Communications in the United States
Encyclopedia
Federal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission is an independent agency of the United States government, created, Congressional statute , and with the majority of its commissioners appointed by the current President. The FCC works towards six goals in the areas of broadband, competition, the spectrum, the...
. It closely regulates all of the industries mentioned below with the exception of newspapers and the Internet service provider industry.
Press
Metropolitan area
The term metropolitan area refers to a region consisting of a densely populated urban core and its less-populated surrounding territories, sharing industry, infrastructure, and housing. A metropolitan area usually encompasses multiple jurisdictions and municipalities: neighborhoods, townships,...
. The closest thing to a national paper the U.S. has is USA Today
USA Today
USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
. Other influential dailies include the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal which are sold in most U.S. cities. The Times has a moderate-left stance, while the Journal is moderate-right and is strongly pro-business.
The largest newspapers (by circulation) in the United States are USA Today
USA Today
USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
.
Legal monopoly
A legal monopoly, statutory monopoly, or de jure monopoly is a monopoly that is protected by law from competition. A statutory monopoly may take the form of a government monopoly where the state owns the particular means of production or government-granted monopoly where a private interest is...
of the government-owned United States Postal Service
United States Postal Service
The United States Postal Service is an independent agency of the United States government responsible for providing postal service in the United States...
has narrowed during the 20th and 21st centuries, although the USPS, through whose hands passes 40% of the world's mail, still delivers more mail in four days than is delivered by DHL Express
DHL Express
DHL Express is a division of the German logistics company Deutsche Post providing international express mail services. DHL is a world market leader in sea and air mail....
, FedEx
FedEx
FedEx Corporation , originally known as FDX Corporation, is a logistics services company, based in the United States with headquarters in Memphis, Tennessee...
, and the United Parcel Service
United Parcel Service
United Parcel Service, Inc. , typically referred to by the acronym UPS, is a package delivery company. Headquartered in Sandy Springs, Georgia, United States, UPS delivers more than 15 million packages a day to 6.1 million customers in more than 220 countries and territories around the...
in one year.
Telephone
Telephone system:General assessment: A large, technologically advanced, multipurpose communications system.
Domestic: A large system of fiber-optic cable, microwave radio relay, coaxial cable
Coaxial cable
Coaxial cable, or coax, has an inner conductor surrounded by a flexible, tubular insulating layer, surrounded by a tubular conducting shield. The term coaxial comes from the inner conductor and the outer shield sharing the same geometric axis...
, and domestic satellites carries every form of telephone traffic; a rapidly growing cellular system carries mobile telephone traffic throughout the country.
International: Country code - 1; 24 ocean cable systems
Submarine communications cable
A submarine communications cable is a cable laid on the sea bed between land-based stations to carry telecommunication signals across stretches of ocean....
in use; satellite earth stations - 61 Intelsat (45 Atlantic Ocean and 16 Pacific Ocean), 5 Intersputnik (Atlantic Ocean region), and 4 Inmarsat (Pacific and Atlantic Ocean regions) (2000).
Landlines
Telephones - main lines in use: 141 million (2009)- Most of the American telephone system was formerly operated by a single monopoly, AT&TAmerican Telephone & TelegraphAT&T Corp., originally American Telephone and Telegraph Company, is an American telecommunications company that provides voice, video, data, and Internet telecommunications and professional services to businesses, consumers, and government agencies. AT&T is the oldest telecommunications company...
, which was split up in 1984 into a long distance telephone companyTelephone companyA telephone company is a service provider of telecommunications services such as telephony and data communications access. Many were at one time nationalized or state-regulated monopolies...
and several local "Baby Bells." - LandlineLandlineA landline was originally an overland telegraph wire, as opposed to an undersea cable. Currently, landline refers to a telephone line which travels through a solid medium, either metal wire or optical fibre, as distinguished from a mobile cellular line, where transmission is via radio waves...
telephone service continues to be divided between incumbent local exchange carrierIncumbent local exchange carrierAn ILEC, short for incumbent local exchange carrier, is a local telephone company in the United States that was in existence at the time of the breakup of AT&T into the Regional Bell Operating Companies , also known as the "Baby Bells." The ILEC is the former Bell System or Independent Telephone...
s and several competing long distance companies. As of 2005, some of the Baby Bells are beginning to merge with long distance phone companies. A small number of consumers are currently experimenting with Voice over Internet Protocol phone service. - Most local loopLocal loopIn telephony, the local loop is the physical link or circuit that connects from the demarcation point of the customer premises to the edge of the carrier or telecommunications service provider's network...
service to homes is provided through old-fashioned copper wire, although many of the Baby Bells are beginning to upgrade the so-called "last mileLast mileThe "last mile" or "last kilometer" is the final leg of delivering connectivity from a communications provider to a customer. The phrase is therefore often used by the telecommunications and cable television industries. The actual distance of this leg may be considerably more than a mile,...
