7. Entertainment and the mass media in the U.S.A.
Major television networks. The printed media:
major American newspapers (choose 10 for your survey) and magazines (choose 15).
Popular culture. Advertising.
The media of the United States consists of several different types of communications media: television, radio, cinema, newspapers,
magazines, and Internet-based Web sites. The U.S. also has a strong music industry.
Much of the media is controlled by large for-profit corporations who reap revenue from advertising, subscriptions, and sale of
copyrighted material.
American media conglomerates tend to be leading global players, generating large profits as well as criticism in many parts of the
world. Further deregulation and convergence are under way, leading to mega-mergers, further concentration of media ownership, and
the emergence of multinational media conglomerates.
Some people allege that the success of such companies may be due to certain policies of the American federal government, though it
may be just as likely that the media field is prone to natural monopolies.
Television
Television in the United States is regulated, along with radio, by the Federal Communications Commission. There are several
thousand local stations, of which many belong to the seven nationwide commercial broadcast networks. Traditionally, there were
three: NBC, ABC, and CBS. The four newer networks are Fox, UPN, the WB, and PAX. There is also a nonprofit public television
network, PBS, which is partially subsidized by the federal government.
Besides the "free" over-the-air television networks, there are also many networks which can be received on a television only after
arranging for a subscription to a cable or satellite service. Examples include HBO and CNN.
The FCC is currently orchestrating a difficult nationwide transition from the old analog television standard, NTSC (often mocked as
"Never The Same Color"), to the new digital standard, ATSC.
Although Americans normally enjoy the broadest free speech rights in the world, restrictions on the content of broadcast media have
been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court. The usual justifications are the scarcity of usable electromagnetic spectrum and the fact that
unlike with books or magazines, it is difficult to provide advance warning of the nature of program content (if someone tunes in
during the middle of the program).
Television often plays an important role in introducing American children to new ideas and developing common worldviews, and has
generally been through the mass media that most Americans develop a national and global awareness.
Many shows are broadcast over the entire U.S., delivered to the home via the air or by cable and thus have an influence on a very
large set of the population, as 99 percent of all American households have at least one television and the majority of households have
more than one.
History of television in the United States
Television first became commercialized in the U.S. in the early 1940s, initially by RCA and CBS. A number of different broadcast
systems had been developed through the end of the 1930s. The National Television System Committee (NTSC) standardized on a
525-line broadcast in 1941 that would provide the basis for TV across the country through the end of the century. Television
development halted with the onset of World War II, but pioneers returned to the airwaves when that conflict ended.
There were only a few dozen stations operating at the end of the decade, concentrated on the East and West coasts. The Federal
Communications Commission began handing out broadcasting licenses to communities of all sizes in the early 1950s, spurring an
explosion of growth in the medium. A brief debacle over the system to use for color broadcasts occurred at this time, but was soon
settled. Half of all U.S. households had TV sets by 1955, though color was a premium feature for many years.
Many of the earliest TV programs were modified versions of well-established radio shows. The '50s saw the first flowering of the
genres that would distinguish TV from movies and radio: talk shows like The Jack Paar Show and sitcoms like I Love Lucy. Stations
across the country also produced their own local programs. Usually carried live, they ranged from simple advertisements to game
shows and children's shows that often featured clowns and other offbeat characters. Bozo the Clown was an unusual mixture of local
and national, as the character became a franchise copied across the country. Local shows could often be popular and profitable, but
concerns about product promotion and other issues led them to almost completely disappear by the mid-1970s. Today, national and
syndicated programs dominate, leaving local programming to mostly consist of news and sports coverage, though some quirky shows
continue to be produced. California and New York are the main sources of content, though this "bicoastal" nature has sometimes led
to tension in the country.
Cable television (now often "cable" in name only — satellite broadcasts are increasingly important) became a force in the early '80s
and has been growing in significance since that time. It is in many ways considered a mixed blessing, bringing a vast amount of
content, but of varying quality. Public access programs continue to be produced across the country, providing one of the last vestiges
of television's early local days, but many find such shows to be nearly unwatchable much of the time. Digital television in all its forms
is also changing the ways that the medium is used, allowing for greater content and higher-quality images, but production quality on
some modern digital cable channels is often derided as nothing better than the no-budget cable access shows.
Unlike the UK, Canada, Australia and Japan, the United States has never had a government-run network or series of networks like the
British Broadcasting Corporation, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Australian Broadcasting Corporation or NHK. American
public broadcasting was established by the government reserving specific channels in each area for the use of "noncommercial/educational" broadcasters. These channels are licensed to non-profit organizations, often a locally-based independent
corporation or a university, but sometimes a local school or local government. To provide government funds for these broadcasters,
the federal government established the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which also partially funds PBS TV and NPR radio, the
major associations of public broadcasters. C-SPAN, which covers the federal government and related topics, is collectively funded
and managed by private cable television companies, and is mostly a "cable" service with minimal exposure through broadcast stations.
The art of television
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The U.S. is the biggest exporter of television content in the world. In the U.S., television production is influenced by two major
parties: advertisers, who hold sway over the broadcast and basic cable networks, and cable systems, who hold sway over the pay cable
networks. The owners of the broadcast and basic cable must attract advertising dollars, while the owners of pay cable networks such
as HBO must only attract viewership.
Most television programming is guided by the same trinity that leads movie production: producers, directors and writers. In most
scripted television, writers have more creative control than is the case in film. Most TV writers are also titled producers. Show
creators and executive producers are called show runners. Famous show runners include Joss Whedon and Aaron Spelling.
Some TV shows seem to fit the auteur theory of filmmaking—David E. Kelley, for example, is widely believed to write almost all of
every script for every one of his shows, while other shows, particularly sitcoms, are very much the result of groupthink. One
individual writer may pitch a particular story arc or premise, but the rest of the writing team is heavily involved in outlining the plot
and scripting individual lines and scenes. That said, usually only one or two writers get screen credit for any one episode.
The broadcast day
The three broadcast channels have a fairly ritualized program day. From the 1950s until the 1980s, each program would begin with an
intonation from the network, signaling to the affiliates to start airing the network feed. CBS would intone a high-pitched bong sound,
heard most notably in the color ident from the 1960s, in the first note. NBC would start each broadcast with a beep, and ABC would
start with a much more curt bip. With the advent of satellite systems, these tones became obsolete and were discontinued.
During the week, morning shows such as The Today Show or Good Morning America and talk shows dominate the morning hours;
soaps dominate the early afternoon; talk shows, tabloid newsmagazines, local news and gameshows dominate the late afternoon and
early evening; prime time begins at 8 p.m. (7 p.m. CST and MST), lasts for three hours, and usually offers a combination of first-run
and repeat sitcoms, one-hour dramas, newsmagazines, news specials, movies of the week and bowdlerized feature films.
Programming becomes increasingly more risqué as the night progresses, with programs (more or less) suitable for young people
running earlier, and programs with more adult content running later in the evening.
