- Home
- Courses
- History of Broadcasting
- History of Broadcasting: Television, 1975-1985
- Broadcasting Regulations
- Fairness Doctrine
- Equal Time, Section 315
- Multiple Ownership Regulations
- Cross-Ownership Regulations
- Radio-TV (1970)
- Newspaper-Broadcast (1975)
- Limits on Commercial Time
- 44 minutes per hour of programming
- 16 minutes per hour of commercials
- Mark Fowler
- FCC Chairman under President Ronald Reagan
- famously called television “a toaster with pictures”
- “Marketplace Approach to Broadcast Regulation”
- campaign to deregulate communications
- break up AT&T’s monopoly
- end requirements for educational children’s programming
- revoke Fin-Syn rules
- end caps on station ownership
- abolish the Fairness Doctrine
- eliminate requirement that licenses be held for three years before transferring to a new owner
- argued against scarcity, public resource, and intrusiveness arguments
- advocated for diversity, competition, and innovation in broadcasting
- Deregulatory Measures
- simplified license renewal process, preference for incumbents
- eliminated requirement that broadcasters provide some news and public affairs programming
- sports and entertainment: 85%
- news and non-entertainment: 10%
- news and public affairs: 5%
- relaxed station ownership caps
- old cap: 7 AM/FM/TV stations
- new cap: 12 AM/FM/TV stations
- limited reach to 25% of US population
- eliminated rules on commercial time
- classified ad programs
- program length commercials (“infomercials”)
- Cable Communications Policy Act of 1984
- eliminated all federal restrictions
- program offerings
- subscription rates
- franchise fees
- unregulated expansion of MSOs
- Satellite Distribution
- Sputnik, 1957, begat space race
- Telstar, 1962
- C-band geostationary satellites
- AT&T’s INTELSAT, 1965
- Western Union’s Westar, 1974
- RCA’s Satcom, 1975
- made possible transoceanic and intercontinental transmissions
- telephone calls
- television signals
- lease transponders to television stations
- Multichannel Universe
- Declining Network Market Share
- 1975: 90% of primetime share
- 1985: 75% of primetime share
- new competition for the television set
- Home Video
- videocassette recorders
- Sony’s Betamax, 1975
- JVC’s Video Home System, 1976
- major movie studios and home video distrubition
- home video rental stores
- sell-through pricing
- mini-majors
- Tri Star Pictures
- Columbia Pictures
- HBO cable
- CBS broadcast television
- Cannon Group
- low-budget independent studio
- action-adventure films
- international distribution
- broadcast and cable television sales
- home video revenue would eclipse box office receipts by 1988
- Cable TV
- satellite distribution inaugurated new networks
- cable channels leased transponders
- Satcom: HBO and WTBS
- Westar: Showtime, Pinwheel, and Trinity Broadcating
- uplink to satellite
- cable system
- downlinks channel
- distributes to subscribers
- scrambles subscription signal
- offers decoder/descramblers to subscribing households
- potentially expands diversity
- most channels are national
- not locally originated as once imagined
- Basic Cable
- cable operators “must carry” local over-the-air stations
- national advertiser-supported cable channels
- cable channel receives carriage fee from cable operator
- examples
- local ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, and independent stations
- MTV, CNN, A&E, ESPN, USA, TNT
- Pay Cable
- premium channels with no advertising
- funded by viewer subscriptions
- examples
- Superstation
- local independent station with national satellite distribution to cable operators
- supported by advertising and carriage fees from cable operator
- examples
- PEG Access
- Public/Educational/Government channel on local cable system
- carried for free and subsidized by cable operator
- Merger Mania
- multiple systems operators acquiring more local cable systems (“franchises”)
- group owners acquired more local broadcast stations
- NBC acquired by General Electric
- ABC acquired by Capital Cities
- CBS acquired by Lawrence Tisch and Loews Company
- Roots
- miniseries
- eight consecutive nights in January 1977
- most watched miniseries in US history
- based on Alex Haley’s novel about his ancestors
- Music Television
- premiered August 1, 1981
- co-venture by Warner AMEX Cable and Viacom
- music videos
- attracted a young audience
- pioneers in video visual style
- The Cosby Show
- NBC, 1984–1992
- Father Knows Best with black cast
- upper middle-class family sitcom
- Miami Vice
- NBC, 1984–1990
- “MTV Cops”
- utilized music video style for network drama
- Hill Street Blues
- NBC, 1981–1987
- “woman’s mode” of seriality
- “men’s genre of crime drama
- social realism
This outline is based on material from Michele Hilmes, Only Connect: A Cultural History of Broadcasting in the United States. 4th ed. Boston: Cengage, 2014.