United Artists Television

“ The Commission's special familiarity with the problems involved in adopting standards for color television is amply attested by the record. It has determined after hearing evidence on all sides that the CBS system will provide the public with color of good quality and that television viewers should be given an opportunity to receive it if they so desire. [11] This determination certainly cannot be held capricious. It is true that the choice between adopting standards now or at a later date was not free from difficulties. ”

“ The tycoons thought they made television, not the writers, directors, and producers. They wouldn’t dream of setting up a studio system, a great pool of brains that could have made NBC or CBS or ABC the biggest creator there ever was of entertainment and the lively arts. They put no funds aside for research, as General Motors, Westinghouse, Du Pont and the others do.
Now TV by and large has become a dime-store business so far as creativity and talent are concerned. The half-hour and sixty-minute series rattle off the production lines like cans of beans, with an occasional dab of ham inside. ”

“ The Committee indicated that it was 'of utmost importance to the Nation that a reasonable opportunity be afforded educational institutions to use television as a noncommercial educational medium.' Id., at 3. Similarly, the House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce has concluded that educational television will 'provide a much needed source of cultural and informational programing for all audiences. ”

“ Although the circulation of the press dropped drastically in the mid-1940s, it has since the 1960s once again become the chief instrument of the mass communications system. Radio has greatly expanded in variety and scope since the 1940s. Television, although slow to develop and still limited in its audience relative to other European countries, has been growing rapidly since the early 1960s and was beginning to experiment with color in the early 1970s. ”

“ In the press there is a very human tendency to compromise between giving the public what it wants and giving the public what it should want. This is equally true in music, where artists like McCormack or Rachmaninoff popularize their programs. It is true in the drama, where managers, producers and authors combine to adjust plots, situations and endings to what the public will be willing to pay to see. It is true in art, in architecture, in motion pictures. It is true of the lecture platform and of the pulpit. ”

“ The TV networks pretend to foster young talents. But do they?
They got going on their own account when Hollywood turned them down as partners, then was compelled to sell its old movies to them to raise cash to keep the studios open. The young, untried talents who came out of the war swarmed like flies into TV. They couldn’t find a place in the movie industry or in the Broadway theater. Early television was like early movie making all over again, a great adventure filled with fun but not much money ”

“ A uniformed brigade of trumpeters was also sent through the country on horseback, and a band of Jubilee singers marched through the streets singing the praises of the "Newly United Shows." Added to these attractions were two stereopticons that pictured, from some house-top or window, the main features of the show. This, together with perhaps the most liberal newspaper advertising that ever had been done, made the whole advance work as near absolute perfection in show advertising as possible. ”

“ But within the Commission itself the need for further light was urged in view of the rapid development that had been made since the Commission's hearings got under way. The heart of the controversy was thus put by Commissioner Hennock: 'It is of vital importance to the future of television that we make every effort to gain the time necessary for further experimentation leading to the perfection of a compatible color television system.' The Commission did not rule out reasonable hope for the early attainment of compatibility. ”

“ Television has the power to shape thoughts, stir emotions, and inspire actions. It teaches, it sells, it entertains, it informs, and it has the capacity to influence powerfully the lives and values of our children. ”

“ In many respects it will be an aid to the cultivation of public taste for entertainment such as the theatre can give. In other respects I do not think it will influence the theatre either for good or for evil. Rut I do think that more good than evil will accrue to the theatre and to the theatrical profession, particularly as I believe that the developments of broadcasting will give a good deal of employment to our profession.
We can serve the public through broadcasting in a way that no other industry can, for we have behind us experience and knowledge of what constitutes, good entertainment. ”

“ Although it seemed to me from time to time that glimmerings of creativity could be detected in the television field, I no longer had any serious interest in the medium. When, shortly after Hope and I were married, we gave an autographing party for Walter Schimmer, a local TV and radio producer who had written a book called, What Have You Done for Me Lately?, the TV relationship was incidental to the objective of boosting a Chicago writer. ”

“ Opera has been stirred by new names in the past decade—Joan Sutherland, Birgit Nilsson, Maria Callas. The concert stage has its Van Cliburns. Politics has its Kennedys and Nixons. The movies have virtually nothing at the top except the same names that were shining in lights ten years ago—Bob Hope, Burt Lancaster, Cary Grant, John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart and the rest politely called “middle-aged.”
Television’s no better off. The surge of talent there was mostly in writers and directors—Rod Serling, Delbert Mann, and others—who subsequently migrated to Hollywood. ”

“ Encourage diversity in the ownership of broadcast media, promote the development of new media outlets for expression of diverse viewpoints, and clarify the public interest obligations of broadcasters who occupy the nation's spectrum. ”

“ The chief things to he studied are the views of the consumer, not those of the producer. That is why, in the controversy that has waged regarding the question of broadcasting theatrical performances, I am in favour of free trade in broadcasting. All theatrical productions are not of necessity suitable for broadcast reproduction. ”

