text:
Riksdag of the Estates

Riksdag of the Estates (Riksens ständer; informally ståndsriksdagen) was the name used for the Estates of Sweden when they were assembled. Until its dissolution in 1866, the institution was the highest authority in Sweden next to the King. It was a Diet made up of the Four Estates, which historically were the lines of division in Swedish society:

 * Nobility
 * Clergy
 * Burghers
 * Peasants

The inclusion of a fourth estate, Bondeståndet, is a peculiarity of the Swedish realm, with few parallels in Europe. The English word peasant is however an inexact translation, as it did not include the entire peasantry, as it is usually defined in an English context. It did not include unlanded or semi-landed groups such as crofters, lodgers and seasonal labourers and of the three categories of Swedish bönder, that is peasants, it included only two. Those were the skattebönder ("tax peasants"), yeomen who owned their own land and were taxed, as well as the kronobönder ("Crown farmers" or "farmers of the Crown"), who farmed land owned by the Crown. The third group, the frälsebönder ("farmers of the nobility/gentry"), who farmed land owned by the nobility, were not represented, as they were considered to be represented by their landowners.

Important assemblies

The meeting at Arboga in 1435 is usually considered to be the first Riksdag, but there is no indication that the fourth estate, the farmers, were represented there.

 * The actual first meeting is likely the one that took place at Uppsala in 1436 after the death of the rebel leader Engelbrekt.
 * At the Riksdag in 1517, regent Sten Sture the Younger and the Privy Council deposed archbishop Gustav Trolle.
 * At Västerås in 1527 Lutheranism was adopted as the new state religion instead of Catholicism.
 * At Västerås in 1544, an order of royal succession was adopted, abolishing elective monarchy in Sweden.
 * At Arboga in 1561, the term Riksdag was used for the first time.
 * At Söderköping in 1595, duke Charles was elected regent of Sweden instead of king Sigismund, who was a Catholic and the king of both Sweden and Poland.
 * In 1612 the Riksdag gave the nobility the privilege and right to hold all higher offices of government, after successful lobbying by the Lord High Chancellor of Sweden Axel Oxenstierna as a reward to this estate in return for their pledge to loyally support the King (Gustavus II Adolfus).
 * The first open conflict between the different estates happened in 1650, when the three lower estates attacked the nobility's privileges. Queen Christina used the conflict to overcome opposition to her having named her cousin Carl Gustav as her heir. When she abdicated in 1654, he succeeded her as Carl X Gustav.
 * At the Riksdag in 1680 a large scale reduction (a return of lands to the Crown earlier granted to the nobility) was enacted, and Sweden became an absolute monarchy. The King's absolute power was confirmed when the Riksdag of the Estates in 1693 officially proclaimed that the king was the sole ruler of Sweden.
 * In 1719, the Riksdag elected Ulrika Eleonora as heir in place of her older sister's son, and Ulrika Eleonora accepted a new constitution restoring the powers of the Riksdag.
 * In 1771–1772, when Gustavus III after his Revolution of 1772 introduced a new Instrument of Government.
 * In 1789, the Riksdag accepted an addition to the instrument of government from 1772. This new law, the Union and Security Act, abolished most noble privileges and commoners, regardless of rank, could hold virtually any office Sweden.
 * In 1809, the Riksdag elected Charles XIII king after his nephew Gustav IV Adolf had been deposed, and after the new king had accepted a new constitution that ended Sweden's second Autocracy (1789–1809).
 * At the sessions in 1634, 1719, 1720, 1772 and 1809 new constitutions were adopted.

Replaced by the new Riksdag
The constitution of 1809 divided the powers of government between the monarch and the Riksdag of the Estates, and after 1866 between the monarch and the new Riksdag. In 1866 all the Estates voted in favor of dissolution and at the same time to constitute a new assembly, Sveriges Riksdag. The four former estates were abolished. The House of Nobility (Riddarhuset) remained as a quasi-official representation of the Swedish nobility until 2003. Although the Nobility remains as a legal entity it is no longer an entity of public law but merely a private association. All Noble privileges have been abolished. However, a number of entailed properties (fidekomisser) remain to be commuted (that is, turned into limited liability companies). The modern Centre Party, which grew out of the Swedish farmers' movement, could be construed as a modern representation with a traditional bond to the Estate of the Farmers.

Riksdag in Finland
Following the Finnish War in 1809, Sweden ceded its eastmost provinces to the Russian Empire. Comprising much of present-day Finland, these became a Grand Duchy under the Emperor, but the political institutions were kept practically intact. The Finnish estates assembled in 1809 at Porvoo to confirm the change in their allegiance. This Diet of Finland followed the forms of the Swedish Riksdag, being the legislative body of the new autonomous region. However, during the reigns of Alexander I and Nicholas I it was not assembled and no new legislation was enacted. The diet was next assembled by tsar Alexander II in 1863, due to the need to modernize the laws. After this the Diet met regularly until 1905, when it passed an act forming a new unicameral parliament. That assembly has been Finland's legislative body since then. The Finnish House of Nobility (Ritarihuone; Riddarhuset) carries on the tradition of the Estate of Nobility, but no new families have been ennobled since 1906.

Literature

 * Stig Hadenius, The Riksdag in Focus: Swedish History in a Parliamentary Perspective, Coronet Books Incorporated, 1997.

title: Riksdag of the Estates


text:
Talk:Scientific method/Archive 1

Cunctator and others''' I edited out a lot of the older talk - we've achieved something a lot nearer a consensus now, so there doesn't seem to be the need for the raging debates of earlier. Anyone who wants to read it can press "View other revisions". - Manning Bartlett

LDC - I really like the new article. I have only made one change - I altered "misconceptions" to philosophical foundations of the scientific method. I really like the way you have re-written the axiomatic viewpoint and I think it is fine as it is. I would also really like you to write an equivalent section explaining the viewpoint that "axioms are not necessary" - this would give the balance that the article needs. I also think that the "non-axiomatic" viewpoint should go first. -- MB

As far as verbs or adjectives - I like the verbs. As long as the surrounding language is consistent then it is fine. Using both verbs and adjectives seems redundant. -- MB

Some useful references from an earlier discussion: http://teacher.nsrl.rochester.edu/phy_labs/AppendixE/AppendixE.html http://biology.clc.uc.edu/courses/bio104/sci_meth.htm http://phyun5.ucr.edu/~wudka/Physics7/Notes_www/node6.html#SECTION02121000000000000000 http://pc65.frontier.osrhe.edu/hs/science/hsimeth.htm

More recent talk...

I removed this right after Cunctator added it:

 * The steps are known as evidential, explanatory, predictive, verificatory, and consequential.

This adds no information that wasn't already there, and it gives the mistaken impression that there is some official consensus about the exact steps; that's just not true. Descriptions even disagree on the number of steps, or that there is any specific rigorous procedure at all; giving them official-sounding names just encourages people to memorize things and encourage teachers to put things on tests that won't help anyone understand the real concept. --LDC
 * I'm with LDC on this. Let's either use verbs or adjectives, but both are unnecessary. - MB

How about a discussion on experimental error and its effect? What constitutes random error and what is a contradiction that warrants further investigation? Consider, for instance, the scientist who exposed a gold foil to alpha particle bombardment (I'm not sure if he knew that alpha radiation was due to helium nuclei) and expected all of the radiation to go through. Indeed most, did, but a very small amount bounced back. From what I've heard, the amount was so small that it could have been explained away as experimental error. The scientist didn't ignore it, however, because to him it was the equivalent of, "firing a sixteen inch shell at a sheet of tissue paper and having it bounce back at you," (not sure if the quote was his). Rutherford reasoned that there must be something incredibly small and solid that the radiation was bouncing off of. Thus the nuclear model of the atom was born and the plum pudding model was refuted.

Perhaps this deserves to be in some other article about data analysis, but it does warrant mentioning somewhere.

Also, it was Earnest Rutherford, right? --BlackGriffen

 * experimental error and its effect deserves to be covered, but an article on the "Scientific Method" doesn't seem like the right place. - Any suggestions? MB

Debate on "an hypothesis" versus "a hypothesis" moved to talk:English language

Added reference to Thomas Kuhn. Personally I think he has a much more accurate description of what scientists do. -- Chenyu

I'm not convinced that Kuhn's ideas are contrary to the scientific method. But I'll let LDC argue that one, if he so chooses. --Stephen Gilbert

The mention of Kuhn seems fine to me. It states something that he believes, and that a lot of people take seriously (though I don't happen to be one of them). While I was here, I also removed the last occurrences of "an hypothesis...". --LDC

-

 * It is not the goal of science to answer irrelevant questions, only those which affect our lives

I think I understand what this sentence is trying to say, but it seems kinda clumsily worded. --Robert Merkel

 * However, neither science nor scientific method itself do not rely on faith;

Damn double negative, could you simplify this sentence ? --Taw

I cut this sentence... ''"Some post-modernists have gone even further and claimed that sociological mechanisms are the only content of science and thus, implicitly, science differs only in the details of its sociology from, say Druidic tree spirit beliefs as a description of reality."

Reason - it's two steps removed from the article. THe preceding sentence introduces how Kuhn said that sociological mechanisms are absent from the SM as traditionally presented. OK, that is relevant. This cut sentence then goes on to discuss the validity and significance of sociological mechanisms within science as a whole. I felt the sentence confuses the article and goes off on a tangent too unrelated to the main topic. - MMGB

- Perhaps the use of the terms "falsify" "falsifiable" should be revisited. In my experience the connotations of these terms is closer to fraud or manufacturing a lie than it is to validate or invalidate.

The lengthy article falsifiable seems to imply that someone thinks it is technical term in use in scientific circles. Perhaps the phrases using the term could be rewritten using other terms such as validate, verify, etc. while leaving the link to falsifiable for readers interested in more detail. To me, falsifiable implies that it is possible to successfully lie about the results ... clearly not the intended concept which I assume to be more along the lines of "possible to validate or invalidate via known published methods". -  user:Mirwin

 * Mirwin, in scientific terminology that's precisely what falsifiable means. Academic psychologists commonly use the term (or actually the inverse "unfalsifiable") to describe Freud's theories, for instance. I would argue that introducing a fairly basic piece of jargon here (and linking to the definition) is preferable to using less precise terms. --Robert Merkel

 * Excellent point. I agree with you.  I was unaware that falsifiable is a term in use as precise technical term.  Thanks for the edification. user:mirwin

I prefer to proceed with the utmost caution through this article. To me there is a distinction between the concepts of scientific method as a topic of debate among philosophers, and scientific method as a practical tool-kit for the study and evaluation of a theory on any subject. The philosophers like this term "falsifiable", and with a little effort I like to believe that I can grasp what that doctrine denotes. Nevertheless, I distinguish between denotations which follow directly from a definition, and connotations which depend as much upon the readers experience with the word. Please believe me when I say that the word "falsifiable" carries a lot of uncontrollable baggage in the mind of the reader. Although the philosophers suggest that a hypothesis is in valid if it is not falsifiable, those who object to the practices of parapsychology seem to suggest exactly the opposite.

