mass communication & media literacy 11
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Mass Communication & Media Literacy 11
The business of media
Do Coca Cola, Gap, HSBC produce their advertising copy directly or do they employ somebody to do it for them?
Who do they employ?Who made the radio programmes and music that
you listen to?Who owns the Sun, the Guardian, Le Figaro, El
Pais?What kind of organisation lie behind them?How can you find out?Who paid for the music playing on the radio?
And how’s it doing?
http://www.google.com/finance?q=LON%3ABSY
Media giants in the US
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cool/giants/
The business of media
The significance of media organisations as organisations and businesses can often be seen when they themselves are the subject of news stories.
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=rupert+murdock+takeover&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&client=firefox-a#hl=en&expIds=17259,22104,27955&xhr=t&q=news+corp+takeover+of+bskyb&cp=8&pf=p&sclient=psy&safe=off&client=firefox-a&hs=5u3&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB%3Aofficial&aq=0&aqi=&aql=&oq=news+corp+takeover&gs_rfai=&pbx=1&fp=f8d6fd944fbe01e9
The business of media
The current organisation of the media is neither obvious nor inevitable There’s substantial variety in the nature of the organisations that
produce media It’s not always clear who made what
But all media organisations are businesses involved in a commercial sphere of exchange – of income generation, of profit and loss.
The economics of media applies as much to not-for profit media organisations as it does to for profit organisations
We MUST think about the economic environment in which media are produced
Studying media organisations
1. Political economy2. Organisation approach
3. Cultural approach
Political economy
The nature of production and the conditions under which it takes place
Where does economic value lie? Where is value generated?
How are economic markets managed Are markets regulated? How do the vested interests of individuals impact?
Political economy
What is the relationship between a range of meanings available in media and the underpinning economic interests and ownership patterns across different media spheres:
The press, Music, TV, Film, Radio, Advertising, The internet
Who pays for media at the point of production?What is the primary commodity of any medium?How do consumers pay for this commodity and
for the different economic activities of the media?
Critical political economy
PowerHow do government oversee media
management and regulation?How does a capitalist economy underwrite
the profit impulse of media businesses?
Political economy: to readLibrary copy at:
http://bit.ly/h28Q5J
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJuqoDvyXOk
Media and the free market
Free market. (2011, January 12). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 17:00, January 12, 2011, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Free_market&oldid=407475375
Media and the free market
Sir Richard Branson's Virgin media empire has helped to make him Britain's wealthiest television and film entrepreneur, with a fortune of £2,600m, according to The Sunday Times Rich List 2010.
How does the free market explain such wealth?
Economic value
Media products differ from other products because of the combination of the way they generate revenue and in the ways they are consumed
Revenue can come from: The final consumer in the form of some kind of
payment Selling space in the artefact to advertisers
Audiences as commodity
Media do not produce ‘products’Media produce audiences
The pessimistic view – we’re included in a group whose interests we don’t share or we get nothing because we are not attractive enough to advertisers
The optimistic view – we get products and experiences that are sharply targeted to our tastes and interests
From product to brand
In order to control for uncertainties in the commodity relations (risky or safe?) media use forms of branding to better predict consumer consumption.
The importance of branding + synergy (from the Greek = together + work)
Synergy is used by media industries to work together to generate greater audiences, publicity, sales and profits
New film is released ... What happens?Who coordinates all this activity?
Costs
Traditionally, high fixed costs and low marginal costs (music studio + repeated prints)
Economies of scale are vital
Now ... New publishing paradigm
New production technologies New distribution technologies
Size and concentration
Concentration Measures the degree to which control of a particular
sector of media is in the hands of the most dominant firms. It is usually measured as the percentage of the revenue received by the largest 5 or 10 firms
Monopoly and Oligopoly Monopoly describes a condition in which one company
or seller has control over the entire market. An oligopoly describes a condition in which sellers are few. This results in the actions of any one of them affecting the market price as well as their competitors.
Models of distribution
Vertical integration
V
Net Neutrality