Media Industries Week 1 Notes

What Makes Media an Industry?

Media industries are defined as any industry involved in producing, distributing, or selling media, broadly construed.
- Traditional/legacy sectors: film and television production, radio, music recording, video distribution, telecommunications.
- Expanded scope includes: social media influencing, AI/software development, streaming piracy, marketing/ads, screen tourism, zine publishing.
- Key question: what is the utility of studying these diverse activities together?
Why this not be the only or simplest question (context from the slide): exploring the industrial dynamics and politics often yields more actionable understanding than simply labeling media as an industry.

Why is it Important to Study the Industrial Aspects of Media?

The industrial perspective helps explain how media is funded, produced, and circulated, and how profits shape content and access.
It illuminates power relations among performers, creators, and capital, including how profit motives influence work practices and ideologies.
It reveals how different cultures and political systems shape media industries across locales.
It examines how technology transforms industrial and labor formations in new media forms.
It considers the role of digital media companies in reorganizing production and distribution over the last two decades.

The Idea of Media Industries

Definition recap: industries involved in creating, distributing, or selling media goods.
Traditional focus vs broader inclusion:
- Legacy media: film, TV, radio, music, telecommunications, video distribution.
- Modern expansions: social media influencing, AI/software, streaming piracy, advertising ecosystems, screen tourism, zines.
Why group these together? To understand how production, circulation, and value capture operate across different media forms and platforms.

The Rise of Digital Media and Global Societies

Digital media technologies have become central to societies globally, altering the way media is produced, distributed, and consumed.
This shift affects labor practices, financing, distribution infrastructures, and regulatory/policy environments.

Some Media Industrial Questions

How is media funded? Who decides what content gets produced and distributed?
What are the relations between performers/creators and the profit motives of capitalist media? How do work practices and ideological commitments affect systems?
How do different cultures, societies, and political systems shape media industries across places?
How does technology influence industrial and labor formations of emerging media forms?
What is the role of digital media firms in reshaping media production and distribution over the last 20+ years?

A Key Tautology of Media Industry Studies

Is it more important to study media as a cultural product or as a business? These are not mutually exclusive.
In the twenty-first century, much media content is subject to value capture under capitalist production imperatives.
The module invites thinking about how to synthesize culture and industry in analysis.

Eurovision Lens: Culture vs Industry

A thought experiment: should we study events like a Eurovision bout through culture or industry? What would that reveal about the relationship between media industries, public good, and democracy?

The Eurovision 2026 RTÉ Statement (contextual example)

RTÉ statement (Sept 11, 2025) outlines Ireland’s position regarding participation in the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest if Israel participates.
Ireland would not participate if Israel goes ahead; decision would follow the EBU’s ruling.
The statement emphasizes concerns about ongoing Gaza fatalities, targeting of journalists, and access restrictions in Gaza.

Media as Cultural Commodity

Traditional view: media as cultural goods that we receive, experience, and interpret as expressions of culture and society.
Public good vs commodity: some societies treat media as a public good with cultural imperatives; others rely on market forces and profit motives.
Public sphere and democracy: the production and circulation of media shape public discourse and democratic processes.
Geography matters: different places assign different roles to culture and commerce in media systems.

Co-Productions: Culture and Finance

Example: Poor Things (Lanthimos) – UK/US/Ireland co-production.
- Public financing treated media as a cultural good, with tax breaks enabling local talent employment.
- Profitability is secondary to cultural cooperation and prestige, though well-known stars or directors contribute to market value.
Why public funding for culture? to support cultural collaboration, national prestige, and access to international talent.

Doctor Who and the Media Franchise (BBC / Disney+)

Disney acquired international distribution rights for Doctor Who in 2022, boosting production budgets for recent seasons.
A 2024 report questioned the long-term stability of the Disney-BBC deal and its future prospects.

How Do Media Industrial Formations Respond to, Reproduce, or Change Existing Social Systems?

Guiding question for analyzing media industries in relation to social, political, and cultural systems.

