As a result, millions of Americans living in rural areas found themselves with either poor TV reception or no access to broadcast television signals at all. Up until this point, television was the main mass medium with three major networks – ABC, CBS and NBC – offering very limited selections of programs. A second Superstation, WGN from Chicago, achieved national satellite distribution that year as well. But past even the public access garbage, there was treasure to be found. There was the story of the guy who was preparing a car to run in a demolition derby, despite constant nagging from everyone that he had a death wish. © 2019 Encyclopedia.com | All rights reserved. Following its launch in 1981, MTV focused its programming on music. Instead, the new cable network often found itself broadcasting unusual sporting events, such as slow-pitch softball games, the World's Strongest Man Competition, and Australian Rules Football. Over the decade from 1983 to 1994, for example, the share of weekly television audiences held by the broadcast networks declined from 69 to 52 percent, while the share held by cable networks increased from 9 to 26 percent. Street-Porter created a schedule based around three blocks of live broadcasting each day from its base on the 24th floor of London's Canary Wharfbuilding. Following passage of the Telecommunications Act, the cable TV industry experienced a great deal of merger and acquisition activity (when one company buys another or two companies combine into one). With no internet and no NBA TV, this was my only chance to see a lot of my favorite players. Best answer gets 10 points. "Cable and Other Pay Television Services." For those of you who had cable tv in the 1990s, what was it like? Turner started his career by working in his father's billboard advertising business. limited cable TV systems to small, local markets that were not being served by the major broadcast networks. Encyclopedia of Emerging Industries, 2nd ed. ESPN 25. But Turner's all-news format gradually attracted viewers and became profitable. For instance, cable providers continued to face stiff competition from satellite services, which generally offered subscribers more channels and more interactive features than cable. "Cable Television's Long March." Network complaints got more extreme when various cable systems began using new technology to bring in television signals from distant cities. These restrictions limited the growth of DBS services and prevented satellite providers from competing against cable systems in most major markets. "The cable industry remade the television world of (December 21, 2020). 1990s tv shows by geoff-41223 | created - 02 Feb 2018 | updated - 02 Feb 2018 | Public Refine See titles to watch instantly, titles you haven't rated, etc Almost as soon as satellite programming became available, a few enterprising people began setting up their own dish-shaped antennas to intercept the signals. fed them into an amplifier to return them to full strength, and carried them down into Lansford through coaxial cables. The merger of Bell Atlantic and TCI promised to bring the “information superhighway” closer to reality. "Direct Broadcast Satellite Television." The rulings also freed the cable industry from FCC requirements to provide local communities with special channels to air their own programming. There's no question that 25 years ago, it was much easier to be aware of everything that was happening on television. For instance, it gradually eliminated all regulation of basic cable rates. One of the people credited with inventing cable TV is Robert J. Tarlton. He soon convinced a number of national advertisers to begin placing their commercials on his cable network. Despite the FCC's efforts, however, cable television continued to grow. But unbeknownst to me, the era’s advances in video technology was beginning to make it possible for near-amateurs to create truly personal, if not always good, video works about their lives and their unique experiences. Some consumer groups began to complain about high cable rates and poor customer service, which they attributed to the cable companies' monopoly power These 18-inch dish antennas capture the signals and carry them to the television set, where they are decoded and decompressed by a box on top of the TV set. At best, you could see some middle school talent show. In 1975 the FCC issued a decision that allowed satellites (antennas that orbit Earth and relay communication signals over large areas) to be used for TV broadcasting. We had a proud, clunky antenna mounted on the top of our house, and it received a solid TEN channels: FOX, NBC, CBS, ABC, NBC, ABC, and three UHF stations before there was UPN, WB, and then CW. Standard Cable TV Cable ONE - Standard Cable TV Sparklight (Previously Cable ONE) provides a wide range of products and services such as Cable TV, Internet service, and phone service with free, unlimited long distance calling. Satellite TV services grew rapidly, especially after the 1999 law removed the restrictions against carrying broadcast network channels. And thanks to YouTube and Vimeo, most of it is easily available. It also granted public access channels to local cable systems, starting PEG (Public Educational Governmental) cable programming. But the cable companies passed much of the expense on to their customers, and rates for basic cable service grew rapidly. Fowler was appointed by President Ronald Reagan (1911–2004; served 1981–89), who believed that the federal government should limit its role in controlling private business. Even though there were a limited number of videos available at first, ratings for the network soared. "Wired, Zapped, and Beamed: 1960s through 1980s" and "Digitally Networked: 1990s through Today." I remember the linear pay-per-view and how it was a real “treat” to be able to catch