Modern Television Research Articles

The Ashgate Research Companion to Monsters and the Monstrous (Asa Simon Mittman and Peter J. Dendle, eds.)

<i>The Ashgate Research Companion to Monsters and the Monstrous</i> (Asa Simon Mittman and Peter J. Dendle, eds.)

Digital Simulation Television Technology Show the Chinese Culture

By using modern television technology, we could create great film and television works by combine the technology and the film art perfectly. The movie Avatar lead a revolution of television technology. In this article, we will focus on the how to make film and television works which contain the Chinese culture.

The Otolith Group’s “Monuments to Dead Television.” Independent Cinema and the Migrant Experience in Europe between Television and the Museum

“Monument to dead television” is the expression the British collective The Otolith Group uses to define its activity of recuperating long-lost quality films, and re-screening them in contemporary art museums and gallery spaces. What these films share is a cinematic vocation and a complex approach to the question of memory and migration in Europe, and to the role of images as testimonies or documents. This essay explores The Otolith Group’s interest in such forgotten archives of modern television in order to unearth their significance for contemporary museums today.

Forensic Microbiology

The field of forensic science has obtained notoriety due, in part, to several sensational court cases, such as the murder trial of O. J. Simpson and the involuntary manslaughter conviction trial of Michael Jackson's physician, Conrad Murray, which captured national attention. In addition, although their roles are not always adequately portrayed, several modern television programs have brought to life the roles forensic scientists play in the criminal justice system. Forensic science encompasses many different areas. Most people are aware of DNA analysis, toxicology, fingerprint comparison, and ballistics, to mention a few. A newer area of forensic science is forensic microbiology. A landmark event in U.S. history, the Bacillus anthracis bioterrorism event in 2001, brought this field of science to the forefront. Forensic microbiology had been practiced before the anthrax event, and forensic microbiology involves more than just bioterror. This article discusses some of the roles that microbiology plays in forensic science.

Television’s “Crazy Lady” Trope: Female Psychopathic Traits, Teaching, and Influence of Popular Culture

This article describes notable illustrations of female psychopathy on modern television to review various characters that will have utility in teaching students about female psychopathy in distinction to male psychopathy and to encourage consideration of the potential effects that viewing these countless examples may have on a generation of young women. The authors use examples from soap operas, crime procedurals, reality television, fantasy, comedies, and young adult programs to illustrate gender differences in psychopathy and make specific teaching points. They also review the research literature related to popular culture's impact on behavior and gender roles. Gender differences in real-world psychopathy are mirrored in television portrayals. For example, female psychopaths, on TV and in reality, use sexual manipulation, demonstrate unstable emotions, and employ social aggression to achieve their ambitions. The examples of female psychopathic traits are prevalent on TV and easily accessible for teaching purposes. Research does give some support for a popular culture impact on behavior and gender roles. As compared to male psychopathy, female psychopathy is less recognized, and there are some notable differences in how the psychopathic traits manifest. Television provides myriad teaching examples that can highlight the gender distinctions such as use of sexual manipulation, emotional instability, and social aggression. Research suggests that the prevalence of "crazy ladies" on television may be negatively impacting gender stereotypes and normalizing bad behavior in young women.

Radigost: Interoperable web-based multi-agent platform

Recent improvements of web development technologies, commonly referred to as HTML5, have resulted in an excellent framework for developing a fully-featured, purely web-based multi-agent platform. This paper presents an architecture of such a platform, named Radigost. Radigost agents and parts of the system itself are implemented in JavaScript and executed inside the client's web browser, while an additional set of Java-based components is deployed on an enterprise application server. Radigost is platform-independent, capable of running, without any prior installation or configuration steps, on a wide variety of software and hardware configurations, including personal computers, smartphones, tablets, and modern television sets. The system is standards-compliant and fully interoperable, in the sense that its agents can transparently interact with agents in existing, third-party multi-agent solutions. Finally, performance evaluation results show that the execution speed of Radigost is comparable to that of a non web-based implementation.

