WK 7 – THE INVENTION OF TELEVISION

Dr. Carolina Matos

Lecturer in Sociology

Department of Sociology

City University London

Core readings

• Essential reading• Crisell, A. (1997) An Introductory History of British Broadcasting.

Routledge. Chapters 4, 5 & 6.• OR• Williams, K. (1998) Get Me a Murder a Day: A History of Mass

Communication in Britain. Arnold. Chapter 8.

• Highly recommended reading• Curran, J. and J. Seaton (2010) Power Without Responsibility - 7th

Edition. Routledge. Chapters 11, 12 & 13.• Scannell, P. (1991) A Social History of British Broadcasting – Vol. 1:

1922-1939 Serving the Nation. Blackwell.

Key issues

• The emergence of television• Early TV sets• The 1953 coronation of Queen Elisabeth II and television • The campaign for commercial television• The 1954 Television Act• The impact of ITV on the broadcasting system• The Pilkington Report• The 1964 Broadcasting Act• The cosy duopoly• TV programmes examples (i.e. That Was the Week That Was)• Conclusions and class topics• Readings for week 8

1946-1955: The Emergence of Television*

• Key points:

• Postwar austerity

• Television programming was slow to develop• Television technology in infancy

• Between 1945 and 1960, radio enjoyed what has been deemed its greatest era, with distinguished programmes reaching audiences of several millions

• The BBC provided a vast amount of music of all kinds, but it was in the field of comedy where its greatest achievements lied

• The post-war period saw the development of a series of comedy shows, many of which lasted five to ten years

The early years of television*

• * The search for ways of sending pictures over distances began as early as the efforts to transmit sound. The problem was to break down a sequence of images into units of information which could be transmitted by wireless. The first attempts were mechanical, and carried out by the German Paul Nipkow and others like Charles Francis Jenkins.

• * The other strand of research into the scanning of images was electronic: the cathode ray tube was developed by Karl Braun in 1897 and the photo-electric cell by Julius Elster and Hans Geitel in 1905.

• The BBC became involved in developing television from about 1929 and was pressed by the Post Office to provide the facility for the Scotsman, John Logie Baird, to continue with his transmissions.

• Initially, sound and vision occupied a single wavelength: the speaker was first seen without being heard.

Early TV sets: RCA CT-100 (April 1954)

The early years of television in Britain (in Crisell, 1997)

• In 1933, the BBC resolved to end Baird’s experiments because the rival electronic technology seemed to be making more progress in the form of the American-originated EMI system.

• In 1934, the government appointed the Seldson Committee to consider the future of television broadcasting, and the latter recommended that a regular public television service should be operated by the BBC, using both the Baird and EMI systems on a weekly basis until the superiority of one or the other had been proved.

• “According to Roy Armes (1988) it was not the first regular TV service in the world: the Germans had begun theirs in March 1935. But since the latter was transmitting only 180 line pictures, the BBC could claim credit for the first high-definition service. It transmitted from Alexandra Palace in north London and was received within a radius of 40 to 100 by a few thousand viewers….”

The early years of television (in Crisell, 1997 and Williams, 1998)

• The government accepted the recommendations that the service should not carry advertising, but be paid out of the existing licence fee.

• Early broadcasts runs for two hours a day, excluding Sundays.• The EMI system, using all-electronic, mobile cameras, delivered a picture of

405 lines, and in February 1937 the Baird system was dropped• By modern standards, even the EMI picture was dim. It was in monochrome,

as all television pictures would be for the next thirty years.

• Television sets and audiences: • * By 1938 about 5.000 sets had been bought. The average TV screen was

about eight inches by ten, and the pictures lacked definition and frequently people needed to sit in a dark room in front of the set.

• * Pre-war television was aimed at a small and affluent audience in London.

Early TV sets: Zenith, circa 1950

Programmes of the time and audiences (in Crisell, 1997 and Williams, 1998)

• The service was a child of the BBC, and thus influenced by the commitment to Reith’s public service principles

• However, as television was new and there was more concern with its technical reliability, content was coming in second and there was less concern with seriousness in programming

• As well as light comedies nonetheless, viewers were presented with plays by Beaumont and Fletcher, Shakespeare and George Bernard Shaw

• As Stuart Hood (1980: 60) affirmed: • “The programmes the viewers wanted were dominated by

the concept of the West End show, of the revue and the kind of entertainment which was the middle class audience’s idea of a night out.”

