ARTS1090 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: The Fast Show, Technological Convergence, University Of New South Wales
4 May 2018
School
Course
Professor
28/04/18 UNSW notes | ARTS1090 Monique Munro
1
Media, Culture & Everyday Life
Week 7 notes
ARTS1090 Lecture
Convergence
• Media convergence
- Big part of media restructuring
- The ways in which govs inquire about the ways in which networks have
transformed the media
+Late 2000s, Aus gov held an inquiry about media convergence to think about
how they could best structure the media in this new environment
- Generally thought of as the synergistic combination of previously separate and
distinct media platforms (TV, Radio, Telephony, Data)
+ with the rise of networks, these platforms have converged, can be produced
and distributed onto a single platform
+Eg, using our phones to access radio, TV and news
- Involves Technological, Industrial and textual convergence
- Is convergence better thought as divergence?
+Is better for media producers to produce content for a multi-platform media
environment
+Implications convergence has had on their business model, traditional single
platform business models are recommended to be developed around multiple
platforms, get an audience that is so involved in your content that are willing to
follow it across multiple platforms = Divergence
- Technological perspective: convergence is a realty. Transition from separate
platforms produced analogically (communication form) into a digital platform
(no matter what the content is, it is just a series of binary digits that has allowed
single tech to be the platform for all the diff forms of media)
• Technological convergence
- Cause: Transition of analogue media to digital
- Tech have inherent characteristics that shape the way they are used and the way
in which they change the scale and scope of human affairs (McCulen)
- Think about TV that is transmitted from an analogue tower (need to be in a
certain range to be able to receive broadcast) Shaped the services analogue
broadcast media was used to deliver
- Although some of the issues are the same with digital terrestrial broadcasting
still ties to spae, if ou go too fa fo “d oull ete diffeet oadastig
signals)
+Scarcity of the signal has changed
+In the past, signals were a scarce resource, managed by gov. However, in the
digital terrestrial world, it is not anymore.
+Use to have 5 tv channels. Now we could have 5 networks but can multi
sequence content across various channels
+Eg, Chanel 9 has Gem, taking their general public interest signal and put it into
different signals that target specific demographics
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
28/04/18 UNSW notes | ARTS1090 Monique Munro
2
- Technological convergence changes how we use the service and the possibilities
for that service
- Internetization
- Mobility
+Producing content for mobile devices is shaping the content
- “hift fo taditioal oadast eas of distiutio to etok eas of
distribution
+Shifts from
▪ Hierarchical, centralised Horizontal, decentralised
+ Eg, How media was produced and organised, rules and restrictions around
the distribution of information have opened up as a result of the transition
▪ Highly regulated, controlled Deregulated, anarchic
+ Eg, FB, people 15 years later ae statig to ask s aout regulating it. Has
been fairly unregulated in the past
▪ Highly territorial (space/time) deterritorialized, mobile
+ Eg, Newspaper served a specific space now publications like the Guardian
can decide to have an Aus or UK addition, no difference in cost to just
produce a single newspaper for distribution in a single country
+costs can dramatically decrease with the convergence of analogue to digital
media, everyone can now produce media, have the equipment to do so
▪ Passie eeptio, audiees Atie eeptio uses / ouities
+ More associated with computers, Actively unfolding texts rather than being
passive and letting the content unfold itself for them
• Industrial Convergence
- American scholar, Henry Jenkins (2004)
+ produced a body of work that talks about the implications of convergence
+Better known for understanding fan cultures
- Ironic consequence for industries around convergence
+Traditional business models have been undermined / Decline in traditional
media networks in monetary terms
eg, Broadcasting is organised around the principles of advertising and the
process of delivering viewers to advertisers, ads are clustered around the
programs which the viewers have come to the TV to view. Changed (5 tv
channels to 99-180 channels, scattered audience) cannot extract the same value
for the ads that they used to do when everyone was clustered across 5 stations
+People are tuning off from TV, not accessing analogue media (antennae), just a
screen that can access other services (gaming, etc)
Eg, physical newspapers
- Direct consequence: media restructuring, Increased concentration of traditional
media ownership
+Value declines = less people are willing to invest in those industry sectors, jobs
dwindle but the people who do remain build bigger empires by taking the ones
that are insolvent or as profitable as they were before
Eg, Traditional media and news corporatios, Dise, Tie Wae of the 90s
are still thriving, taking traditional and emerging media through platforms like
the internet
- Shifting away from professional content to user generated content
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