 * I think most if not all scientists understand that "falsifiable" means that a hypothesis may be proven false, and that this is a crucial feature of any useful hypothesis. I have added a parenthetical in the article clarifying this.

 * Please do not confuse "falsified" with "falsifiable." They are indeed similar words but are used in different ways.  This by the way is common, at least in English.  For example, I don't think any one would say the word "sanction" should be avoided in articles on diplomacy and international relations.

 * the issue here is not what we mean by "falsifiable" but what we mean by "hypothesis." Testimony in a court, or other evidence, may be "falsified" in the sense of fraud.  But a hypothesis does not make the same claims that court testimony or evidence does, and is not used to the same ends.  Thus, the significance of the possibility that something is "false" is very different as well.  slrubenstein

Upon reflection, I changed the numbered list near the start of the article to plain bullets. I think numbers make it sound to formal/official/rigid, when that's not really the case at all. --LDC

[moved from subject page]

Some other things that belong in here:

The scientific method is often confused with technology. Technology is an application of science. While science has proven its usefulness through application to develop technology, from semiconductors to putting a man on the moon, the scientific method in itself is just a simple and robust technique for developing understanding.

The scientific method never proves anything. It is simply a technique for rejecting hypotheses which are not useful.

It's easy to spot things that aren't science. They usually have science in their name.

* Christian Science * Scientology * Computer Science (which is an art, not a science)

Removed:

 * The unreasonable application of purely theoretical structures to actual physical reality (for example, mathematical group theory with regard to particle energy transitions) is a long-standing concern and is as yet unexplained.

I removed this because all mathematics is "purely theoretical", so I don't see what the particular concern about applying this is any more than making predictions using Newtonian physics. --Robert Merkel 06:41 Oct 10, 2002 (UTC)

Why does this extremely accurate synopsis keep getting deleted?
 * Various fringe groups, including radical literary deconstructionists, Marxists and religious fundamentalists, sometimes claim that the scientific method is not a way to acquire knowledge, and that it really is only a procedure for validating knowledge already gathered. However, scientists note that no other process has ever produced confirmable results, and that even critics of science in practice defer to the scientific method by using its results. There is a widespread consensus that the scientific method provides the only testable and confirmable method to learn about the natural world and the rules by which it operates, and that it is the only way to improve existing or proposed knowledge. It is widely held as the only impartial method to avoid religious and cultural biases. RK

Why is there all this anti-Science bias? Why are a tiny number of radical extremists given equal weight to mainstream views? In an NPOV article, we are bound to note when two viewpoints both seem to have equal support, or when one viewpoint is mainstream, and the other viewpoint is a radical view held by a tiny minority. In this case the article isn't evem close to NPOV. It gives equal weight to a tiny number of radicals, and it doesn't even allow the reader to know who holds such views. The test I added puts the information in perspective, by allowing readers to know what groups put forth the radical views. Why is this critical information continually deleted? Why the vehemently anti-science viewpoint? RK

- Eclecticology writes: What do Marxists and religious fundamentalists have to do with this?

 * Uh, they are examples of people who are making the claims against the validity of science? One of the parts of of being NPOV is to attribute who holds a given belief. This is especially important when a belief is considered to be on the radical fringe.
 * The concept of a "Marxist science" had more to do with the purpose and use of science than with challenging scientific method. That fundamentalists would use the term "creation science" doesn't automatically turn that into a science.  I agree that attribution is a part of the NPOV process.  If that's what you believe, do it instead of referring to vague fringe groups.  How can I apply the scientific method to your hypotheses?  I have no way of verifying that your "fringe group" even said what you say it said. -Ec

Eclecticology writes: "Scientists note" statement is a vague generality that identifies neither the scientists nor the critics. Scientists can be critics of science too. Using the scientific method is not a matter of deferring to it.

 * Uh, no. Scientists do not criticise the validity of the scientific method. That's a myth propagated by anti-Science zealots. Of course, scientists do criticise each other within the scientific method itself. The scientific method itself demands that people critically examine each other's assumptions, each other's experimental set-ups and controls, and critically examine each other's data. They do not, however, criticise the very idea that the scientific method is a method tohelp us learn about the physical world in which we live. RK
 * The scientific method itself is subject to its own rules. Even if scientists don't criticize the validity of the scientific method, they are by no means unanimous in their views of what it means.  I suspect there are probably more pro-science zealots than anti-science zealots.  Zealots are often so enamoured of they're own unique view of truth, that they drive the opposing point of view into credibility.  -Ec

There is no "widespread consensus" to misunderstand the scientific method to way RK does. Where does the scientific method make this claim to exclusivity?

 * You really should avoid making claims about subjects which you have not done enough reading on. As a scientist myself, I sadly am far too familiar with the anti-Science literature which I have described. Its out there, there is a lot of it, and it does make such claims. :( RK
 * These statements are typical of a self-proclaimed scientist. This kind of sophistry says that since you believe it's out there, everybody else must know just what specific claims you have in mind. -Ec

You don't avoid religious and cultural bias by dragging in Marxism and fundamentalism as straw men to be disproved.

 * Honestly, I have no idea what you are talking about. The fact that I mentioned religious fundamentalists has nothing to do with whether or not a scientist follows the scientific method or not. Anyone who does follow this method can avoid religious bias. For instance, both an atheist and a fundamentalist Christian will 'always get the same results about the acceleration of gravity at the surface of the Earth. But if one abandons the scientific method, and uses another method to answer this questiom, such as radical feminist literary deconstuction, or Protestant Chrisitan Bible readings, then every person will get a different (and wrong!) answer. RK
 * Of course, the fundamentalist fails to apply the scientific method. Applying the scient6ific method and their belief in God are mutually exclusive. There's too many of these fundamentalists around for them to be a fringe group.  The leap from fundamentalism to the acceleration of gravity is a non sequitur.  As for "literary deconstruction", feminist or otherwise, who ever claimed that the analysis of novels and poetry is scientific in the first place? -Ec

"Anti-Science bias", "radical extremists": what is RK trying to accomplish with these rhetorical questions?

 * First off, leave my name out of it. Stop using ad homenim remarks, and deal with issues.
 * Both expressions were direct quotes from RK. There's nothing ad hominem about that. -Ec

RK seems to want to reduce NPOV to some kind of popularity contest. Who are the radicals? Popper? Kuhn? This is hotly debated stuff. It's important to keep in mind that this article is about the scientific method itself. It is not about any specific network of facts to which it may be applied. It is neither about a specific science or specific pseudoscience.

 * This is a flat-out dishonest claim. I am merely asking people to stop falsely representing a radical anti-science fringe as the mainstream. That is not NPOV. Popularity contests have nothing to do with anything. And your last two sentences here are arguing against statements that no one is making! RK
 * RK did credibly clarify the meaning of pathological science, perhaps out of a wish to apply such methods here. The two sentences in question aren't arguing against anything, but about keeping the discussion of "Scientific method" focused on just that rather than on lunatic fringes.  Almost all questions considered by the application of scientific method remain necesarily open, including the ones whose answers are undisputed.  If a particular hypothesis diverges from mainstream thought the burden of proof that must be borne by its proponents is a much heavier one.  Scientific method does give these ideas the opportunity to be proven; that's a question of open mindedness.  I prefer to see what science says rather than what scientist say.  If you make a claim purporting to represent scientists, I want at least that some opportunity to check the facts is available. Ec.

The truth in any specific circumstance has nothing to do with who the proponents of a particular POV may be. Reference to authority is a logical fallacy. Eclecticology 02:54 Dec 16, 2002 (UTC)

 * HUh? Who are you arguing with, and what are you talking about? Why do you keep attacking statements I never made, and beliefs that I do not have? Please try to stay focused. RK
 * See logical fallacy Eclecticology 09:29 Dec 16, 2002 (UTC)

 * Is this the alt.wiki.jerryspringer.science newsgroup ?? BF

Eclecticology writes "If a particular hypothesis diverges from mainstream thought the burden of proof that must be borne by its proponents is a much heavier one. Scientific method does give these ideas the opportunity to be proven; that's a question of open mindedness. I prefer to see what science says rather than what scientist say. If you make a claim purporting to represent scientists, I want at least that some opportunity to check the facts is available. Ec."

 * Who are you arguing with? This is precisely what I have been saying all along. I don't understand your latest comments, because now you seem to be arguing my position. So what precisely do you find so wrong about the clarification in the article? We all agree that most people accept that the scientific method is valid, and actually tells us about how the world works. You seem to be disagreeing with my claim that many people, who I term radical,s reject the validity of the scientific method. But many such people do exist, I tonight I would be more than happy to provide a partial bibliography of such radical positions. You keep saying that only a tiny number of people are so extreme. Well, that is precisely what the new section in the article says. I agree with you that only a very tiny number of people hold this way, and that is why I don't think that they should be presented as being an equally reasonable or large group. RK

The shorter current version ("Other viewpoints hold & etc.) is better. By avoiding the marginalising term "fringe groups" and the slightly strident tone of the longer version, it carries more weight, and being easier to read, is a better argument for the scientific method. Sometimes simple is best. Tannin 15:28 Dec 16, 2002 (UTC)

--- This article needs more work dont ya think? "In recent years..." Kuhn published that seminal work 40 odd years ago. There is a huge gap between what scientists think they are doing and  what they are actually doing. Everytime philosophers understand things it takes a while for that knowledge to diffuse especially if one has to wait for the entrenched to die off. Also it does seem to me that the scientific method is " a collection of techniques" if we compare the differing methods of different disciplines. Two16 05:28 Jan 9, 2003 (UTC)

--- There is so much that has be done on the scientific method since Kuhn that it staggers the mind to read this article. The scientific method is done no justice by this article. Even when sceintists use the scientific method they can end up with entirely differing world veiws (ex.Bohr and Einstein and their respective camps). Science is not a monolith and it should never be accorded the same status as a dogmatic religon. When clear logical thinking shows the limitations of a world veiw, a scientific mind adjusts to accommodate. This article starts off on a wrong foot and does not get any better (could it be because the source refernces of the external links are so dated - 50s 60s and mass market popular science from the 90s). The instruction I received in junior high was substantially better at presenting a simplified scientific method for childern. Any truth is better than make believe.64.229.15.189 16:21 Jan 9, 2003 (UTC)

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

This archive was placed here by User:Two16

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Talk:Scientific method/Archive 1


text:
Bird feeding

Bird feeding is the activity of feeding wild birds, often by means of bird feeders. With a recorded history dating to the 6th century, the feeding of wild birds has been encouraged and celebrated in the United States and United Kingdom, with it being the United States' second most popular hobby having National Bird-Feeding Month congressionally decreed in 1994. Various types of food are provided by various methods; certain combinations of food and method of feeding are known to attract certain bird species.