The pinnacle of Soviet modernism

The Moscow television tower, built between 1963 and 1967, could be compared with Iofan’s famous design for the Palace of Soviets. Both were in fact conceived in order to achieve, by means of a sophisticated structure, a record height to bear witness to the greatness of their country. However, apart from that similarity, the two towers are completely different and can be taken as models of Stalinist realism and of the ‘modernism’ which followed it under Khrushchev’s rule. The intention to build a town of extraordinary height in order to reach the whole of the Muscovite region, the most populous in the country, with modern television messages was in fact perfectly consistent with the period in which the design was conceived of and implemented. This consistency is borne out by the numerous echoes of the cold war, which can be seen in the history of the design, the construction site and the building: ranging from Fritz Leonhardt’s consulting services to the Solaris film set.

비선형 편집 소프트웨어의 개선방향

Non-linear editing is an editing method that, unlike linear editing, enables users to insert a new frame between existing frames. Non-linear editing systems are systems that support such method, and are composed of a computer, a software and a capture board that inputs/outputs video signals. Non-linear editing is used for modern television broadcasts and movie productions. Recorded footage and various graphic sources are combined into one visual content through a non-linear editing system. In this paper, we will look into functions of various non-linear editing softwares (mainly the most common of all; Adobe Premiere) as well as their merits and demerits during the editing process, and will also discuss their future Improvement direction.

From Documentary Film to Television Documentaries: John Grierson and This Wonderful World

In October 1957, John Grierson, the founder of the British documentary film movement, made the transition to a new medium: television. His series for STV, This Wonderful World, which ran in its original form until August 1965, introduced audiences to international documentary in an ‘inter-generic’ magazine format and was among the most popular broadcasts of the fledgling station, which was formed in August 1957 following the introduction of Independent Television (ITV) in 1954. This article analyses how cinematic documentarists made the transition to television and what their experiences reveal of the documentary's place in British society in the 1950s and 1960s. It argues that Grierson's series stood at the centre of debates over ‘prestige’ programming and ‘cultural uplift’, as well as over fears of the allegedly negative influence of ITV on the mass audience, and shows how British television negotiated an increasingly global media and the emergence of the modern television personality. It concludes with an examination of the legacy of early British documentary on television and demonstrates how its pioneers exploited the memory of the 1930s in order to carve out their place in the genre's history.

Frame Synchronization for the DTMB Systems with the Multiple-Antenna Receivers

Faced with the challenges of modern communication, high data throughput requirements, extensive research has been paid to broadband modulation. The multi-carrier modulation is one of the most important wide band modulation techniques. Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) is an effective blow to the broadcast channel multipath fading and high bit rate transmission multi-carrier modulation technology of wireless channels, it is widely used in modern digital television terrestrial broadcasting (DTTB) system to support performance bandwidth-efficient multimedia services with the aid of inverse fast Fourier transform and fast Fourier transform operation. Multiple-antenna transmitter and receiver technology allows several times to achieve data transmission rates and spectrum efficiency and the use of multiple transmit antennas and multiple receive antennas through spatial processing. The Digital Terrestrial Multimedia Broadcasting (DTMB) system with the multiple-antenna receiver is considered in this paper. Digital Terrestrial Multimedia Broadcasting (DTMB) has three kinds of Frame Head mode with PN420/PN595/PN945 as training sequences for the time domain synchronous OFDM (TDS-OFDM). At the receiver side with multiple antennas, Frame Head mode detection should be done. In this paper, the frame synchronization scheme is proposed for the DTMB systems with the multiple-antenna receiver. System performance studies under different channel situations are used to verify the efficiency of the proposed scheme for the DTMB systems with the multiple-antenna receiver.

Frame Head Mode Detection and Symbol Detection Scheme for Digital Terrestrial Multimedia Broadcasting Systems

As an effective technique for combating multipath fading and for high-bit-rate transmission over wireless channels, orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) is extensively used in modern digital television terrestrial broadcasting (DTTB) systems to support high performance bandwidth-efficient multimedia services. Chinese digital television terrestrial broadcasting standard recommends three kinds of Frame Head mode with PN420/PN595/PN945 as training sequences for the time domain synchronous OFDM (TDS-OFDM) based Digital Terrestrial Multimedia Broadcasting (DTMB) systems. At the receiver side, Frame Head mode detection and symbol detection should be done before subsequent synchronization and channel estimation. In this paper, a Frame Head mode detection and symbol detection scheme robust to carrier frequency offset is proposed for the TDS-OFDM based DTMB systems. Performance studies under different channel situations are used to verify the efficiency of the proposed scheme.