Horkheimer and Adorno’s The Culture Industry

Origin: 1944, in Dialectic of Enlightenment; critique of how US capitalism consolidates culture under monopoly.
Core claim: culture is captured by capitalist media (notably Hollywood), making mass culture a vehicle for capitalist ideology; this is dangerous for democracy.
Key aim: interrogate whether culture remains autonomous under capitalist production; assess risk of mass deception.

The Frankfurt School

A school of thought from the Institute for Social Research at Goethe University Frankfurt.
Key figures: Adorno, Horkheimer, Kracauer, Benjamin, Habermas.
Grounded in Marxist critique; aimed at analyzing how culture shapes political ideologies and power relations, especially in the context of fascism and modern capitalism.
Tradition: critical theory—critiquing power structures in society, with attention to culture and knowledge.

The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception (Key Themes)

Mass culture under monopoly tends to be homogenized; production and distribution are interlocked with corporate power.
Culture is framed as business; this frame legitimizes the finished products as socially necessary, while eroding genuine artistic autonomy.
Industries produce for classification and consumption; consumer segmentation mirrors marketing and propaganda practices.
The logic of capital drives all media products, shaping what is perceived as legitimate culture.

The Culture Industry: Further Reflections

The integration of production elements across media (novel concept, film, sound effects) demonstrates the unity of the production process under capital.
Media serve to perpetuate the power of invested capital and normalize the dominance of capital in everyday life.
The portrayal of cultural products as interchangeable and standardized reinforces social control and expropriated workers’ position.

The Mass Ornament

A reference to broader critiques of how mass culture organizes life and consumption; points to ongoing debates about whether Frankfurt School analyses still apply in the digital era.

Critiques of the Culture Industry Argument

David Hesmondhalgh, summarizing Bernard Miège’s critiques (Cultural and Creative Industries, 2008):
- The culture industry idea underplays how technological innovations transform artistic practice.
- It overemphasizes markets and commodities at the expense of viewing culture as a production process with its own limits and problems.
- It risks treating culture as a unified field rather than a diverse set of industries competing for attention, advertising revenue, and labour.
Contemporary study of cultural industries seeks to account for technology, plurality, and the complex interdependencies across media sectors.

The Social Power of Media (Lotz & Havens)

Media holds tremendous social influence; while this book focuses on business, the social power of media cannot be separated from its economic and political roles.
Media shapes what we know and do not know, influencing public opinion and social norms, in ways users may not realize.

Utility of the Culture Industry Concept Today

The culture industry framework remains useful for understanding power and ideology in industrial formations.
It helps illustrate how capitalism and other social systems influence what media content is produced and how it circulates.
The challenge is to adapt these concepts to digital culture industries, social media, and platform capitalism while avoiding economic determinism.

Media as Industry (Lotz & Havens – Module Orientation)

The textbook demonstrates how traditional understandings of media industries can be adapted to the digital age.
Media industries blend art and commerce, creating different motivations for creators and different measures of success.
The industry depends on production and distribution of media commodities, spanning geographies, infrastructures, labour, financing, and coordination toward a finished product.

The Profit Motive and Economies of Scale

Large media enterprises tend to maximize economies of scale, seeking proportionate gains in profits for larger production.
Media is inherently risky; larger-scale productions are perceived as safer bets due to wider potential distribution.
The rise of streaming and interconnected platforms increases competition for attention, complicating the value of “safe bets.”
Example dynamic: superhero franchises as a response to risk aversion; but the streaming era raises new risks and opportunities for original content.

John Carter (Andrew Stanton, 2012) – Case Study

John Carter was a high-budget production (≈ €200 million) that performed poorly due to marketing and adaptation issues.
This case demonstrates the interaction between perceived cultural value and industrial strategy, highlighting accountability in content decisions.
Related resources: a short overview video and a detailed article analyzing the film’s failure.

