Chapter 13 Media Economics and the Global Marketplace Storytelling as Business Strategy In the end, compelling narratives are what attract people to media—whether in the form of books or blogs, magazines or movies, TV shows or talk radio. The Structure of the Media Industry O Three common structures O Monopoly O One firm dominates production and distribution in a particular industry. O Oligopoly O A few firms dominate an industry. O Limited competition O Many producers and sellers, but only a few products within a particular category The Performance of Media Organizations O Collecting revenue O Direct payment O Indirect payment O Commercial strategies and social expectations O Economies of scale principle O Economic analyses let consumers examine instances when mass media fall short. Deregulation Trumps Regulation O Major regulation legislation O Sherman Antitrust Act (1890) O Clayton Antitrust Act (1914) O Celler-Kefauver Act (1950) O Escalation of deregulation O Carter, Reagan weakened controls. O Some thought deregulation would lower prices and others predicted mergers—both were right. Deregulation Trumps Regulation (cont.) O Deregulation continues today. O In 1995, News Corp. received a special dispensation allowing it to own and operate the Fox network and a number of local TV stations. O In 2007, the newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership rule was relaxed. O Deregulation movement has returned media economics to nineteenth-century principles. Media Powerhouses: Consolidation, Partnerships, and Mergers O Major deals O In 1995, Disney bought ABC for $19 billion and Time Warner bought Turner Broadcasting for $7.5 billion. O Time Warner merged with AOL—a $106 billion deal—in 2001, only to spin the company off by 2009. O Comcast purchased a majority stake in NBC Universal in 2009. Media Powerhouses: Consolidation, Partnerships, and Mergers (cont.) O Until the 1980s, antitrust rules attempted to ensure diversity of ownership among competing businesses. O Media competition has been usurped by media consolidation. O Most media companies have skirted monopoly charges by purchasing diverse types of mass media. Business Tendencies in Media Industries O Flexible markets O Elastic economy O Expansion of the service sector O Need to serve individual consumer preferences O Relies on cheap labor O Demands rapid product development and efficient market research O Decline in the number of workers who belong to labor unions Business Tendencies in Media Industries (cont.) O Downsizing O Supposed to make companies more flexible and profitable O Problematic results O Companies unable to compete due to too few employees and a decline in innovation O Main beneficiaries have been CEOs. O Significant wage gap Table 13.1: How Many Workers Can You Hire for the Price of One CEO? Economics, Hegemony, and Storytelling O Hegemony O Acceptance of the dominant values in a culture by those who are subordinate to those who hold economic and political power O Must convince consumers and citizens that the interests of the powerful are common sense and thus normal or natural Economics, Hegemony, and Storytelling (cont.) O Storytelling O Used by candidates running for office to espouse their connection to Middle American commonsense and ‘down home’ virtues O Narratives work by identifying with the culture’s dominant values. O Hegemony explains why we sometimes support plans that may not be in our best interest. The Rise of Specialization and Synergy O Specialization O Magazine, radio, and cable industries sought specialized markets to counter TV’s mass appeal. O By the 1980s, television embraced niche marketing. O Young and old viewers sought other specialized forms of media. The Rise of Specialization and Synergy (cont.) O Synergy O The promotion and sale of different versions of a media product across the various subsidiaries of a media conglomerate O Default business mode of most media companies today Disney: A Postmodern Media Conglomerate O The early years O Set the standard for popular cartoons and children’s culture O The company diversifies. O Expanded into live action and documentaries and embraced TV O Started Buena Vista, a distribution company O Rereleased movies Disney: A Postmodern Media Conglomerate (cont.) O Global expansion O Death of Walt Disney in 1966 triggered a period of decline. O Michael Eisner initiated a turnaround in 1984. O Touchstone movie division O Hand-drawn animated hits O Partnered with Pixar Animation Studios, creating computer-animated blockbusters Disney: A Postmodern Media Conglomerate (cont.) O Disney came to epitomize the synergistic possibilities of media consolidation. O Continued finding new sources of revenue through the 1990s O Purchased ABC, including ESPN O Launched Broadway musicals O Opened more theme parks O Introduced the Disney Channel to the Middle East and North Africa Disney: A Postmodern Media Conglomerate (cont.) O Corporate shake-ups O Early 2000s brought multiple problems for Disney. O Robert Iger replaced Eisner and O Repaired the relationship with Pixar O Landed a distribution deal with DreamWorks studios O Sold Miramax and its radio stations O Became a partner in Hulu.com O Purchased Marvel Entertainment Global Audiences Expand Media Markets O International expansion has allowed media