The invention of the television created history in the field of entertainment when it was invented by John Logie Baird in 1923. Television broadcasts were initiated formally in 1929. Several programmes of entertainment and educational importance are telecast on the television. With the liberalization of the global economy, advertisements have formed an inherent part of the revenue gathered by the television. These advertisements form the principal source of revenue for private operators who are to compete with national establishments and governmental organisations and other private operators in the race to grab attention from spectators.
Programming in television is usually a mixture of programmes for general channels, but in case of news channels, news forms the main content. The advertisements relayed in between regular news relays forms the main source of revenue. The programmes should be potent enough to grab the attention of viewers and keep it the aim of all the programmes aired on the television is to keep the attention of the viewers fixed on the television set long enough to form an impression on him or her through the advertisement shown. This way, the television, or media professionals get to decide what the4 public should watch on the television or in television programmes. They become the managers of the content.
There is very little or no avenue for a feedback in mass media, this makes the media barons and professionals the kings when it comes to delivering content. The loss of values and degradation of values in terms of the media, that is usually attributed to the media and the public that is believed to get what it wants, is actually a product of media professionals. It is they who decide on the menu to be served to the masses.
Avenues of feedback are very limited in mass communication. This leaves very few opportunities for the media barons to know how popular their programmes are or how much they are disliked. Rather, it is the media professionals and media barons who decide what the public should watch and what impact the programmes would have on the masses.
Their decisions are facilitated by the businesses they aim to promote through their programmes on the television. All programmes on the television are meant to hold the attention of the viewer so long enough to make him or her watch the advertisements. The advertisements are supposed to have a persuasive effect on the audience; they are supposed to make them buy a product by acting on their psychology and thinking.
The programmes aired on the television are relayed on such timings that the target audience can spare some time to watch the programmes or rather the advertisements. For instance, cartoons are aired at the time when most children are getting ready for breakfast before leaving for school. This would ensure children on dining tables insisting on television sets being turned on while they have their breakfasts. The advertisements between such cartoons are also meant to persuade children to try on certain products and toys like fruit juices and cookies. Likewise, when ladies are usually free from household chores, they find themselves witnessing plots unfurling in soaps with melodrama at its best. There is always an element of pathos in these dramas that ladies enjoy. The commercials aired between such soaps are usually of products ladies love to use.