This account of the global switch to digital television, from its origins to its emerging outcomes, provides an understanding of how digital television is converging with the Internet. It pictures a future in which the democratic role of the media, freedom of expression and democratic participation can be enhanced.

This account of the global switch to digital television, from its origins to its emerging outcomes, provides an understanding of how digital television is converging with the Internet. It pictures a future in which the democratic role of the media, freedom of expression and democratic participation can be enhanced.

Televisionaries is the captivating inside story of the digital television revolution, featuring the engineers, entrepreneurs, and media titans who made it happen. During the 1980s, conventional wisdom held that "Japan Inc." would become the leading economic power, with its new HDTV technology dominating the next generation of consumer electronics. In response, European countries funded a billion-dollar HDTV activity designed to keep the Japanese at bay. But both solutions had a fatal flaw - they were based on analog technology. With the world's eyes diverted overseas, General Instrument (GI) harbored a secret project in its San Diego labs. The notion of transforming television from its analog roots to the zeros and ones of computers was deemed impossible at the time. Undaunted, GI boldly developed the world's first digital television system, upsetting the status quo on three continents. Digital TV soon became a reality for consumers throughout the world, and the media business was forever changed.

The electronics industry is on the verge of the most dramatic advance in imaging technology since the color television. Under the banner of High Definition Television, telecommunications, broadcasting, & computer are being merged into a single digital imaging system with a wide range of exciting new applications. This timely book brings the digital "Grand Alliance," & its role as the HDTV standard, into sharp focus. One of the best respected names in the field provides an engrossing account of the technology-including key aspects of video compression-& details late breaking developments in the effort to bring this emerging technology to market.

TV Outside the Box: Trailblazing in the Digital Television Revolution explores the new and exploding universe of on-demand, OTT (Over the Top) networks: Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, Crackle, CW Seed, Vimeo, AwesomenessTV, and many more. Featuring in-depth conversations with game-changing content creators, industry mavericks, and leading cultural influencers, TV Outside the Box is essential reading for anyone interested in the dynamics of a global media revolution – while it’s happening. Readers will discover: How the new "disruptors" of traditional television models are shaping the future of the television and feature film business. You’ll hear directly from the visionaries behind it all – from concept genesis to predictions for the future of streaming platforms; their strategies for acquisitions and development of new original content; and how the revolution is providing unprecedented opportunities for both established and emerging talent. What’s different about storytelling for the progressive, risk-taking networks who are delivering provocative, groundbreaking, binge-worthy content, without the restraints of the traditional, advertiser-supported programming model. Through interviews with the showrunners, content creators, and producers of dozens of trailblazing series – including Orange Is the New Black, House of Cards, Transparent, and many more – you’ll learn how and why the best and the brightest TV content creators and filmmakers are defining the new digital entertainment age – and how you can, too.

Exhaustive compendium of DTV details Now there’s an up-to-the-minute edition of the #1 guide to digital television. And none too soon, because in the two years since the last edition was published, DTV has undergone dizzying technical and regulatory changes. You’ll find them all covered in Jerry Whitaker’s DTV: The Revolution in Digital Video, Third Edition.This engineering-level guide to the ATSC DTV standard and its impact on the television broadcast industry is loaded with examples, detailed diagrams and schematics. It’s a tutorial for all ATSC and SMPTE standards and FCC regulations guiding DTV licensing and applications. This timely edition explores the implications of datacasting and interactive television…harmonizing DTV with the European DVB system…and the bristling controversy over the ATSC standard’s suitability for urban broadcast. A dedicated Website, updated monthly, ensures that you’ll stay on top of all fast-breaking news and developments in the field.

Summary: How engineers developed new technologies to broadcast television in digital form, and how Britain in 1998 became the first country to launch a digital terrestrial service. Based on interviews with engineers who were involoved, and including simple explanations of the engineering involved, this is a book for the general reader. In More Detail: This is an account of how an international team of engineers developed new technologies which would allow television to be broadcast in digital form, and how Britain in 1998 became the first country to launch a digital terrestrial service. Beginning with efforts in the 1950s and 1960s to improve the existing analogue television technology, and the appearance in the 1980s of the ill-fated MAC system, the book traces the development and gradual introduction of digital techniques for manipulating and storing pictures in the studio, through the collaborative efforts of the early 1990s to specify a new family of standards for digital broadcasting, to the triumphs and tribulations which followed the early launch of digital television in Britain and in some other countries.. Based on interviews with a number of the people who made it happen, and including simple explanations of the engineering involved, this is a book for the general reader with an interest in the history of technology and how things work.