Final Exam Study Guide

Chapters 2 and 3 - Cable History and Technical Bases - Know the history of cable television. When, where, and why did it first develop? What did it offer to subscribers in its early days? What developments later helped cable to evolve and become more successful and competitive? What role did HBO and other pay services play in the evolution of cable? What three events/actions helped cable's growth? What is narrow-casting? How did broadcasters feel about cable TV (at first and later)? What is the difference between national cable networks and local cable operators? What are the technical advantages of having cable? Be able to identify/describe head-end, trunk, feeder lines, and drop lines. What is a TVRO? What is coaxial cable? Bandwidth? Fiber optic? What does it mean to send signals upstream? Downstream? What are the drawbacks of coaxial cable? What is the impact of fiber optics and digital compression on cable TV? What is horizontal integration? What is an MSO? What is vertical integration? What’s the future of the cable industry?

Chapter 5-Cable TV Today – What are the 3 broad classifications of cable programming (know examples)? What is tiering? How do cable operators make a profit? How many homes passed (HP) are estimated? What are cable households? Pay households? Multi-pay households? Who licenses cable? What is the cable license called? What aspects of cable does the FCC regulate? What role does the local government play? What’s the average length of a cable franchise? What is must carry? What is retransmission consent? How often does the must carry/retransmission consent be renewed? Why would a station choose retransmission consent over must carry? How much of a cable system channel capacity must be reserved for must carry/retransmission consent? Know characteristics of the three alternatives to cable?

Chapter 6-The Internet and New Media Today – What is the Internet and how did it begin? What is the World Wide Web? What is ARPANET? Who spurred the development of the Internet in Europe? U.S.? What does ISP stand for? Give examples. What is HTML? What is a search engine? Give examples. What do URL and FTP stand for? Be able to identify a primary and secondary domain name. Give examples of initial and new domains. What are web browsers and e-mail? What do plug-ins do? Which modem is the fastest? What is an ISDN? What is a portal? Define a virtual community and provide an example. What are some of the ways to make money on the Web? How are traditional TV and the Web working together? Have traditional radio listeners increased or decreased? What about Internet radio listeners? What is video streaming?

Chapter 7 – The Business of Broadcasting and Cable (Advertising) – What do broadcasters sell? How do they sell it? What role do ratings play? What are the advantages of broadcast advertising? Of broadcast TV? What are the limitations of broadcast TV? What are the advantages of cable ads? Limitations? What are the advantages of radio ads? Limitations? Name and describe the three types of advertising and the advantages/disadvantages of each. What are the three options available in local advertising? What are promotional announcements? Give examples for TV and radio? What are PSAs? How does a monopoly differ from an oligopoly and pure competition? What is a rate card and how is it used? What are three basic elements used to develop a buying plan? What are gross ratings points and gross impressions? What is CPM? What is a standing order? How do upfronts differ from the scatter market? What is an adjacency? What is co-op advertising?

Chapter 12 - Ratings and Audience Feedback - What is a rating? What is a share? What is a HUT? What does HH stand for? Be able to calculate ratings, shares, and HUTs. The calculations will be very simple. What companies do radio/television ratings? What do ratings measure? What are the primary methods to gather ratings information? What is an audience? What is random sampling? What is an audimeter? What is the difference between a sample and a population? Know this for sure. What are sweeps? Which months are sweeps? How are radio ratings different from TV ratings? What's the biggest problem with dairies? What are the drawbacks of methods like coincidental telephone calls and telephone recall? What are the advantages/disadvantages of the peoplemeter?

Chapter 13 - Effects - Know that it is hard to establish causation (especially in terms of TV watching and its impact). What are the advantages of laboratory experiments? What are field experiments? What is an independent variable? What is a dependent variable? What are the characteristics of the surveys discussed in the text and in class? What is content analysis? How does the hypodermic needle theory differ from the limited-effects and special effects theories? What are the three criteria of proof to establish causal relationships? Know how TV can impact individuals…change attitudes/values, reinforcement, creation, conversion, canalization, behavior. What is the catharsis theory? What is social learning theory (observational learning)? What is aggressive cues theory/arousal theory? What is cultivation theory (George Gerbner)? What is mainstreaming? Resonance? What did George Comstock conclude about TV and aggressive behavior? What is agenda setting? What is the definition of a theory? What is uses and gratifications theory? What is dependency theory? What is the spiral of silence? What are examples of quantitative research? Qualitative research? What is a stereotype? What are the effects of TV on prosocial behavior?

© B.L. Yates 2000