a new movie after phoning in the order! When I was a kid, I was obsessed with cable TV. Of the programming on network TV that in the 1990s continued to attract the largest audiences, the most popular new entries were Seinfeld (1990–98), Friends (1994–2004), and ER (1994–2009), all part of NBC’s celebrated Thursday night lineup. To learn more about cheap cable, check out our helpful guide. The networks expressed concerns about the impact of cable from the beginning. Here, then, is a ranking of the top 90 shows of the 1990s. E! By 1962, however, the agency reconsidered this decision. But picking up a television signal from a conventional communication satellite required dish antennas that were very large and quite expensive. "United States: Cable Television." I remember hearing the narration of an American, isolated and homesick, as he tried to make his way through Japan, camcorder in hand. 1990s TV : Trivia Questions and Answers This category is for questions and answers related to 1990s TV, as asked by users of FunTrivia.com. Therefore, it’s best to use Encyclopedia.com citations as a starting point before checking the style against your school or publication’s requirements and the most-recent information available at these sites: http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html. Museum of Broadcast Communications. The rules also tied cable operators more closely to rural communities by requiring them to provide channels for local residents to air their own programming. Record companies already produced short videos to accompany songs by the artists they wanted to promote, so MTV was able to keep its programming costs low by simply arranging to air these promotional videos. Most of it was sourced from a non-profit video art library called Video Data Bank. In fact, it appeared that CNN might be a short-lived experiment, as the network lost $20 million in its first year. The main impact of the 1996 law, however, was to remove some of the restrictions that prevented companies from competing in multiple parts of the telecommunications industry. The two largest, DirecTV and EchoStar, control 95 percent of the market. "When the leaders of the world wanted to find out what was happening in the world—and, sometimes, in their own countries—they turned to CNN," L. J. Davis noted in The Billionaire Shell Game. For instance, MTV's Real World, a show that brings seven strangers together to live in a house, is widely credited with launching the reality-TV craze—unscripted TV programming depicting people in real-life situations—that blossomed in the late 1990s and into the 2000s. Within the “Cite this article” tool, pick a style to see how all available information looks when formatted according to that style. About Cable TV in Oakland, CA Oakland operates one of the busiest ports in all of the San Francisco Bay Area and the fast-paced life of this large city is a reflection of that. "United States: Networks." eporters provided live coverage of U.S.-led bombing raids from a hotel balcony in downtown Baghdad, Iraq. Cable television has come a long way since its origins in the late 1940s, when it was used exclusively as a way to expand the reach of traditional over-the-airwaves television broadcasts. HBO provided dozens of local cable operators across the country with dish-shaped antennas 30 feet (9 meters) wide in order to receive the signal. Another influential early cable network was MTV—Music Television. Those that don't are the exception. “The 90s,” its very name hopeful of the new directions in media and information this would open up, was the first cable network for this sort of content. Around 2000, cable providers began to face intense competition from satellite television systems. Vast networks of cables carry television signals to connected homes, where they are changed into images that can be viewed on a TV screen by either a cable box on top of the TV or a cable converter inside the TV set itself. over communities and regions. Cable networks that are well-known and well-funded today were then flimsy, low-budget affairs. "As the larger video media industry changes, the cable industry's boundaries, roles, and influences will likewise be reshaped, but the historical legacy of its accomplishments will surely continue to be felt.". Did you need a cable box? The summer of 2005 marked the fifth year in a row that cable networks had triumphed in the ratings, nearly doubling the audience share earned by the broadcast networks, 60.9 to 32.4. Excerpt from a speech delivered at the We Media Conference, October 5, 2005 Several other creative cable networks began sending their programs across the country via satellite shortly after HBO and TBS. HBO started out offering movies and special-event programming to markets on the East Coast on a pay-per-view basis. 90. The following year the agency issued its "Second Cable Television Report and Order." Under the leadership of Gerald Levin (1937–), HBO immediately took advantage of the ruling and began distributing its signal nationwide via satellite. . . 