A Comedy of Scientific Errors

William Shakespeare may well have foreshadowed the modern television sitcom. His comic misadventures were expertly crafted. In A Comedy of Errors , for example, twins (with twin servants), each separated at birth, converge unbeknownst to each other in the same town. Mistaken identity leads to miscommunication. More mistaken identity follows, with more misdelivered messages and yet more misinterpretations. Hilarious consequences ensue. It is a stock comedic formula in modern entertainment. A character first makes an unintentional error. Then ironically, in trying to correct it, things only get laughably worse. Science, we imagine, is safeguarded against such embarrassing episodes. In the lore of scientists, echoed among teachers, science is “self-correcting.” Replication, in particular, ensures that errors are exposed for what they are. Research promptly returns to its fruitful trajectory. Serious stuff, science. But just such a case of compounded error occurred in science in the late 18th century. Joseph Priestley discovered that plants can restore the “goodness” of air that had been fouled by animals or combustion. But others could not replicate his results. Even Priestley himself. After further work, Priestley attributed the observed effect to a different cause – only to find later that the new conclusion itself was mistaken! For us now, the story seems amusing, but it is also nonetheless instructive. The case invites us to reconsider the sacred bovine that science is “self-correcting,” especially due to failures of replication. Indeed, this reassessment leads us deeper into reflecting on our romantic idealizations of science, an enduring legacy of Priestley’s Enlightenment period, centuries ago. The story begins in the early 1770s, in Leeds, England. Joseph Priestley – minister, avid experimentalist, and self-taught chemist – had been investigating various kinds of air. At this time, he was examining various ways of making air noxious: by the putrefaction of dead mice …

Convergent Critical Rhetoric at the “Rally to Restore Sanity”: Exploring the Intersection of Rhetoric, Ethnography, and Documentary Production

This essay offers convergent critical rhetoric as an approach to critical television studies. Constructed through a combination of rhetoric, ethnography, and documentary filmmaking, the approach encourages critics to utilize the logic of production to illuminate participatory practices in media. We use the “Rally to Restore Sanity,” hosted by Jon Stewart of The Daily Show, as an exemplar. Through a combination of an academic essay and a short film, we examine the voice of participants at the rally, who questioned the polarized climate of the modern television industry. Using our approach, we found that attendee participation in the spectacle enacted a critique of “The Media” and the politics of profit-motivated news production. We close the essay with a discussion of limitations and future directions of the approach.

The role of the media in empowering minority identities: Basque-language radio during the Franco dictatorship (1960s–1976) and their influence as identity catalysts

The Spanish Civil War ended with the imposition of a dictatorship (1939–75). During those years, Spanish was the only official language throughout Spain. However, in the 1960s the Basque language (spoken in the Basque Country, between Spain and France) would enter into the sphere of public communication thanks to the new rising media. Nevertheless, the Basque language was still generally viewed as a poor and marginal language. This article’s main object of study is the Popular Radio of Loyola, located in the province of Gipuzkoa. This radio station was the first general-service broadcasting medium using the Basque language, and the precursor of the modern Basque Radio and Television Corporation (EITB).

From Blubber and Baleen to Buddha of the Deep: The Rise of the Metaphysical Whale

AbstractHuman attitudes to various nonhuman animals have varied considerably across cultures and throughout time. While some of our responses are undoubtedly instinctive and universal—a visceral fear of large carnivores or the feeling of spontaneous warmth for creatures exhibiting high degrees of neoteny—it is clear that our attitude toward specific species is largely shaped by our innate anthropomorphism: that is, when we think about animals, we are also thinking about ourselves. There are few better examples of this than the shifting attitudes toward whales and dolphins throughout the 20th century, particularly among citizens of Western democracies. This article narrates the cultural history of this development and demonstrates how the current enchantment with whales and dolphins is primarily the result of two broad—and related—cultural developments: the modern entertainment complex, particularly cinema, television, and aquatic theme parks; and the 1960s counterculture, with its potent blend of holistic ecology, speculative neuroscience, and mysticism. The result was the creation of what we might think of as the “metaphysical whale,” a creature who has inspired the abolitionist stance toward whaling.

