ABSTRACT
This chapter is dedicated to the golden age of media. It would be expected that in this phase the dominant medium would be characterized by a context of stability and equilibrium, but it is quite the opposite: as one medium moves to a central position – like radio between the 1920s and 1950s or broadcasting television in the 1950s to 1990s – it will always be subjected to tensions and imbalances generated by other media. From the perspective of technology evolution, perhaps the concept of dominant design is the most interesting for a media evolutionary approach to media change. As in biological or technological ecosystems, in the media ecosystem, there are also dominant “species” that during their golden age can impose their own dynamics on the rest. Although in the last two decades the emergence of new media and the consequent confrontation has accelerated exponentially, in ancient times the life cycle of the media extended over centuries.