21 Dec. 2020 . CNN thus created a huge change in up-to-the-minute television news coverage. The three broadcast networks continued to claim that cable services profited from their programming illegally. A cable operator pays the local city government a percentage of its revenues in exchange for the exclusive right to provide cable services for a certain period of time. The cable companies agreed to pay a fee (usually 5 percent of their revenues) to the community in exchange for the exclusive (not shared with others) right to provide cable service for a certain period of time. There were animations, poems, visuals. Federation of Pub…, At the same time radio began to achieve commercial viability in the 1920s, the United States and Britain began experimenting with "television," the w…, Gore, Al In the early ’90s, … In the modern age of YouTube and Vimeo, where video is something that can be produced by the phones in our pockets, video art seems like a conceptual antiquity: the novelty of once-new technology that has since achieved ubiquity and is no longer even a remotely curious object. The launch of Star TV and ZeeTV further fuelled the spread of cable TV. Museum of Broadcast Communications, http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/U/htmlU/unitedstatesc/unitedstatesc.htm (accessed on June 14, 2006). The DBS beams a digital stream of audio and video data to small, individual reception dishes on the roofs of houses and buildings. Most online reference entries and articles do not have page numbers. I loved it. Refer to each style’s convention regarding the best way to format page numbers and retrieval dates. Encyclopedia of Emerging Industries, 2nd ed. Comcast, with 21.4 million subscribers, took over the top spot among cable providers in 2002 by purchasing TCI's cable operations from AT&T. Encyclopedia of American Industries. This development changed the nature of cable services from simply improving the reception of local TV stations to providing viewers with new program options from distant stations. (Coaxial cable—which consisted of copper wire surrounded by insulation, with an aluminum covering—could be used to transmit TV, telephone, and data signals.) ( Log Out /  D-60320 Frankfurt am Main As of 2001, 95 percent of all cable subscribers received services from the top twenty-five companies in the industry. Industry observers attributed the drop to customer dissatisfaction with cable services, as well as increased competition from new technologies, such as Direct Broadcast Satellite (DBS). Many new customers switched to DBS from cable because they were dissatisfied with their cable service. Cable operators could now charge customers as much as they wanted, as long as they operated in a competitive market. (The FCC, a government agency, was created in 1934 to oversee and regulate all types of communications, including radio, television, telephone, and telegraph.) It ruled that the FCC was not justified in restricting cable TV in order to protect the broadcast networks. In addition, an increasing number of telephone companies and Internet service providers were expected to enter the television market. shows, TV viewers could also choose from among hundreds of cable channels that offered news, sports, music, movies, and other forms of entertainment. Other independent businessmen developed similar CATV systems around the same time, including John Walson, a power-company lineman Complete Text of the Act The Cable Communication Act of 1984 was an ammendment to the Communications Act of 1934. The sudden reduction in FCC regulations led to tremendous growth in cable TV systems from the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s. Although this legislation focused primarily on the telephone industry, it relaxed some of the 1992 rules affecting cable TV. I never actually saw Ren & Stimpy during its original, pure-state run, except for one time I went over to a friend’s house and we saw part of an episode. New York: Doubleday, 1998. to provide broadcast stations to customers who could not receive good reception over the air and had not subscribed to cable TV in the previous six months. Hoping to sell more TV sets, Tarlton convinced some investors to help him build a large antenna on top of the mountain in 1949. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale Group, 1999. In retrospect, it seems amazing that a channel like this could even exist, let alone get national carriage. Channel outages and audio/video issues were much more frequent. After doing some research, Rasmussen discovered that satellite transmission would cost the same whether he beamed a television signal over a small region or across the whole country, so he decided to form a national network. At that time, stations affiliated with the three main national broadcast networks occupied the scarce VHF channels in nearly every important television market. By the 1990s, the cable modem was introduced, making residential high-speed Internet access a reality in the U.S. A major change in satellite technology occurred in 1993, when Hughes Electronics launched the first direct broadcast satellite (DBS). Smith, Ralph Lee. The output was orientated towards a rolling mix of celebrities, interviews, reviews, lifestyle features and reports from events and happenings across the UK. Born in Lansford, Pennsylvania, in 1914, Tarlton opened a radio sales and service shop after graduating from high school. The move toward deregulation (removal of regulations) received a big boost when Mark S. Fowler (1943–) became chairman of the FCC in 1981. Around this time, various community groups and educational institutions began complaining about the limitations the government had placed on cable TV. "Building a TV Sports Empire: How ESPN Created a Model for Cable Success." Television signals gradually lose strength as they pass through the cables, so the cable companies place amplifiers (devices that boost the strength of the signals) at regular intervals to return the signals to their original strength. Within a few years of the start of TV broadcasting, creative citizens began experimenting with alternative ways to transmit television signals so that broadcasts would reach small towns and rural areas. In exchange for a $125 installation charge and $3 monthly service fee, Lansford residents got the same quality reception for Philadelphia's three network television channels as residents of the big city. "Two decades of round-the-clock coverage have changed the way we view sports, the way we talk about sports, even the way athletes play sports," Greg Guss wrote in Sport. Viewers used antennas on rooftops or attached to