Late night begins after the 11 o'clock news (10 o'clock news in the Central and Mountain time zones) and contains still more talk
shows (generally comedy-themed) — David Letterman and Conan O'Brien being two examples — and then often a series of
infomercials, off-network syndicated shows and reruns of old shows, late night movies or overnight news shows such as ABC World
News Now or CBS's Up to the Minute, until the cycle begins again. Before the advent of 24-hour television programming, local
stations would sometimes declare, "This is end of our broadcast day," followed by a rousing rendition of the national anthem or
"America the Beautiful," and then go to SMPTE color bars or the iconic Indian Head test card.
On weekends, sports, religion and children's cartoons grab more time, and the three broadcast networks fulfill their FCC-mandated
obligation to contribute to the public good with the Sunday-morning interview shows.
The schedules of cable networks vary widely, as each network has a specialty which dictates content and programming decisions,
nearly all channels though produce original programming in combination — even C-SPAN, which once broadcast only Congressional
hearings, now offers talk programs and interview shows.
Categories of American television
In general, the broad categories of television programming are scripted, unscripted and news.
Scripted programs have storylines and a regular cast, the category can be divided further into drama (including soap operas, miniseries
and movies of the week) or comedy, or alternately single-camera and multi-camera shows. Single-camera shows act like movies —
they are shot from multiple directions at several places; multiple-camera shows act like plays — they are shot on a set, in a soundstage, often with a laugh track or a studio audience, and usually only range between two or three different sets. The Sopranos is a
single-camera show; Friends is a multiple-camera show. Most soap operas are shot in the multiple-camera format, meaning that
placing and then executing the correct unwritten cues are essential.
Unscripted programs include talk shows, game shows and reality shows such as Survivor (although these programs are often planned
and edited to the second).
News programs include evening news broadcasts, newsmagazine shows and documentaries.
Notable programming
Some commercially successful sitcoms in American television history include I Love Lucy, M*A*S*H, Friends, Seinfeld and All in the
Family. Successful nighttime dramas include Dallas, Dynasty, Hill Street Blues, N.Y.P.D. Blue, The Sopranos and Buffy the Vampire
Slayer.
American soap operas have been running for over six decades. The most successful long-running soaps have been The Guiding Light,
As the World Turns, General Hospital, and The Young and the Restless.
The lifecycle of U.S. television shows
Television production companies either commission teleplays for TV pilots or buy specs. Some of these scripts are turned into pilots.
Those which the production company thinks might be commercially viable are then marketed to television networks—or television
distributors for first-run syndication. (KingWorld distributes Oprah in first-run syndication, for example, because that show is
syndicated—is not affiliated with a particular network.)
Networks sometimes preemptively purchase pilots to prevent other nets from controlling them, and the purchase of a pilot is no
guarantee that a show will get an order for more episodes. Those that do get "picked up" get either a full or partial-season order, and
the show goes into production, usually establishing itself with permanent sets, a full crew and production offices. Writers are hired,
directors are selected and work begins, usually during the late spring and summer before the fall season-series premieres. (Shows can
also be mid-season replacements, meaning they are ordered specifically to fill holes in a network schedule created by the failure and
cancellation of shows which premiered in the fall. Buffy the Vampire Slayer is an example of a successful mid-season replacement.)
The standard broadcast television season in the United States is 22 episodes per season; sitcoms may have 24 or more; animated
programs may have more (or fewer) episodes; cable networks with original programming seem to have settled on about 10 or 12
episodes per season, in line with British television programming.
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American soap operas air in the afternoon, five days a week, without any significant break in taping and airing schedules throughout
the year. This means that, more or less, these serials air approximately 260 episodes a year. These shows are rarely, if ever, repeated,
making it difficult for viewers to "catch up" when they miss a month, or even a week, of programming.
Networks use profits from commercials run during the show to pay the production company, which in turn pays the cast and crew,
and keeps a share of the profits for itself. (Networks sometimes act as both production companies and distributors.) As advertising
rates are based on the size of the audience, measuring the number of people watching a network is very important. This measurement
is known as a show or network's ratings. Sweeps months are important landmarks in the television year—ratings earned during these
periods determining advertising rates until the next sweeps period, therefore shows often have their most exciting plot developments
happen during sweeps.
Shows that are successful with audiences and advertisers receives authorization from the network to continue production. Those that
are not successful are often quickly told to discontinue production by the network, known as cancellation There are instances of
initially low-rated shows surviving cancellation and later becoming highly-popular, but these are rare. For the most part, show that are
not immediately even moderately successfully will be canceled by the end of November sweeps.
Most hour-long TV dramas are shot over eight days, most sitcoms in three to six hours once every eight days (as opposed to soap
operas, described earlier in this section, which tape one or sometimes two hour-long episodes each weekday). A show generally
produces enough programming to fill five or six months of weekly programming, the rest of the slots are filled with reruns. Generally,
any particular episode is eligible for two repeats before it becomes dramatically more expensive for a network to re-air it. If a show
becomes a hit, after 100 episodes it becomes "eligible" for syndication. However that even before cable, that did not always apply. For
instance, Star Trek's 79 episodes and The Honeymooners original 39 were considered sufficient for syndication for decades, and in
recent years Disney has limited all shows, even hits, to 65 episodes. With the rise of cable nets, the resulting need for programming
has lowered that benchmark for shows that are believed to have very reliable audiences. When a TV show originally produced by one
network is rerun by another it is known as off-network syndication. (For more on syndication, see syndication and independent
television below.)
It is also becoming increasingly common for shows to be released as DVD box sets, which is highly profitable for production
companies, as they have usually already recouped their production costs with payments from network buyers.
If a show is highly successful the producers might pitch the network on a spinoff or a franchise. A spinoff is a new show with a
different premise but one or more familiar characters taken from the parent show. (Frasier is a spinoff of Cheers based on Kelsey
Grammer's character of Frasier Crane.) A franchise is a new show with the same or only slightly amended premise, but with an vastly
different cast and/or perhaps a different location. (The Law & Order and Star Trek shows are examples of series franchises.)
Honors
The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences distributes the Emmy award for achievement in television, with a number of awards
divisions, including prime time, daytime, technical achievement, news and local broadcasts. The Hollywood Foreign Press
Association also bestows television honors during its annual Golden Globes ceremony, and the guilds also honor TV work in their
annual awards ceremonies. The Peabody Award honors achievement in television and radio journalism, children's programming,
documentary work and educational programming.
Languages
The major national broadcasts are in English, though many more urbanized areas of the country have some local broadcasts in
languages other than English, such as Spanish, Chinese or Korean, and the two major Spanish-language networks Telemundo and
Univisión network are available in large parts of the country.
The business of television
The U.S. television industry is a multibillion-dollar enterprise.
Stations and networks
In the United States, the TV broadcast industry can be divided into two distinctive sectors: local TV stations and national TV
networks.
Strictly speaking, TV stations are local in nature. There are thousands of stations in the United States; each station holds a license
from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to use a specific channel in a designated area to broadcast TV programs. The
stations' programs come from three sources in most cases: in-house production (local programs), syndication (independently acquired
programs), and, most importantly at most stations, TV networks. For commercial stations, revenue is based on local advertising and
network compensation (a fee received from a network in exchange for airing the network's programs and advertisements). For noncommercial stations, income is from donations, sponsorships, and government grants.
