Entry 3 - Globalisation

The reading is about the production of media at a ‘global level’. Allowing me to understand how one media company could come to own a variety of media practices around the world. For example News Corporation is one of the leading conglomerates with various subsidiaries in England (The Sun, The Times) but also in America (20^th Century Fox).  However it isn't just the fact there are large media conglomerates buying most of the market, with the introduction of the internet, globalisation became more effective whether it was seen as good or bad. For instance, as information circulated online, people could access it without having to read a printed newspaper or even watch the TV. Due to this, Newspapers began to suffer and more recently have started to release there articles online so that they can keep themselves in business. But this isn't that great as search engines such as Google can determine ‘what information is internationally available’ (Balnaves et al., 2008) meaning a website such as the New York Times might not be available in the UK.

One of the big issues that is highlighted in the chapter is the fact conglomerates own more than just one type of media. This poses the question about how we as the audience know what the difference between fact and propaganda is because everything we know of is being fed to us from the same source. For me this was important because even as a photographer you are at risk of your images being seen as supplying ideas due to the invention of Photoshop.

Along with globalisation comes one major issue. Now that the whole world is connected in one way or another, how much of someone’s life is private, especially in terms of social networking and the internet in general. Even saying this, does it matter? I’m asking this as its now become so normal to share everything. This just shows how our culture has become overly mediated (Stevenson, 2014:1).

Overall, I feel that the reading I have done proves how much the internet has changed the way things are done. For instance it allows you to achieve things much quicker than before but it shows how reliant everyone is on one thing. For me, I am able to share photographs with people from across the world, which wouldn't have been possible a few years ago. Thus showing that globalisation can be effective in some terms of the media, whereas in others it can be damaging.

Bibliography

Long, P and Wall, T (2012) Media Studies: Texts, Production, Context (2nd Edition), London: Pearson.

Balnaves, M., Donald D. and Donald, S.H. (2008) The Global Media Atlas, London: British Film Institute.

Stevenson, N (2014) The Transformation of the Media: Globalisation, Morality and Ethics, London: Routledge.

Entry 2 - Media regulation and policy

Media regulation and policy ‘concerns legal or self-imposed controls or restrictions of media organisations’ (Long & Wall, 2012). From understanding this myself it helps organisations protect their audience from something that might not be suitable. It also helps prevent a bad situation occurring. However it doesn't matter what a company does to follow these rules as they can be broken by the audience. For example the illegal downloading of films and music can’t be avoided as it’s hard to monitor everyone, but it’s also made harder with the internet.

But on the other hand, one example of a policy that seems successful is the Flickr’s Creative Commons license, originally created by Lawrence Lessig for understanding music copyright. The idea behind this is that it offers an alternative to copyright, giving the user of the site more of a control over what happens to their images. This can result in the download and use of the image or it could mean that the image can’t even be downloaded.  

Even though there are regulations put into place, it doesn't mean they are followed. With it being easy for a production company or even a consumer to not comply and even prented that they are, it could show that there might not be a need. However 'a youngster watching a video that the video classification board has indicated is for adults only’ (Long & Wall, 2012: 216/7) isn't right, and this shows a good reason to comply with the rules.

From further reading the suggestion that regulation might not be as successful as it seems all comes down to the invention of the internet and how it can’t be ‘easily censored or eliminated’ (Adbramson, 2001:302) from where it’s been published. This shows then how not everything can be regulated, and it also shows that it’s not as controlled as a film company or TV station where rules can actually be enforced. Not only does it touch on this, but it begins to pose the question of whether globalization will ‘mean the end of media policy’ (Adbramson, 2001:304) and in this case it makes you ask yourself whether it would be good or bad to stop the media being regulated.

In terms of my own interest in photography there are a lot of factors that are controlled. These are things such as getting permission to shoot in a place and even release forms that models might have to sign. The other main factors are the issues of copyright and how you can protect yourself.

Bibliography

Long, P and Wall, T (2012) Media Studies: Texts, Production, Context (2nd Edition), London: Pearson.

Abramson, B. D. (2001). Media policy after regulation? International journal of cultural studies, 4(3), 301-326.

Entry 1 - Political Economy

From reading chapter 5 my understanding is that the media is overly controlled, down to the staff working for various companies or even the news stories that are broadcast.

Starting the chapter it discussed how we as an audience don’t know the creators of what we consume, but that we care more about who is in the TV programme or who is in a music video. The book illustrates an example of this where it states that if a celebrity is tied to a certain product it’s more likely to ‘encourage repeat purchases’ (Long & Wall 2012:177) whereas if this person wasn't involved, the product might not do as well.  This should then be a concern for a company, but from the reading, you are able to pick up the fact they know exactly what they’re doing.

The main factors from this reading are that the conglomerates and all involved have certain jobs to do and they know how to do them. Not only this, but the more a company has, the better it is for them in terms of winning over a market. As well as this, the reading has allowed me to see the power that these various media sources have, one main example in the book being a story of the singer Sandi Thom, who was allegedly signed to Sony due to the 100,000 people who tuned into ‘her nightly live web stream’, however legit this seems, the story was apparently leaked after the signing which just shows how much is controlled.

However even with all this in mind, with the rise of the internet, this has initially changed in some ways. From further reading, it is clear that many of the things I have previously discussed will be different. For instance, the fact that using a celebrity in a film would entice someone to buy a variety of products is no longer the case as there are now websites that you can watch films on, listen to music and even read the newspaper. With this issue not a worry years ago the media world as a whole is ‘suddenly vulnerable’ (Ulin 2012: 293).

Overall, the use of money is no longer as powerful as it once was now the internet has been introduced. As a keen photographer, in some ways the internet is great as it allows me to share photos, but in others it’s bad as there are a lot of ways that could potentially stop you making money, just like what’s happening to the larger media companies.

Bibliography

Long, P and Wall, T (2012) Media Studies: Texts, Production, Context (2nd Edition), London: Pearson.

Ulin, Jeff. 2012., Business of Media Distribution. The: Monetizing Film, TV and Video Content in an Online World. [Online]. Focal Press. Available from: <http://www.myilibrary.com?ID=234516> 26 March 2015