ABSTRACT
The rhythm of change in the media does not resemble the regularity of the seasons. Thus the period 1900 to 1940 was a time of rapid transformation, when the hegemony of print, music-hall and piano was undermined by the rise of film, radio and gramophone (to say nothing of television, which first broadcast in Britain in 1936). By contrast, the following forty-year period was an era of relative stability, marked by a reshuffling of the media pack. Between 1940 and 1980, television became the principal mass medium, other media were demoted, and the transistor radio, Walkman and video recorder became popular media accessories. However, after 1980, the pace of change again quickened. The desktop computer became a mass medium; the internet and web came into their own; television channels – satellite, cable and digital terrestrial – mushroomed; production techniques changed across the media; and computer and video games won a mass following. Still greater innovations, we are told, are waiting in the wings. This acceleration of change was fuelled by new communications technol-
ogy. The invention of microprocessors brought into being powerful, compact computers, and facilitated the creation of the internet. Satellites orbiting in space and relaying information between terminals on earth, and fibre-optic cable systems transmitting coded impulses of light down hair-like strands of glass, transformed the carriage of communications. Above all, the digitization of communications (the conversion of words, numbers, sounds and images into electronic binary digits) initiated a chain reaction of innovation that still continues today. Digitization reduced production costs dramatically in many media industries. It offered enormous advantages in terms of compressing, storing, editing, copying and distributing communications. It enabled more digital television channels to be transmitted on the same spectrum. It also allowed new forms of interconnectivity to take place. For instance, it is now technically possible to email friends through an advanced television set, watch a video on a mobile phone, or view television on a computer. It is
this potential for convergence – the coming together of different media technologies – that is giving rise to forecasts of imminent transformation. New media, we are told, are remaking the world. According to the New
Labour government, in 2000: ‘The explosion of information has fuelled a democratic revolution of knowledge and active citizenship. If information is power, power can now be within the grasp of everyone.’1 Its cheerleading White Paper A New Future for Communications descanted eloquently on the way in which new communications technology is expanding choice, extending media diversity (including the creation of over 250 new television channels in twenty years), and increasing pluralism of media ownership. Future developments, it concluded, will move us towards ‘full and sustainable competition’ in the broadcasting industry. The government’s positive reading of technology-driven media expansion provided the main rationale for its decision to accelerate deregulation through its 2003 Communications Act. However, New Labour’s justification for change has a suspiciously familiar
ring. Both the Thatcher and Major governments had invoked similar arguments when they had pressed ahead with media deregulation. Yet, the pace and impact of media change do not seem to match the forecasts that were made at the time. It is worth looking more carefully at what was predicted and what actually
happened. The wisdom of hindsight is a useful corrective to uncritical acceptance of seemingly authoritative opinion, especially when this is summoned to justify important changes of public policy.