The boundaries of local media markets are drawn by ACNielsen, but also recognized by the Federal Communications Commission
(FCC).
When a station is not affiliated, i.e., does not have contractual relations to exchange airtime with programs and money with a
particular network, that station is called independent. Public broadcasting stations can be considered either independent stations or
stations on the PBS "network", though PBS affiliation is not as strict as commercial network scheduling.
TV networks are not bound to a specific local area. The best-known networks operate nationwide. The less-known ones are regional,
or consist of alliances of groups of network affiliated or independent stations.
The major four networks have traditionally been: NBC, CBS and ABC, plus Public Broadcasting System (PBS), a special case.
In the 1990s and on, others have joined the ranks: FOX Network (Fox), Warner Brothers Network (The WB), United Paramount
Network (UPN) and PAX Network (PAX).
Networks have affiliate stations in multiple local areas which carry their programs and advertisements. In many cases, the affiliation is
an exclusive contract between a network and a station. As a result, if a station is an NBC affiliate, the station would not air programs
from ABC, CBS or other networks. The major exception to this rule occurs in local markets in which there are only a very small
number of stations. When a station has affiliation with two networks, one would be primary affiliation and the other would be
secondary affiliation. When a station has a secondary affiliation with a network, it means that the programs supplied by that network
would be rescheduled (such as to late at night) rather than shown as they are received from the network.
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The networks produce their own programs, and may purchase programs from independent production companies. Before the 1990s,
when the Big Three commercial networks (ABC, CBS and NBC) dominated the landscape, the federal government instituted financial
interest and syndication rules, which limited the Big Three's ability to produce in-house, syndicate or have financial interests in their
programming. This was done for fear of a lack of voices in the US media environment. With the emergence of hundreds of cable
television channels in the 1990s, this requirement was dropped.
Although stations and networks are very different entities in regulatory terms, one company may own multiple stations and a network
at the same time, and make those stations affiliates of its own network. This rather common practice results in many "O&O" (owned
and operated) stations. That happens in the major DMAs, like New York or Los Angeles.
Oftentimes, multiple stations are owned by a company which does not own any network. The company is called "station group
owner."
Some stations act as a supplier of original contents. By distributing the programs via satellite to stations and cable operators in other
areas, the stations can reach a wider audience beyond their local market. Those stations are called "super stations."
About the major broadcast networks
The first three broadcast networks, ABC, NBC and CBS have been losing market share in recent years, but still maintain a significant
hold over advertiser dollars and eyeballs—no single cable show has the reach of a CSI and a Friends. Big events, such as the Super
Bowl and the Summer Olympics, run on the broadcast networks as do most major syndication successes, such as The Oprah Winfrey
Show and Jeopardy!.
PBS is the only government-supported broadcaster in the U.S. It is known for offering the gravitas-heavy The News Hour with Jim
Lehrer children's education programs like Sesame Street, shows distributed by American Public Television, and redistributed BBC
series and miniseries such as Masterpiece Theatre. PBS tends to be well-respected, if not particularly highly rated.
Fox and WB target a younger audience. Fox is owned by Rupert Murdoch and specializes in flashy, sexy programming, at the
moment exemplified by The O.C., while the WB is home to sexy-angsty-superpowered teen shows such as Smallville and Gilmore
Girls.
Non-commercial television
Non-commercial television is a visible player in the United States. It is characterized by its relative independence from national
government when compared to public broadcasters in other countries. It is designed, and more or less functioning, as an association of
private organizations rather than a "government" operation.
There are many non-commercial stations throughout the country, and some are "member stations" of PBS, Public Broadcasting
Service, a non-commercial equivalent of networks.
The major differences between commercial and non-commercial TV have to do with programming and revenue sources. The stations
are officially prohibited from airing advertisements, and therefore there is supposedly no advertisement revenue. However, the
stations may have corporate "underwriters," and announcements of underwriters may be aired. These messages are not supposed to
promote a specific product or service to the viewers. Another major source of income is donations from viewers. The broadcasters
routinely run donation requests to remind viewers of the role of private donations in funding public broadcasting.
Non-commercial TV stations, some religious and many affiliated with universities, traditionally broadcast the kind of programs that
commercial stations are less likely to air. Educational, documentary, and public affairs programs have always been staples of public
broadcasting. In the modern television environment, however, much of non-commercial broadcasting may not seem distinctively
different from its commercial counterparts to an uninformed viewer's eyes. The programs are sometimes very similar to the types of
programming now available on cable channels such as A&E and the Discovery Channel. Many of the underwriters' messages have
become longer and sometimes seem more like softer versions of commercial television advertisements.
The Public Broadcasting Service is a network which commissions production of programs by member stations. Its revenue comes
from member stations' membership fees, underwriters, and funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). CPB is
another key player in the realm of non-commercial broadcasting. CPB receives funding from Congress, and distributes the money to
PBS.
Cable television
Cable television in the United States started as a Community Antenna Television (CATV), a retransmission of the over-the-air local
stations' programs through cable. One of the earliest services was by a retailer Robert J. Tarlinton of Lansford, Pennsylvania in order
to boost the sales of TV receivers. The primary subscribers to the service were the households which could not receive a clear signal
due to interference from a nearby mountain.
Like the television industry, cable television industry is consisted of two parts. Cable systems are local entities that own the physical
cable connecting to the individual households. Cable systems usually have to obtain franchise (permission to operate their business)
from local government. They may pay part of their profit to the government, or offer a part of their channels for public, educational
and governmental (PEG) use. Such channel would carry town meeting, theater performance by a local school, and/or programs
produced by a local resident. Unlike television stations, cable systems are mostly local monopolies.
Multiple systems operators are often owned by the same company, (called MSO, multiple system operator). The best known MSOs
include Time Warner Cable, Comcast and Cox. Cable operators were the target of mergers and acquisitions from the mid 1990s to the
early 2000s, because of the expectation that it is one of the two major high-speed Internet infrastructures connecting the backbone to
individual households, or "the last mile." The other last mile infrastructure was the local telephone networks. TCI and MediaOne were
purchased by AT&T, which then sold its cable division to Comcast. Time Warner Cable, part of Time Warner, was purchased by
AOL. (See also: broadband open access)
Retransmission of the local programs is regulated by so-called must-carry rule. According to the rule, cable systems are obligated to
carry all the local stations that ask for the carriage—except for those stations that request payment in exchange for the retransmission.
Programs cable systems carry mostly come from cable networks, national or global entities distributing contents via satellite to local
cable systems. Well known cable networks include BBC America, C-SPAN, CNN, Discovery Channel, ESPN, Fox News, MSNBC,
MTV, SciFi Channel, TLC, and TNT.
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There are also "premium" cable networks such as HBO which typically carry unedited movies and do not display advertisements.
Premium networks typically are added as an additional charge to "basic" service.
Basic cable service typically includes retransmission of local television stations' programs, as well as some cable networks.
Movies and sporting events are often offered as pay-per-view.
Revenues of the cable systems come from two sources—subscription and local advertisements. Subscription fees are divided among
the cable systems and cable networks. The revenue from pay-per-view programs are handled much the same way. Cable networks'
revenue are from subscription fees and national advertisements.
