Television programming and news Television program or television show is a segment of content broadcast on television.

It may be a one-off broadcast or part of a periodically recurring television series. A television series that is intended to be broadcast as a finite number of episodes is usually called a miniseries or serial (although the latter term also has other meanings). A short run lasting less than a year is known in the United States and Canada as a season and in theUnited Kingdom and (not necessarily) the rest of the PAL countries as a series. This season or series usually consists of 1226 installments in the United States, but in the United Kingdom there is no defined length. United States industry practice tends to favor longer seasons than those of some other countries. A single instance of a program is called an episode, although particularly in the USA this is sometimes also called a "show" or "program", and in Great Britain and Ireland a "programme". A one-off broadcast may, again particularly in the USA and USA-influenced countries, be called a "special", or particularly in the UK a "special episode". A television movie or in the UK a television film ("made-for-TV" movie) is a film that is initially broadcast on television rather than released in cinemas or direct-to-video, although many successful television movies are later released on DVD. Today, advertisements play a role in most television programming, such that each hour of programming can contain up to 15 minutes of advertisements in some countries. By contrast, being publicly funded, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) in the United Kingdom does not run advertisements, except to trail its own programmes. Its promotions appear between and near the end of programmes but not in the middle of them, much like the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) in the United States and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) in Australia. The number of commercial interruptions can also vary. For instance, Japanese television has fewer and longer commercial breaks, while American television has several spread throughout the program. This requires writers to provide a smooth transition, as well as keep the audience from switching channels The content of television programs may be factual, as in documentaries, news, and reality television, or fictional as in comedy and drama. It may be topical as in the case of news and some made-for-television movies or historical as in the case of many

documentaries and fictional series. They could be primarily instructional, the intention of educational programming, or entertaining as is the case in situation comedy, reality TV, or game shows, or for income as advertisements. A drama program usually features a set of actors in a somewhat familiar setting. The program follows their lives and their adventures. With the exception of soap operas, many shows especially before the 1980s, remained static without story arcs, the main characters and the premise changed little. If some change happened to the characters lives during the episode, it was usually undone by the end. (Because of this, the episodes could be broadcast in any order.) Since the 1980s, there are many series that feature progressive change to the plot, the characters, or both. Common television program periods include regular broadcasts (like television news), television series (usually seasonal and ongoing with a duration of only a few episodes to many seasons), or television miniseries, which is an extended film, usually with a small predetermined number of episodes and a set plot and timeline. Miniseries usually range from about 3 to 10 hours in length. In the UK, the term "miniseries" is only usually used in reference to imported programmes, and such short-run series are usually called "serials". Older American television shows began with a pilot title sequence, showed opening creditsat the bottom of the screen during the beginning of the show, and included closing credits at the end of the show. However, beginning in the 1990s some shows began with a "cold open", followed by a title sequence and a commercial break. Many serialistic shows begin with a "Previously on..." (such as 24) introduction before the teaser. And, to save time, some shows omit the title sequence altogether, folding the names normally featured there into the opening credits. The title sequence has not been completely eliminated, however, as many major television series still use them in 2010. While television series appearing on TV networks are usually commissioned by the networks themselves, their producers earn greater revenue when the program is sold intosyndication. With the rise of the DVD home video format, box sets containing entireseasons or the complete run of a program have become a significant revenue source as well. Many of the prime-time comedy shows and Saturday morning cartoons were digitally remastered for United States television around midMay 2008, as there will be more original and reissued DVD sets of television programs containing either entire seasons or complete series runs to come in the future.

Television has changed throughout the years, from the classic family sitcoms, with the wholesome commercials during the break, to reality shows and random commercials. Television started out, one per household; now households have multiple sets. Television was something that the family watched together. Many channels have deviated from their original programming focus throughout the years as well because of channel drift. Because most networks throughout the world are 'commercial', dependent on selling advertising time or acquiring sponsorship, broadcasting executives' main concern over their programming is on audience size. Once the number of 'free to air' stations was restricted by the availability of frequencies, but cable (outside the USA satellite) technology has allowed an expansion in the number of channels available to viewers (sometimes at premium rates) in a much more competitive environment. Scripted entertainment Dramatic television series, including: Comedy-drama Legal drama Medical drama Police procedural Serial drama Science-fiction or fantasy Soap opera Television comedy Situation comedy Sketch comedy Animated television series Miniseries and TV Movies Award show Unscripted entertainment Talk shows Reality television Game shows Informational News programs Documentary Television news magazine, dealing with current affairs TV infomercials, which are advertising paid spots

Development United States A person decides to create a new television series. The show's creator develops the show's elements, consisting of the concept, the characters, the crew, and various actors (in some cases, "big-name" actors). They will then offer ("pitch") it to the various television networks in an attempt to find one that is interested in the series and order a prototype first episode of the series, known as a pilot . To create the pilot, the structure and team of the whole series needs to be put together. If the network likes the pilot, they will "pick up" the show for their next season (UK: series). Sometimes they will save it for "midseason" or request rewrites and further review (known in the industry as "Development hell"). And other times they will pass entirely, leaving the show's creator forced to "shop it around" to other networks. Many shows never make it past the pilot stage. If the show is picked up, a "run" of episodes is ordered. Usually only 13 episodes are ordered at first, although a series will typically last for at least 22 episodes (the last nine episodes sometimes being known as the "back nine", borrowing a term from golf). The show hires a "stable" of writers, who usually work in parallel: the first writer works on the first episode, the second on the second episode, and so forth. When all of the writers have been used, the assignment of episodes continues starting with the first writer again. On other shows, however, the writers work as a team. Sometimes they will develop story ideas individually, and pitch them to the show's creator, who then folds them together into a script and rewrites them. United Kingdom In contrast to the US model illustrated above, the UK procedure is operated on a sometimes similar, but much smaller scale. The method of "team writing" is employed on some longer dramatic series (usually running up to a maximum of around 13 episodes). The idea for such a programme may be generated "in-house" by one of the networks; it could originate from an independent production company; it will sometimes be a product of both. For example, the BBC's long-running soap operaEastEnders is wholly a BBC production, whereas its popular drama Life on Mars was developed by Kudos in association with the broadcaster. However, there are still a significant number of programmes (usually sitcoms) that are built around just one or two writers and a small, close-knit

