Technological Innovation And The Great Depression by Richard Szostak

Author:Richard Szostak [Szostak, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, General
ISBN: 9781000314052
Google: -02fDwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2019-06-21T03:02:45+00:00

Television

While many view television as having sprung to life fully developed in the postwar period, and others see it as developing naturally from the 1920s, there were a number of fake starts and dead ends along the way. A number of different elements, engineering, marketing, and programming, had to be brought together. The road to television can be said to begin with the scientific discovery in 1883 that the resistance of selenium varied with light. This, along with the introduction of the telephone, encouraged a surge of research in the 1880s (Burns, 1991:183). In the Nipkow disk of 1884, light hit selenium through a rotating spiral of holes. Thus, a moving picture could potentially be transmitted as electronic signals. The selenium reacted much too slowly, however. After problems of amplification and the slow reaction time of the selenium cell were worked out, the cathode ray tube was developed in 1891. These tubes had a variety of uses (the development of electronics itself required a device capable of displaying the waveform of electronic signals) and spawned another epoch of technical enquiry. In 1905 the photo-electrical cell was devised, based on the work of Hertz; it provided much quicker reaction than selenium. In the same year, Einstein used quantum theory to explain the photoelectric effect.

The development of the radiotelegraph from the 1890s created the possibility of television broadcasting. In the pre-World War One era, the entertainment potential of TV was not recognized (as with radio); scientific, military, and industrial motives dominated. A facsimile machine was available shortly after World War One; moving pictures were much more difficult. The technical difficulties to be overcome were much greater than those required for radio. Cameras had to be developed, the cathode ray tube had to be improved, the signal had to be amplified, transmission and reception needed to be synchronized, and methods of broadcasting developed. The development of radio itself in the 1920s solved some of television’s problems. Still, the further development costs involved were so large that radio companies were very wary of financing research in the 1920s, especially as radio profits were so high (MacLaurin, 1949:196).11

Still, the first efforts at commercial television emerged in 1925 in both the United States and Europe. The fact that inventors in England and the United States unveiled different techniques within months is evidence of the considerable incremental research occurring at the time (Udelson, 1982: 27–8). There was a miniature boom in television after that. In 1928, there were about 15 television stations in the United States, most operated by manufacturers. They broadcast experimental-type pictures. Most receivers could only handle video; it was hoped that television would stimulate radio sales. Christmas shoppers were assured that year that television would not render radio obsolete. Programming included singing, vaudeville, sports, news, and movies. By 1933 this boomlet had collapsed, but not, it should be noted, due to any financial difficulties. The reason was the poor picture quality compared to that of motion pictures. The main drawback was mechanical scanning. The essence of television is that the picture be scanned rapidly (usually in lines, from left to right).

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