The feeding of wild birds has been shown to have possible negative as well as positive effects; while a study in Sheffield, England found that the abundance of garden birds increased with levels of bird feeding, multiple reports suggest that bird feeding may have various negative ecological effects and may be detrimental to the birds being fed, including increased risk of predatory action and malnutrition. It has been estimated that American adults spend approximately US$3.8 billion a year on food, feeders and related accessories.

History
The British naturalist James Fisher wrote that the first person recorded as feeding wild birds was the 6th-century monk Saint Serf of Fife who tamed a robin by feeding it.

During the harsh winter of 1890–1891 in the United Kingdom national newspapers asked people to put out food for birds, and in 1910 in the United Kingdom, Punch magazine declared that feeding birds had become a national pastime.

Today in the United Kingdom, most people feed year-round, and enough food is provided to support the calorie requirements of the 10 most common garden bird species. Bird feeding has grown into the United States' second most popular hobby behind gardening. In celebration of the bird feeding hobby, February was named National Bird-Feeding Month by congressional decree in 1994.

Types
Certain foods tend to attract certain birds. Finches and siskin are attracted by niger (nyger or nyjer), and jays prefer maize. Hummingbirds, sunbirds and other nectivorous birds seek nectar. Mixed seed and black-oil sunflower seed is favoured by many seed-eating species due to its high fat content and thin casing. In Australia, meat, especially raw beef mince (or ground beef), is commonly fed to wild carnivorous birds such as Australian magpies and kookaburras. Birds such as white-eyes, barbets, and certain thrushes will consume fresh and cut fruit. Different feeders can be purchased specialized for different species. It is not only small birds that are attracted by bird feeding. In some urban areas of the UK, red kites are fed chicken and table scraps in gardens.

Most common birds can be fed using peanuts, seed, coconut (but never desiccated coconut) or fat (but not oils that are liquid at room temperature) using a variety of feeders.

After a station is established, it can take some weeks for birds to discover and start using it. This is particularly true if the feeding station is the first one in an area or (in cold-winter areas) if the station is being established in spring when natural sources of food are plentiful. Food, particularly unshelled foods, such as thistle seed and suet, left uneaten for too long may spoil. Birds also require a source of drinking water and a birdbath can attract birds as a feeding station.

In North America, suet can be used to attract a variety of birds that may not reliably visit a bird feeder containing seeds. In Texas, all common species of woodpeckers will use a suet feeder year-round. In winter, yellow-rumped and orange-crowned warblers, golden-crowned kinglets and northern flickers could visit. In spring, northern oriole and other warblers may also visit.

Impact
A study conducted in Sheffield, England, found that the abundance of garden birds increased with levels of bird feeding. This effect was only apparent in those species that regularly take supplementary food, raising the possibility that bird feeding was having a direct effect on bird abundance. In contrast, the density of feeding stations had no effect on the number of different bird species present in a neighbourhood.

The use of bird feeders has been claimed to cause environmental problems; some of these were highlighted in a front-page article in The Wall Street Journal.

Prior to the publication of The Wall Street Journal article, Canadian ornithologist Jason Rogers also wrote about the environmental problems associated with the use of bird feeders in the journal Alberta Naturalist. In this article, Rogers explains how the practice of feeding wild birds is inherently fraught with negative impacts and risks such as fostering dependency, altering natural distribution, density and migration patterns, interfering with ecological processes, causing malnutrition, facilitating the spread of disease and increasing the risk of death from cats, pesticides, hitting windows and other causes. In the UK, introduced eastern gray squirrels can consume significant volumes of food intended for birds. An experimental study providing supplementary food during the breeding season found that predation levels by corvids and eastern gray squirrels were higher when nests were located in close proximity to filled feeders.

In a paper in the journal Oecologia, it was reported that feeding of blue tits and great tits with peanut cake over a long time period significantly reduced brood size. This was driven by smaller clutch sizes in both species and lower hatching success rates for blue tits. Studies by the University of Freiburg and Environment Canada found that blackcaps migrating to Great Britain from Germany had become adapted to eating food supplied by humans. In contrast blackcaps migrating to Spain had bills adapted to feeding on fruit such as olives.

Providing supplementary food at feeding stations may also change interactions with other species. Aphids and carabid beetles are more likely to be predated by birds near bird feeders.

Economy
Large sums of money are spent by ardent bird feeders, who indulge their wild birds with a variety of bird foods and bird feeders. Over 55 million Americans over the age of 16 feed wild birds and spend more than $3 billion a year on bird food, and $800 million a year on bird feeders, bird baths, bird houses and other bird feeding accessories. The activity has spawned an industry that sells supplies and equipment for the bird feeding hobby.

In some cities or parts of cities (e.g. Trafalgar Square in London ) feeding pigeons is activity discouraged by government, either because they compete with vulnerable native species, or because they abound and cause pollution and/or noise.

title: Bird feeding


text:
The Cosby Show

The Cosby Show is an American television sitcom created by (along with Ed. Weinberger and Michael J. Leeson) and starring Bill Cosby that originally aired on NBC from September 20, 1984, to April 30, 1992, with a total of 201 half-hour episodes spanning eight seasons, including an outtakes special. The show focuses on the Huxtables, an upper middle-class African-American family living in Brooklyn, New York; the series was based on comedy routines in Cosby's stand-up comedy act, which in turn were based on his family life. The series was followed by a spin-off, titled A Different World, which ran from September 24, 1987 to July 9, 1993, with a total of six seasons consisting of 144 episodes.

TV Guide listed the series as "TV's biggest hit in the 1980s", adding it "almost single-handedly revived the sitcom genre and NBC's ratings fortunes", while also ranking it 28th on their list of 50 Greatest Shows; with this list, Cliff Huxtable was named as the "Greatest Television Dad" in 2014. In May 1992, Entertainment Weekly stated that The Cosby Show helped to make possible a larger variety of shows with a predominantly black cast, from In Living Color to The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

The Cosby Show spent five consecutive seasons as the number-one rated show on television and, along with All in the Family, is the only sitcom in the history of the Nielsen ratings as the number-one show for five seasons, having spent the series in the top 20 ratings. It also remains the only scripted TV show with a predominantly African-American cast to top the Nielsen ratings, and to do so more than once. Its spinoff, A Different World', also became a ratings hit, featuring in the top 5 of the ratings for four of its six seasons. It launched the extended cast into stardom and Cosby, having already had a successful career on TV, films and stand-up, became the highest paid actor on television.

It was also an international hit, garnering a following from across the world being a regular fixture in markets previously considered unattainable for African-American leads, such as Europe, where the show became a ratings and commercial hit and cemented itself as an international icon of 1980s pop culture. Its effects on Black American portrayal and gender politics on television were a major part of its success. The portrayal of Clair Huxtable, the matriarch of the Huxtable family, by Phylicia Rashad sparked an international wave of working mothers on television dubbed the "Clair Huxtable effect", and Bill Cosby was nicknamed "America's Dad" for his highly celebrated portrayal of Cliff Huxtable. The colourful sweaters he wore as Cliff became a fashion trend for a time which was temporarily revived in the early 2010s. Another sitcom starring Cosby and Rashad, Cosby, aired on CBS from 1996 to 2000, notable for its differences to The Cosby Show, garnering positive reviews.

Premise
The show focuses on the Huxtable family, an upper middle class African-American family, living in a brownstone in Brooklyn Heights, New York, at 10 Stigwood Avenue. The father is Cliff Huxtable, an obstetrician and son of a prominent jazz trombonist. The mother is his wife, lawyer Clair Huxtable.

They have four daughters and one son: Sondra, Denise, Theo, Vanessa, and Rudy. Despite its comedic tone, the show sometimes involves serious subjects, like Theo's experiences dealing with dyslexia, inspired by Cosby's dyslexic son, Ennis. and teenage pregnancy when Denise's friend Veronica (Lela Rochon) becomes pregnant.

Pilot
The Cosby Show pilot episode uses the same title sequence as the rest of the first season, and is widely regarded as the first episode. However, it contains a number of differences from the remainder of the series.

In the pilot, the Huxtables have only four children. Following the pilot, the Huxtables have five children, with the addition of their eldest daughter, Sondra (Sabrina Le Beauf), who is mentioned in episode four and appears first in episode 11. The character was created when Bill Cosby wanted the show to express the accomplishment of successfully raising a child who had graduated from college.

Bill Cosby originally wanted Vanessa Williams to play the part of Sondra due to her college education and background in theater arts. However, Williams had recently been crowned the first black Miss America and pageant officials would not permit her to play the role while she was representing the Miss America pageant. Whitney Houston was also considered for the role of Denise Huxtable, but was unable to commit to the full-time television production schedule in the NBC contract, as she intended to become a full-time music recording artist.

Most of the story in the pilot presentation is taken from Bill Cosby's 1983 comedy film Bill Cosby: Himself. Cosby's character is called "Clifford" in the early episodes of the first season, but his name was later switched to "Heathcliff".

Additionally, Vanessa refers to Theo as "Teddy" twice in the dining room scene. The interior of the Huxtables' home features an entirely different living room from subsequent episodes, and different color schemes in the dining room and the master bedroom. Throughout the remainder of the series, the dining room is reserved for more formal occasions.