production team. These are "pitched" in the traditional way, but since the creator(s) will handle all the writing requirements, there will be a run of six or seven episodes per series once approval has been given. Many of the most popular British comedies have been made this way, including Monty Python's Flying Circus(albeit with an exclusive team of six writerperformers), Fawlty Towers, Blackadder and The Office. Production The executive producer, often the show's creator, is in charge of running the show. They pickcrew and cast (subject to approval by the network), approve and often write series plots, and sometimes write and direct major episodes. Various other producers help to ensure that the show always runs smoothly. As with films or other media production, production of an individual episode can be divided into three parts: Pre-production Pre-production begins when a script is approved. A director is chosen to plan the episode's final look. Pre-production tasks include storyboarding, construction of sets, props, and costumes, casting guest stars, budgeting, acquiring resources like lighting, special effects, stunts, etc. Once the show is planned, it must then be scheduled; scenes are often filmed out of sequence, guest actors or even regulars may only be available at certain times. Sometimes the principal photography of different episodes must be done at the same time, complicating the schedule (a guest star might shoot scenes from two episodes on the same afternoon). Complex scenes are translated from storyboard to animatics to further clarify the action. Scripts are adjusted to meet altering requirements. Some shows have a small stable of directors, but also usually rely on outside directors. Given the time constraints of broadcasting, a single show might have two or three episodes in pre-production, one or two episodes in principal photography, and a few more in various stages of post-production. The task of directing is complex enough that a single director can usually not work on more than one episode or show at a time, hence the need for multiple directors. Principal photography Principal photography is the actual filming of the episode. Director, actors and crew will gather at soundstages or on location to film a scene. A scene

is further divided into shots, which should be planned during preproduction. Depending on scheduling, a scene may be shot not in the chronological order of the story. Conversations may be filmed twice from different angles, often using stand-ins, so one actor might perform all their lines in one set of shots, and then the other side of the conversation will be filmed from the opposite perspective. To complete a production on time, a second unit may be filming a different scene on another set or location at the same time, using a different set of actors, an assistant director, and a second unit crew. Adirector of photography supervises the lighting of each shot to ensure consistency. Post production Once principal photography is complete, producers coordinate postproduction tasks. Visual and digital effects are added to the film; this is often outsourced to companies specializing in these areas. Often music is performed with the conductor using the film as a time reference (other musical elements may be previously recorded). An editor cuts the various pieces of film together, adds the musical score and effects, determines scene transitions, and assembles the completed show. Distribution The show is then turned over to the network, which sends it out to its affiliates, which broadcast it in the specified timeslot. If the Nielsen ratings are good, the show is kept alive as long as possible. If not, the show is usually cancelled. The show's creators are then left to shop around remaining episodes, and the possibility of future episodes, to other networks. On especially successful series, the producers sometimes call a halt to a series on their own likeSeinfeld, The Cosby Show, Corner Gas, and M*A*S*H and end it with a concluding episode, which sometimes is a big series finale. On some occasions, a series that has not attracted particularly high ratings and has been canceled can be given a reprieve if DVD sales have been particularly strong. This has happened in the cases of Family Guy in the US and Peep Show in the UK. If the show is popular or lucrative, and a number of episodes (usually 100 episodes or more) are made, it goes into syndication (in the USA) where broadcast rights are then resold. Seasons/series

The terminology used to define a set of episodes produced by a television series varies from country to country. In North America the term used to describe a regular run of episodes is a television season or simply, season. For example, it is typical for a show's season to comprise 13 or 2026 consecutive episodes between September and December or January and May. This is done to take advantage of the Nielsen Ratings system which calculates viewer numbers during these times. Often this type of release is referred to as a "non-stop season", which are usually used for serial television series, e.g., 24, Dexter, and Lost. Alternately, the season of a television series might consist of 2026 episodes broadcast regularly between September and May with a hiatus during the (Christmas/New Year's Eve) holidays or February to November with a hiatus during the summer months. Sometimes these types of seasons are referred to as ".5" or half seasons. This is typically done to increase DVD sales of the show. The distributor will release the first half of the season in stores just before the second half first airs, in order to increase interest in the season's second half. Examples of this would be the science fiction remake Battlestar Galactica, its prequel Caprica, and NBC'sHeroes. In the United Kingdom, on the ABC in Australia and in other countries, these sets of episodes are referred to as a series. Australian television does not follow seasons in the way that US television does. So there is no "Fall Season" or "Fall schedule", for example. In Australia a batch of episodes will still sometimes be called a "season" as per American terminology, although the UK term "series" is also used. For many years popular night time dramas in Australia would run much of the year, and would only go into recess over the summer period (December February) where ratings are not taken. Therefore popular dramas would usually run FebruaryNovember each year. This schedule was used in the 1970s for popular dramas including Number 96.Neighbours and other dramas continue this routine as at 2010. Australian situation comedyseries usually have seasons of about 13 episodes, and might premiere at any month between FebruaryNovember. In the United States, most regular television series have 20 to 26 episodes per season. In general, dramas usually last 44 minutes (an hour with advertisements), while sitcoms last 22 (30 with advertisements). However, with the rise of cable networks, especially pay ones, series and episode lengths have been changing. Cable networks usually feature seasons

