Watergate
Web or online drama Th e internet has proved
fertile ground for made-for-the-web drama,
usually in serial form, each episode (or webi-
sode) of a few minutes’ duration. Online drama
was made possible with the arrival of broadband,
and was soon being tuned into, via computer
or mobile phone, by hundreds of thousands
and occasionally millions of fans. The first
advertisement-supported web drama, indeed the
fi rst web soap, is considered to be ad-executive
Scott Zakarin’s Th e Spot (1995), a drama based
on movie clips and photos of the day-to-day
activities of the characters.
Viewers were encouraged to e-mail writers
and cast with advice for storylines. Another
early web drama from the US was Homicide:
Second Shift which was tied into the TV series
Homicide: Life on the Street. Started in 1997, it
ran into fi nancial diffi culties soon afterwards.
In 1999 Muscle Beach took to the airwaves in
eight-minute weekly instalments. Th is combined
drama with a fi tness programme.
Audiences soon began to top the million mark
with often short-lived web dramas – Red v Blue,
Soup of the Day, Sam Has 7 Friends and Lonely-
girl 15 which, during its 26-month run, attracted
100 million views and stretched over 500
episodes. Kate Modern (2007) picked up on this
success, while Roommates attracted the spon-
sorship of the Ford Motor Company. By 2008 the
corporate media giants had become interested
in web drama. From NBC came Gemini Division
and from Warner Brothers, Sorority for Ever.
In the same year the International Academy of
Web Television was founded, initiating in 2009
a range of annual awards – the Streamy Awards.
A UK contribution to the oeuvre, To y b o i z e,
broadcast on YouTube was nominated for a
Bafta Award in 2009 in the Interactive Creative
Contribution Category. Th e drama was acquired
by the UKTV network and was broadcast on the
Dave TV channel from March 2009. Other UK
notables have been Kirill, Th e Gap Year and Cell,
all from the Endemol company.
Web drama has prospered – at least in terms
of viewer popularity – in Ireland, where Radio
Television Eire (RTE) launched Storyland, a
competition for web dramas which progressed
or bit the dust according to viewer preferences.
Th e winner of the fi rst ever Storyland award was
Hardy Bucks (2009). Zombie Bashers was the
2010 winner.
Web radio See community radio.
Web 2.0 A term that has been contested but
which has proved useful in describing a signifi -
cant watershed in the development of internetAn arms manufacturing company with a
portfolio that includes newspapers, radio and
TV stations is unlikely to smile benignly on these
media if, in the interests of the public, they wish
to challenge arms manufacture and export. Th e
result, usually, is not overt censorship, but
self-censorship. With the trend in recent years
of convergence of ownership, the risks of self-
censorship, of failing to fulfi l the role of public
watchdog, have inevitably increased.
It is for this reason, among others, that media
commentators express concern about conver-
gences of media ownership worldwide, fearing
that watchdogs will be ‘seen off ’ by guard dogs.
See conglomerates; democracy and the
media; hegemony; journalism: citizen
journalism; news values; watergate.
Watergate Scene of one of history’s most famous
break-ins, and source of one of modern history’s
most dramatic scandals that eventually led to the
resignation of the US President. Th e apartment
block called Watergate in Washington DC was
the 1972 election campaign headquarters of the
National Committee of the Democratic Party.
It was broken into in June by agents of the
rival Republican Party’s Committee to Re-elect
President Richard Nixon. Th ey were caught in
the act as they were removing electronic bugging
devices.
The ensuing cover-up was penetrated and
revealed by two reporters on the Washington
Post, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, fed
with significant information by a mysterious
deep throat within government and close to
the President. A Senate investigation committee
pushed fearlessly against presidential closed
doors. Eventually the Supreme Court forced the
White House to give access to tape recordings
made, at Nixon’s command, over a long period in
the President’s offi ce. Th e tapes proved Nixon’s
complicity in the Watergate Aff air.
He was the fi rst President of the US to resign;
if he had not resigned, he would have been
impeached by Congress. His successor, Presi-
dent Ford, extended a blanket pardon to Nixon,
but not to his associates, several of whom ended
up in jail (and most of whom wrote successful
books on their experiences). Watergate is vary-
ingly cited as a supreme example of investigative
journalism, a classic case study of offi cial corrup-
tion and an alarming illustration of the paranoia
that sometimes comes with power and author-
ity. However, it is perhaps most importantly
a breathtaking glimpse of the nature of open
government and the potential of the democratic
process. See spycatcher case; wikileaks.