Conception and development
In the early 1980s, Marcy Carsey and Tom Werner, two former executives at ABC, left the network to start their own production company: Carsey-Werner. At ABC, they had overseen sitcoms such as Mork & Mindy, Three's Company, and Welcome Back, Kotter. The two partners decided that to get a sitcom to sell for their fledgling company, they needed a big name behind it. Bill Cosby had had performed stand-up comedy with award-winning albums and starred in several genres in TV and film in the 1960s and 70s, but his career had become more static by the early 1980s. According to a Chicago Tribune article from July 1985, despite Carsey and Werner's connection to the network, Lewis Erlicht, president of ABC Entertainment, passed on the show, prompting a pitch to rival network, NBC.

Outside of his work on his cartoon series Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, Cosby was doing little in film or television, but Carsey and Werner were fans of Cosby's stand-up comedy and thought it would be the perfect material for a family sitcom.

Cosby originally proposed that the couple should both have blue-collar jobs, with the father a limousine driver, who owned his own car, and the mother an electrician. With advice from his wife Camille Cosby, though, the concept was changed so that the family was well-off financially, with the mother a lawyer and the father a physician.

Cosby wanted the program to be educational, reflecting his own background in education. He also insisted that the program be taped in New York City instead of Los Angeles, where most television programs were taped. The Huxtable home exterior was filmed at 10 St. Luke's Place near 7th Avenue in Manhattan's Greenwich Village (although in the show, the residence was the fictional "10 Stigwood Avenue").

Production notes
Early episodes were videotaped at NBC's Brooklyn studios (subsequently JC Studios). The network later sold that building, and production moved to the Kaufman Astoria Studios in Queens. Even though the show was set to take place in Brooklyn, the exterior façade was actually of a brownstone townhouse located in Manhattan's Greenwich Village at 10 Leroy Street/ 10 St. Luke's Place. The pilot was filmed in May 1984, with season one's production commencing that July, and the first taping on August 1 (Goodbye Mr. Goldfish).

During its original NBC run, it was one of five successful sitcoms on the network that featured predominantly African-American casts. The others were 227 (1985–90), Amen (1986–91), Cosby Show spin-off A Different World (1987–93) and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (1990–96).

Although the cast and characters were predominantly African-American, the program was unusual in that issues of race were rarely mentioned when compared to other situation comedies of the time with predominantly African-American casts, such as The Jeffersons. However, The Cosby Show had African-American themes, such as the Civil rights movement, and it frequently promoted African-American culture and culture of Africa represented by artists and musicians such as Jacob Lawrence, Miles Davis, James Brown, B. B. King, Stevie Wonder, Sammy Davis Jr., Lena Horne, Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie and Miriam Makeba.

The spin-off, A Different World, dealt with racial issues more often. The Cosby Show's series finale, taped March 6, 1992, aired during the 1992 Los Angeles riots, with Cosby quoted in media at the time pleading for peace.

During the third season, Rashad was pregnant with her daughter Condola. Rather than write this pregnancy in, the producers simply greatly reduced Rashad's scenes or filmed in such a way that her pregnancy was not noticeable.

Another main cast member pregnancy, that of Bonet, almost caused the actress to be fired, especially coming in the wake of appearing in the film Angel Heart, which contained explicit sexual scenes with actor Mickey Rourke. Cosby strongly disapproved of Bonet's role, but allowed her to continue on World until returning to Cosby after her pregnancy. Tensions remained, however, and Bonet was eventually fired in April 1991.

Theme song and opening sequence
The show's theme music, "Kiss Me", was composed by Stu Gardner and Bill Cosby. Seven versions of this theme were used during the run of the series, making it one of the few television series to use multiple versions of the same theme song over the course of a series. For season four, the theme song music was performed by musician Bobby McFerrin.

Due to legal complications regarding the background mural, the opening for season seven was filmed on August 17, 1990, at Kaufman Astoria Studios in New York City, New York was replaced with the one from the previous season. The original season seven opening, with slight modifications, returned to use in the beginning of season eight.

Reception and legacy
The show's portrayal of a successful, stable black family was praised by some for breaking racial stereotypes and showing another part of the African-American experience. However, it was criticized by others, including Henry Louis Gates Jr., for allowing white audiences to think that racism and poverty were problems of the past. Phylicia Rashad claimed that when she met Nelson Mandela, he told her that he "is eternally grateful for the show and its influence on Apartheid and us Black people. [The inmates in prison] watched the show while in prison." As a result of the Bill Cosby sexual assault cases, Malcolm-Jamal Warner has stated that the show's legacy is "tarnished".

The Cosby Show had generated US$2.5 billion in television revenue, including US$1 billion from television advertisement, and US$1.5 billion from syndication.

Broadcast history and ratings
The Cosby Show aired on Thursdays at 8:00 pm for all eight seasons. In its first season, the show was the beginning of a Thursday NBC schedule that was followed by Family Ties, Cheers, Night Court, and Hill Street Blues.

The Cosby Show is one of three television programs (All in the Family and American Idol being the others) that were number one in the Nielsen ratings for five consecutive seasons.

Syndication
The Carsey-Werner Company handles domestic distribution, while Paramount Global's unit CBS Media Ventures handles international distribution of the series, and has done so since 1997. In the United States, The Cosby Show began its television syndication run in September 1988 in broadcast syndication, shortly before the show's fifth-season premiere, and was at the time distributed by Viacom; many stations that carried the series were Big Three television networks affiliates. As time went on, this moved to lower-profile timeslots, independent station and minor network affiliates.

Fort Worth, Texas–based independent station KTVT carried the series until 1995, when it ceased operating as a regional cable superstation and became an affiliate of CBS. TBS, then a national cable superstation, carried the series for nearly a decade beginning in 1999. Fellow superstation WGN America began carrying the series shortly thereafter, and continued to until September 2010. Viacom's Nick at Nite began airing reruns of the series in March 2002, and its sister network TV Land began airing reruns in 2004, making The Cosby Show one of the few series that were shown on both Nick at Nite and TV Land at the same time. The series was also available to stream on Hulu.

The French version just called Cosby Show aired on M6 in 1988.

In the Italian version of the show, the family name is not Huxtable but Robinson. The whole show is named I Robinson (The Robinsons) airing on Canale 5 & K2 from 1986 until 1993.

2010s removal from syndication
Reruns of The Cosby Show have been pulled from several networks and venues as a result of the Bill Cosby sexual assault cases. In November 2014, TV Land pulled the series from its lineup. "Episodes have been pulled immediately for the foreseeable future ... TV Land even removed references to The Cosby Show from its website on Wednesday afternoon as the scandal accelerated." In December 2014, the Magic Johnson–owned network Aspire removed the show from its lineup.

BET's Centric (another Viacom unit), along with Bounce TV, ceased airing reruns of The Cosby Show. At the same time, barter syndicator The Program Exchange ceased distributing the show. Bounce TV resumed airing the series in December 2016 but pulled the show on April 26, 2018 — the day Cosby was convicted of sexual assault. TV One began airing reruns of the show in May 2017. It is the only American network to offer the series. The series is available on Amazon Prime Video and Philo.

Spin-off
The Cosby Show's producers created a spin-off series called A Different World that was built around the "Denise" character (portrayed by actress Lisa Bonet), the second of the Huxtables' four daughters. Initially, the new program dealt with Denise's life at Hillman College, the fictional historically black college from which her father, mother, and paternal grandfather had graduated.

Denise was written out of A Different World after its inaugural season, due to Bonet's pregnancy, and the following season was revamped, with the addition of director Debbie Allen (Phylicia Rashad's sister) and new characters. Denise later became a recurring character on The Cosby Show for seasons four and five, and a regular again in seasons six and seven.

Awards won
Emmy Award
 * Outstanding Comedy Series (1985)
 * Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series (1985) – Michael J. Leeson and Ed. Weinberger for the pilot episode
 * Outstanding Directing in a Comedy Series (1985) – Jay Sandrich for "The Younger Woman"
 * Outstanding Directing in a Comedy Series (1986) – Jay Sandrich for "Denise's Friend"
 * Outstanding Guest Performer in a Comedy Series (1986) – Roscoe Lee Browne for "The Card Game"
 * Outstanding Editing for a Series – Multi-Camera Production (1986) – Henry Chan for "Full House"

Golden Globe Awards
 * Best TV Series – Comedy (1985)
 * Best Performance by an Actor in a TV Series – Comedy – Bill Cosby (1985, 1986) 2 wins

NAACP Image Awards
 * Outstanding Comedy Series (1988)
 * Outstanding Actress in a Comedy Series – Phylicia Rashad (1988, 1989) 2 wins
 * Outstanding Actor in a Comedy Series – Bill Cosby (1989, 1993) 2 wins

Peabody Award (1986)

People's Choice Awards
 * Favorite New TV Comedy Program (1985)
 * Favorite Male Performer in a New TV Program – Bill Cosby (1985)
 * Favorite Female Performer in a New TV Program – Phylicia Rashad (1985)
 * Favorite TV Comedy Program (1985–89) 5 wins
 * Favorite Male TV Performer – Bill Cosby (1986–92) 7 wins
 * Favorite All-Around Male Entertainer – Bill Cosby (1986–88, 1990–91) 5 wins
 * Favorite Young TV Performer – Keshia Knight Pulliam (1988)
 * All-Time Favorite TV Program (1989)
 * Favorite Female TV Performer – Phylicia Rashad (1989)
 * Favorite All-Around Male Star – Bill Cosby (1989)
 * Favorite TV Comedy Series (1990, 1992) 2 wins

Nominations
Emmy Awards
 * Outstanding Technical Direction/Electronic Camerawork/video control for a series – 1985
 * Outstanding Live and Tape Sound Mixing and Sound Effects for a series – (1985) 2 nominations
 * Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series – (1985–86)
 * Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series – Phylicia Rashad (1985–86) 2 nominations
 * Outstanding Comedy Series (1986–87) 2 nominations
 * Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series – Lisa Bonet (1986)
 * Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series – Keshia Knight Pulliam (1986)
 * Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series – Malcolm-Jamal Warner (1986)
 * Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Comedy Series or a Special – (1986–87)
 * Outstanding Editing for a Series (multi camera production) – (1987)
 * Outstanding Directing in a Comedy Series – Jay Sandrich (1987)
 * Outstanding Comedy Series – (1987)
 * Outstanding Guest Performer in a Comedy Series – Eileen Heckart (1988)
 * Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series – Sammy Davis Jr. (1989)