lasting around thirteen episodes (e.g. The Sopranos from HBO, with 12- to 13-episode seasons). Many British series have significantly shorter runs, particularly sitcoms such as The Office,Extras and Peep Show, which feature six episodes per series (see below). This may be related to the fact that many British shows are written by a single writer or writing team, unlike some US shows. However, even British shows that have multiple writers have tended toward shorter series in recent years. For example, the first series of long-running science fiction seriesDoctor Who in 1963 featured 42 x 25-minute episodes, which had been reduced, gradually, to 14 x 25minute episodes in 1989. The revival of Doctor Who has comprised 13 x 45-minute installments. Recently, American non-cable networks have also begun to experiment with shorter seasons for some programs, particularly reality shows such as Survivor. However, they often air two seasons per year, resulting in roughly the same number of episodes per year as a drama. This is a reduction from the 1950s, in which many American shows (e.g., The Twilight Zone) had between 29 to 39 episodes per season. Actual storytelling time within a commercial television hour has also gradually reduced over the years, from 50 minutes out of every 60 in the early days down to the current 44 (and even less on some networks) in the 2000s. Television news Television news refers to disseminating current events via the medium of television. "News bulletins" or "newscasts" are programs lasting from seconds to hours that provide updates on world, national, regional or local news events. Television news is very image-based, showing video of many of the events that are reported. Television channels may provide news bulletins as part of a regularly scheduled news program. Less often, television shows may be interrupted or replaced by "news flashes" to provide news updates on current events of great importance or sudden events of great importance. Cable news refers to channels which are devoted to current events 24 hours per day. The originator of this format from which the name derives is CNN (as well as CNN International and CNN-IBN), which originally stood for cable news network in reference to the then-new phenomenon of cable television. As satellite and other forms have evolved, the term cable news has become something of an anachronism but is still in common use; many other channels have since been established, such as BBC World News, BBC News, Sky News, Al Jazeera, ABC News 24, France 24, STAR News, Fox News Channel, MSNBC, Press TV, Russia

Today, teleSUR and ABC News Now. Some news channels specialize even further, such as ESPNews (sports from ESPN),CNBC, Bloomberg Television and Fox Business Network(financial). Television news channels are television specialty channels which focus on presenting news content Reality television Reality television is a genre of television programming that presents purportedly unscripted dramatic or humorous situations, documents actual events, and usually features ordinary people instead of professional actors, sometimes in a contest or other situation where a prize is awarded.The genre has existed in some form or another since the early years of television, began in earnest as a television formula in the 1990s, and exploded as a global phenomenon around 1999-2000, via series such as Big Brother and Survivor. Programs in the reality television genre are commonly called reality shows and often are produced in series. Documentaries and nonfictional programming such as news and sports shows are usually not classified as reality shows. The genre covers a wide range of programming formats, from game or quiz shows which resemble the frantic, often demeaning shows produced in Japan in the 1980s and 1990s (such as Gaki no tsukai), to surveillance- or voyeurism-focused productions such as Big Brother. Reality television frequently portrays a modified and highly influenced form of reality, utilizing sensationalism to attract viewers and so to generate advertising profits.Participants are often placed in exotic locations or abnormal situations, and are sometimes coached to act in specific scripted ways by off-screen "story editors" or "segment producers," with the portrayal of events and speech manipulated and contrived to create an illusion of reality through editing and other post-production techniques. History 1940s1950s Precedents for television that portrayed people in unscripted situations began in the 1940s. Debuting in 1948, Allen Funt's Candid Camera, (based

on his previous 1947 radio show,Candid Microphone), broadcast unsuspecting ordinary people reacting to pranks. It has been called the "granddaddy of the reality TV genre. In 1948, talent search shows Ted Mack's Original Amateur Hour and Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts featured amateur competitors and audience voting. The Miss America Pageant, first broadcast in 1954, was a competition where the winner achieved status as a national celebrity. In the 1950s, game shows Beat the Clock and Truth or Consequences involved contestants in wacky competitions, stunts, and practical jokes. The Groucho Marx-hosted game show, You Bet Your Life, was primarily composed of Marx' prescripted comebacks to what was most often candid interviews of the contestants, although some 'contestants' were actors. The radio series Nightwatch (19511955), which tape-recorded the daily activities ofCulver City, California police officers, also helped pave the way for reality television. The series You Asked For It (19501959), in which viewer requests dictated content, was an antecedent of today's audienceparticipation reality TV elements, in which viewers cast votes to help determine the course of events. 1960s1970s First broadcast in the United Kingdom in 1964, the Granada Television series Seven Up!, broadcast interviews with a dozen ordinary seven-year olds from a broad cross section of society and inquired about their reactions to everyday life. Every seven years, a film documented the life of the same individuals during the intervening period, titled 7 Plus Seven, 21 Up, etc. The series was structured as a series of interviews with no element of plot. However, it did have the then-new effect of turning ordinary people into celebrities. In the 1966 Direct Cinema film Chelsea Girls, Andy Warhol filmed various acquaintances with no direction given; the Radio Times Guide to Film 2007 stated that the film was "to blame for reality television." The first reality show in the modern sense may have been the 12-part 1973 PBS series An American Family, which showed a nuclear family going through a divorce; unlike many later reality shows, it was more or less documentary in purpose and style. In 1974 a counterpart program, The Family, was made in the UK, following the working class Wilkins family of Reading. Other forerunners of modern reality television were the 1970s productions of Chuck Barris: The Dating Game, The Newlywed Game, and The Gong Show, all of which featured participants

who were eager to sacrifice some of their privacy and dignity in a televised competition.[9] One Man and His Dog was a British Television series which began in 1976 featuring the participants of sheepdog trials. In 1978, Living in the Past recreated life in an Iron Age English village. 1980s1990s Reality television as it is currently understood can be directly linked to several television shows that began in the late 1980s and early 1990s. COPS, which first aired in the spring of 1989 and came about partly due to the need for new programming during the 1988 Writers Guild of America strike, showed police officers on duty apprehending criminals; it introduced the camcorder look and cinma vrit feel of much of later reality television. The series Nummer 28, which aired on Dutch television in 1991, originated the concept of putting strangers together in the same environment for an extended period of time and recording the drama that ensued. Nummer 28 also pioneered many of the stylistic conventions that have since become standard in reality television shows, including a heavy use of soundtrack music and the interspersing of events on screen with after-the-fact "confessionals" recorded by cast members, that serve as narration. One year later, the same concept was used by MTV in their new series The Real World and Nummer 28 creator Erik Latour has long claimed that The Real World was directly inspired by his show. However, the producers of The Real World have stated that their direct inspiration was An American Family. According to television commentator Charlie Brooker, this type of reality television was enabled by the advent of computer-based non-linear editing systems for video (such as those produced by Avid Technology) in 1989. These systems made it easy to quickly edit hours of video footage into a usable form, something that had been very difficult to do before. (Film, which was easy to edit, was too expensive to shoot enough hours of footage with on a regular basis.) The TV show Expedition Robinson, created by TV producer Charlie Parsons, which first aired in 1997 in Sweden (and was later produced in a large number of other countries asSurvivor), added to the Nummer 28/Real World template the idea of competition and elimination, in which cast members/contestants battled against each other and were removed from the show until only one winner remained. (These shows are now sometimes called elimination shows.)

