History of Journalism

journalism n. the business or practice of writing and producing newspapers.

journalist n. a person employed to write for, edit, or report for, a newspaper, journal or

newscast.

Oxford English Dictionary

In the Middle Ages, a journal was a book listing the times of daily prayers. The word journal originates from the late Latin word diurnalis 'belonging to the day'. The use of the word to mean a personal diary, filled

every day, comes at the beginning of the 17th century. Journal meaning a 'daily newspaper'

dates from the early 18th century, giving us our current uses of journalist and

journalism.

The PressBoth press and print can be traced back to

the Latin premere, 'to press'. Journalists and the newspaper industry have been known as the press, in reference to printing presses,

since the late 18th century.

Another name for journalists, used since the 1830s or 1840s, is the fourth estate. The

three traditional estates of the realm are the three groups consisting Parliament: the Lords

spiritual, the Lords temporal and the Commons. The fourth estate was originally

the common people.

Storytelling tradition

Stories have always had a place in human culture. 35,000-year-old paintings on the

walls of the Lascaux Caves are our earliest recorded evidence of storytelling.

Printing press technology was first developed in China in 593AD. The first newspaperIn Beijing in 700AD, using wood block

technology. Movable type invented in 1041.

Just as the printing press didn’t eliminate oral traditions and the spoken word from

storytelling, neither will digital media and technological advancements eliminate the need for those that are good storytellers.

The role of storytellers has, arguably, never been of greater importance.

Movable Type

1436-1450 – German Johannes Gutenberg develops a metal movable type printing

press.

Gutenberg's system spread rapidly across Europe.

This system led to the wide dissemination of the Bible and other printed books.

Caxton

William Caxton set up the first English printing press in Westminster in 1476.

The first book Caxton printed, and the first book to appear in English, was his own

translation of the History of Troy.

Modern, factory-produced movable type was available in the late 19th century.

First newspapers

Britain's press can trace its history back more than 300 years, to the time of William of

Orange.

By the early 16th century, the first 'news papers' were seen in Britain. However, the largely illiterate population relied on town

criers for news.

1702 - Launch of the first regular daily newspaper: The Daily Courant.

1709 - Berrow's Worcester Journal, considered the oldest surviving English newspaper, started regular publication.

1709 - First Copyright Act.

1718 - Leeds Mercury started (later merged into Yorkshire Post).

1785 – The Daily Universal Register – which will become The Times and also spawn The Sunday Times - launched.

1791 - The Observer launched.

1835 - Libel Act (defamation law in Britain in existence since 13th century); truth allowed as defence for first time in Britain.

1855 - Daily Telegraph started.

1868 - Press Association set up as a national news agency.

1903 - First tabloid style newspaper, the Daily Mirror, is published.

1907 - National Union of Journalists founded.

1959 - Manchester Guardian becomes The Guardian.

1964 – The Sun launched.

1967 - Newspapers use digital production processes and using computers in production.

1969 - News International acquire The Sun and News of the World.

1971 - Use of cost-effective offset printing presses becomes common.

1986 - News International move titles to a new plant at Wapping.

1986 - Today, the first colour national daily, launched.

2004 - The Times switches to tabloid size.

2005 - The Guardian moves to Berliner format after £80m investment in new presses.

2010 – News International place paywalls around its online content for The Times and The Sunday Times

History of Journalism

1910 - First British cinema newsreel appears, launched as a weekly product by the French Pathe company under the title Pathe’s Animated Gazette. Soon joined by competitor products, both French (Gaumont and Eclair) and home-grown (Warwick Bioscope Chronicle, Williamson’s Animated News and Topical Budget).

1916 - The British Government, deciding that it needed an official newsreel with which to communicate news of the war to cinema audiences, purchase Topical Budget and rename it ‘Official War News’.

1920s - Popularity of cinema newsreels increases significantly.

1920 - Radio Broadcasting in the UK begins with Marconi's experimental station 2MT located in an ex-army hut in Writtle, Essex.

1922 - October 18th: The British Broadcasting Company formed - with the government granting the BBC a licence to operate.

November 14th: First-ever news bulletins at six o'clock and nine o'clock.

December 22nd: BBC's first regular bulletin of general news from London, provided by Reuters.

1923 - November 14th: John Reith becomes Managing Director of the BBC and declares that the BBC must bring the best broadcasting to the widest possible number of homes with a mission to "inform, educate and entertain".

1926 - Government committee recommended that the British Broadcasting Company should be replaced with a public authority. The British Broadcasting Company is nationalised and becomes the British Broadcasting Corporation with the granting of the first 10-year Royal Charter. Pledge that BBC will remain 'independent'.

Late 1920s - due to pressure from the newspaper industry BBC still not allowed to transmit its news bulletins, assembled by the news agencies, until after 7pm.

1929 - British Movietone News, the first British sound newsreel, launched. 1932 - BBC acquires its first newsman with newspaper experience.

1936 – November 2nd. Regular television services begin, limited to two hours a day and split equally between afternoons and evenings.

1936 (cont) - No BBC produced television news; instead, on alternate evenings, the latestGaumont British News and British Movietone News cinema newsreels screened. Each evening’s transmission ended with a recording of radio’s nine o’clock news.

1939-45 BBC's news bulletins widely believed to have been fundamental to the morale of the troops. Newsreels covered by the press censorship managed by the Ministry of Information.

1948 – BBC's Television Newsreel makes its debut in January.

1954 - First recognisable BBC TV news bulletin - BBC News and Newsreel - on July 5th. Richard Baker read the first introduction.

1955 - Independent Television News launches on September 22nd. Two weeks before the launch of ITV, BBC newsreaders appear on screen for the first time.

1980 – Cable News Network (CNN) launched by Ted Turner.

1982 – Channel 4 launched and, with it, 55 minute long Channel 4 News evening programme.

1989 - Sky News starts broadcasting in February as part of the four-channel Sky Television service.

1989 – World Wide Web created by Tim Berners-Lee.

1991 – First website to be built goes online in August.

1994 - Radio5 Live launched in March. DG John Birt says it will provide "a service of intelligent news and sport for a younger audience", "coherent and cohesive".

1995 – Talk Radio UK launched. Subsequently re-branded, in 1999 and following a takeover, as TalkSport.

1997 – Channel 5 launched in March. Its news, supplied by ITN, is informal with readers perched on desks.

1997 - BBC News Online launched – BBC now a 'tri-media' producer. BBC News 24 becomes Beeb's first digital channel on November 9th.

2000 – ITN News Channel launched in August. It closes in 2005.

2000 – BBC's Nine O Clock News – which has survived for 30 years – is scrapped when the evening bulletin re-scheduled to go on-air at 10pm.

2006 - ITN News for mobile launched.

2010 – iPad.

History of Journalism

First British Movietone newsreelhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HS1cjdvYD4k

The Day Today 24 news report covering the September 11th terrorist attacks in New York.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SPWgodul_E

Peter O'Hanrahanrahan reporting on news that General Motors have laid off 35,000 industrial workers...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RpFPCDgeI4&feature=related

The Day Today - some of the best bitshttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6jZFZNeOF0&feature=related

Chris invokes a war out of an accordhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3BO6GP9NMY&feature=related