News

===Radio and television===
The [[British Broadcasting Company]] began transmitting radio news from London in 1922, dependent entirely, by law, on the British news agencies.<ref name=Allen26>Allan, ''News Culture'' (2004), pp. 26–27.</ref> BBC radio marketed itself as a news by and for social elites, and hired only broadcasters who spoke with upper-class accents.<ref>Wood, ''History of International Broadcasting'' (1992), p. 31. "It was quite normal for the average listener to be depicted as dressed immaculately in full evening dress, seated or standing elegantly with an expensive brand of cigarette in his hand, listening to his set. The BBC was happy to live up to this stereotype. Radio announces always arrived in evening dress, and announcers were chosen from the upper classes of English society. More importantly, they had to be able to speak the King's English just as the King spoke it."</ref> The BBC gained importance in the May 1926 general strike, during which newspapers were closed and the radio served as the only source of news for an uncertain public. (To the displeasure of many listeners, the BBC took an unambiguously pro-government stance against the strikers).<ref name=Allen26 /><ref>Wood, ''History of International Broadcasting'' (1992), pp. 33–34.</ref>

In the US, RCA's Radio Group established its radio network, NBC, in 1926. The Paley family founded CBS soon after. These two networks, which supplied news broadcasts to subsidiaries and affiliates, dominated the airwaves throughout the period of radio's hegemony as a news source.<ref>Straubhaar and LaRose, ''Communications Media in the Information Society'' (1997), pp. 177–178.</ref> Radio broadcasters in the United States negotiated a similar arrangement with the press in 1933, when they agreed to use only news from the Press–Radio Bureau and eschew advertising; this agreement soon collapsed and radio stations began reporting their own news (with advertising).<ref>Allan, ''News Culture'' (2004), p. 33.</ref> As in Britain, American news radio avoided "controversial" topics as per norms established by the [[National Association of Broadcasters]].<ref name=Allen34>Allan, ''News Culture'' (2004), p. 34.</ref> By 1939, 58% of Americans surveyed by ''Fortune'' considered radio news more accurate than newspapers, and 70% chose radio as their main news source.<ref name=Allen34 /> Radio expanded rapidly across the continent, from 30 stations in 1920 to a thousand in the 1930s. This operation was financed mostly with advertising and public relations money.<ref>Wood, ''History of International Broadcasting'' (1992), p. 27. "Thus WEAF planted the seeds of a new business that eventually grew to envelop the broadcasting industry: advertising, public relations, and propaganda. From about 1927 this revolution was under way. Advertising agencies, manufacturers, sponsors, promoters, and the sellers of medical and life insurance were jockeying for places in a world of propaganda disseminated by radio broadcasting."</ref>

The Soviet Union began a major international broadcasting operation in 1929, with stations in German, English and French. The [[Nazi Party]] made use of the radio in its rise to power in Germany, with much of its propaganda focused on attacking the Soviet Bolsheviks. The British and Italian foreign radio services competed for influence in North Africa. All four of these broadcast services grew increasingly vitriolic as the European nations prepared for war.<ref>Wood, ''History of International Broadcasting'' (1992), pp. 38–42.</ref>

The war provided an opportunity to expand radio and take advantage of its new potential. The BBC reported on [[Normandy landings|Allied invasion of Normandy]] on 8:00&nbsp;a.m. of the morning it took place, and including a clip from German radio coverage of the same event. Listeners followed along with developments throughout the day.<ref>Allan, ''News Culture'' (2004), p. 29.</ref> The U.S. set up its [[United States Office of War Information|Office of War Information]] which by 1942 sent programming across South America, the Middle East, and East Asia.<ref>Wood, ''History of International Broadcasting'' (1992), p. 51.</ref> [[Radio Luxembourg (English)|Radio Luxembourg]], a centrally located high-power station on the continent, was [[Germany Calling|seized by Germany]], and then [[Radio 1212|by the United States]]—which created [[fake news]] programs appearing as though they were created by Germany.<ref>Wood, ''History of International Broadcasting'' (1992), pp. 45.</ref> Targeting American troops in the Pacific, the Japanese government broadcast the "[[The Zero Hour (World War II)|Zero Hour]]" program, which included news from the U.S. to make the soldiers homesick.<ref>Wood, ''History of International Broadcasting'' (1992), pp. 87–91.</ref> But by the end of the war, Britain had the largest radio network in the world, broadcasting internationally in 43 different languages.<ref>Wood, ''History of International Broadcasting'' (1992), pp. 39, 105.</ref> Its scope would eventually be surpassed (by 1955) by the worldwide [[Voice of America]] programs, produced by the [[United States Information Agency]].<ref>Wood, ''History of International Broadcasting'' (1992), pp. 108–114, 132.</ref>

In Britain and the United States, television news watching rose dramatically in the 1950s and by the 1960s supplanted radio as the public's primary source of news.<ref>Allan, ''News Culture'' (2004), p. 42–44.</ref> In the U.S., television was run by the same networks which owned radio: CBS, NBC, and an NBC spin-off called ABC.<ref>Straubhaar and LaRose, ''Communications Media in the Information Society'' (1997), p. 209.</ref> [[Edward R. Murrow]], who first entered the public ear as a war reporter in London, made the big leap to television to become an iconic newsman on CBS (and later the director of the United States Information Agency).<ref>Straubhaar and LaRose, ''Communications Media in the Information Society'' (1997), pp. 179, 210.</ref>

[[Ted Turner]]'s creation of the [[Cable News Network]] (CNN) in 1980 inaugurated a new era of [[24-hour news cycle|24-hour]] satellite news broadcasting. In 1991, the BBC introduced a competitor, [[BBC World Service Television]]. Rupert Murdoch's Australian [[News Corporation (1980–2013)|News Corporation]] entered the picture with [[Fox News Channel]] in the US, [[Sky News]] in Britain, and [[Fox Networks Group Asia Pacific|STAR TV]] in Asia.<ref name=McNair108 /> Combining this new apparatus with the use of [[Embedded journalism|embedded reporters]], the United States waged the 1991–1992 [[Gulf War]] with the assistance of nonstop [[Media coverage of the Gulf War|media coverage]].<ref>Hachten, ''World News Prism'' (1996), p. 34.</ref> CNN's specialty is the [[crisis]], to which the network is prepared to shift its total attention if so chosen.<ref name=HachtenCNN>Hachten, ''World News Prism'' (1996), pp. 45–48. "When a major crisis breaks out overseas, ABC, CBS, and NBC will issue news bulletins and then go back to scheduled programming and perhaps do a late-evening wrap-up, but CNN stays on the air for long stretches of time continually updating the story. The networks' version of the story will be seen in the United States; CNN's version will be seen all over the world."</ref> CNN news was transmitted via [[INTELSAT]] communications satellites.<ref>Hachten, ''World News Prism'' (1996), pp. 54–55.</ref> CNN, said an executive, would bring a "town crier to the global village".<ref name=Tomlinson />

In 1996, the Qatar-owned broadcaster [[Al Jazeera Media Network|Al Jazeera]] emerged as a powerful alternative to the Western media, capitalizing in part on anger in the Arab & Muslim world regarding biased coverage of the Gulf War. Al Jazeera hired many news workers conveniently laid off by [[BBC Arabic Television]], which closed in April 1996. It used [[Arabsat]] to broadcast.<ref name=McNair108>McNair, ''Cultural Chaos'' (2006), pp. 108–114.</ref>