Broadcasting is relatively new when it comes to possible career choices. Traditional broadcasting has been around for just over 100 years, which – in the grand scheme of things – is a short time. However, in this 100 year span, there have been some truly incredible broadcasting inventions.

If you are looking to learn about broadcasting for a future career, understanding these broadcasting inventions is important.

Morse Code

Morse Code essentially opened up the world to the potential of broadcasting in the 1800s. While a textual formation of broadcasting information, this proved to be the first step in sharing information from one location to another.

Subscription Music Services

While some might look at satellite radio as the first subscription music service, the original paid subscription services actually came about in the early 1890s. Wealthy home owners living in countries such as the UK, France, Hungary and a few other locations paid to have music piped in through their telephone line. The music played like a traditional radio station, only it did not have the broadcast advertisements. Breaking news, fiction readings and even religious broadcast were available through these subscription services.

Voice Transmission

While the subscription services all depended on a telephone line, in 1907 Lee de Forest and Reginald A. Fessenden both came up with the ability to transmit the human voice over an electrical current instead of the textual versions of Morse Code. From here, the development of radio signals became more and more prevalent. However, at this time, the majority of radio transmissions were used by naval vessels and for military purposes in order to communicate between different locations.

Commercial Radio Stations

Individuals with some radio knowledge had started to create their own broadcast stations as early as 1913. These stations were often used to broadcast sports scores and news stories close to home. The amplification power could not reach very far, and most people at the time did not have a radio receiver. However, AT&T purchased several patents from Lee de Forest. AT&T allowed Forest to keep broadcast rights for news and music, as the larger company did not see any use in it. In 1916, Forest broadcast the Yale vs. Harvard football game. The first scheduled commercial radio program came out of station KDKA in Pittsburgh.

Broadcast Imagery

Broadcasting inventions up until the mid-1920s focused on audio-based frequencies. However, John Logie Baird transmitted the first recognizable visual image in 1925. Known as a Televisor, the image used 30 lines flashing around 10 times per second, although at the time the image did give viewers headaches. Some crude color became possible by 1928 and an improvement in camera quality came about in 1929.

RCA Color

RCA developed a commercial color adopter in 1953 in order to produce color television programming. It did require new televisions to be purchased in order to view the content, but it proved to be a major step in the overall improvement in visual quality around the entire world.