Media Management and Economics 2002 Abstracts
Media Management and Economics Division
“Many Will Play, Few Will Win”: Global Strategies and Content Characteristics of Web Portals of Transnational Internet Media Corporations • Debashis “Deb” Aikat, North Carolina at Chapel Hill • Inspired by their success in the United States, transnational Internet media corporations have launched international Web portals by forging global partnerships or starting localized subsidiaries to market their products and vision worldwide. Based on a survey and a content analysis incorporating information theories and concepts related to Internet economics, this study analyzed the global strategies and content characteristics of Web portals and examines media management practices.
Change and Stability in the Newspaper Industry’s Journalistic Labor Market • Lee B. Becker, Tudor Vlad and Hugh J. Martin, Georgia • Among the common assumptions made about the journalistic labor market is that it hierarchical, with entry-level hiring done almost exclusively by smaller organizations. Individuals are thought to be able to gain employment at larger media organizations only after they have served time in smaller ones. The assumed normal career progression for a newspaper journalist is from a small newspaper, perhaps even a weekly, to a larger one and on up the chain, with employment at larger organizations open only to those who have served their time at the lower levels of the employment chain.
Measuring Radio Program Diversity in the Era of Consolidation • Todd Chambers, Texas Tech University • This paper addresses the issue of market structure in the top 50 radio markets and the different types of program diversity measures. The study used a secondary analysis of ownership information, format information and song information to analyze the research questions and hypotheses. Overall, the study confirmed previous research related to an increase in format diversity with an increase in the number of competitors. Likewise the findings showed a negative relationship between ownership concentration and radio program diversity.
Diversification Strategy of Global Media Conglomerates: Examining Its Patterns and Drivers • Sylvia M. Chan-Olmsted and Byeng-Hee Chang, Florida • This paper reviews the diversification patterns of the leading global media conglomerates and proposes an analytical framework for examining the factors that influence these strategic choices. Using a case-study approach, we analyzed the top seven global media conglomerates’ product and international (geographic) diversification strategies. Combining both the industrial economics and resource-based view of strategic management, we further devise a system of drivers that might affect the extent, direction, and mode of diversification for global media conglomerates.
The Emerging Broadband Television Market: Assessing the Strategic Differences between Cable Television and Telephone Firms • Sylvia Chan-Olmsted and Jae-Won Kang, Florida • This paper compared the strategic differences between telcos and cable television firms based on a proposed strategic architecture that depicts the roles of various channel members and the interrelationships between them in the emerging broadband television industry. We found that M&As were practiced more frequently than other types of alliances and cable was a more attractive target as well as an active acquirer in M&A alliances. Also, “relatedness” appeared to be a more important M&A strategy for the cable firms as the telcos focused on a resource alignment strategy, allying with firms in the information services and software sectors.
The Dual Structure of Global Networks in the Entertainment Industry: Interorganizational Linkage and Geographical Dispersion • Bum Soo Chon, Kyunggido, Korea and George A. Barnett, SUNY-Buffalo • This paper describes the contour of the global media networks in terms of interorganizational linkages and spatial distribution of foreign direct investment in the entertainment industry. The results of the multiple network analyses revealed that there were significant differences in the positional structures of global media networks in the entertainment industry. However, in the case of the structural relationships between the interorganizational and geographical dispersion networks, the QAP analyses revealed structural similarities between both networks in the entertainment industry.
Measuring the Financial Success of Motion Pictures: A Study Integrating the Economic and Communication Theory Perspectives • Bryan Greenberg, Syracuse University • Prior research into movie attendance has fallen into two camps. The first, economic, revolves around financial measurements and how these measurements correlate with attendance. The second perspective, known as the communication theory or psychological approach, focuses on the processes undertaken by the audience in choosing an entertainment option. While these two perspectives differ on the surface they in fact share certain similarities, most notably an assumption of an active audience influenced by and interacting with outside variables.
Ownership and Barriers to Entry in Non-metropolitan Daily Newspaper Markets • Stephen Lacy, Michigan State University; David C. Coulson, Nevada-Reno and Hugh J. Martin, Georgia • This exploratory study found that private ownership of dailies was negatively associated with the number of weekly newspapers and with the penetration of paid and all weeklies within the county. This is consistent with the prediction that privately held newspapers keep prices and profits lower and quality higher than publicly held dailies. The strategy of lower prices and higher investment in quality could discourage weeklies from starting and would lower weekly penetration.