Golden Globe Awards
 * Best TV Series – Comedy – (1986–1987) – Two nominations
 * Best Performance by an Actor in a TV Series – Comedy – Bill Cosby (1987)

Other honors

 * 1993: TV Guide named The Cosby Show the All-Time Best Family Show in its issue celebrating 40 years of television.
 * 1997: TV Guide ranked the episode "Happy Anniversary" #54 on their list of the TV Guide's 100 Greatest Episodes of All Time
 * 1999: Entertainment Weekly placed show's debut at #24 in its list of the "100 Greatest Moments in Television"
 * 2002: TV Guide placed The Cosby Show at #28 in its list of the TV Guide's 50 Greatest TV Shows of All Time
 * 2004: TV Guide ranked Cliff Huxtable number 1 on its 50 Greatest TV Dads of All Time list
 * 2004: Bravo ranked Cliff Huxtable #44 on its list of the 100 Greatest TV Characters
 * 2007: Time magazine placed the show on its unranked list of "100 Best TV Shows of All-TIME"
 * 2007: USA Today's web site ranked the show as #8 in its list of the "top 25 TV moments of the past quarter century"
 * 2008: Entertainment Weekly selected Cliff Huxtable as the Dad for "The Perfect TV Family"
 * 2013: TV Guide ranked The Cosby Show #26 on its list of the 60 Best Series.
 * 2013: The Writers Guild of America ranked The Cosby Show #29 on their list of the 101 Best Written TV Series.
 * 2023: Variety ranked The Cosby Show #90 on its list of the 100 greatest TV shows of all time.

Albums
Two albums were produced that included various theme and background music from the show. The albums were presented by longtime Cosby collaborator Stu Gardner. They were:

 * A House Full of Love: Music from The Cosby Show (1986)
 * Total Happiness (Music from the Bill Cosby Show, Vol. II) (1987)

In popular culture

 * During the series' run, the character of Cliff Huxtable frequently wore an array of knit sweaters that were often brightly colored and featured abstract, asymmetrical patterns or themes. The sweaters were erroneously thought to be designed by the Australian clothing company Coogi, but were actually designed by Dutchman Koos Van Den Akker.
 * They were dubbed "Cosby sweaters", a term that is used to describe sweaters that are generally deemed garish and unappealing. In May 2008, Cosby's daughter Evin auctioned a batch of the sweaters that her father had kept on eBay. The proceeds of the sales went to the Hello Friend/Ennis William Cosby Foundation, a non-profit charity named for Ennis Cosby. Ennis, Cosby's only son, was murdered in January 1997.
 * The character of Dr. Hibbert, who is featured on the long-running animated sitcom The Simpsons, is modeled after Dr. Cliff Huxtable. The Simpsons writing staff decided to make Dr. Hibbert a parody of Cliff Huxtable after the Fox network moved The Simpsons to Thursday nights airing opposite the top-rated The Cosby Show.
 * In the Teen Titans Go! episode "Oil Drums", Starfire says "I would like to watch The Crosby Pudding Half-Hour Show of Sweaters. Theo, get your glorp-nops off the kitchen table. Rudy!"

International broadcast
In The Philippines The Show aired on GMA Network, in 1985–1991 PTV-4 in 1992–1996 & ABC-5 in 1997–2001 (Tagalized). In the United Kingdom it was broadcast on Channel 4.

Home media
All eight seasons of The Cosby Show have been released on DVD in Region 1. Seasons one and two were released by UrbanWorks which was subsequently acquired by First Look Studios, who then released the remaining six seasons. Seasons One and Two contain special features, including the ninety minute retrospective documentary entitled The Cosby Show: A Look Back, which aired on NBC in May 2002.

It contains interviews with cast members, bloopers, deleted scenes and audition footage. In December 2010, First Look Studios filed bankruptcy, and all its assets were subsequently acquired by Millennium Entertainment, who also took over distribution of The Cosby Show DVD releases. As of 2013, these releases have been discontinued, and are now out of print.

On November 5, 2013, it was announced that Mill Creek Entertainment had acquired the rights to the series. They have subsequently re released all eight seasons on DVD. On September 1, 2015, Mill Creek released a sixteen disc complete series set entitled The Cosby Show – The Complete Series.

In Region 4, Magna Pacific has released all eight seasons on DVD in Australia and New Zealand. The first two seasons have similar artwork to the North American copies, although season two is red rather than blue. Each Australian cover also features the tagline "In a house full of love, there is always room for more".

Universal Studios Home Entertainment has released Seasons 1 to 4 in Region 2 (United Kingdom).

Note: The Millennium Entertainment release of season one contains the edited versions of the episodes aired in syndication. However, all subsequent DVD releases (including the complete series set) contain the original, uncut broadcast versions. In 2011, Millennium quietly released season one uncut in Region 1, which featured the special features from The Complete Series set.

title: The Cosby Show


text:
Universal Pictures

Universal City Studios LLC, doing business as Universal Pictures (informally as Universal Studios or also known simply as Universal) is an American film production and distribution company that is a division of Universal Studios, which is owned by NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast.

Founded in 1912 by Carl Laemmle, Mark Dintenfass, Charles O. Baumann, Adam Kessel, Pat Powers, William Swanson, David Horsley, Robert H. Cochrane, and Jules Brulatour, Universal is the oldest surviving film studio in the United States and the fifth oldest in the world after Gaumont, Pathé, Titanus, and Nordisk Film, and is one of the "Big Five" film studios.

The most commercially successful film franchises from Universal include Fast & Furious, Jurassic Park, and Despicable Me. Additionally, the studio's library includes many individual films such as Jaws and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, both of which became the highest-grossing films of all time during their initial releases. Universal Pictures is a member of the Motion Picture Association (MPA), and was one of the "Little Three" majors during Hollywood's golden age.

Early years
Universal was founded by Carl Laemmle, Mark Dintenfass, Charles O. Baumann, Adam Kessel, Pat Powers, William Swanson, David Horsley, Robert H. Cochrane and Jules Brulatour. One story has Laemmle watching a box office for hours, counting patrons, and calculating the day's takings. Within weeks of his Chicago trip, Laemmle gave up dry goods to buy the first several nickelodeons. For Laemmle and other such entrepreneurs, the creation in 1908 of the Edison-backed Motion Picture Patents Company (or the "Edison Trust") meant that exhibitors were expected to pay fees for Trust-produced films they showed. Based on the Latham Loop used in cameras and projectors, along with other patents, the Trust collected fees on all aspects of movie production and exhibition and attempted to enforce a monopoly on distribution.

Soon, Laemmle and other disgruntled nickelodeon owners decided to avoid paying Edison by producing their own pictures. In June 1909, Laemmle started the Yankee Film Company with his brothers-in-law Abe Stern and Julius Stern. That company quickly evolved into the Independent Moving Pictures Company (IMP), with studios in Fort Lee, New Jersey, where many early films in America's first motion picture industry were produced in the early 20th century. Laemmle broke with Edison's custom of refusing to give billing and screen credits to performers. By naming the movie stars, he attracted many of the leading players of the time, contributing to the creation of the star system. In 1910, he promoted Florence Lawrence, formerly known as "The Biograph Girl", and actor King Baggot, in what may be the first instance of a studio using stars in its marketing.

The Universal Film Manufacturing Company was incorporated in New York City on April 30, 1912. Laemmle, who emerged as president in July 1912, was the primary figure in the partnership with Dintenfass, Baumann, Kessel, Powers, Swanson, Horsley, and Brulatour. The company was established on June 8, 1912, formed in a merger of Independent Moving Pictures (IMP), the Powers Motion Picture Company, Rex Motion Picture Manufacturing Company, Champion Film Company, Nestor Film Company, and the New York Motion Picture Company. Eventually all would be bought out by Laemmle. The new Universal studio was a vertically integrated company, with movie production, distribution, and exhibition venues all linked in the same corporate entity, the central element of the Studio system era.

Following the westward trend of the industry, by the end of 1912, the company was focusing its production efforts in the Hollywood area.

Universal Weekly and Moving Picture Weekly were the alternating names of Universal's internal magazine that began publication in this era; the magazine was intended to market Universal's films to exhibitors. Since much of Universal's early film output was destroyed in subsequent fires and nitrate degradation, the surviving issues of these magazines are a crucial source for film historians.

On March 15, 1915, Laemmle opened the world's largest motion picture production facility, Universal City Studios, on a 230-acre (0.9-km2) converted farm just over the Cahuenga Pass from Hollywood. Studio management became the third facet of Universal's operations, with the studio incorporated as a distinct subsidiary organization. Unlike other movie moguls, Laemmle opened his studio to tourists. Universal became the largest studio in Hollywood and remained so for a decade. However, it sought an audience mostly in small towns, producing mostly inexpensive melodramas, westerns, and serials. In 1916, Universal formed a three-tier branding system for their releases. Unlike the top-tier studios, Universal did not own any theaters to market its feature films. Universal branding their product gave theater owners and audiences a quick reference guide. Branding would help theater owners judge films they were about to lease and help fans decide which movies they wanted to see. Universal released three different types of feature motion pictures: Directors of "Jewel" films included Jack Conway, John Ford, Rex Ingram, Robert Z. Leonard, George Marshall, and Lois Weber, one of the few women directing films in Hollywood. Starting in the mid-1920s, Universal branded its most expensive and heavily-promoted feature films as "Super-Jewel" productions. These included films such as Erich von Stroheim's Foolish Wives (1922), Clarence Brown's The Acquittal (1923), Hobart Henley's A Lady of Quality (1924), Harry A. Pollard's Uncle Tom's Cabin (1927), and Edward Sloman's Surrender (1928).
 * Red Feather Photoplays – low-budget feature films
 * Bluebird Photoplays – mainstream feature release and more ambitious productions
 * Jewel – prestige motion pictures featuring high budgets using prominent actors

Despite Laemmle's role as an innovator, he was an extremely cautious studio chief. Unlike rivals Adolph Zukor, William Fox, and Marcus Loew, Laemmle chose not to develop a theater chain. He also financed all of his own films, refusing to take on debt. This policy nearly bankrupted the studio when actor-director Erich von Stroheim insisted on excessively lavish production values for his films Blind Husbands (1919) and Foolish Wives (1922), but Universal shrewdly gained a return on some of the expenditure by launching a sensational ad campaign that attracted moviegoers. Character actor Lon Chaney became a drawing card for Universal in the mid-1910s, appearing steadily in dramas. However, Chaney left Universal in 1917 because of a salary dispute, and his two biggest hits for Universal were made as isolated returns to the studio: The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) and The Phantom of the Opera (1925).