Satellite television
Satellite television, which had been used since 1962 to relay television feeds over large distances globally, began to emerge as a
method of consumer television delivery around 1980. Based around open-standard C-band TVRO equipment, the large movable
"backyard" satellite dish became a fixture in the United States for more affluent television viewers who wanted an alternative to
traditional cable television. By 1996, C-band delivery became largely displaced by smaller direct broadcast satellite systems.
Beginning in the 1990s, media companies became to deliver television signals by direct broadcast satellite or DBS, led by DirecTV
and followed shortly thereafter by EchoStar, which operates Dish Network. By the first decade of the 21st century, DirecTV was sold
to international satellite TV provider News Corporation. There are currently about 16 million DBS subscribers in the United States.
Independent TV and syndication
TV syndication is the practice of selling or leasing shows to television stations independent of network packages. Before the 1990s,
many successful TV stations ran on a steady diet of syndicated TV and TV packages. (Anime, for example, before the mid-1990s in
the U.S. was pretty much strictly limited to syndication; with popular and successful shows like Sailor Moon, Robotech, Voltron and
Dragon Ball airing in syndication with little or no network exposure.)
Independent TV stations were often low-budget affairs in the high-band (and thus more interference-ridden) Ultra-High-Frequency
(UHF) channels, which picked up and ran a mix of poorly-rated or obscure programming, aging afternoon kiddie cartoons and
shlocky movies. Weird Al Yankovic's 1989 film UHF was a loving homage to the mixture of odd syndicated programming and highband broadcast television. Only a very few independent stations were sufficiently well-founded or sufficiently wealthy (such as the
Twin Cities' KMSP, and most stations in the major broadcast markets) to afford quality programming; most of these joined up with
either Fox, The WB or UPN in the early to mid-1990s.
Syndication and independent television often went hand in hand, and were generally seen as the "afterlife" for a program with mixed
success in its first run, or for cult TV classics like Gilligan's Island and Rocky and Bullwinkle. Programs which are extremely
successful (such as Seinfeld and Friends) often see earlier seasons syndicated while new shows are still being made, to maximize
profit for the production company. Two of the handful of scripted programs to be made for "first-run" syndication are Star Trek: The
Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
Changes to FCC rules in the 1990s pretty much killed syndicated television as a business model. By the late '90s the independent local
television station was more or less dead.
Radio
American radio broadcasts in two bands: FM and AM. Some stations are only talk radio--featuring interviews and discussions--while
music radio stations broadcast one particular type of music: Top 40, hip-hop, country, etc. Radio broadcast companies have become
increasingly consolidated in recent years. National Public Radio is the nation's primary public radio network, but most radio stations
are commercial and profit-oriented.
Talk radio as a political medium has also exploded in popularity during the 1990s, due to the 1987 repeal of the FCC Fairness
Doctrine, which meant that stations no longer had to "balance" their day by programming alternative points of view. Many also
attribute this to the success of radio personality Rush Limbaugh.
The FCC has recently approved a transition to digital radio technology which allows both FM and AM stations to "piggyback" digital
data on top of their existing analog broadcasts. When the transition is complete at some point in the far future, the analog broadcasts
will be replaced with true high-quality digital broadcasts.
The beginning of regular commercially licensed sound broadcasting in the United States in 1920 ended the print monopoly over the
media and opened the doors to the more immediate and pervasive electronic media. By 1928, the United States had three national
radio networks - two owned by NBC (the National Broadcasting Company), and one by CBS (the Columbia Broadcasting System).
Until 1943, there were four major national radio networks: two owned by NBC, one owned by CBS, and one owned by Mutual
Broadcasting System. The NBC's second network became ABC, the American Broadcasting Company.
Though mostly listened to for entertainment, radio's instant, on-the-spot reports of dramatic events drew huge audiences throughout
the Great Depression of the 1930s and World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt recognized the potential of radio to reach the
American public, and during his four terms (1933-1945), his radio "fireside chats" informed the nation on the progress of policies to
counter the Depression and on developments during World War II. After World War II, television's visual images replaced the audioonly limitation of radio as the predominant entertainment and news vehicle. Radio adapted to the new situation by replacing
entertainment programs with a format of music interspersed with news and features. In the 1950s, automobile manufacturers began
offering car radios as standard accessories, and radio received a big boost as Americans tuned in their car radios as they drove to and
from work.
The expansion and dominance of FM radio, which has better sound quality but a more limited range than traditional AM, represented
the major technical change in radio in the 1970s and 1980s. FM radio, aided by the invention of ever smaller portable radios and
inexpensive "Walkman" headsets, dominates music programs, while AM has shifted to "talk" and news formats. Barely in existence
25 years ago, "talk radio," in which celebrities and experts from various fields answer listener "call-in" questions and offer their
advice on various topics, has grown spectacularly in recent years. It has contributed to the comeback of AM radio. Both FM and AM
radio have become increasingly specialized. Music formats, for instance, comprise a variety of specializations -- the top five in 1991
being "country and western," "adult contemporary," "top 40," "religious" and "oldies."
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In an era in which TV is clearly the glamour medium, the reach of radio is still awesome. Ninety-nine percent of American
households in 1999 had at least one radio; the average is five per household. Every day, radio reaches 80 percent of the U.S.
population at one time or another. Revenues more than doubled from $8.4 billion in 1990 to more than $17 billion in 2000.
In 1998, the number of U.S. commercial radio stations had grown to 4,793 AM stations and 5,662 FM stations. In addition, there are
1,460 public radio stations in the United States. Most of these stations are run by universities and public authorities for educational
purposes and are financed by public and/or private funds, subscriptions and some underwriting. NPR (National Public Radio) was
incorporated in February 1970 under the 1967 Public Broadcasting Act. NPR was created to provide leadership in national
newsgathering and production and to act as a permanent nationwide interconnection of noncommercial stations.
Until the 1980s, most commercial radio stations were affiliated to the large networks, such as Capital Cities/ABC, CBS, Mutual
Network, NBC, and others. NBC sold its radio network in 1988. Mutual was purchased by Westwood One. Capital Cities/ABC, later
sold to Disney, reduced gradually its radio operations. Nowadays, most commercial radio stations are controlled by media
conglomerates like Clear Channel Communications, Infinity Broadcasting and many others.
Motion Pictures
In the 20th century, the motion picture industry rose to become one of the most successful and powerful industries in the U.S. Along
with other intellectual property industries, its relative importance to the American economy has strengthened as the importance of
manufacturing and agriculture have decreased (due to globalization).
The high quality of American cinema has led to its widespread distribution throughout the world, which in turn has exposed much of
the world to American culture. Of course, many other countries, notably France, have become dissatisfied with the dominance of
American cinema and have sought to promote their own native talent.
The cinema of the United States, sometimes simply called—correctly or not—Hollywood, can perhaps be summed up by the title
American film critic Pauline Kael gave a 1968 collection of her reviews: Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. By way of explanation, she said that
the words, which came from an Italian movie poster, were "perhaps the briefest statement imaginable of the basic appeal of movies."
