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The nature of the media and their relationship with their audiences can be profoundly influenced by changes in technology. In 1975, SATCOM I, the first domestic communications satellite, was launched. Up to that time most broadcast messages were trans-mitted through landlines. By the GHD MK5(http://www.topghdhairstore.com/ghd-mk5-c-2.html) mid-1980s, most radio, broadcast, and cable signals were delivered by satellite. Satellites multiply the quantity of programming to which the typical viewer has access and make possible direct and almost immediate transmission of broadcast information from one point on the globe to another.

The advent of home videocassette recorders also altered the media environment. VCRs increased the viewer's control over what was watched and when it was watched. The concept of "day part" (a segment of a broadcast day), once a mainstay of media planners, is rendered potentially obsolete by VCRs. Viewers who are not even at home when a program airs can now record it and view it at their leisure. VCR tracking by Nielsen in November 1998 revealed that VCR owners spent approximately one hour and fifty-four ...
... minutes recording per week. The households, on average, spent four hours per week in playback.

VCRs also made it possible for viewers to eliminate commercials from programming by fast-forwarding through them. Such "zipping" is a major concern of advertisers, who are eager to learn the extent to which VCRs are whittling down the size of their audiences. Barry Kaplan, chairperson of the Advertising Research Foundation Video Electronics Media Council, believes that up to a quarter of the programming re-corded is never played back and that as many as two-thirds of the commercials are "zipped" when playback does occur.

Technological changes have also altered the ways that news is gathered. Reporters now use computers to scan archives and to reduce large amounts of data to manageable form. Inequities can be found and reported. In 1984, for example, reporters at Newsday used a computer to search every state-awarded highway contract and county-awarded sewer contract for an 11-year period. The computer parsed out a pattern that would otherwise have been difficult to see. As it turned out, five firms had collected a disproportionate amount of government business.18 In April 1990, Los Angeles Times reporters Sara Fritz and Dwight Morris used computers to search the disclosure files of candidates to track political contributions by more than 100 wealthy individuals. Donald Trump was among those found to have contributed more than the legal $25,000 limit.

The increased use of computer data by political reporters is a function of reporters' increased comfort with computers and the existence of purchasable magnetic tapes containing all the federal election data for a political cycle. Additionally, a wealth of Federal Election Commission data is now accessible on the Web , and direct access to FEC databases is available for a fee.

The advent of the World Wide Web made it possible for individuals to program their own "home pages" and at the same time created the option for advertisers to sell products online. Whereas advertisers have tried to reach demographic groups through the mass media, the interactive capacity of the computer means that companies can now adapt their messages to individuals. For example, Chrysler Corporation asks Web site visitors to provide some demographic information before being given a "virtual tour" of the Chrysler Technology Center. In the text, the GHD IV MK4 Purple(http://www.myghdhairhome.com) viewer is then addressed by name. Such information can then be used to tailor a message from Chrysler to the individual computer operator.20 Such possibilities led the Magazine Publishers of America in early July 1995 to call for a standard means of measuring advertising on the Web. Each click of the computer mouse now registers as a hit. The problem with this method of counting is that the same viewer may click the mouse many times.

In 1998, advertisers spent an estimated $2 billion promoting products on the Internet.