During the early 1920s Laemmle entrusted most of Universal's production policy decisions to Irving Thalberg. Thalberg had been Laemmle's personal secretary, and Laemmle was impressed by his cogent observations of how efficiently the studio could be operated. Promoted to studio chief in 1919, Thalberg made distinct improvements of quality and prestige in Universal's output in addition to dealing with star director Erich von Stroheim's increasing inability to control the expense and length of his films, eventually firing Stroheim on October 6, 1922, six weeks into the production of Merry-Go-Round (1923) and replacing him with Rupert Julian. Louis B. Mayer lured Thalberg away from Universal in late 1922 to his own growing studio, Louis B. Mayer Productions, as vice-president in charge of production, and when Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer was formed in 1924 Thalberg continued in the same position for the new company. Without Thalberg's guidance, Universal became a second-tier studio and would remain so for several decades. In 1926, Universal opened a production unit in Germany, Deutsche Universal-Film AG, under the direction of Joe Pasternak. This unit produced three to four films per year until 1936, migrating to Hungary and then Austria in the face of Hitler's increasing domination of central Europe. With the advent of sound, these productions were made in the German language or, occasionally, Hungarian or Polish. In the U.S., Universal Pictures did not distribute any of this subsidiary's films. Still, some of them were exhibited through other independent, foreign-language film distributors based in New York City without the benefit of English subtitles. Nazi persecution and a change in ownership for the parent Universal Pictures organization resulted in the dissolution of this subsidiary.

In the early years, Universal had a "clean picture" policy. However, by April 1927, Carl Laemmle considered this a mistake as "unclean pictures" from other studios generated more profit while Universal lost money.

Oswald the Lucky Rabbit
In early 1927, Universal had been negotiating deals with cartoon producers since they wanted to get back into producing them. On March 4, Charles Mintz signed a contract with Universal in the presence of its vice president, R. H. Cochrane. Mintz's company, Winkler Pictures, was to produce 26 "Oswald the Lucky Rabbit" cartoons for Universal. Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks created the character and the Walt Disney Studio provided the animation for the cartoons under Winkler's supervision.

The films enjoyed a successful theatrical run, and Mintz would sign a contract with Universal ensuring three more years of Oswald cartoons. However, after Mintz had unsuccessfully demanded that Disney accept a lower fee for producing the films, Mintz took most of Walt's animators to work at his own studio. Disney and Iwerks would create Mickey Mouse in secret while they finished the remaining Oswald films they were contractually obligated to finish. Universal subsequently severed its link to Mintz and formed its own in-house animation studio to produce Oswald cartoons headed by Walter Lantz, which would later result in the creation of Woody Woodpecker in 1940.

In February 2006, NBCUniversal sold all the Disney-animated Oswald cartoons, along with the rights to the character himself, to The Walt Disney Company. In return, Disney released ABC sportscaster Al Michaels from his contract so he could work on NBC's recently acquired Sunday night NFL football package. Universal retained ownership of the remaining Oswald cartoons.

Keeping leadership of the studio in the family
In 1928, Laemmle Sr. made his son, Carl Jr., head of Universal Pictures, a 21st birthday present. Universal already had a reputation for nepotism—at one time, 70 of Carl Sr.'s relatives were supposedly on the payroll. Many of them were nephews, resulting in Carl Sr. being known around the studios as "Uncle Carl". Ogden Nash famously quipped in rhyme, "Uncle Carl Laemmle/Has a very large faemmle". Among these relatives was future Academy Award-winning director/producer William Wyler.

"Junior," Laemmle persuaded his father to bring Universal up to date. He bought and built theaters, converted the studio to sound production, and made several forays into high-quality production. His early efforts included the critically panned part-talkie version of Edna Ferber's novel Show Boat (1929), the lavish musical Broadway (1929) which included Technicolor sequences; and the first all-color musical feature (for Universal), King of Jazz (1930). The more serious All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) won its year's Best Picture Oscar.

Laemmle Jr. created a niche for the studio, beginning a series of horror films which extended into the 1940s, affectionately dubbed Universal horror. Among them are Dracula (1931), Frankenstein (1931), The Mummy (1932) and The Invisible Man (1933). Other Laemmle productions of this period include Tay Garnett's Destination Unknown (1933), John M. Stahl's Imitation of Life (1934) and William Wyler's The Good Fairy (1935).

The Laemmles lose control
Universal's forays into high-quality production spelled the end of the Laemmle era at the studio. Taking on the task of modernizing and upgrading a film conglomerate in the depths of the Great Depression was risky, and for a time, Universal slipped into receivership. The theater chain was scrapped, but Carl Jr. held fast to distribution, studio, and production operations.

The end for the Laemmles came with a lavish version of Show Boat (1936), a remake of its earlier 1929 part-talkie production, and produced as a high-quality, big-budget film rather than as a B-picture. The new film featured several stars from the Broadway stage version, which began production in late 1935, and unlike the 1929 film, was based on the Broadway musical rather than the novel. Carl Jr.'s spending habits alarmed company stockholders. They would not allow production to start on Show Boat unless the Laemmles obtained a loan. Universal was forced to seek a $750,000 production loan from the Standard Capital Corporation, pledging the Laemmle family's controlling interest in Universal as collateral. It was the first time Universal had borrowed money for a production in its 26-year history. The production went $300,000 over budget; Standard called in the loan, cash-strapped Universal could not pay, and Standard foreclosed and seized control of the studio on April 2, 1936.

Although Universal's 1936 Show Boat (released a little over a month later) became a critical and financial success, it was not enough to save the Laemmles' involvement with the studio. They were unceremoniously removed from the company they had founded. Because the Laemmles personally oversaw production, Show Boat was released (despite the takeover) with Carl Laemmle and Carl Laemmle Jr.'s names on the credits and in the film's advertising campaign. Standard Capital's J. Cheever Cowdin had taken over as president and chairman of the board of directors and instituted severe cuts in production budgets. Joining him were British entrepreneurs C.M. Woolf and J. Arthur Rank, who bought a significant stake in the studio. Gone were the big ambitions, and though Universal had a few big names under contract, those it had been cultivating, like William Wyler and Margaret Sullavan, left.

Meanwhile, producer Joe Pasternak, who had been successfully producing light musicals with young sopranos for Universal's German subsidiary, repeated his formula in the United States. Teenage singer Deanna Durbin starred in Pasternak's first American film, Three Smart Girls (1936). The film was a box-office hit and reputedly resolved the studio's financial problems. The film's success led Universal to offer her a contract, which for the first five years of her career, produced her most successful pictures.

When Pasternak stopped producing Durbin's pictures, and she outgrew her screen persona and pursued more dramatic roles, the studio signed 13-year-old Gloria Jean for her own series of Pasternak musicals from 1939; she went on to star with Bing Crosby, W. C. Fields, and Donald O'Connor. A popular Universal film of the late 1930s was Destry Rides Again (1939), starring James Stewart as Destry and Marlene Dietrich in her comeback role after leaving Paramount.

By the early 1940s, the company was concentrating on lower-budget productions that were the company's main staple: westerns, melodramas, serials, and sequels to the studio's horror pictures, the latter now solely B pictures. The studio fostered many series: The Dead End Kids and Little Tough Guys action features and serials (1938–43); the comic adventures of infant Baby Sandy (1938–41); comedies with Hugh Herbert (1938–42) and The Ritz Brothers (1940–43); musicals with Robert Paige, Jane Frazee, The Andrews Sisters, and The Merry Macs (1938–45); and westerns with Tom Mix (1932–33), Buck Jones (1933–36), Bob Baker (1938–39), Johnny Mack Brown (1938–43); Rod Cameron (1944–45), and Kirby Grant (1946–47).

Universal could seldom afford its own stable of stars and often borrowed talent from other studios or hired freelance actors. In addition to Stewart and Dietrich, Margaret Sullavan and Bing Crosby were two of the major names that made a couple of pictures for Universal during this period. Some stars came from radio, including Edgar Bergen, W. C. Fields, and the comedy team of Abbott and Costello (Bud Abbott and Lou Costello). Abbott and Costello's military comedy Buck Privates (1941) gave the former burlesque comedians a national and international profile.

During the war years, Universal did have a co-production arrangement with producer Walter Wanger and his partner, director Fritz Lang, lending the studio some amount of prestige productions. Universal's core audience base was still found in the neighborhood movie theaters, and the studio continued to please the public with low- to medium-budget films. Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce in new Sherlock Holmes mysteries (1942–46), teenage musicals with Gloria Jean, Donald O'Connor, and Peggy Ryan (1942–43), and screen adaptations of radio's Inner Sanctum Mysteries with Lon Chaney Jr. (1943–45). Alfred Hitchcock was also borrowed for two films from Selznick International Pictures: Saboteur (1942) and Shadow of a Doubt (1943).

As Universal's main product had always been lower-budgeted films, it was one of the last major studios to contract with Technicolor. The studio did not make use of the three-strip Technicolor process until Arabian Nights (1942), starring Jon Hall and Maria Montez. Technicolor was also used for the studio's remake of their 1925 horror melodrama, Phantom of the Opera (1943) with Claude Rains and Nelson Eddy. With the success of their first two pictures, a regular schedule of high-budget Technicolor films followed.

Universal International and Decca Records
In 1945, J. Arthur Rank, who had already owned a stake in the studio almost a decade before, hoping to expand his American presence, bought into a four-way merger with Universal, the independent company International Pictures, and producer Kenneth Young. The new combine, United World Pictures, was a failure and was dissolved within one year. However, Rank and International remained interested in Universal, culminating in the studio's reorganization as Universal-International; the merger was announced on July 30, 1946. William Goetz, a founder of International along with Leo Spitz, was made head of production at the renamed Universal International Pictures, a subsidiary of Universal Pictures Company, Inc. which also served as an import-export subsidiary, and copyright holder for the production arm's films. Goetz, a son-in-law of Louis B. Mayer, decided to bring "prestige" to the new company. He stopped the studio's low-budget production of B movies, serials and curtailed Universal's horror and "Arabian Nights" cycles. He also reduced the studio's output from its wartime average of fifty films per year (nearly twice the major studio's output) to thirty-five films a year. Distribution and copyright control remained under the name of Universal Pictures Company Inc.