DVR Pilot Study: Measuring Uses and Gratifications of Digital Video Recorders in Modern Television Viewing

The use of digital video recorders (DVRs) has caused concern among advertisers and the television industry. Many have argued that the 30-second ad is no longer effective because users of digital video recorders are fastforwarding though commercials. This denies the potential actual usage of the DVR in modern television viewing. Bio-metric research has suggested that it is not the behavior of fast-forwarding that matters most, but actual viewing patterns and choices viewers make coupled with memories of previously-viewed advertisements. In the process of fast-forwarding, viewers must pay attention to passing images and are capable of not only recognizing advertisements but altering their viewing to incorporate DVR use. DVRs are used in order to view specific advertising content based on multiple factors, including past emotional memories. Visual cues within advertising are often provocative enough to stimulate action – stopping viewers from fast-forwarding through ads. Still, the idea persists that when viewers do fast-forward through television advertisements, the ads have a reduced effectiveness. This broad assumption ignores the fact that DVR owners report watching more television, using their DVRs for the primary benefit of time shifting – and not fast-forwarding through advertising. The central motivation for using DVR technology is the ability to watch programming at convenient times. In attempting to avoid advertising, most viewers do, in fact, pay attention to their TV screens. Doing so may result in viewers inadvertently paying even more attention to advertising messages.

Efficient data replication for the delivery of high-quality video content over P2P VoD advertising networks

Recent advances in modern television systems have had profound consequences for the scalability, stability, and quality of transmitted digital data signals. This is of particular significance for peer-to-peer (P2P) video-on-demand (VoD) related platforms, faced with an immediate and growing demand for reliable service delivery. In response to demands for high-quality video, the key objectives in the construction of the proposed framework were user satisfaction with perceived video quality and the effective utilization of available resources on P2P VoD networks. This study developed a peer-based promoter to support online advertising in P2P VoD networks based on an estimation of video distortion prior to the replication of data stream chunks. The proposed technology enables the recovery of lost video using replicated stream chunks in real time. Load balance is achieved by adjusting the replication level of each candidate group according to the degree-of-distortion, thereby enabling a significant reduction in server load and increased scalability in the P2P VoD system. This approach also promotes the use of advertising as an efficient tool for commercial promotion. Results indicate that the proposed system efficiently satisfies the given fault tolerances.

Accomodating Pre-Compressed Digital Audio in the Modern Television Plant

Television production and distribution plants are increasingly tasked to handle, manipulate, and transport multichannel audio packages that have been already compressed using one of a variety of technologies. This paper examines the various sources of impairments and errors in the handling and transport of these precompressed audio packages in video synchronization, processing, and encoding situations.

The Peculiarities of Modern Television Speech

The article surveys the state of modern on- air speech illustrated by the examples of the programs with substandard vocabulary and examines the language behavior of modern presenters.

The Chinese Ugly Betty: TV cloning and local modernity

This article examines the themes inherent in the serial Ugly Wudi, a Chinese version of the Ugly Betty. By comparing the Chinese version with its American counterpart, conducting interviews with producers of Ugly Wudi and audience focus groups, this article analyses the modifications made by the producers in Ugly Wudi. After conducting in-depth interviews with the producers, examining audience reactions and analysing the context of the show, the authors argue that the modifications in the Chinese version are deliberately made to suit the local understanding and acceptance of modern television dramas. Unlike Ugly Betty, Ugly Wudi is positioned within a more politically restrictive but rapidly liberalizing economic climate. Thus Ugly Wudi bears the marks of attempts to merge the demands of market forces with those of the paternalistic state, as its producers seek to embrace the global popular aesthetics of modern television dramas.