Task 1
- 1. Task 1: Structure of the TV and Radio Industry. Megan Hughes
- 2. Public & Commercial Ownership Private Ownership is a situation in which a company is owned by private stockholders (citizens), as opposed to being owned by a government. An example of a privately owned company is ITV… This explains why they have adverts on their channel as they need to make money because people aren't paying them due to them not being publicly owned. ITV work with SyCo and Sony to produce and process all the media so this way all the profits are split into 3rds if one goes down hill. Advantages of private ownership are: you own it so you make all the decisions and you can control everything. Disadvantages of private ownership are: you have to put all your own money into your projects from your company and there's not always a 100% guarantee that people are going to watch it so if you don’t make it you’ve basically wasted your money and time and you’re left with not a lot. Public Ownership refers to government provision of goods and services; the commercial or business activities of the state. Public service is the opposite to private ownership… For example, the BBC don’t use adverts so it is beneficial to the public as they can just watch their programmes with no disruptions. Some advantages of public service are: It is not an individual who holds the authority, and it is not guided by an individual interest so it pleases everyone. Also its content is usually more prescriptive, with no pressure to attract high ratings or to generate advertisement revenue. Some disadvantages of public service are: Public service in media can be used frequently by the autocratic government as the propaganda tools. Public owned media are also criticized for the boundary they impose in media competition. Unlike independent media, state owned media cannot ensure people's acquisition of unbiased information.
- 3. Conglomerates A media conglomerate ownership group is a company that owns large numbers of companies in various mass media such as television, radio, publishing, movies, and the Internet. As a legal construct a media conglomerate has become a standard feature of the global economic system since 1950. Advantages of conglomerate ownership are: Due to the combination of companies being so big they can promote largely across the world and have great control and power of the media on a whole. Disadvantages of conglomerate ownership are: Critics have accused the larger conglomerates of dominating media, especially news, and refusing to publicize or deem "newsworthy" information that would be harmful to their other interests, and of contributing to the merging of entertainment and news (sensationalism) at the expense of tough coverage of serious issues.
- 4. Examples of Conglomerates The 6 major media conglomerates are: News Corporation, Disney, Comcast, Time Warner, Viacom and CBS Corporation. These 6 actually own 95 of the media. The News Corporation run by Rupert Murdoch is the biggest, most recognised one as it’s also linked to news limited (the sun/ the times), BSkyB, and 20th fox century… These are part of the ownership. As well as this, the news corporation also own nearly 10% of ITV.
- 5. Vertical Integration Commercial institutions try to combat the power of the BBC by becoming larger and creating vertical integration. This is where an institution has shares or owns each part of the production and distribution process. For example: Warner Bros Entertainment calls itself a fully integrated broad based entertainment company which owns film studios and the means to distribute the films as well as some of the cinemas in which they are shown. Advantages of vertical integration are: Vertical organizations provide clear lines of authority and a tight span of control, which can lead to high operating efficiency. In general, the organization is comprised of relatively small departments, allowing managers to closely monitor and control the activities of their subordinates. Disadvantages of vertical integration are: Employees at the bottom of a vertical structure may feel less valued than those higher up in the chain. Some employees may not relish the accompanying culture of politics, which places heavy emphasis on pleasing the boss.
- 6. Horizontal Integration In business, horizontal integration is a strategy where a company creates or acquires production units for outputs which are alike - either complementary or competitive. Advantages of horizontal integration are: Employees may attain greater satisfaction in a horizontal structure due to greater freedom and autonomy. The use of cross-function teams can also lead to high levels of cooperation throughout the organization. Disadvantages of horizontal integration are: The decentralized structure could lead to a loose ship as the team and project leaders have high levels of responsibility for achieving results but little real authority over their team members. A resulting lack of control can lead to finger-pointing when things go awry, which can hinder productivity, according to the Practical Management website.
