Entertainment has changed and evolved over countless years to get to where it is now. A lot of this change comes down to the shifting of viewpoints and tastes of people over time. One of the first forms of entertainment was sports, and the Greeks took this entertainment one step further by adding betting to the sports scene. The first sports people bet on are thought to be the Olympic sports. Although sports and sports betting are still popular forms of entertainment, there have been many more forms of entertainment introduced to society over the past 2000 years. From the TV to changes in music, here are some of the major evolutions in entertainment.
Cable TV
When TVs first came out, there was generally just one channel available to be watched. But the introduction of cable TV was a game-changer. It allowed for multiple channels that in turn allowed for more sports matches, movies, and a variety of shows to be seen by the general public and helped these forms of entertainment reach new heights.
Live Broadcasting
Tying into the above, when the live broadcasting of events such as sports matches was implemented, it was a massive breakthrough for entertainment. Before, if you weren’t at the sports match itself, you wouldn’t ever be able to experience the match, but live broadcasting brought about a brand-new way for different events to reach so many more people. Over time, this included people anywhere in the world.
The Development of Different Platforms
In the past, if you wanted to watch a movie or series, you would have to do so on a TV or at a movie theater, however, with the development of new technologies, we can now watch all these various shows on our computers and even our phones.
Video Games
Entertainment has grown to be bigger than just an industry that revolves around movies and TV shows; it now includes things such as video games. Video gaming has become a huge industry, and a lot of its popularity has come with the development of the entertainment industry as a whole. As entertainment has changed and people’s tastes have developed, video games have transformed into one of the biggest industries in the world. This has also allowed competitive video gaming to grow and thus opened up more doors in the entertainment industry.
Music
Music is one of the oldest forms of entertainment but has changed dramatically over time. Before the 1950s, there was no real rock and roll, but then artists such as Elvis Presley developed jazz and the blues into rock and roll. At the time, this was looked down upon, and Elvis was seen as a rebel, with some of his ‘scandalous’ dance moves even being censored on TV. These days those dance moves would never have been thought to be remotely scandalous or inappropriate.
In the 60s, bands like the Beatles and Rolling Stones took rock music even further. Rock was still considered scandalous music at the time, but the general public began loving it, and hence it continued to gain immense popularity. It was also around the time the Beatles took their music to live television, which was a breakthrough for music and entertainment.
The 70s brought about grittier rock with groups like AC/DC and Led Zeppelin while also being the base for the dance-influenced pop music of the likes of the late, great Michael Jackson. The 80s continued the dance music movement as it gained even more popularity while rock music split into sub-genres such as metal and grunge after bands like Kiss and Nirvana were created.
The 90s was a big breakthrough in the music industry, with rap coming to the forefront with the emergence of artists like Tupac and The Notorious B.I.G. While Nirvana continued to grow in popularity, bands like Green Day and the Red Hot Chilli Peppers were formed. Today music is incredibly varied, with each genre having multiple subgenres and collaborations, allowing for music suitable for almost everyone’s tastes.
The development of music over the past couple of decades alone, as well as the many new and improved ways we can access it, shows the massive steps that have been taken in the entertainment industry. Music that was once thought to be scandalous is normal; mainstream music like the Blues is now a smaller genre in the grand scheme of things – but either way, the platforms available to us are numerous. The development of the entertainment industry and all its categories is incredible and just how it will continue to develop in the future remains to be seen.
