COMM Assignment 4 Yingquan Wang
1. "Nobody Knows" issue: difficulty with predicting what products will succeed than it is in most other industries.
2. Public/Semi-public good: commodities that are not destroyed or used up in the process of consuming them.
3. Ars longa: the long economic life of media industry products, eg. tv shows that still earn money after decades.
4. A-list/B-list issue: difficulty assigning value to the status of a creative staff, eg. famous actor with poor acting vs. infamous actor with good acting.
5. Intentional overproduction: producing large amounts of shows because of the unpredictability of identifying which media texts will achieve commercial success, to offset inevitable miscalculations against a broad repertoire.
6. Artificial scarcity: create scarcity in order to stretch the life of creative goods. eg.viewing a film right away in big cities vs. waiting for a while in rural areas.
7. Formats/Formatting: using known and successful textual forms. Eg. sequels, famous stars. Provides the most likely prediction of success and explains why so much of the media industries produce resembles previous products.
8. Economies of scale: achieved when the average cost of a commodity decreases with expansion of output. Radio networks spread to sell advertising to national corporations. The downside is the sacrifice of local flavor that makes content particular to where it's created.
subscription services.
10. Vertical integration: the attempt to control every stage of a media text's development, from production through distribution and sales.
11. Horizontal integration: the conglomeration of various companies at the same level of the value chain. Eg. a company purchasing multiple production studios, views choosing between one cable service or satellite providers. Reduces competition.
12. Industry concentration: result of vertical and horizontal integrations, small amount of companies dominating the market; The degree at which a small number of firms make up for the total production in the market
13. Conglomeration: integration of previously distinct sectors of media industries under a single corporate umbrella. Eg. Walt Disney Company expanding into broadcast, cable television, magazine publishing and so on.
14. Cross-promotion/synergy: cross-promoting successful texts in one sector of the media industries throughout the other media sectors in their organization. Eg. Harry Potter film and game
1. Think of a media text -- an album, a movie, a video game, a book, etc. -- that you recently PAID for. What were some of the economic risks involved in making that text? Now identify ways in which the media company may have attempted to minimize those risks and/or create value to convince you to part with your money (try to come up with at least two for each).
I've been watching Friends from HBO for the last month or two. When Friends started to air in 1994, the economic risks they were facing was the A list/B list issue and that "Nobody knows" if it would be a success or not. The casts have made a few appearances on TV but the audiences weren't familiar with all of them, so even though they have