Changing Rooms, a TV show that began in 1996, showed couples redecorating each others' houses, and was the first reality show with a selfimprovement or makeover theme. 2000s Reality television saw an explosion of global popularity starting in the summer of 2000, with the successes of Big Brother and Survivor (in the US). In particular, Survivor and American Idol have topped the US seasonaverage television ratings on several occasions. Survivor led the ratings in 200102, and Idol has topped the ratings six consecutive years (2004 05 through 200910). The shows Survivor, the Idolseries, The Amazing Race, the America's Next Top Model series, the Dancing With The Stars series, The Apprentice, Fear Factor and Big Brother have all had a global effect, having each been successfully syndicated in dozens of countries. There have been at least three television channels devoted exclusively to reality television:Fox Reality in the United States, launched in 2005, Global Reality Channel in Canada in 2010, and Zone Reality in the UK, launched in 2002. (The Canadian and British channels still exist; Fox Reality ended in mid-2010). In addition, several other cable channels, such as MTV and Bravo, feature original reality programming as a mainstay. [14] Mike Darnell, head of reality TV for the US Fox network, was quoted as saying that the broadcast networks (NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox) "might as well plan three or four [reality shows] each season because we're going to have them, anyway."[14] During the early part of the 2000s, network executives expressed concern that reality-television programming was limited in its appeal for DVD reissue and syndication. Despite these concerns, DVDs for reality shows have sold briskly; Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County, The Amazing Race, Project Runway, and America's Next Top Modelhave all ranked in the top DVDs sold on Amazon.com, and DVDs of The Simple Lifehave outranked scripted shows like The O.C. and Desperate Housewives. Syndication, however, has indeed proven problematic; shows such as Fear Factor, COPS and Wife Swap in which each episode is self-contained can indeed be rerun fairly easily, but usually only on cable television and/or during the daytime (COPS and America's Funniest Home Videos being exceptions). Season-long competitions such as The Amazing Race,Survivor, and America's Next Top Model generally perform more poorly and usually must be rerun in marathons to draw the necessary

viewers to make it worthwhile. Another option is to create documentaries around series including extended interviews with the participants, such as the NFL Films-style documentary American Idol Rewind and the pay-perview Jerry Springer Too Hot for TV series are examples of using this strategy. COPS has had huge success in syndication, direct response sales and DVD. A FOX staple since 1989, COPS is, as of 2008, in its 21st season, having outlasted all competing scripted police shows. Another series that has seen wide success is "Cheaters", which has been running for 10 seasons in the US and is syndicated in over 100 countries worldwide. In 2007, according to the Learning and Skills Council, one in seven UK teenagers hopes to gain fame by appearing on reality television.[15] In 2001, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences added the reality genre to theEmmy Awards with the category of Outstanding Reality Program. In 2003, to better differentiate between competition and informational reality programs, a second categoryOutstanding RealityCompetition Program was added. In 2008, a third category,Outstanding Host for a Reality or Reality-Competition Program was added. In 2010, the Tester became the first reality television show ever aired over a videogame console. The show entered its second season in the same year. [16] Subgenres The genre of reality television consists of various subgenres. 1.Documentary-style In many reality TV programs, camera shooting and footage editing give the viewer the impression that they are passive observers following people going about their daily personal and professional activities; this style of filming is often referred to as fly on the wall or factual television. Story "plots" are often constructed via editing or planned situations, with the results resembling soap operashence the terms docusoap and docudrama. In other shows, a cinma vrit style is adopted, where the filmmaker is more than a passive observertheir presence and influence is greatly manifest. Within documentary-style reality television are several subcategories or variants: Special living environment Some documentary-style programs place cast members, who in most cases previously did not know each other, in artificial living

environments; The Real World is the originator of this style. In almost every other such show, cast members are given a specific challenge or obstacle to overcome. Road Rules, which started in 1995 as a spin-off of The Real World, started this pattern: the cast traveled across the country guided by clues and performing tasks. Big Brother is probably the best known program of this type in the world with different versions produced in many countries around the globe. Another example of a show in this category The 1900 House, involves historical re-enactment with cast members hired to live and work as people of a specific time and place. 2001'sTemptation Island achieved some notoriety by placing several couples on an island surrounded by single people in order to test the couples' commitment to each other. U8TV: The Lofters combined the "special living environment" format with the "professional activity" format noted below; in addition to living together in a loft, each member of the show's cast was hired to host a television program for a Canadian cable channel. Celebrities Another subset of fly-on-the-wall-style shows involves celebrities. Often these show a celebrity going about their everyday life: notable examples include The Anna Nicole Show, The Osbournes, Newlyweds: Nick and Jessica and Hogan Knows Best. In other shows, celebrities are put on location and given a specific task or tasks; these include Celebrity Big Brother, The Simple Life, Tommy Lee Goes to College, The Surreal Life, and I'm a Celebrity... Get Me out of Here!.VH1 has created an entire block of shows dedicated to celebrity reality, known as "Celebreality". Professional activities Some documentary-style shows portray professionals either going about day-to-day business or performing an entire project over the course of a series. No outside experts are brought in (at least, none appear on screen) to either provide help or to judge results. The earliest example (and the longest running reality show of any genre) is COPS which has been airing since 1989, preceding by many years the current reality show phenomenon. Other examples of this type of reality show include the American shows Miami Ink, The First 48, American Chopper and Deadliest Catch; the British showsAirport, Police Stop! and Traffic Cops; the Australian shows Border Securityand Bondi Rescue, and the New Zealand show Motorway Patrol. The US cable

