Broadcasting Industry

The industry that distributes audio and audiovisual content to dispersed audiences through electronic mass communication, operating on a one to many model that typically uses radio waves to reach many receivers from a single source, unlike earlier one to one technologies such as the telephone and telegraph. Content reaches audiences over the air, by cable, by satellite and increasingly by digital streaming, and most countries require a broadcasting license for over the air transmission while cable and streaming operate under separate regulatory schemes. The industry funds itself through advertising, public funding, subscription fees and audience contributions, and began commercially with AM radio in the 1920s before expanding with television after the Second World War and moving from analog to digital transmission in the 2000s.