The Big Five of Commercial Media
After a number of mergers and acquisitions five powerful media conglomerates lead the world's content production and distribution. They operate on an international basis with subsidiaries all around the globe and engage in every imaginable kind of media industry.
Table: The World's Leading Media Companies
Media Company
| 1998 Revenues
(in US$)
| Property/Corporate Information
|  AOL Time Warner (US)
| 26,838.000.000*
| http://www.timewarner.com/corp/about/timewarnerinc/corporate/index.html
| Disney (US)
| 22,976.000.000
| http://www.disney.com
| Bertelsmann (GER)
| 16,389.000.000
| http://www.bertelsmann.com/facts/report/report.cfm
|  News Corporation (AUS)
| 12,841.000.000
| http://www.newscorp.com/public/cor/cor_m.htm
| Viacom (US)
| 12,100.000.000
| http://www.viacom.com/global.tin
| |
(* Revenues of Time Warner only (merger with AOL took place in January 2000)
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1960s - 1970s: Expert Systems Gain Attendance
The concept of expert systems dates back to the 1960s but first gained prominence in the 1970s. Conclusive for this development were the insights of the Stanford University professor Edward Feigenbaum, who in 1977 demonstrated that the problem-solving capacity of a computer program rather is a result of the knowledge it posses, than of the applied programming techniques and formalisms.
Expert systems were designed to mimic the knowledge and reasoning capabilities of a human specialist in a given domain by using (top down) artificial intelligence techniques. Made possible by the large storage capacity of the computers at the time, expert systems had the potential to interpret statistics and formulate rules. An initial use of expert systems was to diagnose and treat human physical disorders, but as its applications in the market place were extensive over the course of the following years they were also employed in fields such as stock market forecast, taxation, chemistry, and geology.
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INTELSAT
INTELSAT is in business since 1964 and owns and operates a global communications satellite system of 17 geostationary satellites providing capacity for voice, video, corporate/private networks and Internet in more than 200 countries and territories.
http://www.intelsat.int/index.htm
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Mass production
The term mass production refers to the application of the principles of specialization, division of labor, and standardization of parts to the manufacture of goods. The use of modern methods of mass production has brought such improvements in the cost, quality, quantity, and variety of goods available that the largest global population in history is now sustained at the highest general standard of living. A moving conveyor belt installed in a Dearborn, Michigan, automobile plant in 1913 cut the time required to produce flywheel magnetos from 18 minutes to 5 and was the first instance of the use of modern integrated mass production techniques.
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