stories with neutrality

• War coverage

  • 6 tonne mobile radio truck

  • Big Betsy

Lorne Greene

• Chief announcer for CBC radio during the war

• Was not natural

Most famous mistake

• The victory over Japan was expected at any time

• The prime minister (Mackenzie King) prerecorded a speech to be aired

  • Aired 4 days early

  • Ran in its entirety anyway by Ernie Bushnell

William Paley & CBS

• Sacrifice ad revenue for news and events

  • Will interrupt programming

  • Hired for knowledge and ability

• In charge of psychological warfare division

• Oversaw

  • Black Propaganda

    • In Germany to Germans

      • Thought they were real German stations

  • White propaganda

    • Used BBC to broadcast to allied troops

American coverage of WW2 (CBS radio)

• Unprecedented news created growing public interest

• Edward R. Murrow

  • Went to Vienna

Robert Trout

• First anchor

Nazi radio

• Strictly controlled

• Real and fake news

Post war

• Resources are being put towards TV

TV News

• 1930s

  • Not a big audience

  • No pictures

  • Avoided stories of the depression

• 1937

  • BBC has the staff and facilities to cover the coronation of george VI

• 1954

  • TV news launched

    • After war and rebuild

• NBC (USA)

  • 1938

  • Experimental station W2XBT

    • Mobile coverage of fire on NY Ward Island

  • 1940s

    • Sunoco News

      • Radio and TV

      • Point a camera at the person doing the radio news

      • Sunoco

        • Oil company

    • Esso Television Reporter

      • Used news photos, maps, graphics

    • CBS

      • Two 15 min newscasts a day to NY

• WW2

  • Recourses went to the war and not to TV

  • 1944

    • NBC: The war as it happens

      • Network news broadcast

        • 3 stations

      • Newsreel format

        • Used footage from US Army

Network TV News

• 1948

  • 4 US networks: all have news shows

Edward R. Murrow

• 1951 went to TV news

• See it now

  • News documentaries

  • Half hour show

• Murrow vs. McCarthy

  • McCarthy makes a speech claiming there are communists in state department

    • No evidence

  • Murrow built up his credibility

    • Had to go to Paley to ask for permission for the documentary - permission granted

    • Goes on CBS to expose McCarthy

Great TV debate

• Visually made Nixon look bad

• First example of how TV could shape popular opinion

French CBC (SRC)

• Rene Levesque

CTV

• Becomes the second canadian network 1961

• 1965

  • W5

    • News magazine and docu show

Defining moment

• Kennedy assaination