Goetz set out an ambitious schedule. Universal-International became responsible for the American distribution of Rank's British productions, including such classics as David Lean's Great Expectations (1946) and Laurence Olivier's Hamlet (1948). Broadening its scope further, Universal-International branched out into the lucrative non-theatrical field, buying a majority stake in home-movie dealer Castle Films in 1947 and taking the company over entirely in 1951. For three decades, Castle would offer "highlights" reels from the Universal film library to home-movie enthusiasts and collectors. Goetz licensed Universal's pre–Universal-International film library to Jack Broeder's Realart Pictures for cinema re-release, but Realart was not allowed to show the films on television.

The production arm of the studio still struggled. While there were to be a few hits like The Killers (1946) and The Naked City (1948), Universal-International's new theatrical films often met with disappointing response at the box office. By the late 1940s, Goetz was out. The studio returned to low-budget and series films such as Ma and Pa Kettle (1949), a spin-off of the studio's 1947 hit The Egg and I and the inexpensive Francis (1950), the first film of a series about a talking mule, became mainstays of the company. Once again, the films of Abbott and Costello, including Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948), were among the studio's top-grossing productions. But at this point, Rank lost interest and sold his shares to the investor Milton Rackmil, whose Decca Records would take full control of Universal in 1952. Besides Abbott and Costello, the studio retained the Walter Lantz cartoon studio, whose product was released with Universal-International's films.

In the 1950s, Universal-International resumed their series of Arabian Nights films, many starring Tony Curtis. The studio also had success with monster and science fiction films produced by William Alland, with many directed by Jack Arnold and starring John Agar. Other successes were the melodramas directed by Douglas Sirk and produced by Ross Hunter, which were critically reassessed more positively years later. Among Universal-International's stable of stars were Rock Hudson, Tony Curtis, Jeff Chandler, Audie Murphy, and John Gavin.

Although Decca would continue to keep picture budgets lean, it was favored by changing circumstances in the film business, as other studios let their contract actors go in the wake of the 1948 U.S. vs. Paramount Pictures, et al. decision. Leading actors were increasingly free to work where and when they chose, and in 1950 MCA agent Lew Wasserman made a deal with Universal for his client James Stewart that would change the rules of the business. Wasserman's deal gave Stewart a share in the profits of three pictures in lieu of a large salary. When one of those films, Winchester '73 (1950), proved to be a hit, the arrangement would become the rule for many future productions at Universal and eventually at other studios as well.

MCA takes over

In the early 1950s, Universal set up its own distribution company in France. In the late 1960s, the company also started a production company in Paris, Universal Productions France S.A., although sometimes credited by the name of the distribution company, Universal Pictures France. Except for the two first films it produced, Claude Chabrol's Le scandale (English title The Champagne Murders, 1967) and Romain Gary's Les oiseaux vont mourir au Pérou (English title Birds in Peru), it was only involved in French or other European co-productions, including Louis Malle's Lacombe, Lucien, Bertrand Blier's Les Valseuses (English title Going Places, 1974), and Fred Zinnemann's The Day of the Jackal (1973). It was only involved in approximately 20 French film productions. In the early 1970s, the unit was incorporated into the French Cinema International Corporation arm.

By the late 1950s, the motion picture business was again changing. The combination of the studio/theater-chain breakup and the rise of television saw the reduced audience size for cinema productions. The Music Corporation of America (MCA), the world's largest talent agency, had also become a powerful television producer, renting space at Republic Studios for its Revue Productions subsidiary. After a period of complete shutdown, a moribund Universal agreed to sell its 360-acre (1.5 km2) studio lot to MCA in 1958 for $11 million, renamed Revue Studios. MCA owned the studio lot, but not Universal Pictures, yet was increasingly influential on Universal's products. The studio lot was upgraded and modernized, while MCA clients like Doris Day, Lana Turner, Cary Grant, and director Alfred Hitchcock were signed to Universal contracts.

The long-awaited takeover of Universal Pictures by MCA, Inc. happened in mid-1962 as part of the MCA-Decca Records merger. The company reverted in name to Universal Pictures from Universal-International. As a final gesture before leaving the talent agency business, virtually every MCA client was signed to a Universal contract. In 1964, MCA formed Universal City Studios, Inc., merging the motion pictures and television arms of Universal Pictures Company and Revue Productions (officially renamed as Universal Television in 1966). And so, with MCA in charge, Universal became a full-blown, A-film movie studio, with leading actors and directors under contract; offering slick, commercial films; and a studio tour subsidiary launched in 1964.

Television production made up much of the studio's output, with Universal heavily committed, in particular, to deals with NBC (which much later merged with Universal to form NBC Universal; see below) providing up to half of all prime time shows for several seasons. An innovation during this period championed by Universal was the made-for-television movie. In 1982, Universal became the studio base for many shows that were produced by Norman Lear's Tandem Productions/Embassy Television, including Diff'rent Strokes, One Day at a Time, The Jeffersons, The Facts of Life, and Silver Spoons which premiered on NBC that same fall.

At this time, Hal B. Wallis, who had recently worked as a major producer at Paramount, moved over to Universal, where he produced several films, among them a lavish version of Maxwell Anderson's Anne of the Thousand Days (1969) and the equally lavish Mary, Queen of Scots (1971). Although neither could claim to be a big financial hit, both films received Academy Award nominations, and Anne was nominated for Best Picture, Best Actor (Richard Burton), Best Actress (Geneviève Bujold), and Best Supporting Actor (Anthony Quayle). Wallis retired from Universal after making the film Rooster Cogburn (1975), a sequel to True Grit (1969), which Wallis had produced at Paramount. Rooster Cogburn co-starred John Wayne, reprising his Oscar-winning role from the earlier film, and Katharine Hepburn, their only film together. The film was only a moderate success.

In 1983, Universal Pictures launched an independent film arm designed to release specialty films, Universal Classics, and the division has sights on separation. In 1987, Universal Pictures, MGM/UA Communications Co., and Paramount Pictures teamed up to market feature film and television products to China. Consumer reach was measured in terms of the 25 billion admission tickets that were clocked in China in 1986, and Worldwide Media Sales, a division of the New York-based Worldwide Media Group, had been placed in charge of the undertaking.

In the early 1980s, the company had its own pay television arm Universal Pay Television (a.k.a. Universal Pay TV Programming, Inc.), which spawned in 1987, an 11-picture cable television agreement with then-independent film studio New Line Cinema.

In the early 1970s, Universal teamed up with Paramount to form Cinema International Corporation, which distributed films by Paramount and Universal outside of the US and Canada. Although Universal did produce occasional hits, among them Airport (1970), The Sting (1973), American Graffiti (also 1973), Earthquake (1974), and a big box-office success which restored the company's fortunes: Jaws (1975), Universal during the decade was primarily a television studio. When Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer purchased United Artists in 1981, MGM could not drop out of the CIC venture to merge with United Artists overseas operations. However, with future film productions from both names being released through the MGM/UA Entertainment plate, CIC decided to merge UA's international units with MGM and reformed as United International Pictures. There would be other film hits like Smokey and the Bandit (1977), Animal House (1978), The Jerk (1979), The Blues Brothers (1980), The Four Seasons (1981), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), The Breakfast Club (1985), Back to the Future (also 1985), An American Tail (1986), The Land Before Time (1988), Field of Dreams (1989), Jurassic Park (1993) and Casper (1995), but the film business was financially unpredictable with some films like Scarface (1983), Dune (1984) or Waterworld (1995), which turned out to be big box office disappointments despite their high budget. UIP began distributing films by start-up studio DreamWorks in 1997 due to the founders' connections with Paramount, Universal, and Amblin Entertainment. In 2001, MGM dropped out of the UIP venture and went with 20th Century Fox's international arm to handle the distribution of their titles, an ongoing arrangement. UIP nearly lost its connection with Universal Pictures in 1999 when Universal started Universal Pictures International to take over the assets of PolyGram Filmed Entertainment and wanted UPI to distribute their films starting in 2001. Only a small handful of films were released theatrically by Universal Pictures International, up until the release of the film Mickey Blue Eyes. UIP then took over the theatrical distribution inventory of future films planned to be released by Universal Pictures International, such as The Green Mile and Angela's Ashes. On October 4, 1999, Universal renewed its commitments to United International Pictures to release its films internationally through 2006.

Matsushita, Seagram and Vivendi
Anxious to expand the company's broadcast and cable presence, longtime MCA head Lew Wasserman sought a rich partner. He located Japanese electronics manufacturer Matsushita Electric (now known as Panasonic), which agreed to acquire MCA for $6.6 billion in 1990.

On December 9, 1996, the new owners dropped the MCA name; the company became Universal Studios, Inc. and become the parent company of Universal Pictures, while Universal Pictures become a division. MCA's music division, MCA Music Entertainment Group, was renamed Universal Music Group. MCA Records continued to live on as a label within the Universal Music Group. The following year, G. P. Putnam's Sons was sold to the Penguin Group subsidiary of Pearson PLC.

Afterward, Universal Pictures acquired the United States distribution rights of several of StudioCanal's films, such as David Lynch's Mulholland Drive (2001) and Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001) which became the sixth-highest-grossing French-language film of all time in the United States. Universal Pictures and StudioCanal also co-produced several films, such as Love Actually (2003); a $40 million-budgeted film that eventually grossed $246 million worldwide. In late 2000, the New York Film Academy was permitted to use the Universal Studios backlot for student film projects in an unofficial partnership.

Expansions
In September 2013, Adam Fogelson was ousted as co-chairman of Universal Pictures, promoting Donna Langley to the sole chairperson. In addition, NBCUniversal International chairman Jeff Shell would be appointed as chairman of the newly created Filmed Entertainment Group. Longtime studio head Ron Meyer would give up oversight of the film studio and appointed vice chairman of NBCUniversal, providing consultation to CEO Steve Burke on all of the company's operations. Meyer retained oversight of Universal Parks and Resorts.

Universal's multi-year film financing deal with Elliott Management expired in 2013. In summer 2013, Universal made an agreement with Thomas Tull's Legendary Pictures to distribute their films for five years starting in 2014 (the year that Legendary's similar agreement with Warner Bros. Pictures ended).