" to fiber opticFiber in the loopFiber In The Loop is a system implementing or upgrading portions of the POTS local loop with fiber optic technology from the central office of a telephone carrier to a remote Serving area interface located in a neighborhood or to an Optical Network Unit located at the customer premises...
. - Early in the 21st century the number of wire lines in use stopped growing and in some markets began to decline.
Cellular communication
Telephones - mobile cellular: 286 million (2009)- Most states have several competing cellular phone networks.
- The major cellphone companies in the U.S. are AT&T Mobility, Verizon WirelessVerizon WirelessCellco Partnership, doing business as Verizon Wireless, is one of the largest mobile network operators in the United States. The network has 107.7 million subscribers as of 2011, making it the largest wireless service provider in America....
, Sprint NextelSprint NextelSprint Nextel Corporation is an American telecommunications company based in Overland Park, Kansas. The company owns and operates Sprint, the third largest wireless telecommunications network in the United States, with 53.4 million customers, behind Verizon Wireless and AT&T Mobility...
, and T-Mobile
Radio
Federal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission is an independent agency of the United States government, created, Congressional statute , and with the majority of its commissioners appointed by the current President. The FCC works towards six goals in the areas of broadband, competition, the spectrum, the...
)
- Most broadcast stations are controlled by large media conglomerates like Clear Channel CommunicationsClear Channel CommunicationsClear Channel Communications, Inc. is an American media conglomerate company headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It was founded in 1972 by Lowry Mays and Red McCombs, and was taken private by Bain Capital LLC and Thomas H. Lee Partners LP in a leveraged buyout in 2008...
. There are also many small independent local stations. National Public Radio (NPR) is the public radio network.
Radios: 575 million (1997)
Television
Television broadcast stations: 9,024 (of which 1,750 are full-power TV stations; 592 are class-A TV stations; 4,537 are TV translators; and 2,145 are other low-power TV stations) (as of December 31, 2005, according to the Federal Communications CommissionFederal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission is an independent agency of the United States government, created, Congressional statute , and with the majority of its commissioners appointed by the current President. The FCC works towards six goals in the areas of broadband, competition, the spectrum, the...
); in addition, there are about 12,000 cable TV systems.
- Most local commercial television stations are owned-and-operated by or affiliated with the large national broadcast networks such as ABCAmerican Broadcasting CompanyThe American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
, CBSCBSCBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
, Fox, NBCNBCThe National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
, and The CW. Some television networks are aimed at ethnic minorities, including Spanish languageSpanish languageSpanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
networks UnivisiónUnivisionUnivision is a Spanish-language television network in the United States. It has the largest audience of Spanish language television viewers according to Nielsen ratings. Randy Falco, COO, has been in charge of the company since the departure of Univision Communications president and CEO Joe Uva...
and TelemundoTelemundoTelemundo is an American television network that broadcasts in Spanish. The network is the second-largest Spanish-language content producer in the world, and the second-largest Spanish-language network in the United States, behind Univision....
. Public Broadcasting Service (PBSPublic Broadcasting ServiceThe Public Broadcasting Service is an American non-profit public broadcasting television network with 354 member TV stations in the United States which hold collective ownership. Its headquarters is in Arlington, Virginia....
), is the public broadcasting network, with over 300 non-profit affiliated stations across the United States. Besides the large broadcast networks (which are free for anyone with a TV and an antenna), there are also many networks available only with a subscription to cable or satellite television, like CNNCNNCable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
.
Televisions: 219 million (1997)
Internet
Internet Service Providers (ISPs): 7,600 (1999 est.)- Because of aggressive lobbying and the United States' strong libertarianLibertarianismLibertarianism, in the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view...
traditions, the Internet service providerInternet service providerAn Internet service provider is a company that provides access to the Internet. Access ISPs directly connect customers to the Internet using copper wires, wireless or fiber-optic connections. Hosting ISPs lease server space for smaller businesses and host other people servers...
industry remains relatively unregulated in comparison to other communications industries.
Country code (Top level domain): US
- For various historical reasons, the .us domain was never widely used outside of a small number of government agencies and school districts. Most companies signed up for top level domains like .com instead.
- NeuStar Inc. now has control over the .us registry and is trying to promote the domain as an option for American-oriented Web sites.
See also
- United States of AmericaUnited StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
- Media in the United States
- Mobile phone industry in the United StatesMobile phone industry in the United StatesThe Mobile phone industry in the United States is covered in this article. Mobile phones are usually called "cell phones" in the United States.-History:* In 1983, Ameritech launched the first generation mobile phone service in Chicago....
- Cable television in the United StatesCable television in the United StatesCable television in the United States is a common form of television delivery, generally by subscription. Cable television first became available in the United States in 1948, with subscription services in 1949. Data by SNL Kagan shows that as of 2006 about 58.4% of all American homes subscribe to...
- National broadband plans from around the worldNational broadband plans from around the worldBroadband is a term normally considered to be synonymous with a high-speed connection to the internet. The term itself is technology neutral; broadband can be delived by a range of technologies including DSL, LTE or next generation access. This page presents an overview of official Government...