networks TLC and A&E in particular show a number of this type of reality show. VH1's 2001 show Bands on the Run was a notable early hybrid, in that the show featured four unsigned bands touring and making music as a professional activity, but also pitted the bands against one another in game show fashion to see which band could make the most money. 2. Competition/game shows Game show Another sub-genre of reality TV is "reality competition" or so-called "reality game shows," which follow the format of a nontournament elimination contests. Typically, participants are filmed competing to win a prize, often while living together in a confined environment. In many cases, participants are removed until only one person or team remains, who/which is then declared the winner. Usually this is done by eliminating participants one at a time, inballoon debate style, through either disapproval voting or by voting for the most popular choice to win. Voting is done by the viewing audience, the show's own participants, a panel of judges, or some combination of the three. A well-known example of a reality-competition show is the globallysyndicated Big Brother, in which cast members live together in the same house, with participants removed at regular intervals by either the viewing audience or, in the case of the American version, by the participants themselves. There remains some disagreement over whether talent-search shows such as the Idolseries, America's Got Talent, Dancing with the Stars, and Celebrity Duets are truly reality television, or just newer incarnations of shows such as Star Search. Although the shows involve a traditional talent search, the shows follow the reality-competition conventions of removing one or more contestants per episode and allowing the public to vote on who is removed; the Idol series also require the contestants to live together during the run of the show (though their daily life is never shown onscreen). Additionally, there is a good deal of interaction shown between contestants and judges. As a result, such shows are often considered reality television, and the American Primetime Emmy Awards have nominated both American Idol and Dancing with the Stars for the Outstanding RealityCompetition Program Emmy.

Modern game shows like Weakest Link, Greed, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?,American Gladiators, Dog Eat Dog and Deal or No Deal also lie in a gray area: like traditional game shows (e.g., The Price Is Right, Jeopardy!), the action takes place in an enclosed TV studio over a short period of time; however, they have higher production values, more dramatic background music, and higher stakes than traditional shows (done either through putting contestants into physical danger or offering large cash prizes). In addition, there is more interaction between contestants and hosts, and in some cases they feature reality-style contestant competition and/or elimination as well. These factors, as well as these shows' rise in global popularity at the same time as the arrival of the reality craze, lead many people to group them under the reality TV umbrella as well as the traditional game show one. There are various hybrid reality-competition shows, like the worldwidesyndicated Star Academy, which combines the Big Brother and Idol formats, The Biggest Loser and The Pick-up Artist which combine competition with the self-improvement format, andAmerican Inventor, which uses the Idol format for products instead of people. Some shows, such as Making the Band and Project Greenlight, devote the first part of the season to selecting a winner, and the second part to showing that person or group of people working on a project. Popular variants of the competition-based format include the following: Dating-based competition Dating-based competition shows follow a contestant choosing one out of a group of suitors. Over the course of either a single episode or an entire season, suitors are eliminated until only the contestant and the final suitor remains. For a time, in 20012003, this type of reality show dominated the other genres on the major US networks. Shows that aired included The Bachelor, its spin-off The Bachelorette, as well as For Love or Money, Paradise Hotel, Temptation Island, Average Joe and Farmer Wants a Wife, among others. More recent such shows includeFlavor of Love and its spin-offs I Love New York, Rock of Love, and The Cougar. This is one of the older variants of the format; shows such as The Dating Game that date to the 1960s had similar premises (though each episode was self-contained, and not the serial format of more modern shows). Job search In this category, the competition revolves around a skill that contestants were pre-screened for. Competitors perform a variety of tasks based on that skill, are judged, and are then kept or removed

by a single expert or a panel of experts. The show is usually presented as a job search of some kind, in which the prize for the winner includes a contract to perform that kind of work. Popstars, which debuted in 1999, may have been the first such show. The first job-search show which showed dramatic, unscripted situations may have been America's Next Top Model, which premiered in May 2003. Other examples include The Apprentice(which judges business skills), Hell's Kitchen and Top Chef (for chefs), Shear Genius (for hair styling), Project Runway (for clothing design), Top Design (for interior design), Stylista (for fashion editors), Last Comic Standing (for comedians), The Starlet and Scream Queens (for actresses), I Know My Kid's a Star (for child performers), On the Lot (for filmmakers), The Shot (for photographers), So You Think You Can Dance (for dancers), MuchMusic VJ Search (for television hosts), Dream Job (for sportscasters), Face Off (for make-up artists), and The Tester (for game testers). Some shows use the same format with celebrities: in this case, there is no expectation that the winner will continue this line of work, and prize winnings often go to charity. Examples of celebrity competition programs include Deadline, Celebracadabra, and The Celebrity Apprentice. Sports Most of these programs create a sporting competition among athletes attempting to establish their name in that sport. The Club, in 2002, was one of the first shows to immerse sport with reality TV, based on a fabricated club competing against real clubs in the sport of Australian rules football; the audience helped select which players played each week by voting for their favorites. Golf Channel's The Big Break is a reality show in which aspiring golfers compete against one another and are eliminated. The Contender, a boxing show, unfortunately became the first American reality show in which a contestant committed suicide after being eliminated from the show. In The Ultimate Fighter participants have voluntarily withdrawn or expressed the desire to withdraw from the show due to competitive pressure. In sports shows, sometimes just appearing on the show, not necessarily winning, can get a contestant the job. The owner of UFC declared that the final match of the first season of Ultimate Fighter was so good, both contestants were offered a contract, and in addition, many non-winning "TUF Alumni" have prospered in the UFC. Many of the losers from World Wrestling Entertainment's Tough

Enoughand Diva Search shows have been picked up by the company. Not all sports programs, however, involve athletes trying to make a name in the sport. The 2006 US reality series Knight School focused on students at Texas Tech University vying for a walk-on (non-scholarship) roster position on the school's men's basketball team under legendary coach Bob Knight. In the Republic of Ireland, RT One's Celebrity Bainisteoir involves eight non-sporting Irish celebrities becoming bainisteoiri (managers) of midlevel Gaelic football teams, leading their teams in an officially sanctioned tournament. Self-improvement/makeover Some reality television shows cover a person or group of people improving their lives. Sometimes the same group of people are covered over an entire season (as in The Swanand Celebrity Fit Club), but usually there is a new target for improvement in each episode. Despite differences in the content, the format is usually the same: first the show introduces the subjects in their current, less-than-ideal environment. Then the subjects meet with a group of experts, who give the subjects instructions on how to improve things; they offer aid and encouragement along the way. Finally, the subjects are placed back in their environment and they, along with their friends and family and the experts, appraise the changes that have occurred. Other self-improvement or makeover shows include "How Do I Look?" (fashion makeover). The Biggest Loser and Fat March, (which covers weight loss), Extreme Makeover (entire physical appearance), Queer Eye and What Not to Wear (style and grooming), Supernanny (child-rearing), Made (attaining difficult goals),Trinny & Susannah Undress (fashion makeover and marriage), Tool Academy(relationship building) and Charm School and From G's to Gents (self-improvement and manners). Renovation Some shows make over part or all of a person's living space, work space, or vehicle. The American show This Old House was the first such show, debuting in 1979. The British show Changing Rooms, beginning in 1996 (later remade in the U.S. as Trading Spaces) was the first such renovation show that added a game show feel with different weekly contestants. Other shows in this category include Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,Debbie Travis' Facelift, Designed to Sell, While You Were Out, and Holmes on Homes.Pimp My Ride and Overhaulin' show vehicles being rebuilt. Some shows, such asRestaurant Makeover and Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares,

