Page 446 - Battleground The Media Volume 1 and 2

Real ty Telev s on |

see also Cable Carriage Disputes; Hypercommercialism; Innovation and Imita-
tion in Commercial Media; Media Reform; Minority Media Ownership; Net
Neutrality; Online Digital Film and Television; Public Opinion; Represen-
tations of Race; Representations of Women; Sensationalism, Fear Monger-
ing, and Tabloid Media; Shock Jocks; Transmedia Storytelling and Media
Franchises.
Further reading: Ang, Ien. Desperately Seeking the Audience. New York: Routledge,
1991; Bates, James, and Matthew James. “Political Opposites Costar in a TV Ratings
Drama; Murdoch’s News Corp. and a Minority Coalition Seek to Delay New System
for Counting Viewers.” Los Angeles Times, June 3, 2004, A1; Bermejo, Fernando. The
Internet Audience: Constitution and Measurement. New York: Peter Lang, 2007; Bianco,
Anthony, and Ronald Grover. “How Nielsen Stood up to Murdoch.” Business Week,
September 20, 2004, 88; Buzzard, Karen S. Chains of Gold: Marketing the Ratings and Rat-
ing the Market. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow, 1990; Napoli, Philip M. Audience Economics:
Media Institutions and the Audience Marketplace. New York: Columbia University Press,
2003; Webster, James G., Patricia F. Phalen, and Lawrence W. Lichty. Ratings Analysis:
The Theory and Practice of Audience Research, 3rd ed. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum
Associations, 2005.
Philip M. Napoli

reality teleVision
From the evolving Survivor series to Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, the
phenomenon known as reality TV has transformed the face of television and
changed the way programs are produced, distributed, and consumed. For more
than a decade, reality TV has exerted considerable influence on media econom-
ics, program aesthetics, and industry practices, and raised critical issues for par-
ticipants and viewers alike. Reality TV has become a battleground for media
observers and critics, who charge that these popular programs expose private
spaces, encourage voyeurism, and claim that entertainment is reality in competi-
tions that often lead to ridicule and humiliation.
Reality television is simultaneously a genre, a format, a technological form, a
series of experiments, a celebrity-making machine, an interactive aesthetic, and
a political ideology. While its history is contested and its boundaries are fuzzy,
reality TV is without doubt one of the most significant developments in twenty-
first-century media.

PrEDECEssors
Many of the characteristics found in reality TV can be found in TV programs
from decades ago. Bringing cameras into people’s everyday lives as entertain-
ment can be traced back to shows like Queen for a Day and This Is Your Life
in the 1950s. This attention to “ordinary people” could later be found in Real
People and That’s Incredible!, shows that highlighted unusual abilities. Daytime
talk shows continued this focus on everyday lives, as well as featuring “make-
over” segments (central to later reality TV). America’s Funniest Home Videos and