Editing History of broadcasting (section)

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[[File:Guglielmo Marconi.jpg|thumb|Guglielmo Marconi]]
[[File:Donald Manson working as an employee of the Marconi Company.jpg|The [[Marconi Company]] was formed in England in 1910. The photo shows a typical early scene, from 1906, with Marconi employee Donald Manson at right.|thumb]]
[[File:1916 Lee DeForest Columbia broadcast at 2XG.JPG|thumb|Lee DeForest broadcasting Columbia phonograph records on pioneering New York station 2XG, in 1916<ref>{{cite journal|title=The Music Trade Review|date=November 4, 1916|url=https://elibrary.arcade-museum.com/Music-Trade-Review/1916-63-19|volume=63|issue=19}}</ref>]]
[[File:Broadcasting House by Stephen Craven.jpg|thumb|The British Broadcasting Corporation's landmark and iconic London headquarters, [[Broadcasting House]], opened in 1932. At right is the 2005 eastern extension, the John Peel wing.]]

It is generally recognized that the first [[radio transmission]] was made from a temporary station set up by [[Guglielmo Marconi]] in 1895 on the [[Isle of Wight]]. This followed on from pioneering work in the field by a number of people including [[Alessandro Volta]], [[André-Marie Ampère]], [[Georg Ohm]], [[James Clerk Maxwell]] and [[Heinrich Rudolf Hertz]].<ref>{{cite book|first=Mimi|last=Colligan|year=1991|title=Golden Days of Radio|publisher=Australia Post|isbn=0642160252}}</ref>{{full citation needed|date=February 2019}}<ref name="ReferenceA">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=c0snKQEACAAJ|isbn=9780646555812 |title=Australian Radio History |date=2011 |publisher=Bruce Carty }}</ref>{{full citation needed|date=February 2019}}<ref name="ReferenceD">{{cite book|title=When Radio was the Cat's Whiskers|author=Bernard Harte|date=2002|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=W6LGAgAAQBAJ&q=radio+2XT+mobile&pg=PA138|page=138|publisher=Rosenberg Publishing, 2002|isbn=9781921719707|access-date=2020-10-26|archive-date=2022-06-16|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220616113938/https://books.google.com/books?id=W6LGAgAAQBAJ&q=radio+2XT+mobile&pg=PA138|url-status=dead}}</ref>

The [[radio broadcasting]] of music and talk intended to reach a dispersed audience started experimentally around 1905–1906, and commercially around 1920 to 1923. [[VHF]] (very high frequency) stations started 30 to 35 years later.
In the early days, radio stations broadcast on the [[longwave]], [[mediumwave]] and [[shortwave]] bands, and later on VHF ([[very high frequency]]) and UHF ([[ultra high frequency]]). However, in the United Kingdom, Hungary, France and some other places, from as early as 1890 there was already a system whereby news, music, live theatre, [[music hall]], fiction readings, religious broadcasts, etc., were available in private homes [and other places] via the conventional [[history of the telephone|telephone]] line, with subscribers being supplied with a number of special, personalised [[headset (audio)|headsets]]. In Britain this system was known as [[Electrophone (information system)|Electrophone]], and was available as early as 1895 or 1899 [sources vary] and up until 1926.<ref name="ReferenceD"/> In Hungary, it was called [[Telefon Hírmondó]] [1893-1920s], and in France, [[Théâtrophone]] [1890-1932]).

By the 1950s, virtually every country had a broadcasting system, typically one owned and operated by the government. Alternative modes included commercial radio, as in the United States; or a dual system with both state sponsored and commercial stations, introduced in Australia as early as 1924, with Canada following in 1932. Today, most countries have evolved into a dual system,  including the UK. By 1955, practically every family in North America and Western Europe, as well as Japan, had a radio. A dramatic change came in the 1960s with the introduction of small inexpensive portable transistor radios which greatly expanded ownership and usage.  Access became practically universal around the world.