show both the decor and the menu of a failing restaurant being remade. The issue of "making over" was taken to its social extreme with the British show Life Laundry, in which people who had become hoarders, even living in squalor, were given professional assistance. As with game shows, a gray area exists between such reality TV shows and more conventional formats. Some argue the key difference is the emphasis of the human story and conflicts of reality shows, versus the emphasis on process and information in more traditional format shows. The show This Old House, which began in 1979, the start to finish renovation of different houses through a season; media critic Jeff Jarvis has speculated that it is "the original reality TV show." Social experiment Another type of reality program is the social experiment that produces drama, conflict, and sometimes transformation. Wife Swap which began in 2003 on Channel 4 and has aired for four seasons on ABC is a notable example. People with different values agreed to live by each other's social rules for a brief period of time and sometimes learn from the experience. Other shows in this category include ITV's Holiday Showdown, Oxygen's The Bad Girls Club (lifestyles and actions), and Channel 4's Secret Millionaire. Faking It was a series where people had to learn a new skill and pass themselves off as experts in that skill.Shattered was a controversial 2004 UK series where contestants competed for how long they could go without sleep. Dating shows Unlike the aforementioned dating competition shows, some shows feature all new contestants each episode. This format was first used in the 1960s show The Dating Game. Modern examples include Blind Date, Matchmaker, Room Raiders, Elimidate, Next, and Parental Control. Talk shows Though the traditional format of a talk show is that of a host interviewing a featured guest or discussing a chosen topic with a guest or panel of guests, the advent of trash TV shows has often made people group the entire category in with reality television. Programs like Ricki Lake, The Jerry Springer Show, Dr. Phil and many others have generally recruited guests by advertising a potential topic for a future program. Topics are frequently outrageous and are chosen in the interest of creating on-screen drama, tension or outrageous behaviour. Though not explicitly reality television by traditional standards, this sort of depiction of someone's life, even if only in

a brief interview format, is frequently considered akin to broader-scale reality TV programming. Hidden cameras Another type of reality programming features hidden cameras rolling when random passers-by encounter a staged situation. Candid Camera, which first aired on television in 1948, pioneered the format. Modern variants of this type of production include Punk'd, Trigger Happy TV, The Jamie Kennedy Experiment and Just For Laughs Gags. The seriesScare Tactics and Room 401 are hidden-camera programs in which the goal is to frighten contestants rather than just befuddle or amuse them. Not all hidden camera shows use strictly staged situations. For example, the syndicated show Cheaters, purports to use hidden cameras to record suspected cheating partners, although the authenticity of the show has been questioned.[19] Once the evidence has been gathered, the accuser confronts the cheating partner with the assistance of the host. Supernatural and paranormal Started by MTV's Fear in 2000, supernatural and paranormal reality shows place participants into frightening situations which ostensibly involve the paranormal. In series such as Celebrity Paranormal Project, the stated aim is investigation, and some series like Scariest Places on Earth challenge participants to survive the investigation; whereas others such as Paranormal State and Ghost Hunters use a recurring crew of paranormal researchers. Shows such as Fear Factor and Scare Tactics dispense with supernatural overtones and aim solely at inciting fear or aversion in the cast. In general, the shows follow similar stylized patterns of night vision, surveillance, and hand held camera footage; odd angles; subtitles establishing place and time; desaturated imagery; rapid fire, MTV editing; and non-melodic soundtracks. Noting the recent trend in reality shows that take the paranormal at face value, New York Times Culture editor Mike Hale Documentary film Documentary film is a broad category of moving pictures intended to document some aspect of reality. A "documentary film" was originally a movie shot on film stockthe only medium availablebut now includes video and digital productions that can be either direct-to-video or made for a television program. "Documentary" has been described as a

"filmmaking practice, a cinematic tradition, and mode of audience reception" that is continually evolving and is without clear boundaries. In popular myth, the word, documentary was coined by Scottish documentarian John Grierson in his review of Robert Flaherty's film Moana (1926), published in the New York Sun on 8 February 1926, written by "The Moviegoer" (a pen name for Grierson) Grierson's principles of documentary were that cinema's potential for observing life could be exploited in a new art form; that the "original" actor and "original" scene are better guides than their fiction counterparts to interpreting the modern world; and that materials "thus taken from the raw" can be more real than the acted article. In this regard, Grierson's views align with Vertov's contempt for dramatic fiction as "bourgeois excess", though with considerably more subtlety. Grierson's definition of documentary as "creative treatment of actuality" has gained some acceptance, though it presents philosophical questions about documentaries containing stagings and reenactments. In his essays, Dziga Vertov argued for presenting "life as it is" (that is, life filmed surreptitiously) and "life caught unawares" (life provoked or surprised by the camera). Pare Lorentz defines a documentary film as "a factual film which is dramatic."Others further state that a documentary stands out from the other types of non-fiction films for providing an opinion, and a specific message, along with the facts it presents. Documentary Practice is the complex process of creating documentary projects. It refers to what people do with media devices, content, form, and production strategies in order to address the creative, ethical, and conceptual problems and choices that arise as they make documentaries. There are clear connections in terms of practice with magazine and newspaper feature-writing and indeed to non-fiction literature. Many of the generic forms of documentary, for example the biopic or profile; or the observational piece. These generic forms are explored on the University of Winchester Journalism Department 'features web' where 'long form journalism' is classified by genre or content, rather than in terms of production as film, radio or 'print'. History Pre-1900