Certainly, they sum up the raw energy of many American films.
Thomas Alva Edison played an important role in the invention of motion pictures, but his heavy-handed patent enforcement caused
early filmmakers to look for a new location to practice their craft. In Los Angeles, California, the studios spawned in a sleepy section
of the town, known as Hollywood. Before World War I, movies were made in several U.S. cities, but filmmakers gravitated to
southern California as the industry developed. They were attracted by the mild climate and reliable sunlight, which made it possible to
film movies outdoors year-round, and by the varied scenery that was available. There are several starting points for American cinema,
but it was David Wark Griffith's Birth of a Nation that pioneered the filmic vocabulary that still dominates celluoid to this day.
In the early 1900s, when the medium was new, many immigrants, particularly Jews, found employment in the U.S. film industry.
Kept out of other occupations by racial prejudice, they were able to make their mark in a brand-new business: the exhibition of short
films in storefront theaters called nickelodeons, after their admission price of a nickel (five cents). Within a few years, ambitious men
like Samuel Goldwyn, Carl Laemmle, Adolph Zukor, Louis B. Mayer, and the Warner Brothers (Harry, Albert, Samuel, and Jack) had
switched to the production side of the business. Soon they were the heads of a new kind of enterprise: the movie studio. (It is worth
noting that the US had at least one female director, producer and studio head in these early years, Alice Guy Blaché.) They also set the
stage for the industry's internationalism—the industry is often accused of Amero-centric provincialism, but simultaneously the
industry employs a huge number of foreign-born "creatives"—from Swedish actress Greta Garbo to Australian actress Nicole
Kidman, from Hungarian director Michael Curtiz to Mexican director Alfonso Cuarón—the American film industry has many faults,
but it has never silenced the world's filmic voices.
Other moviemakers arrived from Europe after World War I: directors like Ernst Lubitsch, Alfred Hitchcock, Fritz Lang, and Jean
Renoir; actors like Rudolph Valentino, Marlene Dietrich, Ronald Colman, and Charles Boyer. They joined a homegrown supply of
actors--lured west from the New York City stage after the introduction of sound films--to form one of the 20th century's most
remarkable growth industries. At motion pictures' height of popularity in the mid-1940s, the studios were cranking out a total of about
400 movies a year, seen by an audience of 90 million Americans per week.
During the so-called Golden Age of Hollywood, the 1930s and 1940s, movies issued from the Hollywood studios rather like the cars
rolling off Henry Ford's assembly lines. No two movies were exactly the same, but most followed a formula: Western, slapstick
comedy, film noir, musical, animated cartoon, biopic (biographical picture), etc. Yet each movie was a little different, and, unlike the
craftsmen who made cars, many of the people who made movies were artists. For example, To Have and Have Not (1944) is famous
not only for the first pairing of actors Humphrey Bogart (1899-1957) and Lauren Bacall (1924- ) but also for being written by two
future winners of the Nobel Prize in Literature: Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961), author of the novel on which the script was based,
and William Faulkner (1897-1962), who worked on the screen adaptation.
Moviemaking was still a business, however, and motion picture companies made money by operating under the so-called studio
system. The major studios kept thousands of people on salary--actors, producers, directors, writers, stuntmen, craftspersons, and
technicians. And they owned hundreds of theaters in cities and towns across the nation--theaters that showed their films and that were
always in need of fresh material.
What is remarkable is how much quality entertainment emerged from such a regimented process. One reason this was possible is that,
with so many movies being made, not every one had to be a big hit. A studio could gamble on a medium-budget feature with a good
script and relatively unknown actors: Citizen Kane, directed by Orson Welles (1915-1985) and widely regarded as the greatest of all
American movies, fits that description. In other cases, strong-willed directors like Howard Hawks (1896-1977) and Frank Capra
(1897-1991) battled the studios in order to achieve their artistic visions. The apogee of the studio system may have been the year
1939, which saw the release of such classics as The Wizard of Oz, Gone With the Wind, Stagecoach, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,
Only Angels Have Wings, Ninotchka and Midnight.
The studio system succumbed to two forces in the late 1940s: (1) a federal antitrust action that separated the production of films from
their exhibition; and (2) the advent of television. The number of movies being made dropped sharply, even as the average budget
soared, because Hollywood wanted to offer audiences the kind of spectacle they couldn't see on television. However, the competition
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by this rival medium inadvertently benefitted the film industry. This is because public opinion about the quality of television content
soon declined, and by contrast, cinema's status began to rise to become a more respected artform.
This blockbuster syndrome has continued to affect Hollywood. Added to the skyrocketing salaries paid actors, studio heads, and dealmaking agents, it means that movies released today tend to be either huge successes or huge failures, depending on how well their
enormous costs match up with the public taste.
The studios still exist, often in partnership with other media companies, but many of the more interesting American movies are now
independent productions. The films of Woody Allen (1935- ), for example, fall into this category. Critics rate them highly and most of
them make a profit, but since good actors are willing to work with Allen for relatively little money, the films are inexpensive to make.
Thus, if one happens to fail at the box office, the loss is not crushing. In contrast, a movie featuring Tom Cruise or Bruce Willis
typically begins with a cost of $10 million or more just for the star's salary, partly as a result of the rise of powerful agents and
managers. With multiples of a sum like that at stake, Hollywood studio executives tend to play it safe.
A major change to American filmmaking occurred during the 1970s when a new breed of young directors who had degrees from film
schools and had absorbed the techniques developed in Europe in the 1960s emerged. Directors like Steven Spielberg, George Lucas,
and Francis Ford Coppola came to produce fare that was often both critically acclaimed and successful at the box office.
The 1990s saw another significant development. The full acceptance of video by studios opened a vast new business to exploit which
allowed many acclaimed films which performed poorly in their theatrical to find success in the video market such as The Secret of
NIMH and The Shawshank Redemption. It also saw the first generation of film makers with access to video tapes emerge. Directors
such as Quentin Tarantino and P.T. Anderson had been able to view thousands of films and produced films with vast numbers of
references and connections to previous works. This, along with the rise of so-called "independent film" and ever-decreasing costs for
filmmaking, changed the landscape of American movie-making once again, and led a renaissance of filmmaking among Hollywood's
lower and middle-classes—those without access to studio megabucks.
The rise of the DVD in the 21st century has quickly become even more profitable to studios and has led to an explosion of packaging
extra scenes, extended versions, and commentary tracks with the films.
Newspapers
Newspapers have declined in their influence and penetration into American households over the years. The U.S. does not have a
national paper per se, although the influential dailies New York Times and the Wall Street Journal are sold in most U.S. cities. The
Times has a moderate-left stance, while the Journal is moderate-right and is strongly pro-business.
Although the Times' primary audience has always been the people of New York City, the New York Times has gradually become the
dominant national "newspaper of record." Apart from its daily nationwide distribution, the term means that back issues are archived
on microfilm by every decent-sized public library in the nation, and the Times' articles are often cited by both historians and judges as
evidence that a major historical event occurred on a certain date. The Los Angeles Times and the Wall Street Journal are also
newspapers of record to a lesser extent. Although USA Today has tried to establish itself as a national paper, it has been widely
derided by the academic world as the "McPaper" and is not subscribed to (let alone archived) by most libraries.