conglomerates some advantages. O As media technologies get cheaper and more profitable, American media proliferate inside and outside national boundaries. O Globalism permits companies that lose money on products at home to profit abroad. The Internet and Convergence Change the Game O Companies struggle in the transition to digital. O Traditional broadcast and cable services have challenged sites like YouTube for displaying content without permission. O These companies are unsure of how to get people accustomed to free online content to pay. The Internet and Convergence Change the Game (cont.) O New digital media conglomerates O Largest digital media companies O Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft O Each has become powerful for a different reason. O Still need to provide compelling narratives to attract people O Digital age favors small, flexible startup companies. The Limits of Antitrust Laws O Diversification O Most media companies diversify, never fully dominating a particular media industry. O Promotes oligopolies O Local monopolies O Antitrust laws aim to curb national monopolies, not local, and have no teeth globally. The Fallout from a Free Market O Lack of public debate on the tightening oligopoly structure of international media boils down to two major issues: O Reluctance to criticize capitalism O Debate over how much control consumers have in the marketplace O Consumer control differs from consumer choice Cultural Imperialism O Cultural imperialism O Refers to American styles dominating the globe O Although many indigenous forms of media culture are popular, U.S. dominance in producing and distributing mass media puts a severe burden on countries attempting to produce their own cultural products. Cultural Imperialism (cont.) O Supporters O Creates an arena in which citizens can raise questions O Universal popular culture creates a global village. O Critics O Protests can be turned into products and lose their bite. O ‘Cultural dumping’ hampers the development of native cultures. O Causes cultural disconnection The Media Marketplace and Democracy O Superficial consumer concerns, not broader social issues, dominate the media agenda. O Mass media mergers make public debate over economic issues difficult. O Local groups and consumer movements are working to challenge ‘Big Media.’ Chapter 15 Should Life Imitate Culture? Since the emergence of popular music, movies, television, and video games as influential mass media, the relationship between make-believe stories and real-life imitation has drawn a great deal of attention. Researching the Effect of Mass Media on Individuals and Society ? Media effects research ? Attempts to understand, explain, and predict the effects of mass media on individuals and society ? Cultural studies ? Focuses on how people make meaning, articulate values, comprehend reality, and arrange experiences through cultural symbols Early Media Research Methods ? Propaganda analysis ? Public opinion research ? Social psychology studies ? Marketing research Early Theories of Media Effects ? Hypodermic-needle model ? Media shoot effects directly into unsuspecting victims. ? Minimal-effects model ? Researchers argued that people generally engage in selective exposure and selective retention with regard to the media. Early Theories of Media Effects (cont.) ? Uses and gratifications model ? Researchers studied the ways in which people used the media to satisfy various emotional or intellectual needs. Conducting Media Effects Research ? Private or proprietary research ? Generally conducted for a business, a corporation, or a political campaign ? Usually applied research ? Public research ? Usually takes place in academic and government settings ? More often theoretical information Conducting Media Effects Research (cont.) ? Most research today employs the scientific method. ? Identify the research problem. ? Review existing research. ? Develop a working hypothesis. ? Determine an appropriate method. ? Collect information or relevant data. ? Analyze results. ? Interpret the implications. Conducting Media Effects Research (cont.) ? Scientific method relies on: ? Objectivity ? Reliability ? Validity ? Hypotheses ? Tentative general statements that predict the influence of an independent variable on a dependent variable Conducting Media Effects Research (cont.) ? Experiments ? Test whether a hypothesis is true ? Utilize an experimental group and a control group ? Survey research ? Collecting and measuring data from a group of respondents ? Content analysis ? Studies specific media messages Contemporary Media Effects Theories ? Social learning theory ? Four-step process ? ? ? ? Attention Retention Motor reproduction Motivation ? Agenda-setting ? Media set the agenda for major topics of discussion. Contemporary Media Effects Theories (cont.) ? Cultivation effect ? Heavy viewing of television leads individuals to perceive reality in ways consistent with portrayals on television. ? Spiral of silence ? Those whose views are in the minority will keep their views to themselves for fear of social isolation. Contemporary Media Effects Theories (cont.) ? Third-person effect ? People believe others are more affected by media messages than they are themselves. ? Instrumental in censorship Evaluating Research on Media