television sets to receive the signals. It may also be the first system built with the express purpose of charging a monthly fee for service. Born out of a Chicago-area art college, The 90s (“The New Channel for the New Decade”) featured video art, ranging from independent documentaries to video essays to weird and experimental stuff. In 1995 the number of cable TV subscribers declined for the first time. Related quizzes can be found here: 1990s TV Quizzes There are 88 questions on this topic. MTV's influence could also be seen in broadcast network programming. Also, phone and internet services through your cable was still all but science fiction at the time. For many years after the invention of cable TV, though, the FCC was unwilling to step in and make rules to control the technology. I can’t wait to write about my pay-per-view obsession. Robert Tarlton builds the first cable system to receive widespread publicity in the U.S. The new law also removed FCC-imposed limits on the monthly rates that cable It also, as would be important to any teenage boy, occasionally featured nudity. Television in American Society Reference Library. Compared to the major broadcast networks, the new CNN had a small budget, and many people criticized its simple studio sets and low-cost production techniques. In 1990, however, Primestar became the first company to offer commercial satellite TV service direct to customers' homes. When we finally did get cable, it was a huge deal for us. But Tarlton soon found that no one in Lansford was willing to invest in a TV set because the town had terrible reception. The networks demanded that cable operators pay royalties (a fee for the use of material protected by copyright) in exchange for retransmitting their programs. A 1984 study by Warner Amex Cable Communications found that these channels accounted for less than 1 percent of all viewing time. If the internet has robbed us of anything, it’s the mystery of the unknown. In 1969 the FCC issued new regulations that further limited the growth of cable TV. In thinking about a new career, Rasmussen came up with the idea of starting a sports network that would provide programming to regional cable TV systems. Communities usually granted cable operators access through But I also had TCI’s split A/B cable service (they had about 5 different names over the course of years — United Cable, United Artists Cable, TCI Cablevision, one or two others I’m forgetting, then Comcast). The closest TV stations were located 65 miles away in Philadelphia, and a mountain at the edge of town blocked the already weak signals before they reached residents' homes. The Christian Tele-Communications Inc. (TCI), under the leadership of John Malone, became the largest MSO by gobbling up smaller competitors. The law prohibited satellite services from offering programming from the three major broadcast networks—which consistently attracted more viewers than any cable network—except in certain cases. ESPN soon connected with sports fans, however, with its technical innovations, story-like highlight reels, and lively on-air personalities. Traditional family comedies such as The Cosby Show, Family Ties, and Growing Pains (ABC, 1985–92) remained on the air into the 1990s, while at the same time more “realistic” shows featuring lower-middle-class families such as Roseanne (ABC, 1988–97), The Simpsons (Fox, begun 1989), Married…with Children (Fox, 1987–97), and Grace Under Fire (ABC, 1993–98) introduced a completely different … "The Rise of Cable Television The 90s It also required the FCC to develop a plan to ensure that the broadcast networks would receive fair pay for their original programming. I recall seeing one program open with the title cards, “What you are about to see is a play. It’s almost absurd just how much of my early history can be traced to random cable channel surfing. Cable TV had NBC, CBS, ABC, and PBS from Greenville, SC (my market), ABC and CBS from Augusta, GA. NBC from Columbia, SC. Encyclopedia.com gives you the ability to cite reference entries and articles according to common styles from the Modern Language Association (MLA), The Chicago Manual of Style, and the American Psychological Association (APA). In 1976 Turner turned his small, independent station into a national cable network. ESPN2 was introduced in 1993, but that wasn’t the big news in cable TV. Surf through our catalog of some of the best 1990s TV shows that aired in primetime television from 1990 to 1999. He changed his call letters to WTBS (for Turner Broadcasting System) and referred to it as a "Superstation" because of its nationwide reach. The 1990s Were a Revolutionary Decade That Forever Changed How We Watch TV ... A major TV industry shift took hold during the '90s. At the same time, it felt provocative and dirty, and even a little bit dangerous. (A monopoly is where one company controls an entire industry or line of business.) Davis wrote: "cable could offer its customers something that the networks didn't have, and the number of new choices could only grow.". He began showing old movies, cartoons, and sporting events to give viewers an alternative to the network offerings. Fowler achieved many of his goals with the passage of the Cable Communications Policy Act of 1984. They argued that cable TV systems stole their programming by intercepting their signals and then charged subscribers a fee for delivering them. In fact, average cable rates increased by 25 to 30 percent between 1986 and 1988 alone. Reprinted from the Associated Press For instance, cable systems were forbidden to show movies that were less than ten years old or sporting events that had occurred within the past five years. Taylor, Chris. For instance, they claimed that the need to provide round-the-clock news pushed the American media toward sensational journalism, which emphasized celebrity-centered