Media Economics
The Global Marketplace
The beginnings of Mass Media
• Urbanization
• Mass Production Industrialization
• Education & Literacy
Free Market
v.
Government Controls
• Monopoly
• Oligopoly
• Limited Competition
Monopoly
• No competition
• AT&T up through the 1980s
• Microsoft?
Oligopoly
• Limited competition
• Feature films
• Commercial Recording
Limited Competition
• “Many producers and sellers but
only a few differentiable products
within a particular category.”
• Radio Broadcasting
Media Specialization
• Audience Fragmentation
• Increased emphasis on audience and market
research
• The business of broadcasting: Selling
audiences to advertisers.
Collecting the Revenues
• Direct Payment: Books, Cable Television,
CDs, etc.
• Indirect Payment (Advertiser Supported):
Television, Radio, Daily Newspapers,
Consumer Magazines
The Shift to Information
Economy
• More than 50% of the U.S. economy
based on creation, packaging and
selling information, than on
manufacturing.
Economies of Scale
• Higher production output lowers cost.
• Except where oligopolies keep prices
artificially inflated.
• In general, economies of scale allow the
U.S. to dominate the world’s media
marketplace.
De-Regulation
• Preceded by “RE-regulation.”
• Brought about by cuts in government
spending in the late 1970s.
• The Free Market philosophy.
• Technological Darwinism.
Free Market and Technological
Diffusion
• The consumer will determine the better
mousetrap.
• The government will not impose a standard.
• The result is the “DCC,” the “Betamax,”
etc.
• Often this is the technology we export to the
“have-nots.”
Two views of media
consolidation
• Proliferation versus diversity.
• The same dichotomy extends to views of
globalization.
• “Our economy suffers from job loss, but we
want to buy $25 DVD players.”
Synergy
• Cross-promotions. (e.g. Disney)
• Seagrams promotes concerts for artists on
Universal labels.
• Product placement in television, films,
video games, sports events.
What happens when the product
is “news?”
•
•
•
•
Viewing news as a commodity
Defining news
Packaging news
Selling news
Cultural Imperialism
• Viewed as the “imposition” of American
culture and values on other (developing)
nations.
• Global Village or Cultural Homogenization?
• Hegemony.
Capitalism
v
Democracy
• Are they the same?
• What are the similarities? Differences?
• Criticisms of capitalism.
http://www.cjr.org/tools/owners/
http://www.consumersunion.org/i/Telecom___Utilities/