Effects ? Media effects research is inconsistent and often flawed. ? Continues to resonate because it offers an easy- to-blame social cause for real-world violence ? Limits on research ? Funding ? Inability to address how media affect communities and social institutions Early Developments in Cultural Studies Research ? Karl Marx and Antonio Gramsci ? Investigated how mass media support existing hierarchies ? Examined how popular culture and sports distract people from redressing social injustices ? Addressed the subordinate status of particular social groups Early Developments in Cultural Studies Research (cont.) ? Frankfurt School ? Three inadequacies of traditional scientific approaches ? ? ? Reduce large ‘cultural questions’ to measurable and ‘verifiable categories’ Depended on ‘an atmosphere of rigidly enforced neutrality’ Refused to place ‘the phenomena of modern life’ in a ‘historical and moral context’ Conducting Cultural Studies Research ? Textual analysis ? Highlights the close reading and interpretation of cultural messages ? Audience studies ? Subject being researched is the audience for the text. ? Political economy studies ? Examines interconnections among economic interests, political power, and how that power is used Cultural Studies’ Theoretical Perspectives ? The public sphere ? A space for critical public debate ? Advanced by German philosopher Jürgen Habermas ? Society in England and France in late seventeenth century and eighteenth century created spaces (coffeehouses, pubs) for public discourse. Cultural Studies’ Theoretical Perspectives (cont.) ? Communication as culture ? James Carey argued that communication is a cultural ritual. ? Described it as ‘a symbolic process whereby reality is produced, maintained, repaired, and transformed’ ? Leads researchers to consider communication’s symbolic process as culture itself Evaluating Cultural Studies Research ? Cultural studies research ? Involves interpreting written and visual ‘texts’ or artifacts as symbolic representations that contain cultural, historical, and political meaning ? Affords the freedom to broadly interpret the impact of mass media ? Like media effects research, it has its limits. Media Research and Democracy ? Academics in media studies charged with increased specialization and use of jargon ? Alienates nonacademics ? Many researchers isolated from life outside of the university ? Larger public often excluded from access to the research process Media Research and Democracy (cont.) ? Public intellectuals based on campuses help carry on the conversations of society and culture, actively circulating the most important new ideas of the day and serving as models for how to participate in public life. For Module 6, I chose to write about a chapter instead of the usual video. Chapter 15 was particularly interesting, because it discusses the effects of mass media on individuals and society. The chapter discussed the show 13 Reasons Why and the controversy it sparked because of its heavy suicidal themes. Google searches for suicide went up by about 20% nineteen days after the show was released. 13 Reasons Why was a good introductory discussion for the chapter, because it’s a pretty good example of how media can affect reality. In fact, the earliest theory on media is called the hypodermic-needle model, suggesting that media shoots its potent effects directly into unsuspecting victims. However, this is untrue, because not everyone has difficulty separating media from reality. While some media messages can have a strong effect on children, this is most likely because children have young, impressionable minds that struggle to separate fiction from reality. Any study that tries to generalize the impact of media on individuals is going to be faulty in some way, because every individual consumes media for a different reason, and therefore will have a different reaction. For example, some people watch tv shows, movies, or read books as a way to escape from reality. In contrast, some people will consume media simply for entertainment or information. 5 Reply Yesterday I viewed the video titled “Killing us softly: Advertising’s image of women.” where it talks about the way that women are portrayed in advertisements. Women are portrayed as abnormally thin with smooth flawless skin and sexualized. In my opinion, this is nothing new hence this video is 12 years old. There is a saying that says sex sells and it’s true. It is obvious in certain ads such as in-car magazines where they have women in bikinis posing next to cars. I was relieved to see an ad inside a target store portraying women of different sizes, skin color, and even with stretch marks which is the most realistic portrayal of women in ads I have ever seen. I hope this becomes normalized. It is important that they do normalize more realistic-looking people in advertisements because this affects impressionable teenagers who might be striving to look in a way that is unrealistic. They can even doubt their worth if they don’t fit in the standards portrayed in ads for what a beautiful woman is supposed to look like. Also, there are many women who suffer from body dysmorphia and bulimia as a result of this quest to be thin. All this can even lead to cases of suicide. 5 Reply Purchase answer to see full attachment