- 7. Free To Air & Subscription Based Television Packages The two types of ways to watch TV today is Freeview (the United Kingdom comes under the name Freeview) or there is subscription based packages such as Sky, Virgin and BT, etc. Freeview is a type of television package that gives a certain amount of channels to view without needing to pay for a service, making it free to view. This is a good way to view TV if there is only a certain amount TV channels that you watch (that are included in this package) making it so you don't need to pay for anything. It is also a good way to be view TV if they are on a low budget and cannot afford to pay monthly. The way the distribute it is not with a service, they do it by just making the view purchase the equipment to receive free-to-air digital terrestrial television channels and then the view does not need to do anything else as the box automatically comes with Freeview. This makes it much easier to set up than a subscription package, though a Digital set-up box is required. Subscription Based Packages offer a lot more channels than Freeview such as movies, sports and many more entertainment channels. The benefit of subscription packages is that you are able to choose the package that is best to suit you, for example the viewer may be a big sports fan but big on movies. They are able to purchase the sports package plus the package of TV they want so you’re paying for exactly what you want and you know you’re going to be happy with it. The biggest of the subscription TV services is between Sky and Virgin as they have a lot more to offer the new comer (BT Vision). With subscription services, you are able to view up to over 200+ channels, some of them being what you'd find on Freeview such as BBC One and ITV to channels that won't appear on Freeview such as Sky 1 and the Virgin channels. The thing about subscription boxes coming from other companies and not just one is the competition so a service such as Virgin won't offer channels such as Sky 1, Sky Sport and Sky Atlantic and the same applies to Sky as they won't have the Virgin channels so at the end of the day it comes down to viewers preference and what they prefer to watch.
- 8. Programme & International Sales, Spin Offs & Franchising Television shows at the moment are more popular than ever. There are more people watching TV shows than ever before thanks to the use of streaming services such as Netflix and On Demand TV. Though this is not just with streaming services though, on both subscription TV and Freeview TV. Each viewer can wait for their favourite programmes to release weekly or daily before the show airs. Broadcasters can discus deals to either sell the show that they broadcast to another broadcaster or company and give the rights to them or they can discus terms for them air the show at different times so it doesn't cause competition or even worse, rivalry. An example of this is when BBC Three sold Family guy and American Dad to ITV for when BBC Three closes down and becomes just online as it is the much cheaper alternative to having the channel on TV. All new series of family guy will have it's UK Premiere exclusively on ITV2 (Instead of BBC Three) the UK's biggest digital channel for young people. This does not come under international sales as they only selling the show nationally, from the biggest Public service broadcaster to the biggest commercial broadcaster in the United Kingdom. Then there is international sales where instead of selling nationally, they sell a programme to a corporation overseas. As well as this, channels abroad in other countries do not have as good enough as a public service as we do, they have to get their funding via advertising and they also buy their shows from other corporations (Whether that be national or internationally as it is much cheaper to buy their shows than making the show their-selves, so that is why they decide to buy shows, though they will make some of their shows as well.) Spin offs of television show is a new television show which contains new characters or the same characters and a similar theme elements from a previous series. An example is when Joey’s comedy aired, which was a spin-off to the show Friends. The two shows were pretty similar and contained the same genres and Joey was still a big star. A related phenomenon, not to be confused with the spin-off, is crossovers. Many, if not all spinoffs, are produced by some of the original producers of the root show. A spin off television programme or any narrative work, derived from one or more already existing works that focuses, in particular, in more detail on one aspect of the original work (E.g. A particular topic, character, or event that happens in the original programme). A spin-off may be called a sidequal when it when it exists in the same chronological frame of time as its predecessor. Media franchising is a collection of media exist in multiple forms such as film, literature, television or video games. The best example of this can be either Doctor Who or the popular TV series The Walking Dead as they are seen as the best television shows to date. These are some of the best examples as they come in multiple forms, for example, Doctor Who as it comes in comic form, book form + audio book, film and television so the doctor who franchise is massive and it is the BBC's biggest selling TV intentionally (Another good example of international sales). Another big franchise is the Marvel franchise which all started with comic books but has adopted into television and film with "The Avengers" which comes under the highest grossing films of all time with the sequel coming close to beating it which is great news for the franchise.
