ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book focuses on what is wrong with them and why, and on how they may be made better. It describes the information and entertainment functions of media; it sets forth a central proposition: that the media must be regarded as a single interlocking system in which no element stands apart. The book discusses the dependence of the media system upon advertising, shows how advertising affects its substance and form, and points to some of the fallacies that underlie its preoccupation with audience size. It reviews and appraises the discouraging consequences of this obsession in its injection of banality and sensation into media content and its tendency to erode the distinction between the reality of journalism and the fictions of pastime entertainment. The book traces the transformation of media support from advertising to consumers and the growing preeminence of entertainment over information.