The BBC and its attitudes to television* Television and its slow development: •The news until 1948 was broadcast in sound only: an anonymous announcer reading the news behind a picture of the BBC clock. •Dominated by the ‘old radio hands’, the BBC’s hierarchy regarded television as an extension of radio•The television service in the immediate post-war years was heavily circumscribed, opening for an hour in the late afternoon, between 5 to 6 pm, aimed at women and children mainly, and closed down until 7.30pm• Other problems: the cost of producing television programmes, the cost of television sets and the small audience•“As a result TV output during this period was dull, dreary and unimaginative. Many of the staples of radio were transferred to TV, in particular ‘Talks’ which constituted a strong part of the early output of BBC TV. …” (Williams, 1998).

The BBC and the 1950’s

• The predominance of radio over television: • As Williams (1998) notes, the war had established the public’s appetite for

news, but radio did not want to jeopardise its reputation by putting its news reporting at risk with television.

• The other important characteristic of this period was the absence of domestic political discussion and commentary. The BBC’s own political programmes focused on foreign and international politics.

• Panorama began life in 1953 as a fortnightly general information programme, and when it became a harder current affairs programme, the initial focus was on the world

• Two TV shows originated during this period: Come Dancing in 1950, and What’s My Line? in 1951

The 2nd June 1953 Coronation (Elisabeth II) and television

• As Williams (1998) notes, the 1950’s were the ‘age of affluence’, with the postwar rebuilding that followed the austerity of the late 1940s having stimulated demand and economic growth.

• People were hungry for new goods, pleasures and activities. • Britain’s first media event• This was considered the corporation’s greatest television triumph and

symbolised the moment when television surpassed radio as the major mass medium.

• 56 % of the UK adult population (20 million people) watched the Coronation

• TV becoming a mass medium:• 1950: only 4 % of the UK population owned a TV set• 1955: 40 %• 1960: 80 %

The 2nd June 1953 Coronation (Elisabeth II) and television

The 2nd June 1953 Coronation (Elisabeth II) and television

The Campaign for Commercial

Television The Beveridge Report, 1951

Charges against the BBC:• Acted as if it believed it had a divine right to broadcast (the Reith

legacy)• Too biased in favour of London• Minority report: Tory MP Selwin Lloyd

The BBC monopoly was questioned because: • The deficiencies of the BBC• The socio-economic climate• Efficient lobbying from the advertising industry

The debate on quality in broadcasting*

• The commercial campaign lobby consisted of a group of Tory backbenchers and enjoyed strong backing from business, among others Pye Radio, the West End theatre managers and the advertising agency, J. Walter Thompson, as well as the support of the Daily Mirror and the Financial Times

• Campaigners were concerned with distribution, and wanted to offer their services to more than one broadcasting organization.

• Their opponents were seen as more concerned with content. These were led by the Labour MP and BBC broadcaster Christopher Mayhew, including churchmen, educators, politicians and journalists.

• Those who sought to preserve the BBC’s monopoly took on an elitist view, that competition would drive out quality.

• The campaigners for commercial TV argued that competition would force up quality.

The 1954 Television Act• The 1954 Act ended the BBC’s monopoly• ITV was to be constructed around two aspects of the Beveridge Report –

the preference of spot advertising over programme sponsorship and the decentralisation of broadcasting

• ITV: Independent Television• A network of 14 regional franchises

Each franchise holder entered into a separate contract with the ITA and was answerable for the programmes in its region

• ITN: Independent Television News (central news service)• ITA: Independent Television Authority• The 1954 did not produce a truly commercial system, and more a hybrid one

combining characteristics of commercial and PSB.

ITV: A network of regional franchises

The Impact of ITV on the Broadcasting System

* Initial years were difficult, with audiences in small numbers which made it difficult to attract advertisers

* As the transmitting system started to reach greater numbers and other companies came on air, the growth in audiences brought a rise in advertising.

1.Success - By 1957, the ITV companies saw a change in their financial fortunes

2.Innovation• Televisual approach to news - ITN reporters less deferential to

politicians than BBC journalists• More popular programming (i.e. eight quiz shows every week)• Introduction of new drama series, such as Coronation Street

• Sir Hugh Greene is seen as having been the greatest BBC director since John Reith.