- 9. Advancements In Technology As the years go on, technology is improving and you are able to do more and more with TV’s especially. It started with a black and white screen with just a couple of channels to choose from but now there are big companies such as Sky and Virgin that offer us hundreds of channels of different sorts and genres. For the United Kingdom, The digital switch over which is the process of switching of the analogue broadcasting signals and have them replaced by the digital signal. This primarily involves the conversion of analogue terrestrial television to digital terrestrial. It can also involve an analogue cable conversion to digital, as well as analogue to digital satellite. The switch-over was completed in October 2012. To move on to the digital signal now, The digital television is the transmission of audio and video by digitally processed and multiplexed signal, Digital TV can support more than one program in the same channel bandwidth. To this day after all the changes over the years we are now able to even pause our programmes when we want and fast forward or rewind to a certain part of a programme. As well as this we now have On Demand / Catch Up where you can find the programmes you’ve missed or to watch something again if you really like it. I think the future of technology holds a lot more, especially with television… For example: 4D or Imax will be introduced after 3D and more. A good example of a company that continue to advance in their technology is Apple. They have the IPhone, IPod and IPad in various designs, they have the IMac, IBook and now even the IWatch. Each time a new edition/product gets introduced it has even more pro’s and there’s always more you can do with it.
- 10. Ofcom Regulations Ofcom stands for Office of Communications and it is one of the main regulatory bodies for television. They supervise television to make sure they don't air content that is against their regulation and make sure every show is up to a certain standard where it is suitable for the public to watch. Ofcom govern television with the broadcasting code, they use it as a rule book to help enforce their rules and television standards. The code exists to protect viewers and listeners from harmful and offensive content but also ensures that broadcasters have the freedom to make challenging programme. There's also a whole section of the code that is dedicated to protecting children from certain things on the TV, this includes the rules about the watershed that starts at 9pm. Ofcom also have rules about the times broadcasters choose to schedule their programmes as well as the restrictions on programmes broadcasted before the watershed that include offensive language, violence, sexual material and dangerous or harmful behaviour that children might try to copy. One thing that comes under the Broadcasting Code is "Protecting the under eighteens" which is a set of rules in itself, this covers the watershed and when is the best time to broadcast a programme that is suitable and unsuitable for the under eighteens. They are also the ones who regulate about complaints that have been sent in from viewers who have been disturbed or offended by the content that was aired by the station, complaints can include the audio and video quality not being to standard or not even able to understand what the actor is saying, the complaints can be from very minor things to much more complaints, like a show has offended a certain culture or ethnicity.
- 11. Watersheds In British broadcasting, watershed is the point in time after which programmes with adult content may be broadcast. In the same way that a watershed refers to the crest dividing two drainage basins, a broadcasting watershed serves as a dividing line. It divides the day into the overnight period where family-oriented programming suitable for children may be aired and where programming aimed at or suitable for a more adult audience is permitted, though not required. It may also mean the period of time during which programmes with adult content may be broadcast. Ofcom have a Broadcasting Code which sets standards for television and radio shows and broadcasters must follow its rules. The watershed continues to help parents protect their children from material that might be unsuitable or even harmful for them. Twice a year, every year, Ofcom ask parents and the wider general public what they think about standards on TV. Almost everyone (93 per cent) understands the watershed and 74 per cent think 9pm is the right time. If you just ask parents, that number rises to 76 per cent. Since 2003 Ofcom has taken action on more than 300 occasions when broadcasters have scheduled unsuitable content before or immediately after the watershed. In two recent cases inappropriate music videos — including Rihanna’s S&M — were shown early in the afternoon.