Mastering the Art of Online Learning: Your Guide to Acing Online Courses

Introduction

In recent years, the popularity of online courses has skyrocketed, offering learners the flexibility to acquire new skills and knowledge from the comfort of their homes. However, succeeding in online courses requires a different approach compared to traditional classroom settings. To help you make the most of your online learning experience, this article presents essential strategies and tips to ace your online courses.

1. Set Clear Goals and Plan Ahead

Before embarking on an online course, establish clear goals and objectives. Determine what you hope to achieve by the end of the course and break down your goals into manageable milestones. Create a study schedule that aligns with your other commitments, ensuring you allocate dedicated time for coursework, assignments, and revision.

2. Create a Productive Study Environment

Establishing a conducive study environment is crucial for online learning success. Find a quiet, well-lit space where you can concentrate without distractions. Remove any potential interruptions, such as notifications from social media or email. Organize your study materials and have a reliable internet connection to ensure seamless access to course materials.

3. Actively Engage in the Course

Active participation is key to mastering online courses. Engage with course materials, including videos, readings, and interactive components. Take comprehensive notes, highlighting key concepts and ideas. Participate in discussion boards, forums, and virtual meetings to interact with instructors and peers, fostering a sense of community and enhancing your understanding of the subject matter.

4. Manage Your Time Effectively

Online courses offer flexibility, but it’s essential to manage your time wisely to avoid falling behind. Create a detailed schedule, allocating specific time slots for coursework, assignments, and studying. Break down larger tasks into smaller, manageable segments to prevent procrastination. Prioritize tasks based on deadlines and dedicate focused time to each one, ensuring consistent progress throughout the course.

5. Develop Effective Communication Skills

Online courses often rely on written communication, making it crucial to hone your skills in this area. Be concise and clear in your written responses, paying attention to grammar and spelling. Actively participate in discussions, asking thoughtful questions and providing constructive feedback to your peers. Regularly check your course emails and notifications, ensuring you stay updated with any important announcements or changes.

6. Utilize Available Resources

Take full advantage of the resources provided by your online course platform and instructors. Familiarize yourself with the learning management system (LMS) and explore its features. Access supplementary materials, such as textbooks, lecture slides, and external resources recommended by instructors. Utilize online libraries, research databases, and tutorial services to deepen your understanding of the subject matter.

7. Stay Motivated and Engaged

Maintaining motivation throughout an online course can be challenging, particularly when faced with competing priorities or a lack of face-to-face interaction. Set short-term goals and reward yourself upon their completion. Connect with fellow learners through virtual study groups or online forums to foster a sense of camaraderie. Regularly remind yourself of the benefits and personal growth associated with completing the course successfully.

8. Seek Support and Clarification

Don’t hesitate to seek support or clarification when needed. Reach out to your instructors for guidance or clarification on course material. Utilize online discussion forums to ask questions or engage in collaborative problem-solving. Leverage the support services provided by your course platform or institution, such as technical support or academic advising.

Conclusion

Online courses present unique opportunities for self-paced learning and personal growth. By setting clear goals, creating a productive study environment, actively engaging with course materials, and managing your time effectively, you can maximize your chances of acing online courses. Remember to stay motivated, seek support when needed, and make the most of the available resources. Embrace the flexibility and adaptability of online learning to achieve your educational goals.