• By the time the Pilkington Committee reported in 1962, Greene had raised the BBC’s audience share to 50:50 for the first time since the competition began.

• Under him, the Corporation succeeded in justifying itself to Pilkington and discrediting the achievements of ITV, thus capturing the third channel.

• The Pilkington report was disposed in their favour, as it had among its members Professor Richard Hoggart, who was critical of the cultural standards of the ITV

• It was seen as confining itself to entertaining people and not improving them, and was sensitive to the enormous profits made by ITV, besides the acquisition attitudes encouraged by the big money prizes of the ITV give away shows.

The Pilkington Report and the state of broadcasting (in Crisell, 1997, 108-109)

The Pilkington Report, June 1962

“Television does not, and cannot, merely reflect the moral standards of society. It must affect them, either by changing or by reinforcing them.” p. 19

“The kinds of programme which were cited to us as tending to erode moral standards were, we recall, these: some crime and adventure programmes, quizzes in which valuable prizes were offered, programmes which ridiculed and humiliated ordinary people, and some forms of drama.” p. 57

The Pilkington Report

“It is not that an intellectual minority finds the programmes trivial. Rather, it is that as quiz programmes some of them do not stand on their merits – whatever the educational standards of the audiences. In relying upon the appeal to greed and fear, and to the pleasure of watching these emotions roused in others because of valuable prizes are at stake, and in relying on an atmosphere of artificial good fellowship, these programmes abandon the objective - light entertainment which amuses because it is good – for light entertainment which is poor in invention and needs the support of extraneous appeals… Accordingly, we recommend that the maximum value of prizes should be greatly reduced .” p. 58

The 1964 Broadcasting Act and BBC 2

1. The BBC rewarded for good behaviour

2. ITV’s commercialism curbed

3. Creation of the cosy duopoly

• Programmes that started in the 1960s include:

• That Was the Week That Was; Z Cars; Coronation Street; Match of the Day; News at Ten, Monty Python’s Flying Circus.

Quality versus commercial broadcasting: the Cosy Duopoly

• Thus after initial difficulties in the 50’s and 60’s, the 1954 Act provided the basis for the BBC and ITV to live together in relative harmony for the next 20 years.

• The changes brought about by the 1964 Act saw the ITV network move more closely towards the public service responsibilities and away from commercial considerations.

• At the same time, the BBC embarked in more adventurous programming • Limited competition between BBC and ITV – For most of the period from

1964 up to the election of Thatcher in 1979, the BBC and ITV had roughly the same share of viewing audience.

That Was the Week That Was

• A satirical programme

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INxp98-2i6A

Coronation Street

The first ever Coronation Street episode, 9th December 1960

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fT0Jz8KC9DA

Cathy Come Home (Loach, 1966)

• (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1RYVjlP0dM)

Monty Python’s Flying Circus

Final episode of Season 2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyPRpmOpxnU

Conclusions and questions for thought

• Television was slow to develop, but eventually surpassed radio from the 1950’s onwards as a mass medium

• The BBC initially was reluctant and hesitant to embrace television due to cultural elitism attitudes, and the medium took some time to find its potential

• The emergence of ITV, and commercial broadcasting, also shaped significantly the development of broadcasting in Britain

• The debate on quality and commercial broadcasting does not seem to have gone away.

• Class topics: - Outline the circumstances in which ITV was launched and explain what was so innovative in the network’s structure and programming. And what was the impact the network on broadcasting in the 1960s and 1970s?

• - What was meant by the phrase ‘comfortable duopoly’ as applied to television in Britain?

Readings for week 8 • Essential reading• Chalaby, J. (2010) ‘The rise of Britain’s super-indies: Policy-making in the

age of the global media market’, the International Communication Gazette, 72(8): 675-693.

• Doyle, G. And R. Paterson (2008) ‘Public Policy and Independent Television Production In the U.K.’, Journal of Media Business Studies, 5(3): 17-33. (Web link on moodle and article free to download from the journal’s website.)

• Highly recommended reading• Crisell, A. (1997) An Introductory History of British Broadcasting.

Routledge. Chapter 9.• Curran, J. and J. Seaton (2010) Power Without Responsibility - 7th Edition.

Routledge. Chapter 13.