“ Suppose they can reach people all over the world through the Internet, and perhaps ultimately through wireless connections based on the Net. Will they need CBS or NBC or ABC or equivalents as much as they do now? I can already download snippets from, say, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Too, just what will be the fate of art dealers if so much of art goes digital and people can discover artists on their own without leaving their living rooms? ”

“ It is clear that all broadcasters want, for a variety of reasons, to show programmes that have a mass appeal. Often, generating that appeal means developing programmes which whole families can watch together. With that desire to build a mass audience comes a responsibility to those who commission, make, broadcast and regulate television to ensure that their concept of what constitutes family viewing aligns closely with the values and concerns of the families watching. However, it appears that the broadcasting industry needs to do more to connect with families whose attention they want to hold. ”

“ But if enough people stop watching the stuff that’s put on their screens, then commercial television faces331 a similar fate to the movies, in spite of color sets or tomorrow’s gimmicks such as giant screens to hang on your living-room wall.
I believe the only possible solution for television and movies alike is a recognition of the eternal values of real talent, excitement, and glamour. Audiences are starved for all three. Entertainment must be a satisfying emotional experience, a stirring of the heart. We need all kinds of young men and women. ”

“ I think, therefore, that the time will come when the British Broadcasting Company will set about making its own company of players in its own studio and with its own producer, finding, therefore, much employment for the theatrical profession.
All plays that are broadcast should receive special adoption for that purpose. Everything, ultimately, should to considered from a broadcasting point of view, and all the stage directions will have to be done most deftly. A new craft will be developed, and new methods evolved to make things much less dull through the medium of broadcasting. ”

“ If I may explain this further, when we relied on the print and audiovisual (film, television, radio, video, cassettes) media, we had to depend on the information or entertainment we wanted to receive being brought to us by agents (publishers, television and radio stations, cassette and video producers) who have to subsist in a commercial world or — as in the case of public service broadcasting — under severe budgetary restraints. That means that the size of the customer-base is all-important, and determines the degree to which languages other than the ubiquitous English can be accommodated. ”

“ For neither the movies nor radio can be used for reasoned persuasion; their attack is too immediate, the listener-spectator does not have time for argument and contemplation. Radio profits positively by its limitation to sound when it works with the right materials; but when President Roosevelt asked his audience to have a map at hand, television supplied the map and the meaning of the map without diverting attention from the speech, which radio could not do. The movies, great pioneer in text and sound, have mastered none of the arts of demonstration or persuasion ”

“ The poor time slot, the overloading of commercials were no excuse. I could lick my wounds and say, “Nothing lasts forever. Television is television. They squeeze you out and throw you out.” But in my heart I knew that the show had never had an audience because it was not good enough. ”

“ With the advent of HDTV, television achieves a quality that makes it appropriate for integration in many practical experiences. Design (of clothes, furniture, new products) can result from a collaborative effort of people working at different sites, and in the manufacture of their design during a live session. ”

“ Between recording the movement and viewing it, time is used for processing and duplication.
Television is structurally different, capturing movement and everything else belonging to what we call reality, in order to make it immediately available to the viewer. Electronic mediation is much more elaborate, has many more layers than cinematography, and as a result is much more efficient. Film mapped from the selected world of movement, in a studio, on the street, or in a laboratory, to a limited viewership: public in a movie theater. ”

“ The Congress has expressed its support for such policies in the past and has found that promoting diversity of ownership of broadcast properties satisfies important public policy goals. Diversity of ownership results in diversity of programming and improved service to minority and women audiences. ”

“ Similar conditions prevail in radio, though in a less striking and more sporadic manner, since American radio is largely supported by commercial sponsors. Competition plays so great a role that giving programs a conspicuously individual character is every sponsor’s aim, and since many radio programs consist of concerts of recorded music, the tenor is abundance rather than scarcity.
A discussion of music education in the United States must consider the educational impact of both recordings and radio performances during the past twenty-five years. ”

“ For most of us, what goes on in the television set is magic. Before the age of VCRs and camcorders it was even more so. The creation and broadcast of a television program was a magic act. Whoever has his image in that box must be special. ”

“ It can be said from the outset that while cinematography is at the borderline between the civilization of literacy and that of illiteracy, television definitely embodies the conflict between the two. In fact, television irreversibly tipped the balance in favor of the visual. The invention of television took place in the context of the change in scale of humankind. ”

“ For the first time ever, leaders of the television and entertainment industry have come to-gether as one force and agreed to develop a rating system for their programming that will help parents to protect their children from violence and other objectionable content on television. ”

“ They learn much from television about the world, our society, and their place in it.
Television can communicate values that are consistent with our heritage and traditions and can portray those actions and attitudes that make for better citizens. It also can depict themes that are destructive of these values. Recognizing that children are at a formative and vulnerable stage in their lives, many individuals and groups have a great interest in television programming. These concerned citizens are working to improve the quality of television programs viewed by their families. ”

“ They are, however, interested in the drama, and as a certain advance has been made in the drama within the last ten or fifteen years, it is important to point out that this advance is entirely due to a few individual artists refusing to accept the popular want of taste as their standard, and refusing to regard Art as a mere matter of demand and supply. ”