Electronic Diffusion of Culture

The distribution of popular culture around the world is not uniform. The principal obstacle to the diffusion of popular culture is lack of access to electronic media. Access is limited primarily by lack of income. In some developing countries, access is also limited by lack of electricity (refer to Figure 4-9).

Diffusion of TV: Mid-Twentieth Century

The world’s most important electronic media format by far is television. TV supplanted other formats, notably radio and telegraph, during the twentieth century. Into the twenty-first century, other formats have become popular, but they have not yet supplanted TV worldwide.

Watching TV is especially important for popular culture for two reasons:

• Watching TV is the most popular leisure activity in the world. The average human watched 4.4 hours of TV per day in 2018, and the average American watched 5.1 hours.

• TV has been the most important mechanism by which popular culture, such as professional sports, rapidly diffuses across Earth.

Through the second half of the twentieth century, TV diffused from the United States to Europe and other developed countries and then to developing countries (Figure 4-32):

• Early twentieth century: Multiple hearths. TV technology was developed simultaneously in the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Japan, and the Soviet Union, as well as in the United States.

• Mid-twentieth century: United States dominates. In 1954, the first year that the United Nations published data on the subject, the United States had 86 percent of the world’s 37 million TV sets.

• Late twentieth century: Diffusion to Europe. TV diffused to Europe by 1970, but most of Africa and Asia had little if any TV broadcasting.

• Early twenty-first century: Near-universal access. Ownership rates climbed sharply in developing countries.

Diffusion of TV

TVs per 1,000 population in (a) 1954, (b) 1970, and (c) 2005.

Figure 4-32 Full Alternative Text

Diffusion of the Internet: Late Twentieth Century

The changing distribution and diffusion of Internet service follows the pattern established by television a generation earlier, but at a more rapid pace (Figure 4-33):

• In 1995, most countries did not have Internet service, and the United States had 63 percent of the world’s users.

• Between 1995 and 2000, Internet users increased rapidly in the United States, from 9 percent of the population (25 million people) to 44 percent (124 million people). But the worldwide increase was much greater, so the share of the world’s Internet users clustered in the United States declined from 63 percent to 35 percent.

• Between 2000 and 2017, Internet usage continued to increase rapidly in the United States, to more than three-fourths of the population. Again, the U.S. increase was more modest than in the rest of the world, and the share of the world’s Internet users found in the United States continued to decline, to 7 percent in 2017. China now accounts for 22 percent of the world’s Internet users.

Diffusion of The Internet

Internet users per 1,000 population in (a) 1995, (b) 2000, and (c) 2017.

Diffusion of TV and the Internet Compared

Tables 4-1 and 4-2 show changes in the distribution and diffusion of TVs and the Internet in the United States compared with the rest of the world. Table 4-1 shows that the density of TVs in the United States has increased, as TV diffused through the U.S. population. At the same time, TV has diffused to the rest of the world, leaving the United States with an ever-decreasing concentration of the world’s TV sets. Table 4-2 shows that the changes in the distribution and diffusion of the Internet in the United States have occurred at a more rapid pace than was the case with TV.

Changing Distribution and Diffusion of U.S. TV

Changing Distribution and Diffusion of the Internet

Note that all six maps use the same intervals. For example, the highest class in all maps is 300 or more per 1,000. And the first table and the second table use the same units of measurement. What is different between the two figures and two tables is the time interval period. The diffusion of TV from the United States to the rest of the world took a half-century, whereas the diffusion of the Internet took only a decade. Given the history of TV, the Internet is likely to diffuse further in the years ahead at a rapid rate.

Pause & Reflect 4.3.1

The United States has slightly under 1 TV per person. Does your household have more than 1 TV or less than 1 TV per person?