Conceptualizing Media and Development

Abstract

Mass media is a term used to denote a section of the media specifically envisioned and designed to reach a very large audience such as the population of a nation state. It was coined in the 1920s with the advent of nationwide radio networks, mass-circulation newspapers and magazines, although mass media was present centuries before the term became common. The term ;p'ublic media has a similar meaning: It is the sum 0 the public mass distributors of news and entertainment across such media as newspapers, television, radio, broadcasting, which may require union membership further by the large markets such as Newspaper Guild, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) and text publishers. The concept of mass media is complicated further by the emergence of leT and convergence such that internet media is available to individuals as a means of potential exposure on a scale incomparable to what was previously restricted to select a group of mass media producers.