This lively and accessible book charts how Australian audiences have engaged with radio and television since the 1920s. Ranging across both the commercial and public service broadcasting sectors, it recovers and explores the lived experiences of a wide cross-section of Australian listeners and viewers. Offering new perspectives on how audiences have responded to broadcast content, and how radio and television stations have been part of the lives of Australians, over the past one hundred years, this book invites us into the dynamic world created for children by the radio industry, traces the operations of radio and television clubs across Australia, and uncovers the workings of the Australian Broadcasting Commission's viewers' advisory committees. It also opens up the fan mail received by Australian broadcasting stations and personalities, delves into the complaints files of regulators, and teases out the role of participants and studio audiences in popular matchmaking programs.

At a time when the traditional media have been reshaped by digital technologies and audiences have fragmented, people are using mediated forms of communication to manage all aspects of their daily lives as well as for news and entertainment. The Media and Communications in Australia offers a systematic introduction to this dynamic field. Fully updated and expanded, this fifth edition outlines the key media industries – from print, sound and television to film, gaming and public relations – and explains how communications technologies have changed the ways in which they now operate. It offers an overview of the key approaches to the field including a consideration of Indigenous communication, and features a ‘hot topics’ section with contributions on issues including diversity, misinformation, algorithms, COVID-19, web series, and national security. With chapters from Australia's leading researchers and teachers in the field, The Media and Communications in Australia remains the most comprehensive and reliable introduction to media and communications from an Australian perspective. It is an ideal student text and a key resource for teachers, lecturers, media practitioners, and anyone interested in understanding these influential industries.

At a time when the traditional media have been reshaped by digital technologies and audiences have fragmented, people are using mediated forms of communication to manage all aspects of their daily lives as well as for news and entertainment. The Media and Communications in Australia offers a systematic introduction to this dynamic field. Fully updated and expanded, this fifth edition outlines the key media industries – from print, sound and television to film, gaming and public relations – and explains how communications technologies have changed the ways in which they now operate. It offers an overview of the key approaches to the field including a consideration of Indigenous communication, and features a ‘hot topics’ section with contributions on issues including diversity, misinformation, algorithms, COVID-19, web series, and national security. With chapters from Australia's leading researchers and teachers in the field, The Media and Communications in Australia remains the most comprehensive and reliable introduction to media and communications from an Australian perspective. It is an ideal student text and a key resource for teachers, lecturers, media practitioners, and anyone interested in understanding these influential industries.

This lively and accessible book charts how Australian audiences have engaged with radio and television since the 1920s. Ranging across both the commercial and public service broadcasting sectors, it recovers and explores the lived experiences of a wide cross-section of Australian listeners and viewers. Offering new perspectives on how audiences have responded to broadcast content, and how radio and television stations have been part of the lives of Australians, over the past one hundred years, this book invites us into the dynamic world created for children by the radio industry, traces the operations of radio and television clubs across Australia, and uncovers the workings of the Australian Broadcasting Commission's viewers' advisory committees. It also opens up the fan mail received by Australian broadcasting stations and personalities, delves into the complaints files of regulators, and teases out the role of participants and studio audiences in popular matchmaking programs.

Legendary media baron Sir Frank Packer was pugnacious, autocratic and always controversial. After joining forces with Labor politician E.G. Theodore to establish Australian Consolidated Press and the Women's Weekly in the 1930s, his empire grew to encompass newspapers, magazines and the Nine television network. This absorbing biography traces the newspaper career of Frank's father R.C. Packer from Hobart and the outback to the founding of Smith's Weekly in 1919. Overshadowed by his brilliant father, Frank was an academic failure at school and a mediocre cadet reporter. Despite his own lack of promise as a journalist, Frank came to rule the Australian media landscape with an iron fist.He was famous for his spectacular takeover bids and editorial interventions, his closeness to Prime Minister Menzies and his pitched battles with unions. A philanthropist as well as a philanderer, he bullied his staff including his sons Clyde and Kerry. In 1960s Sydney, he jostled with the rising Rupert Murdoch for control of the country's largest newspaper market.A keen sportsman, Frank's first successes were in the boxing ring and on the polo field. In 1962 he mounted Australia's first challenge for the America's Cup in the yacht Gretel, named after his late wife.