A Case-Study Analysis of Divestiture Determinants & Strategies of Major Media Firms, 1996-2000 • Daphne Eilein Landers, Florida • The Telecommunications Act of 1996 has stimulated media firms to restructure their operations, relative to new opportunities. The deregulatory law has led firms to engage in extensive mergers and acquisitions. Nevertheless, media firms also have divested numerous operations. The goal of this exploratory research paper, therefore, is to ascertain what have been the divestiture strategies – and divestiture determinants – of major media firms since the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Divestiture strategies and motivations are reviewed and applied to recent media divestiture activity.
Switching Radio Stations While Driving: Magnitude, Motivation and Measurement Issues • Walter McDowell, Miami and Steven J. Dick, Southern Illinois University • Rather than examining what attracts radio audiences to a station, this study looked at what turns audiences away. Among the findings of a general public self-report survey of over 350 people were that, while driving a car or truck, there is considerable station switching within a mere quarter-hour listening span and that avoidance of commercials (or zapping) was by far the most influential motivator.
Free Riders and Pretenders: Media Industry Organizations and Collective Action • Jennifer H. Meadows, Design California State University, Chico and August E. Grant, Focus25 Research & Consulting • This study uses collective action theory to examine membership in media industry organizations. In particular it examines the free riders, those actors who benefit from the services of a media industry organization such as lobbying but do not participate. A survey of members and non-members of a media organization was conducted to measure dimensions of collective action. A third group, pretenders, non-members who indicate that they are members, was found. Differences among members, non-members and pretenders are examined.
Anatomy of a Death Spiral: Newspapers and Their Credibility • Philip Meyer and Yuan Zhang, North Carolina at Chapel Hill • Editors have long believed in their hearts that the economic success of newspapers depends on their credibility. We find evidence to support this belief by examining 21 counties where newspaper credibility has been measured. The more people believe what they read in the papers, the greater the robustness of circulation penetration over a recent 5-year period. Unfortunately, both credibility and readership are falling in what appears to be a classic reinforcing process.
DonÕt I Know You? Understanding and Serving Audiences for Special-Interest Publications • Allison Morgan, Middle Tennessee State University • Using a case study approach, this paper considers how media managers working for special interest publications can seek to hold and maintain their readers’ loyalty. Specifically, this study explored the challenges faced by the communications department of Tennessee Farmers Cooperative, a farm-supply organization that publishes a monthly special-interest newspaper for its agricultural audience.
Digital Cinema Goes to Hollywood: The Economic Effects of Digital Technology on the Motion Picture Industry • Siho Nam, The Pennsylvania State University • Situated within economic and industrial contexts, this research aims to examine how digital technology differs from other preceding film technologies and to assess the economic effects of digital cinema at this stage of development by utilizing some secondary statistical data. It also pays specific attention to the technical and economic barriers that inhibit digital cinema’s rapid diffusion. Finally, a possibility of the Internet as a new film exhibition venue is briefly discussed.
Must-Carry: An Economic Consideration • Namkee Park, Southern California • In Turner Broadcasting System v. FCC (1994 & 1997), the US Supreme Court justified and affirmed the constitutionality of the “must-carry” restrictions of the Cable Act of 1992 by referring to the cable operators’ “bottleneck, or gatekeeper control over most of the television programming.” However, an economic analysis focusing on the current conditions for competition, relevant market analysis, and concentration and vertical integration data suggests that the Court’s ruling was based upon faulty reasoning.
Managing Innovation: Newspapers’ and the Development of Online Editions • Shashank Saksena and C. Ann Hollifield, Georgia • Media managers in the 21st century will need to constantly assess and respond to emerging technologies that have the potential to disrupt the industry. This project examined the innovation management processes that the newspaper industry used to respond to the Internet, using an analytical framework of recommended innovation management techniques derived from previous research. The study found that newspapers’ innovation-management processes were generally haphazard and that industry executives should be better prepared in the future to manage innovation.
Business Models Of Online News Organizations: Endgame For Global Media Dominance? • Frederick Schiff, and Jefferson Gaskin, Houston • The study compares leading news websites. Results show that content factors and market factors are both important in predicting the size of the unique audience attracted to news sites. The most important market factor seems to be paying attention to news consumers outside the area of the core product strength of established media firms. Content characteristics also predict online performance of news organizations, especially business models that optimize information retrieval and storage, and interactive networking.
Competition and/or Coexistence?: The Relationship between Local Television Stations and Their Websites at the Macro and Micro Levels • Tae-Il Yoon and Glen T. Cameron, Missouri-Columbia • In an attempt to explore the relationship between traditional television media and the new Internet media, this study will use market survey data of local television stations in a city within the framework of the niche theory framework. The findings of the current study suggest that the relationship between local TV stations and their websites are more complicated than practitioners and researchers assume. Their relationship depends on the context in which the two media work.
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