Apart from the newspapers just mentioned, all major metropolitan areas have their own local newspapers. Typically, a metropolitan
area will support at most one or two major newspapers, with many smaller publications targeted towards particular audiences.
Although the cost of publishing has increased over the years, the price of newspapers has generally remained low, forcing newspapers
to rely more on advertising revenue and on articles provided by a major wire service, such as the Associated Press or Reuters, for their
national and world coverage.
With a very few exceptions, all the newspapers in the U.S. are privately owned, either by large chains such as Gannett or Knight
Ridder, which own dozens or even hundreds of newspapers; by small chains that own a handful of papers; or in a situation that is
increasingly rare, by individuals or families.
Most general-purpose newspapers are either being printed one time a week, usually on Thursday or Friday, or are printed daily.
Weekly newspapers tend to have much smaller circulation and are more prevalent in rural communities or small towns. Major cities
often have "alternative weeklies" to complement the mainstream daily paper(s), for example, New York City's Village Voice or Los
Angeles' L.A. Weekly, to name two of the most well-known. Major cities may also support a local business journal, trade papers
relating to local industries and papers for local ethnic and social groups.
Probably due to competition from other media, the number of daily newspapers in the U.S. has declined over the past half-century,
according to Editor & Publisher, the trade journal of American newspapers. In particular, the number of evening newspapers has
fallen by almost one-half since 1970, while the number of morning editions and Sunday editions has grown.
For comparison, in 1950, there were 1,772 daily papers (and 1,450--or about 70 percent--of them were evening papers) while in 2000,
there were 1,480 daily papers (and 766--or about half--of them were evening papers.)
Daily newspaper circulation is also slowly declining in America, partly due to the near-demise of two-newspaper towns, as the weaker
newspapers in most cities have folded:
The primary source of newspaper income is advertising--in the form of "classifieds" or inserted advertising circulars--rather than
circulation income. However, since the late 1990s, this revenue source has been directly challenged by Web sites like eBay (for sales
of secondhand items), Monster.com (jobs), and Craigslist (everything).
The largest newspapers (by circulation) in the United States are USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times and the Los
Angeles Times.
Major daily newspapers distributed nationally
 Christian Science Monitor
 The New York Times
 USA Today
 The Wall Street Journal
 El Nuevo Dia (Puerto Rico)
 El Vocero (Puerto Rico)
Weekly newspapers
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The Boston Phoenix
The Charleston City Paper (Charleston, South Carolina)
The (Madison, Wisconsin) Onion
The Martha's Vineyard Times
New York's Village Voice
Honolulu Weekly
LA Weekly
Salt Lake City Weekly
San Francisco Bay Guardian
The Stranger (Seattle, Washington)
Willamette Week
Magazines
Thanks to the huge size of the English-speaking North American media market, the United States has a large magazine industry with
hundreds of magazines serving almost every interest, as can be determined by glancing at any newsstand in any large American city.
Most magazines are owned by one of the large media conglomerates or by one of their smaller regional brethren.
The U.S. has three leading weekly newsmagazines: Time, Newsweek, and U.S. News and World Report. Time and Newsweek are
center-left while U.S. News tends to be center-right, although all three (in theory, at least) strive to provide objective news reporting
and limit personal bias to the opinion pages. Time is well-known for naming a "person of the year" each year, while U.S. News
publishes annual ratings of American colleges and universities.
The U.S. also has over a dozen major political magazines (the exact number is debatable, of course), serving every part of the political
spectrum from left to right.
Finally, besides the hundreds of specialized magazines that serve the diverse interests and hobbies of the American people, there are
also dozens of magazines published by professional organizations for their members, such as Communications of the ACM (for
computer science specialists) and the ABA Journal (for lawyers).
Automotive Magazines
 Auto World
 Automobile
 AutoWeek
Business and Finance Magazines
 Aviation Week & Space Technology
 BusinessWeek
 Vogue
 Consumers Digest
 Fortune
 Harvard Business Review
 Money
 Red Herring
 SmartMoney
Children's Magazines
 American Girl
 Babybug
 Boys' Life
 Disney Adventures
 Jack & Jill
 Ladybug
 Nickelodeon Magazine
Entertainment & Art Magazines
 Amazing Heroes (defunct)
 Architectural Digest
 artForum
 Array DVD magazine
 Comics Buyer's Guide
 Comics Journal
 Entertainment Weekly
 Film Threat
 Giant magazine
 Modern Screen
 Movielink's Hollywood Life
 Premiere
 Soap Opera Digest
 Soaps In Depth
 TV Guide
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Food & Cooking Magazines
 Bon Appetit
 Cooking Light
 Cook's Illustrated
 Food & Wine
 Gourmet
General Interest Magazines
 Interview
 Life
 National Geographic
 The New York Review of Books
 The New Yorker
 People
 Reader's Digest
 Today's Christian (formerly The Christian Reader)
 Us Weekly
 Vanity Fair
Health Magazines
Men
 Men's Health
Women
 Shape
Humor Magazines
 The Door Magazine
 MAD Magazine
 National Lampoon
 Private Eye
 Punch magazine
 Spy Magazine
Men's Magazines
 FHM
 GQ (Gentlemen's Quarterly)
 Maxim
 Men's Health
 Playboy
Music Magazines
 Billboard
 Blues Review
 CCM (Magazine)
 Down Beat
 Heavy Metal
 Rolling Stone
 Spin
News Magazines
 Newsweek
 Time Magazine
 U.S. News & World Report
 World (Magazine)
Science magazines
 Astronomy
 Discover
 National Geographic
 Popular Science
 Scientific American
 Science News
 Skeptical Inquirer
 Sky & Telescope
Sports Magazines
 KO Magazine
 Ring Magazine
 Sports Illustrated
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Internet
The Internet has provided a means for newspapers and other media organisations to deliver news and, significantly, the means to look
up old news. Some organisations only make limited amounts of their output available for free, and charge for access to the rest. Other
organisations allow their archives to be freely browsed. It is possible that the latter type obtain more influence, as they are true to the
spirit of freedom of information by virtue of making it free. Anyone who has followed external links, say, from Wikipedia, only to be
confronted with a pay to view banner, might attest that the reputations of organisations that charge is not enhanced by their charging
policy, particularly when the same information is available from sources that don't charge.
The Internet, by means of making available such constantly growing news archives, is, in effect, writing our history as it happens, at a
level of detail never before known. While proprietary archives are slowly exposed to the public after many decades, organisations that
maintain immediately-updating resources have more control over what will be remembered by the general public in the near future.
Arts and Entertainment in the United States
The development of the arts and entertainment in the United States—music, movies, dance, architecture, literature, poetry and the
visual arts—has been marked by a tension between two strong sources of inspiration: European sophistication and domestic
originality. Frequently, the best American artists have managed to harness both sources.
