Bradbury's early life witnessed the Golden Age of Radio, while the transition to the Golden Age of Television began right around the time he started to work on the stories that would eventually lead to "Fahrenheit 451". Bradbury saw these forms of media as a threat to the reading of books, indeed as a threat to society, as he believed they could act as a distraction from important affairs. This contempt for mass media and technology would express itself through Mildred and her friends and is an important theme in the book.