In June 2014, Universal Partnerships took over licensing consumer products for NBC and Sprout with the expectation that all licensing would eventually be centralized within NBCUniversal. In May 2015, Gramercy Pictures was revived by Focus Features as a genre label concentrating on action, sci-fi, and horror films.

On December 16, 2015, Amblin Partners announced that it entered into a five-year distribution deal with Universal Pictures by which the films will be distributed and marketed by either Universal or Focus Features.

In early 2016, Perfect World Pictures announced a long-term co-financing deal with Universal, representing the first time a Chinese company directly invests in a multi-year slate deal with a major U.S. studio.

On April 28, 2016, Universal's parent company, NBCUniversal, announced a $3.8 billion deal to buy DreamWorks Animation. On August 22, 2016, the deal was completed. Universal took over the distribution deal with DreamWorks Animation starting in 2019 with the release of How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World, after DreamWorks Animation's distribution deal with 20th Century Fox ended.

On February 15, 2017, Universal Pictures acquired a minority stake in Amblin Partners, strengthening the relationship between Universal and Amblin.

In December 2019, Universal Pictures entered early negotiations to distribute upcoming feature film properties based on the Lego toys. Although the original Lego Movie characters are still owned by Warner Bros. Pictures, Universal Pictures will serve as a distributor of future releases and will develop additional Lego films. The future of the already in-development films is believed to remain the same.

In June, it was announced longtime Universal International Distribution President Duncan Clark would be stepping down. He would transition to a consulting role with the studio in August and would be replaced by Veronika Kwan Vandenberg.

Units

 * Universal Pictures International
 * Universal International Distribution

 * Universal Pictures Home Entertainment
 * Universal Home Entertainment Productions
 * Universal 1440 Entertainment
 * DreamWorks Animation Home Entertainment
 * Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Australia (joint venture with Sony Pictures Home Entertainment)
 * Universal Playback
 * Studio Distribution Services (joint venture with Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment)
 * Focus Features
 * Universal Pictures International Entertainment
 * NBCUniversal Entertainment Japan
 * Working Title Films
 * WT2 Productions
 * Working Title Television
 * Carnival Films
 * Rede Telecine (12.5%, joint venture with Canais Globo, Walt Disney Studios, Paramount Pictures and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer)
 * Illumination
 * Illumination Studios Paris
 * Illumination Labs
 * Moonlight
 * DreamWorks Animation
 * DreamWorks Animation Television
 * DreamWorks Classics
 * Big Idea Entertainment (in-name-only unit of DreamWorks Animation)
 * Bullwinkle Studios (JV)
 * Harvey Entertainment (in-name-only unit of DreamWorks Animation)
 * DreamWorks Theatricals
 * DreamWorks New Media
 * DreamWorksTV
 * DreamWorks Press
 * OTL Releasing
 * Back Lot Music
 * Universal Products & Experiences
 * United International Pictures (50%, joint venture with Paramount Global's Paramount Pictures)
 * Amblin Partners (minor stake) (JV)
 * Amblin Entertainment
 * Amblin Television
 * DreamWorks Pictures
 * Storyteller Distribution
 * Blumhouse Holdings, LLC (minority stake with Jason Blum and James Wan)
 * Blumhouse Productions
 * Atomic Monster
 * BH Tilt (with Neon)
 * BlumHansonAllen Films
 * Blumhouse Books
 * Blumhouse Games
 * Blumhouse International
 * Blumhouse Television (55%)
 * Haunted Movies

Film library
Main article: Lists of Universal Pictures films

In addition to its own library, Universal releases the EMKA, Ltd. catalog of 1929–1949 Paramount Pictures, owned by sister company Universal Television.

Highest-grossing films
Universal was the first studio to have released three billion-dollar films in one year; this distinction was achieved in 2015 with Furious 7, Jurassic World, and Minions.
 * {{legend|#b6fcb6;"|Indicates films currently in theatrical release in the week commencing .|text=}}

‡ Includes theatrical reissue(s).

title: Universal Pictures


text:
Robert van Gulik

Robert Hans van Gulik (, 9 August 1910 – 24 September 1967) was a Dutch orientalist, diplomat, musician (of the guqin), and writer, best known for the Judge Dee historical mysteries, the protagonist of which he borrowed from the 18th-century Chinese detective novel Dee Goong An.

Life
Robert van Gulik was born in Zutphen, the son of a medical officer in the Dutch army of what was then called the Dutch East Indies (modern-day Indonesia). He was born in the Netherlands, but from the age of three till twelve he lived in Batavia, Dutch East Indies (now Jakarta), where he was tutored in Mandarin and other languages. He went to Leiden University in 1929. He began his studies under the Sinologist J.J.L. Duyvendak, whose interests were in Ancient China. Perhaps because of his upbringing in the East Indies, Van Gulik's interests were in later periods, and he transferred and obtained his PhD in 1935 from Utrecht University. His talents as a linguist suited him for a job in the Dutch Foreign Service, which he joined in 1935; and he was then stationed in various countries, mostly in East Asia (Japan and China).

He was in Tokyo when Japan declared war on the Netherlands in 1941, but he, along with the rest of the Allied diplomatic staff, were evacuated in 1942. He spent most of the rest of World War II as the secretary for the Dutch mission to Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist government in Chongqing. While in Chongqing, he married a Chinese woman, Shui Shifang (1912-2005), the daughter of a Qing dynasty Imperial mandarin, and they had four children together. There he freely mingled with prominent figures in traditional and modern Chinese culture, though he had little interest in China's modernization and the intellectual changes since the New Culture Movement.

Van Gulik was an accomplished calligrapher. His work is known in China under the name Kao Lo-p'ei.

After the war ended, he returned to the Netherlands, then went to the United States as the counsellor of the Dutch Embassy in Washington, D.C. He returned to Japan in 1949 and stayed there for the next four years. While in Tokyo, he published his first two books, the translation Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee and a privately published book of erotic colored prints from the Ming dynasty. Later postings took him all over the world, from New Delhi, Kuala Lumpur, and Beirut (during the 1958 Civil War) to The Hague. In 1959 Van Gulik became correspondent of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences; he resigned in 1963. In 1964 he became a full member, and the next year he became a foreign member. From 1965 until his death from cancer at The Hague in 1967, he was the Dutch ambassador to Japan.

Judge Dee mysteries
During World War II van Gulik translated the 18th-century detective novel Dee Goong An into English under the title Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee (first published in Tokyo in 1949). The main character of this book, Judge Dee, was based on the real statesman and detective Di Renjie, who lived in the 7th century, during the Tang dynasty (AD 618–907), though in the novel itself elements of Ming dynasty China (AD 1368–1644) were mixed in.

Thanks to his translation of this largely forgotten work, van Gulik became interested in Chinese detective fiction. To the translation he appended an essay on the genre in which he suggested that it was easy to imagine rewriting some of the old Chinese case histories with an eye toward modern readers. Not long afterward he himself tried his hand at creating a detective story along these lines. This became the book The Chinese Maze Murders (completed around 1950). As van Gulik thought the story would have more interest to Japanese and Chinese readers, he had it translated into Japanese by a friend (finished in 1951), and it was sold in Japan under the title Meiro-no-satsujin. With the success of the book, van Gulik produced a translation into Chinese, which was published by a Singapore book publisher in 1953. The reviews were good, and van Gulik wrote two more books (The Chinese Bell Murders and The Chinese Lake Murders) over the next few years, also with an eye toward Japanese and then Chinese editions. Next, van Gulik found a publisher for English versions of the stories, and the first such version was published in 1957. Later books were written and published in English first; the translations came afterwards.

Van Gulik's intent in writing his first Judge Dee novel was, as he wrote in remarks on The Chinese Bell Murders, "to show modern Chinese and Japanese writers that their own ancient crime-literature has plenty of source material for detective and mystery-stories". In 1956, he published a translation of the T'ang-yin-pi-shih ("Parallel Cases from Under the Pear Tree"), a 13th-century casebook for district magistrates. He used many of the cases as plots in his novels (as he states in the postscripts of the novels).

Van Gulik's Judge Dee mysteries follow in the long tradition of Chinese detective fiction, intentionally preserving a number of key elements of that writing culture. Most notably, he had Judge Dee solve three different (and sometimes unrelated) cases in each book, a traditional device in Chinese mysteries. The whodunit element is also less important in the Judge Dee stories than it is in the traditional Western detective story, though still more so than in traditional Chinese detective stories. Nevertheless, van Gulik's fiction was adapted to a more Western audience, avoiding the supernatural and religious traditions of Buddhism and Daoism in favour of rationality.

Friends and even his daughter, Pauline, said that he identified with Judge Dee. He lived the life of a mandarin who cultivated calligraphy, poems and paintings. When he started writing the stories in 1949, he was in a conservative and nostalgic mood, remarking "Judge Dee, it's me".

Other works
Robert van Gulik studied Indisch Recht (Dutch Indies law) and Indologie (Indonesian culture) at Leiden University from 1929 until 1934, receiving his doctorate for a dissertation on the horse cult in Northeast Asia at Utrecht University. Though he made his career in the Dutch diplomatic service, he kept up his studies. During his life he wrote twenty-odd essays and monographs on various subjects, mainly but not exclusively on aspects of Chinese culture. Typically, much of his scholarly work was first published outside the Netherlands. In his lifetime van Gulik was recognized as a European expert on Imperial Chinese jurisprudence.

Van Gulik was interested in Chinese painting. For example, in his book The Gibbon in China (1967), he devotes pages to the gibbon-themed paintings in China and Japan, from the Northern Song dynasty onwards. Analyzing the portrayal of these apes throughout history, he notes how the realism of the pictures deteriorated as the gibbon population in most of China was extirpated. As an art critic, he greatly admired the portrayal of the apes by such renowned painters as Yi Yuanji and Muqi Fachang. Commenting on one of Ming Emperor Xuande's works, "Gibbons at Play", van Gulik says that while it is "not a great work of art", it is "ably executed". The lifelike images of the apes make one surmise that the emperor painted from the live models that could have been kept in the palace gardens.

Library and personal archive
In 1977 part of the library of Robert van Gulik was acquired from the heirs of Van Gulik for the Sinological Institute at Leiden University and transferred in 2016 to Leiden University Libraries. In 2022 and 2023 the personal archive and collection of Robert van Gulik was donated by his heirs to Leiden University Libraries.

title: Robert van Gulik