The Television Portal

Flat-screen television receivers on display for sale at a consumer electronics store in May 2008

Television (TV) is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. Additionally, the term can refer to a physical television set rather than the medium of transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, entertainment, news, and sports. The medium is capable of more than "radio broadcasting", which refers to an audio signal sent to radio receivers.

Television became available in crude experimental forms in the 1920s, but only after several years of further development was the new technology marketed to consumers. After World War II, an improved form of black-and-white television broadcasting became popular in the United Kingdom and the United States, and television sets became commonplace in homes, businesses, and institutions. During the 1950s, television was the primary medium for influencing public opinion. In the mid-1960s, color broadcasting was introduced in the U.S. and most other developed countries.

In 2013, 79% of the world's households owned a television set. The replacement of earlier cathode-ray tube (CRT) screen displays with compact, energy-efficient, flat-panel alternative technologies such as LCDs (both fluorescent-backlit and LED), OLED displays, and plasma displays was a hardware revolution that began with computer monitors in the late 1990s. Most television sets sold in the 2000s were still CRT, and it was only in early 2010s that flat-screen TVs decisively overtook CRT. Major manufacturers announced the discontinuation of CRT, Digital Light Processing (DLP), plasma, and even fluorescent-backlit LCDs by the mid-2010s. LEDs are being gradually replaced by OLEDs. Also, major manufacturers have started increasingly producing smart TVs in the mid-2010s. Smart TVs with integrated Internet and Web 2.0 functions became the dominant form of television by the late 2010s.[better source needed] (Full article...)

Series creator Josh Schwartz during a 2007 Comic-Con event
"Premiere" is the series premiere of the television series The O.C., which first aired on the Fox network on August 5, 2003. Written by series creator Josh Schwartz (pictured) and directed by executive producer Doug Liman, the episode depicts the introduction of troubled teenager Ryan Atwood (Benjamin McKenzie) into the wealthy lifestyle of the Cohen family in Newport Beach, Orange County, California. The casting directors, Patrick J. Rush and Alyson Silverberg, began selecting the principal cast eight to ten weeks before filming started. Seth Cohen (Adam Brody) was based on Schwartz's experiences at the University of Southern California as a "neurotic Jewish kid from the East Coast in a land of water polo players". Other central characters in the episode are Seth's parents—Sandy (Peter Gallagher) and Kirsten (Kelly Rowan)—and teenage neighbor Marissa Cooper (Mischa Barton). The series premiere led the first half-hour of its time slot in viewership. It was generally well received by critics, and earned Schwartz a Writers Guild of America Award nomination for Best Screenplay in an Episodic Drama. Originally broadcast and released in a 1.33:1 aspect ratio, the episode was remastered in a widescreen ratio for the series DVD, released in November 2007.

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1969. Stan Lebar, the project manager for Westinghouse's Apollo Television Cameras, shows the Field-Sequential Color Camera on the left, and the Monochrome Lunar Surface Camera on the right. The Color camera was used on all flights starting with Apollo 10, while the monochrome Lunar Surface Camera was used on Apollo 11, and captured Neil Armstrong's first steps on the Moon.
1969. Stan Lebar, the project manager for Westinghouse's Apollo Television Cameras, shows the Field-Sequential Color Camera on the left, and the Monochrome Lunar Surface Camera on the right. The Color camera was used on all flights starting with Apollo 10, while the monochrome Lunar Surface Camera was used on Apollo 11, and captured Neil Armstrong's first steps on the Moon.
Credit: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

The Apollo TV camera refers to several television cameras used in the Apollo program's space missions, and on the later Skylab and Apollo-Soyuz Test Project missions, in the late 1960s and 1970s. These cameras varied in design, with image quality improving significantly with each successive model. Two companies made these various camera systems: RCA and Westinghouse. Originally, these slow-scan television (SSTV) cameras, running at 10 frames-per-second (fps), produced only black-and-white pictures and first flew on the Apollo 7 mission in October 1968. A color camera — using a field-sequential color system — flew on the Apollo 10 mission in May 1969, and every mission after that. The Color Camera ran at the North American standard 30 fps. The cameras all used image pickup tubes that were initially fragile, as one was irreparably damaged during the live broadcast of the Apollo 12 mission's first moonwalk. Starting with the Apollo 15 mission, a more robust, damage-resistant camera was used on the lunar surface. All of these cameras required signal processing back on Earth to make the frame rate and color encoding compatible with analog broadcast television standards.

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  • ... that Donald A. Morgan is the first director of photography to be inducted into the Television Hall of Fame?
  • ... that, although Self's fifth studio album was cancelled, its songs were still used in television commercials?
  • ... that Pedro Berroeta Morales, a diplomat and later the president of a Venezuelan television channel, has also written fiction and essays on topics from science to esotericism?
  • ... that a cable TV channel in the UK was still broadcasting primarily in black and white as late as 1979?
  • ... that Oliver Hutchinson was the subject of the first successful live demonstration of the television on 26 January 1926?
  • ... that Angelito de Canal 13, the mascot of the Chilean television network Canal 13, was inspired by its creator's son?

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Dwight D. Eisenhower
I can think of nothing more boring for the American people than to have to sit in their living rooms for a whole half hour looking at my face on their television screens.

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Sorkin in 2016

Aaron Benjamin Sorkin (born June 9, 1961) is an American screenwriter, playwright, and filmmaker. As a writer for stage, television, and film, he is recognized for his trademark fast-paced dialogue and extended monologues, complemented by frequent use of the storytelling technique called the "walk and talk". Sorkin has earned numerous accolades including an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, five Primetime Emmy Awards, three Golden Globes, and two WGA Awards, in addition to a Laurence Olivier Award nomination.

Born in New York City, Sorkin developed a passion for writing at an early age. He rose to prominence as a writer-creator and showrunner of the television series Sports Night (1998–2000), The West Wing (1999–2006), Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (2006–2007), and The Newsroom (2012–2014). He is also known for his work on Broadway including the plays A Few Good Men (1989), The Farnsworth Invention (2007), To Kill a Mockingbird (2018), and the revival of Lerner and Loewe's musical Camelot (2023). (Full article...)

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