Early film (pre-1900) was dominated by the novelty of showing an event. They were single-shot moments captured on film: a train entering a station, a boat docking, or factory workers leaving work. These short films were called "actuality" films; the term "documentary" was not coined until 1926. Very little storytelling took place before the twentieth century. Many of the first films, such as those made by Auguste and Louis Lumire, were a minute or less in length, due to technological limitations. Films showing many people (e.g., leaving a factory) were often made for commercial reasons: the people being filmed were eager to see, for payment, the film showing them. One notable film clocked in at over an hour and a half, The Corbett-Fitzsimmons Fight. Using pioneering filmlooping technology, Enoch J. Rector presented the entirety of a famous 1897 prize-fight on cinema screens across the country. The French surgeon Eugne-Louis Doyen started a series of surgical films sometime before July 1898. Until 1906, the year of his last film, Doyen recorded more than 60 operations. As Doyen said that his first films taught him how to correct professional errors he had been unaware of. For scientific purposes, after 1906 Doyen combined 15 of his films into three compilations, two of which survive, the six-film series Extirpation des tumeurs encapsules (1906), and the four-film Les Oprations sur la cavit crnienne (1911). These and five other of Doyen's films survive. Between July 1898 and 1901 the Romanian professor Gheorghe Marinescu made several science films in his neurology clinic in Bucharest:The walking troubles of organic hemiplegy (1898), The walking troubles of organic paraplegies (1899), A case of hysteric hemiplegy healed through hypnosis (1899), The walking troubles of progressive locomotion ataxy (1900) and Illnesses of the muscles (1901). All these short films have been preserved. The professor called his works "studies with the help of the cinematograph", and published the results, along with several consecutive frames, in issues of "La Semaine Mdicale" magazine from Paris, between 1899 and 1902. In 1924, Auguste Lumiere recognized the merits of Marinescu's science films: "I've seen your scientific reports about the usage of the cinematograph in studies of nervous illnesses, when I was still receiving "La Semaine Mdicale", but back then I had other concerns, which left me no spare time to begin biological studies. I must say I forgot those works and I am thankful to you that you reminded them to me. Unfortunately, not many scientists have followed your way." 1900-1920

Travelogue films were very popular in the early part of the 20th century. They were infrequently known as "scenics." Scenics were among the most popular sort of films at the time. An important early film to move beyond the concept of the scenic was In the Land of the Head Hunters (1914), which embraced primitivism and exoticism in a staged story presented as truthful re-enactments of the life of Native Americans. Early color motion picture processes such as Kinemacolor and Prizmacolor used travelogues to promote the new color process. (In contrast, Technicolor concentrated primarily on getting their process adopted by Hollywood studios for fictional feature films.) Also during this period Frank Hurley's documentary film, South (1919), about the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, was released. It documented the failed Antarctic expedition led by Ernest Shackleton in 1914. 1920s Romanticism Nanook of the North poster. With Robert J. Flaherty's Nanook of the North in 1922, documentary film embracedromanticism; Flaherty went on to film a number of heavily staged romantic films, usually showing how his subjects would have lived 100 years earlier and not how they lived right then. For instance, in Nanook of the North Flaherty did not allow his subjects to shoot a walrus with a nearby shotgun, but had them use a harpoon instead. Some of Flaherty's staging, such as building a roofless igloo for interior shots, was done to accommodate the filming technology of the time. Paramount Pictures tried to repeat the success of Flaherty's Nanook and Moana with two romanticized documentaries, Grass (1925) and Chang (1927), both directed by Merian Cooper and Ernest Schoedsack. The city symphony The continental, or realist, tradition focused on humans within human-made environments, and included the so-called "city symphony" films such as Walter Ruttmann's Berlin, Symphony of a City (of which Grierson noted in an article that Berlin represented what a documentary should not be), Alberto Cavalcanti's Rien que les heures, and Dziga Vertov'sMan with the Movie Camera. These films tend to feature people as products of their environment, and lean towards the avant-garde.

Kino-Pravda Dziga Vertov was central to the Soviet Kino-Pravda (literally, "cinematic truth") newsreel series of the 1920s. Vertov believed the camera with its varied lenses, shot-counter shot editing, time-lapse, ability to slow motion, stop motion and fast-motion could render reality more accurately than the human eye, and made a film philosophy out of it. Newsreel tradition The newsreel tradition is important in documentary film; newsreels were also sometimes staged but were usually re-enactments of events that had already happened, not attempts to steer events as they were in the process of happening. For instance, much of the battle footage from the early 20th century was staged; the cameramen would usually arrive on site after a major battle and re-enact scenes to film them. 1920s-1940s The propagandist tradition consists of films made with the explicit purpose of persuading an audience of a point. One of the most notorious propaganda films is Leni Riefenstahl's filmTriumph of the Will (1935). Leftist filmmakers Joris Ivens and Henri Storck directedBorinage (1931) about the Belgian coal mining region. Luis Buuel directed a "surrealist" documentary Las Hurdes (1933). Pare Lorentz's The Plow That Broke the Plains (1936) and The River (1938) andWillard Van Dyke's The City (1939) are notable New Deal productions, each presenting complex combinations of social and ecological awareness, government propaganda, and leftist viewpoints. Frank Capra's Why We Fight (19421944) series was a newsreel series in the United States, commissioned by the government to convince the U.S. public that it was time to go to war. Constance Bennett and her husband Henri de la Falaise produced two feature length documentaries, Legong: Dance of the Virgins (1935) filmed in Bali, and Kilou the Killer Tiger (1936) filmed in Indochina. In Canada the Film Board, set up by John Grierson, was created for the same propaganda reasons. It also created newsreels that were seen by their national governments as legitimate counter-propaganda to the psychological warfare of Nazi Germany (orchestrated by Joseph Goebbels). In Britain, a number of different filmmakers came together under John Grierson. They became known as the Documentary Film Movement. Grierson, Alberto Cavalcanti, Harry Watt, Basil Wright, and Humphrey