stories instead of important, but more complex, national and international news events. By the 2000s, the cable networks actually earned higher ratings than the broadcast networks in some time periods. The 1990s is considered as the age of alternative media. Becker, Anne. When promoting the new network, he claimed that he wanted to provide the American people with a source of news that was independent of the powerful broadcast networks. But by the 1990s, the continuing expansion of cable and satellite TV meant more channels and more choices for programming. But even though it might feel more established and less exciting, there is still amazing work being done, if you know where to dig. This law gave local communities the power to regulate rates for basic cable television services. As more people became aware of DBS services, they started demanding that the FCC allow satellite service to compete directly with cable. For the first few years of its existence, ESPN had trouble convincing the broadcast television networks to share their coverage of major sporting events, such as pro football and basketball games. It was the development of "broadband" cable, capable of supporting a 750MHz+ bandwidth and served by a fibre-optic backbone that took cable TV forward in the mid-nineties. In 1980 Turner launched the Cable News Network (CNN) to provide viewers with news and information twenty-four hours per day. The monthly fee varies depending on the number and type of channels a viewer wishes to receive. Due to CNN news coverage, cable became Americans' top choice for information about breaking news events. The transmission of TV signals using satellites orbiting the Earth was not a new technology at that time. Meanwhile, the number of cable subscribers declined to 66 million households, or 68.6 percent of the market. It moved to the forefront of international news coverage during the 1991 Persian Gulf War, when CNN Its founder, Bill Rasmussen, had recently lost his job as communications director for the Hartford Whalers, a professional hockey team. Given the high level of dissatisfaction with cable TV providers at this time, DirecTV attracted 100,000 customers in its first year. One of the most successful of all the cable networks made its debut in 1979. The Nation (special issue), May 18, 1970. The Billionaire Shell Game: How Cable Baron John Malone and Assorted Corporate Titans Invented a Future Nobody Wanted. This event marked the first time that American television viewers were able to watch a major sporting event as it occurred halfway around the world. When it finally disappeared from our channel lineup I was crushed. Encyclopedia.com. Sport, July 1998, p. 28. ." Also available at http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features…, ARD Instead, they came up with unique programs and services, often targeted toward specific, narrow audience groups. . The FCC asserted its authority over cable TV because cable had an impact on broadcast television—an industry that the agency was required to support and promote. "To Dish or Not to Dish." The first successful alternative transmission method—originally known as Community Antenna Television (CATV) and later called cable TV—appeared around 1948. FCC History Project. With the success of the Ali-Frazier broadcast, HBO filed a lawsuit against the FCC in order to force the agency to give cable operators greater access to current programming. These companies purchased thousands of small, local cable providers in order to gain access to their valuable franchises. A typical early show was a two-hour a… Several of the cable networks that emerged during this period affected the development of television specifically and American society and culture in general. Hubbard Broadcasting Inc. Congress responded in November 1999 by passing the Satellite Home Viewer Improvement Act, which allowed DBS services to rebroadcast local network signals just like cable providers. Over the next few years, the FCC continued to hear complaints from consumers about problems with cable TV providers, including rate increases and poor customer service. In addition, TV networks tended to concentrate their operations in heavily populated urban areas, where their signals would reach the largest number of viewers. networks. There was a lot of chaff in there too. New York: Hyperion, 2004. I remember seeing food vendors in Vietnam, demonstrating how they lit a dish on fire in a wok before flinging it over the heads of their patrons and catching it on a plate. Cable operators gained the right to air current movies and sporting events, for instance, and to offer services in the nation's top television markets. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale Group, 1999. Today I can barely even find evidence online of its existence. Cable networks started competing directly with the broadcast networks for the right to air major sporting events, and they also started showing reruns of popular network series. As compared to the fairly polished digital look of even the scrappiest television networks today, deep cable of the early and mid-90s was a weird and wonderful no-mans land, full of absurd and unusual video of questionable origin. The act eliminated must-carry rules, so that cable systems were no longer required to carry local broadcast stations. Time, October 28, 2002, p. 70. Hoffer, Richard. During the mid-1970s the FCC faced increasing public pressure to revise its rules limiting the growth of cable TV. "Cable Television." TLC actually stood for “The Learning Channel,” and was mostly horrifically dry demonstrations of math problems. As compared to the fairly polished digital look of even the scrappiest television networks today, deep cable of the early and mid-90s was a weird and wonderful no-mans land, full of absurd and unusual video of questionable origin.