Civilizatia Britanica Si Americana Mass Media

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BRITISH AND AMERICAN CIVILIZATION.

MASS MEDIA

In UK radio and television broadcasting is being provided by a company owned by the state – British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), which has an international reputation for its objectivity. Besides the British Broadcasting Corporation there are also some other radio and TV broadcasting authorities. The press is free in UK, but the radio and the TV broadcasting are subject to state control.

The communication media of UK press, broadcasting and TV are some of the most influential in the entire world. In UK there are four quality daily papers: The Times, The Guardian, The Financial Times and last but not least, The Daily Telegraph. These four daily papers contain a variety of national, european and international news, business news, sport news, art reviews and fashion features. The papers present some different political views and different political orientations, but none of them is organ of the political parties.

The Times is a well-known daily paper in UK and it is not a government newspaper. The Times is an independent paper including serious editorials presenting some independent views regarding politics. It began in 1785 under the name The Daily Universal Register and changed its name in 1788. The Times features news for the first half of the paper; the Opinion/Comment section begins after the first news section with world news following. The business pages begin on the center spread, and are followed by The Register, containing obituaries, a Court & Social section, and other related material. The sport section is at the end of the paper.

The Daily Telegraph is a daily paper, read by those whose political opinions are right-winged and conservative. Founded in 1855 as the Daily Telegraph and Courier, the paper was later renamed The Daily Telegraph and transformed into London’s first penny paper. The newspaper has consistently combined a high standard of reporting with the selection of interesting feature articles and editorial presentation.

The Guardian is in general a daily paper of the left orientation, therefore being a socialist paper. The Guardian is part of the Guardian Media Group. The paper's readership is generally on the mainstream left of British political opinion. The Guardian's print edition has an average daily circulation of approximately 160 thousand copies in the whole country, just a little behind The Times and The Daily Telegraph.

The Financial Times publishes business news on a daily basis. The paper was founded in 1888 by James Sheridan and Horatio Bottomley, and merged in 1945 with its closest rival, the Financial News. The Financial Times, through its printed copies and its website has an average daily readership of 2 million people worldwide.

Beside the four quality papers, in the UK there are also popular papers (tabloids) like the Daily Mirror and the Sun. The articles in the tabloids mostly deal with scandals, advertisements, scandalous news about pop stars of actors. Press in the United Kingdom is not censored, but all editors are responsible for the content they are publishing.

Press in the United States of America includes different types of media, like the television channels, the radio posts, the newspapers, the magazines, and the Internet news sites.

With the passage of the American Telecommunications Act in 1996, different types of media have emerged, thus concentrating the media ownership, along with the emergence of media conglomerates. Now, there are five American corporations which control approximately 90% of the American media.

The newspapers have registered a decrease in their influence and penetration over the last few years. The United States of America does not have a national paper, but the most important newspapers are the New York Times, USA Today and the Wall Street Journal. These three are the most circulated newspapers in the USA, copies of them being sold in most of the cities.

The New York Times' primary audience has always been people from New York City, but the newspaper has become the dominant national newspaper. The New York Times has daily distribution nationwide, and back issues of the newspaper are archived on microfilm by most public libraries and articles from the newspaper are cited as evidence that a historical event of major importance has occurred on a specific date.

The Wall Street Journal is also a daily newspaper based in the town of New York City. As a complement to the printed version, The Wall Street Journal Online, was launched back in 1996 allowing access only to subscribing users.

USA Today was on the market since 1980 and has always tried to establish itself as a national paper, but the manner in which the newspaper synthesizes the news has not helped. Even if USA Today is known as a daily newspaper, it does not print on weekend days, as the Friday edition of the newspaper serves as a weekend edition.

Besides the three major newspapers, all metropolitan areas publish local newspapers. Usually a metropolitan area supports one or two newspapers and small publications which target specific audiences.

With some exceptions, all of the newspapers in the United States of America are owned by private companies, either by big corporations which own lots of publications and newspapers or by small companies which own only a limited number of publications and newspapers.

The USA media today is frequently known as the Fourth Estate, an appellation that suggests the press shares equal stature with the other branches of government created by the Constitution. The press plays a vital role as a guardian of USA democracy. That role is guaranteed by the First Amendment to the USA Constitution, adopted in 1789, stipulating that Congress not enact any laws abridging freedom of the press.

Political differentiation of the media is one of the most important differences among media systems and is something that generally divides the United States (and Canada) from most of Europe.

Many of the European newspapers are connected to the political parties or to other organized social groups, whose views they are representing in the public sphere. The American press, unlike the press in most of the Europe, is primarily a local, monopoly press. In the mid-20th century, competition among a dwindling number of papers in each city led their owners to avoid identification with particular political orientations.

BIBLIOGRAFIE

Lewis J., Williams A., Franklin B., Thomas J., Mosdell N. (2008), The Quality and Independence of British Journalism, available online at: http://online.fliphtml5.com/bwzm/ctyd/