Learn the top five things you need to know about British media and entertainment
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Kellie: Top 5 Facts about British Media and Entertainment |
| Gina: This will serve as our introduction to the topic of British media and entertainment. |
| Kellie: We’ll explain a little about the topic while telling the most important things to know. |
| Gina: So let’s get started! |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Kellie: Alright! Number 5 is that media and entertainment can take many forms. |
| Gina: Name some forms of entertainment for me. |
| Kellie: Okay. Um, television, radio, books, music, movies, computer games… things like that. |
| Gina: Yep, all pretty traditional forms of entertainment. Do you know the definition of entertainment? |
| Kellie: It’s something that amuses and entertains people. |
| Gina: That’s right. So in November when it’s Bonfire Night and there are firework displays, do the fireworks entertain you? |
| Kellie: Yes, they do. So they’d be entertainment too? |
| Gina: Of course! Entertainment can be almost anything. And media is more than just newspapers and TV, it’s any form of mass communication. |
| Kellie: This is going to be a bigger topic area than I thought! Our number four is that there are six general categories. |
| Gina: You list them, and I’ll explain them. |
| Kellie: Right. Music. |
| Gina: This is an obvious one. Any type of music is entertainment and everybody knows what music is. It doesn’t matter if it’s an amateur performing solo in the street, or an orchestra performing a classical symphony on television, it’s all music and all entertainment. |
| Kellie: I’m sure one of those would be better than the other though! The next category is games. |
| Gina: This is a bit broader than music. Games can be simple word games such as I Spy or Hangman, or they can be more technologically advanced games. |
| Kellie: Like games for the upcoming Playstation 4. |
| Gina: I’m more of an X-box person, but yes! And everything in-between those two extremes. |
| Kellie: The next category is comedy. |
| Gina: I love comedy. I love watching amateur stand up or just hearing a few jokes in the pub. |
| Kellie: I like sitcoms and comedy movies. |
| Gina: They’re all entertainment and they all fit the category of comedy. |
| Kellie: Next is cinema, theatre and performance. |
| Gina: We’ve put these together because they are basically the same. They all involve a show of some sort being played before an audience. |
| Kellie: Performances like this have happened for centuries. I think that there have always been performers willing to stand in front of a crowd and entertain them. |
| Gina: I think so too. Imagine being in one of those audiences that saw Shakespeare’s plays performed for the first time. |
| Kellie: I’d love to have been there! The fifth form is literature. |
| Gina: That’s an easy one. The written word has been around for millennia and stories, plays and poems have been committed to paper for just as long. |
| Kellie: And now we can add e-books to this form. |
| Gina: Yeah, they’re making literature popular all over again. |
| Kellie: Finally, there is.. sport? Sport is entertainment? I thought it was athletes proving how good they are. |
| Gina: It is for the athletes. For the spectators though it’s entertainment. Or maybe it’s more like torture if your team keeps losing. |
| Kellie: Torture, I think. Our number 3 is that it changes over time. |
| Gina: Media and technology are tightly connected to society and technology. |
| Kellie: What do you mean? |
| Gina: Both have existed for as long as civilisation, but they have changed forms over the years. Entertainment would have once been nothing more than performances and later books, but what is entertainment now? |
| Kellie: Movies, television, computer games and mobile phone apps. |
| Gina: All of those only exist because the technology does. As new technology arises, new forms of entertainment do too. |
| Kellie: It’s the same with media too, I guess. At one time the only way to hear the news was from tomorrow’s newspapers. Then radio made it more accessible. |
| Gina: And now, we have 24 hour dedicated news channels and the internet bringing us live footage from across the world. |
| Kellie: I wonder where technology will take media and entertainment next? |
| Gina: Who knows? |
| Kellie: Number 2 is that media and entertainment are industries. |
| Gina: To the general public that consumes entertainment, it’s amusement. However, there are many companies and employees that make a living out of entertainment and media. To them, it’s as important an industry as manufacturing or finance is. |
| Kellie: Yeah, and we’re their customers, just as we are for the manufacturing companies. |
| Gina: Of course. We buy their products, whether it’s CDs, books or concert tickets. There are more customers than just the general public though. |
| Kellie: Huh? |
| Gina: Non-entertainment companies will spend money on sponsoring sports teams or placing their products in key movie scenes. If an author writes a successful book, they can sell it to a movie company or games developer. |
| Kellie: So even entertainment companies are customers and also make money out of other entertainment companies. |
| Gina: There’s a lot of money to be found in media and entertainment! |
| Kellie: It sounds like it! Let’s finish with our number 1. The most important thing you need to remember about media and entertainment is to have fun! |
| Gina: Entertainment can be a serious business. It can be politically driven or exist to make money. It can be thought-provoking and informative but ultimately, the aim of media and entertainment is to entertain. |
| Kellie: Of course. People watch TV shows, they read books, listen to music, play games and watch sports because they get enjoyment out of them. |
| Gina: Even when media and entertainment are being serious and informative, there should still be enjoyment there. |
| Kellie: There is so much entertainment choice out there these days that people won’t pay for things that they don’t enjoy and have fun with. |
| Gina: Exactly. Entertainment and media should be fun! |
| Kellie: Hopefully this lesson is fun too, as it is entertainment! |
| Gina: Informative entertainment. |
| Kellie: Yes. And that’s all for this lesson. |
Outro |
| Kellie: See you next time! |
| Gina: See you! |
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