Services and Subscription Models vs. Box Office and Live Event

The shift to streaming/subscription models reconfigures distribution, financing, and marketing.
Online services emerged to mitigate large-scale production risk while driving new business practices.
TV still negotiates tensions between event-style releases and bingeable content.
The proliferation of platforms changes cultural norms around monocultural media events.

Digital Media Industries

Daily media consumption increasingly happens on social platforms.
Key issues: participatory culture, AI, misinformation, and algorithmic bias.
Reflect on: what gets made, bought, and sold on social media; how production paradigms influence social relations.
These are central media industrial questions for the semester.

Course Logistics and Roadmap

NEXT WEEK (WEEK 2) – Approaches to Media Industries: online lecture; not in Theater P; pre-readings required.
Required readings for Week 2: Lotz & Havens Chapter 1; Kellner; Miller et al., Chapter 1, Global Hollywood 2.

UNIT 1 – HISTORY AND THEORY OF THE MEDIA INDUSTRIES

Why study media industries? Analyzing production to distribution, political economy, cultural theory, public goods vs commodities.
How distribution technologies shift production/consumption and profit models.
Global and local geographies of media industries.
On-the-ground research methods (e.g., interviews, fieldwork) for final project.

UNIT 2 – LABOUR AND PRACTICE

Applying theory to practical industrial scenarios, with a focus on labor formations, exploitation, policy.
Media industries involve long hours, precarious work, and intense competition, but also longstanding unionization and labor organization.
Unit concludes with case studies in traditional and non-traditional sectors (screen tourism, AI/software, music, streaming/influencing).

ASSESSMENT OVERVIEW

Two primary assessments:
- Take-home midterm exam (40%) – Week 7 (20–22 October)
- Final interview project (60%) – due 24 November
Midterm specifics:
- Two 800-word answers to short prompts; three days to complete.
- Must reference and integrate 3 direct quotes from different module texts; interpret critically.
- Open 20 October 8:00, due 22 October 17:00.
Final project specifics:
- Multi-part project centered on an interview with a media industry worker.
- Ethics assessment, consent form, and interview guide due 7 November.
- Interview and critical reflection due 24 November (800–1000 words).
- Submit audio plus written reflection; post audio in a discussion forum; engage with two classmates’ materials by 28 November.

ENGAGEMENT AND CLASS PARTICIPATION

Engagement with two classmates’ materials in online exhibition is worth 10%.
If you do not post, 2 percentage points may be deducted.
Responses should reflect on critical theories and consider future careers in media industries; 3–4 sentences or longer.

GENERAL ASSESSMENT GUIDELINES

Consult syllabus and Brightspace for detailed guidelines; refer to UCD policies on plagiarism and citation.
Academic integrity is strongly monitored; use a recognized citation style.
Generative AI usage is not tolerated in this module and will be penalised.

Data Center Emissions and AI Footprint (Contemporary Context)

Data center energy use is a growing concern with potential climate impact.
Global electricity consumption attributed to data centers was around 1\% \text{ to } 1.5\% in 2022, prior to the AI surge.
AI workloads are significantly more energy-intensive; a single ChatGPT query can require roughly 10 \times the energy of a Google search.
Projections suggest data center power demand could grow by 160\% by 2030.
Some analyses estimate global data center emissions could reach about 2.5 \text{ billion metric tons of CO}_2\text{e} by 2030.
In-house data center emissions can be notably higher than official tallies; figures cited include roughly 7.62\times higher than declared or 662\% higher in certain analyses.

NEXT WEEK (WEEK 2) – APPROACHES TO MEDIA INDUSTRIES

The Week 2 lecture will be online only (not in Theatre P).
Pre-readings for Week 2:
- Lotz & Havens, Chapter 1, "Media Industries in the Twenty-First Century"
- Kellner, "Media Industries, Political Economy, and Media/Cultural Studies"
- Miller et al., Chapter 1, Global Hollywood 2
The recorded lecture will be posted on Brightspace with essential information for the take-home exam and Week 3 material.