American culture has a large influence on the rest of the world, especially the Western world. American music is heard all over the
world, and American movies and television shows can be seen almost anywhere. This is in stark contrast to the early days of the
American republic, when the country was generally seen as an agricultural backwater with little to offer the culturally advanced world
centers of Asia and Europe. Nearing the end of its third century, nearly every major American city offers classical and popular music;
historical, scientific and art research centers and museums; dance performances, musicals and plays; outdoor art projects and
internationally significant architecture. This development is a result of both contributions by private philanthropists and government
funding.
American culture also exhibits a tendency to hybridize pop culture and so-called high culture, and generally questions normative
standards for artistic output. This is likely an effect of the country's egalitarian tradition, and the nation's history of constitutionally
protected freedom of speech and expression, as enshrined in the First Amendment.
American Popular Culture
American popular culture has expressed itself through nearly every medium, including movies, music and sports. Mickey Mouse,
Babe Ruth, screwball comedy, G.I. Joe, jazz, the blues, The Simpsons, Michael Jackson, Gone With the Wind, Michael Jordan,
Indiana Jones, Sesame Street, Catch-22--these names, genres, and phrases have joined more tangible American products in spreading
across the globes.
It is worth noting, that while America tends to be a net exporter of culture, it absorbs many other cultural traditions with relative ease,
for example: origami, soccer, anime, and yoga.
It can be argued that this ability to easily absorb parts of other cultures and other languages is its greatest strength and helps American
culture and language spread. Americans in general do not worry about protecting their "indigenous culture"(see below) but instead
eagerly create and adopt new things and then change or modify to make them their own.
Exportation of Popular Culture
The United States is an enormous exporter of entertainment, especially television, movies and music. This readily consumable form of
culture is widely and cheaply dispersed for entertainment consumers world-wide.
For better or worse, many nations now have two cultures: an indigenous one and globalized/American popular culture. That said,
what one society considers entertainment is not necessarily reflective of the "true culture" of its people. More popular syndicated
programs cost more, so overseas entertainment purchasers often choose older programs that reflect various, and dated, stages of the
United States cultural development. Pop culture also tends to neglect the more mundane and/or complex elements of human life.
Advertising
Generally speaking, advertising is the paid promotion of goods, services, companies and ideas by an identified sponsor. Marketers see
advertising as part of an overall promotional strategy. Other components of the promotional mix include publicity, public relations,
personal selling and sales promotion.
Media
Some commercial advertising media include billboards, street furniture components, printed flyers, radio, cinema and television ads,
web banners, Web Popups, skywriting, bus stop benches, magazines, newspapers, town criers, sides of buses, taxicab doors and roof
mounts, musical stage shows, elastic bands on disposable diapers, stickers on apples in supermarkets, the opening section of
streaming audio and video, and the backs of event tickets and supermarket receipts. Any place an "identified" sponsor pays to deliver
their message through a medium is advertising. Covert advertising embedded in other entertainment media is known as product
placement.
The TV commercial is generally considered the most effective mass-market advertising format and this is reflected by the high prices
TV networks charge for commercial airtime during popular TV events. The annual US Super Bowl football game is known as much
for its commercial advertisements as for the game itself, and the average cost of a single thirty-second TV spot during this game has
reached $2.3 million (as of 2004).
Advertising on the World Wide Web is a recent phenomenon. Prices of Web-based advertising space are dependent on the
"relevance" of the surrounding Web content. E-mail advertising is another recent phenomenon. Unsolicited E-mail advertising is
known as "spam".
Some companies have proposed to place messages or corporate logos on the side of booster rockets and the International Space
Station. Controversy exists on the effectiveness of subliminal advertising (see mind control), and the pervasiveness of mass messages
(see propaganda).
Unpaid advertising (also called word of mouth advertising), can provide good exposure at minimal cost. Personal recommendations
("bring a friend", "sell it by zealot"), spreading buzz, or achieving the feat of equating a brand with a common noun ("Hoover" =
"vacuum cleaner") -- these must provide the stuff of fantasy to the holder of an advertising budget.
Objectives
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Whereas marketing aims to identify markets that will purchase a product (business) or support an idea and then facilitate that
purchase, advertising is the paid communication by which information about the product or idea is transmitted to potential consumers.
In general, advertising is used to convey availability of a "product" (which can be a physical product, a service, or an idea) and to
provide information regarding the product. This can stimulate demand for the product, one of the main objectives of advertising. More
specifically, there are three generic objectives of advertisements : communicate information about a particular product, service, or
brand (including announcing the existence of the produce, where to purchase it, and how to use it), persuade people to buy the
product, and keep the organization in the public eye (called institutional advertising). Most advertising blends elements of all three
objectives. Typically new products are supported with informative and persuasive ads, while mature products use institutional and
persuasive ads (sometimes called reminder ads). Advertising frequently uses persuasive appeals, both logical and emotional (that is, it
is a form of propaganda), sometimes even to the exclusion of any product information. More specific objectives include increases in
short or long term sales, market share, awareness, product trial, mind share, brand name recall, product use information, positioning or
repositioning, and organizational image improvement.
Examples of the ideas, informative or otherwise, that advertising tries to communicate are product details, benefits and brand
information. Advertising usually seeks to find a unique selling proposition (USP) of any product and communicate that to the user.
This may take the form of a unique product feature or a perceived benefit. In the face of increased competition within the market due
to growing numbers of substitutes there is more branding occurring in advertising. This branding attributes a certain personality or
reputation to a brand, termed brand equity, which is distinctive from its competition. Generally, brand equity is a measure of the
volume and homogeneity of, as well as positive and negative characteristics of, individual and cultural ideas associated with the
product.
Effective advertising will stimulate demand for a product and build brand equity and brand franchise. When enough brand equity is
created that the brand has the ability to draw buyers (even without further advertising), it is said to have brand franchise. The ultimate
brand franchise is when the brand is so prevalent in people's mind (called mind share), that it is used to describe the whole category of
products. This phenomena is sometimes known as "hyperbranding." Kleenex, for example, can distinguish itself as a type of tissue or
a label for a category of products. That is, it is frequently used as a generic term. One of the most successful firms to have achieved a
dominant brand franchise is Hoover, whose name was for a very long time synonymous with vacuum cleaner (and Dyson has
subsequently managed to achieve similar status, having moved into the Hoover market with a more sophisticated model of vacuum
cleaner). The strength of a brand franchise can be established to a greater or lesser degrees in various markets. In Texas, for example,
it is common to hear people refer to any soft drink as a Coke, regardless of whether it is actually produced by Coca-Cola or not (more
accurate terms would be 'cola' or 'soda').
A legal risk of the dominant brand franchise is that the name can become so widely accepted that it becomes a generic term, and loses
trademark protection.
Techniques
Advertisers use several recognizable techniques in order to better convince the public to buy a product and shape the publics attitude
towards their product. These may include:
 Repetition: Some advertisers concentrate on making sure their product is widely recognized. To that end, they simply
attempt to make the name remembered through repetition.
 Bandwagon: By implying that the product is widely used, advertisers hope to convince potential buyers to "get on the
bandwagon."
 Testimonials: Advertisers often attempt to promote the superior quality of their product through the testimony of ordinary
users, experts, or both. "Three out of four dentists recommend..." This approach often involves an appeal to authority.
