Understanding the modern communication environment requires an understanding of the source of the stories that are being told and the motives of those who are telling those stories.

In this book you will find the phrase mass commercial media. It is broadly defined as stories - movies, television shows, books, magazines, music, etc. - created for the purpose of creating profit. It is important to understand the profit motive, because so much of the storytelling environment in which we live exists to generate profit. To illustrate: A logo t-shirt generates money at the point of sale, but it also becomes a permanent advertisement generating brand awareness for the company that created the logo. Even our bodies, literally, become part of the mass commercial media environment.

Not all of the stories of any society are created purely for profit. But in the contemporary media environment, most of the stories, for most of the people, are created for profit.

Without that understanding, any examination of the stories produced by that system are likely to be incomplete at best.

These stories are the end result of a long and complex process. The public's focus tends to be on the characters at the end of that process - actors and actresses, writers and directors.

This book offers some basic, easy-to-understand tools that can be used to explain the process in its totality. In doing so, the student begins to truly understand what the mass commercial media is, what it does, and how it shapes who we are.