"The role of the media goes much further than simply providing information about events and issues; media also play a formative role in society ... they are largely responsible for forming the concepts, belief systems and even the language ... which citizens use to make sense of, and to interpret the world in which they live... In other words, media play a major role in forming our cultural identity."

Industry self-regulation in advertising and media

Self-regulation is a principle founded on the liberal ideology of non-intervention by governments in private enterprises. Self-regulation is invariably cast in a rhetoric of assurances that the industry will be socially responsible and dedicated to safeguarding public interests. For many years, the advertising industry had practiced and promoted voluntary self-regulation. Most advertisers, their agencies and the media recognise the importance of maintaining consumer trust and confidence, therefore the rational for them to do so is not because it profits the industry that this be done, but rather because this benefits the citizen through better administration,

Secondly, there is self-regulation that fits in with a legal framework or has a basis laid down in law. In this case, public authorities generally lay down a set of objectives, and some general behavioural rules to be achieved, but leave it up to the operators and other interested parties to establish, implement and sometimes monitor the more detailed rules whereby these objectives are achieved.

Arens, William F, 1999, Contemporary Advertising 7th ed, Irwin/McGraw-Hill, Boston.

A major distinctive feature of pay TV is the direct contractual relationship between the service provider and the subscriber. This voluntary relationship between the provider of a retail service and a subscriber to that service, provides subscribers with freedom of choice along with the capability and responsibility to select the programs they wish to receive. Pay TV has a smaller target audience to commercial television and is further differentiated from free to air television in terms of the number of different channels, total hours broadcast, reduced advertising opportunities and the niche nature of much of its programming.

Advertisements are matter which draw the attention of the public, or a segment thereof, to a product, service, person, organisation or line of conduct in a manner calculated to promote or oppose, directly or indirectly that product, service, person, organisation or line of conduct.

Some common words found in the essay are:
Services Act, National Advertisers, ADVERTISING INDUSTRY, ABA ABA, Appraising Self-Regulation, Pay TV, ABA's Standards, Association ASTRA, Division NAD, Parental Lock, commercial television, pay tv, broadcasting services act, services act 1992, services act, broadcasting services, act 1992, codes conduct, advertising industry, codes practice, radio television, television pay tv, broadcasting industry, product service person, service person organisation,
Approximate Word count = 1993
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)