 Pressure: By attempting to make people choose quickly and without long consideration, some advertisers hope to make
rapid sales: "Buy now, before they're all gone!"
 Appeal to emotion Various techniques relating to manipulating emotion are used to get people to buy a product. Apart from
artistic expression intended to provoke an emotional reaction (which are usually for associative purposes, or to relax or excite
the viewer), three common argumentative appeals to emotion in product advertising are wishful thinking, appeal to flattery,
and appeal to ridicule. Appeals to pity are often used by charitable organizations and appeals to fear are often used in public
service messages and products, such as alarm systems or anti-bacterial spray, which claim protection from an outside source.
Finally, appeals to spite are often used in advertising aimed at younger demographics.
 Association: Advertisers often attempt to associate their product with desirable imagery to make it seem equally desirable.
The use of attractive models, a practice known as sex in advertising, picturesque landscapes and other alluring images is
common. Also used are "buzzwords" with desired associations. On a large scale, this is called branding.
 Advertising slogans These can employ a variety of techniques; even a short phrase can have extremely heavy-handed
technique. For example, Ford's slogan "We want you to think about buying a Ford" is a pressure tactic directed at the viewer,
and McDonalds' slogan, "I'm lovin' it" is a combination of many different techniques, including a variety of associative
responses ("it" invokes both the brand and product, as well as the slogan already being a popular phrase), and cognitive
dissonance: In some people, the first person phrase "I'm" causes dissonance—being unable to associate the pronoun "I" in the
context—and the viewer may compensate to reduce dissonance by acceptance of the phrase as one's own idea.
 Controversy, as in the Benetton publicity campaign.
 Guerilla Advertising: Advertising by association. Done in such a way so the target audience does not know that they have
been advertised to, but their impression of the product is increased (or decreased) if that is the intent of the advertiser.
 Subliminal messages: It was feared that some advertisements would present hidden messages, for example through brief
flashed messages or the soundtrack, that would have a hypnotic effect on viewers ('Must buy car. Must buy car.') The notion
that techniques of hypnosis are used by advertisers is now generally discredited, though subliminal sexual messages are
extremely common, ranging from car models with SX prefixes to suggestive positioning of objects in magazine ads and
billboards.
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It is important to note: During the past decade, advertising has increasingly employed the device of irony. Aware that today's mediasavvy viewers are familiar with -- and thus cynical about -- the traditional methods listed above, advertisers have turned to poking fun
at those very methods. This "wink-wink" approach is intended to tell viewers, "We know that YOU know we're trying to sell you
something, so bear with us and let's have fun." The ultimate goal of such advertising is to convey a sense of trust and confidence with
viewers, by essentially saying, "We respect your intelligence, and you should respect us because we're not trying to fool you."
Common television examples include most beer advertising and the commercials of the Geico insurance company.
Public service advertising
The same advertising techniques used to promote commercial goods and services can be used to inform, educate and motivate the
public about non-commercial issues, such as AIDS, political ideology, energy conservation, religious recruitment, and deforestation.
Advertising, in its non-commercial guise, is a powerful educational tool capable of reaching and motivating large audiences.
"Advertising justifies its existence when used in the public interest - it is much too powerful a tool to use solely for commercial
purposes." - Attributed to Howard Gossage by David Ogilvy
Public service advertising, non-commercial advertising, public interest advertising, cause marketing, and social marketing are
different terms for (or aspects of) the use of sophisticated advertising and marketing communications techniques (generally associated
with commercial enterprise) on behalf of non-commercial, public interest issues and initiatives.
The granting of television and radio licenses by the FCC is contingent upon the station broadcasting a certain amount of public service
advertising.
Public service advertising reached its height during World Wars I and II under the direction of several U.S. government agencies.
Social impact
Regulation
There have been increasing efforts to protect the public interest by regulating the content and the reach of advertising. Some examples
are the ban on tobacco advertising imposed in the USA, and the total ban on advertising to children under twelve imposed by the
Swedish government in 1991. Though that regulation continues in effect for broadcasts originating within the country, it has been
weakened by the European Court of Justice, which has found that Sweden was obligated to accept whatever programming was
targeted at it from neighboring countries or via satellite. In Europe and elsewhere there is a vigorous debate on whether and how much
advertising to children should be regulated. This debate was exacerbated by a report released by the Henry J. Kaiser Family
Foundation in February 2004 which suggested that food advertising targeting children was an important factor in the epidemic of
childhood obesity raging across the United States.
Critiques of the medium
As advertising and marketing efforts become increasingly ubiquitous in our culture, the industry has come under criticism of groups
such as AdBusters via culture jamming which criticizes the media and consumerism using advertising's own techniques. The industry
is accused of being one of the engines powering a convoluted economic mass production system which promotes consumption. Some
advertising campaigns have also been criticized as inadvertently or even intentionally promoting sexism, racism, and ageism. Such
criticisms have raised questions about whether this medium is creating or reflecting cultural trends.
Public interest groups, and free thinkers are increasingly suggesting that access to the mental space targeted by advertisers should be
taxed, in that at the present moment that space is being freely taken advantage of by advertisers with no compensation paid to the
members of the public who are thus being intruded upon. This kind of tax would be a Pigovian tax in that it would act to reduce what
is now increasingly seen as a public nuissance. Efforts to that end are gathering momentum, with Arkansas and Maine considering
bills to implement such taxation. Florida enacted such a tax in 1987 but was forced to repeal it after six months, as a result of a
concerted effort by national commercial interests, which withdrew planned conventions, causing major losses to the tourism industry,
and cancelled advertising, causing a loss of 12 million dollars to the broadcast industry alone.
Future
With the dawn of the internet has come many new advertising opportunities. Popup ads, Flash ads, Banner ads, and email ads (often a
form of SPAM) abound. What the advertising community is just recently beginning to do is making the ads themselves desirable to
the public. For example: Cadillac chose to advertise in the movie 'The Matrix: Reloaded' which as a result contained many scenes in
which Cadillac cars were used. From some points of view the whole movie could be viewed as an ad, but since it was entertaining, the
public desires to view that ad. During the superbowl each year greater sums are paid to get a commercial spot. These commercials are
often very entertaining and many members of the public desire to watch them (many people watch the superbowl just for the
commercials).
The advertising community has not yet succeeded in making their ads available to the public. Since the dawn of interesting and
entertaining (desirable) advertising some people have been so entertained by a particular ad that they might like to watch the ad later
or show a friend. The advertising community has not yet made it easy to acquire and watch an ad when and where a member of the
public wants to. A few members of the advertising community have and many more may in the future wish to use the internet to
widely distribute their ads to anyone who wishes to see or hear them. Possibly by distributing their television advertisements for free
from their websites. Considering that in most cases they have to pay to get them seen or heard it could be valuable to allow those who
wish to watch them to do so freely and even distribute them to others.
Potentially (and this has not been achieved by the advertising community to any degree) we could see the advertising community
releasing quantities of free advertising content (in the form of pictures, sounds and video) to the public for whatever use they wish
(perhaps under a creative commons license) which would likely result in widespread viewing and distribution which is desirable for
both the advertiser and the public who enjoy using the content in their own creations.
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