Jennings amongst others succeeded in blending propaganda, information, and education with a more poetic aesthetic approach to documentary. Examples of their work include Drifters (John Grierson), Song of Ceylon(Basil Wright), Fires Were Started and A Diary for Timothy (Humphrey Jennings). Their work involved poets such as W. H. Auden, composers such as Benjamin Britten, and writers such as J. B. Priestley. Among the best known films of the movement are Night Mail and Coal Face. 1950s-1970s Cinma-vrit Cinma vrit (or the closely related direct cinema) was dependent on some technical advances in order to exist: light, quiet and reliable cameras, and portable sync sound. Cinma vrit and similar documentary traditions can thus be seen, in a broader perspective, as a reaction against studio-based film production constraints. Shooting on location, with smaller crews, would also happen in the French New Wave, the filmmakers taking advantage of advances in technology allowing smaller, handheld cameras and synchronized sound to film events on location as they unfolded. Although the terms are sometimes used interchangeably, there are important differences between cinma vrit (Jean Rouch) and the North American "Direct Cinema" (or more accurately "Cinma direct"), pioneered by, among others, Canadians Allan King, Michel Brault and Pierre Perrault[citation needed] , and Americans Robert Drew, Richard Leacock,Frederick Wiseman and Albert and David Maysles. The directors of the movement take different viewpoints on their degree of involvement with their subjects. Kopple and Pennebaker, for instance, choose non-involvement (or at least no overt involvement), and Perrault, Rouch, Koenig, and Kroitor favor direct involvement or even provocation when they deem it necessary. The films Primary and Crisis: Behind a Presidential Commitment (both produced byRobert Drew), Harlan County, USA (directed by Barbara Kopple), Dont Look Back (D. A. Pennebaker), Lonely Boy (Wolf Koenig and Roman Kroitor) are all frequently deemedcinma vrit films. The fundamentals of the style include following a person during a crisis with a moving, often handheld, camera to capture more personal reactions. There are no sit-down interviews, and the shooting ratio (the amount of film shot to the finished product) is very high, often reaching 80 to one. From

there, editors find and sculpt the work into a film. The editors of the movement such as Werner Nold, Charlotte Zwerin, Muffie Myers, Susan Froemke, and Ellen Hovde are often overlooked, but their input to the films was so vital that they were often given co-director credits. Famous cinma vrit/direct cinema films include Les Raquetteurs, [14] Showman,Salesman, Near Death, The Children Were Watching, and Grey Gardens. Political weapons In the 1960s and 1970s, documentary film was often conceived as a political weapon against neocolonialism and capitalism in general, especially in Latin America, but also in a changing Quebec society. La Hora de los hornos (The Hour of the Furnaces, from 1968), directed by Octavio Getino and Fernando E. Solanas, influenced a whole generation of filmmakers. Modern documentaries One of 150 DV cameras used by Iraqis to film themselves and create the 2004 film Voices of Iraq. Box office analysts have noted that this film genre has become increasingly successful in theatrical release with films such as Fahrenheit 9/11, Super Size Me, Earth, March of the Penguins, and An Inconvenient Truth among the most prominent examples. Compared to dramatic narrative films, documentaries typically have far lower budgets which makes them attractive to film companies because even a limited theatrical release can be highly profitable. The nature of documentary films has expanded in the past 20 years from the cinema verit style introduced in the 1960s in which the use of portable camera and sound equipment allowed an intimate relationship between filmmaker and subject. The line blurs between documentary and narrative and some works are very personal, such as the late Marlon Riggs's Tongues Untied (1989) and Black Is...Black Ain't (1995), which mix expressive, poetic, and rhetorical elements and stresses subjectivities rather than historical materials. Historical documentaries, such as the landmark 14-hour Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Years (1986 - Part 1 and 1989 - Part 2) by Henry Hampton, Four Little Girls (1997) by Spike Lee, and The Civil War by Ken Burns, UNESCO awarded independent film on slavery 500 Years Later, expressed not only a distinctive voice but also a perspective and point of

views. Some films such as The Thin Blue Line by Errol Morrisincorporated stylized re-enactments, and Michael Moore's Roger & Me placed far more interpretive control with the director. The commercial success of these documentaries may derive from this narrative shift in the documentary form, leading some critics to question whether such films can truly be called documentaries; critics sometimes refer to these works as "mondo films" or "docu-ganda."However, directorial manipulation of documentary subjects has been noted since the work of Flaherty, and may be endemic to the form. Although the increasing popularity of the documentary genre, and the advent of DVDs, has made documentaries financially more viable, funding for documentary film production remains elusive. Within the past decade the largest exhibition opportunities have emerged from within the broadcast market, making filmmakers beholden to the tastes and influences of the broadcasters who have become their largest funding source. Modern documentaries have some overlap with television forms, with the development of "reality television" that occasionally verges on the documentary but more often veers to the fictional or staged. The makingof documentary shows how a movie or a computer game was produced. Usually made for promotional purposes, it is closer to an advertisement than a classic documentary. Modern lightweight digital video cameras and computer-based editing have greatly aided documentary makers, as has the dramatic drop in equipment prices. The first film to take full advantage of this change was Martin Kunert and Eric Manes' Voices of Iraq, where 150 DV cameras were sent to Iraq during the war and passed out to Iraqis to record themselves.] Documentaries without words Films in the documentary form without words have been made. From 1982, the Qatsi trilogy and the similar Baraka could be described as visual tone poems, with music related to the images, but no spoken content. Koyaanisqatsi (part of the Qatsi trilogy) consists primarily of slow motion and time-lapse photography of cities and many natural landscapes across the United States. Baraka tries to capture the great pulse of humanity as it flocks and swarms in daily activity and religious ceremonies. Bodysong was made in 2003 and won a British Independent Film Award for "Best British Documentary". The 2004 film Genesis shows animal and plant life in states of expansion, decay, lovemaking, and death, with some, but little, narration.

Other documentary forms Compilation films Compilation films were pioneered in 1927 by Esfir Schub with The Fall of the Romanov Dynasty. More recent examples include Point of Order (1964), directed by Emile de Antonio about the McCarthy hearings and The Atomic Cafe which is made entirely out of found footage that various agencies of the U.S. government made about the safety of nuclear radiation (e.g., telling troops at one point that it's safe to be irradiated as long as they keep their eyes and mouths shut). Similarly, The Last Cigarette combines the testimony of various tobacco company executives before the U.S. Congress with archival propaganda extolling the virtues of smoking.