News Corporation research

Tasks

1) Research News Corporation’s response to the growth of new and digital media by listing each of the institution’s brands (Sky News, Times etc.) Have any closed, changed or been in the news in the last five years for any reason?

Global vertically integrated media company founded by Rupert Murdoch, with properties in film, television, cable, magazines, newspapers, publishing. News corp is the worlds third largest media conglomerate and is a multi media companu and cross platform which includes print and broadcast. News corporation owns many different institution brands such as

1) Sky news
2) The times
3) Foxtell
4) Sunday times
5) Vogue
6) Fox sports
7) the courier mail 

etc.  

2) Develop examples of the impact that new and digital media has had on News Corp’s brands (paywalls, readership figures, audience share etc.)

1) Falling newspaper sales cut ihnto profit of the times and the sun
2) The times and the sun on internet paywall
3) Less money spent on journalist 
4) More user generated content
5) Sky go, TV on demand might impact newspapers
6) Social media
7) Price promotions for newspapers

3) Why and with what success are traditional media institutions adapting to the challenge posed by new/digital media?

NDM summary

All of my NDM stories are on one regularly updated blogpost.

The directory of posts is as follows:

1) 25/12/13 Google has never revealed revenue figures for YouTube.

2) 10/01/14 Privacy concerns raised as Google+ makes it possible to send email via name search

3)  15/01/14 - Top Gear and Doctor Who dominate record ratings for BBC iPlayer

4) 24/01/14 - IS GOOGLE KILLING GENERAL KNOWLEDGE?

5) 29/01/14 Candy Crush Saga boss says sorry for cloning, but defends trademark filings

6) 03/02/14 Apple shares plunge as sales disappoint

7) 07/02/14 apple revenue goes down

8) 12/01/14 - How social media can change the face of fundraising

9) 17/01/14 Windows 8 hits 200m licences - at a pace putting it on a par with Vista

10) 25/01/14 Thousands of Tesco.com customer accounts suspended after hacker attack

11) 31/01/14 News UK chief Mike Darcey says the Daily Mail and Guardian are ‘minnows’ compared to internet giants such as Google.

12) 06/02/14 Apple aims to boost iPhone 5c sales with cheaper 8GB model

13) 12/02/14 Firefox on Windows 8 Metro only had 1,000 daily users

14) 19/02/14 The readers' editor on; sometimes forgetting that our roots are in Manchester

15) 25/02/14 UK mobile advertising set to overtake newspaper ad revenue in 2014

16) 29/02/14 Phone hacking: Wall Street Journal wins ruling on reporting restrictions

17) 04/03/14 The Sun links up with O2 to offer Premier League clips with 4G deals

18) 12/03/14 'Three-fifths of Twitter's UK users follow a newspaper or journalist'

19) 18/03/14 Karisma Kidz app aims to give kids emotional tools to deal with stress

20) 24/03/14 Nokia sees closure of Microsoft deal delayed to April

Exam question

Developments in new and digital media mean that audiences can now have access to a greater variety of views and values. To what extent are audiences empowered by these developments?

Due to developments in the new and digital media audience now have access to more variety and greater views and values. Audiences use the internet for many different reasons as this can have both positive effects and also negative. Audiences use the internet for reasons such as to surf the internet, socialize, entertainment and so on. Users due to NDM now have access to more variety of opinion and views, this is better because traditional media platforms are owned by a few people who dominate what they print and the views. An example of this would be Rupert Murdoch and the Sun, he was against Neil Kinnock becoming PM as it was seen that Kinnock would win. 

The Sun printed an article that said if Neil Kinnock wins ‘would the last person to leave
Britain please turn out the lights’. The next day in the elections the conservatives won by a landslide, the Sun. Due to NDM we now have alternative news sites where we get the same news but different opinions of it from the mainstream views. By doing this the user has access to a variety of views and can choose from both sides, An example of this would be the BBC on-line talked about how in the US the Americans ere financing a corrupt company. A Marxist would argue that the mainstream will always dominate the NDM e.g. bbc online whereas a pluralist would say there is NDM for everyone.

Furthermore due to NDM audiences are able to share there views online due to the forums there are out there on every website which allows the audience to give there own opinion and share with others. This has put a good impact on both the audience and institutions as the audience can get there point acrossed and the institutions are able to see how the audience feel about there particular news story as this keeps the audience engaged on that topic. This links to the marxists theory of the audience being able to own the instituion and shares there own views and opinions online. NDM has also let them share there views through via facebook and twitter by 'hashtaging' and 'tweeting' news stories which can go globally. Futhermore NDM also allows audiences to see live footage as the news channels such as sky and CNN the two 24hour news allows audiences to watch the news anytime which gives them the power to control the news of when to watch it and when not to.

In conclusion i believe that new and digital means that audience have a greater variety to news and values. this is because i believe NDM it is a great way to build up people’s confidence as some people may feel safer on the internet then they do in real life as this way people are able to express themselves. For example Facebook is an on-line social networking service.  Facebook was founded in February 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg. Facebook now allows anyone who claims to be at least 13 years old to become a registered user of the website. This shows how Facebook allows people to share what they are doing with the world and have new friends. However, things such as citizen journalism is impacting the way audiences have access as it’s challenging the professional journalists. In contrast there are also other sites out there such as blogger and MySpace which allow people to share their own views and make comments to posts which show the 'freedom' side of the world as in real life some people are band from giving their opinions on things whereas the internet can sometimes had your identity letting you get involved with news forums etc. and take part in discussions. An article showed how people have been leaking information about people which is a positive for us as we would know what is happening and how the goverment is doing behind our backs. However i would still argue that 'freedom' will then not be a case of how people describe the internet as. This is because everything people do is being watched by the police or either the government which shows how peoples privacy has been interrupted. 

Globalisation and news

1) Has the increased globalisation of news improved the audiences experience? How? Why?

I believe yes globalisation of news has improved the audience experience in many different ways. This is because audience now are able to view live footage on-line or on any of their devices for free which gives them access from many different technology devices and lets them watch the footage many times. This has improved the experience as when looking at news papers i can see that audiences are only able to read but not see the actual video of what has happened. Globalisation has let audience be updated with new news everyday. This links to them showing what is happening in the world then showing what is happening in the area as the news institution know that audiences prefer to see what is happening around the world which keeps the news going.

2) Is our news influenced by american cultural imperialism?

Yes i believe it has been influenced and this is because an example would be the CNN news which is on for 24/7. Due to this many audiences had the chance to catch up on the news any time from the television as the news was on all day so they make sure audiences are able to view it whenever they want. On the other side sky news for example did not have there news streaming for 24/7 however seeing how CNN 24/7 hour news attracted many audiences they also made there news to 24/7. Therefore this shows how our news influenced by american cultural literalism news. 

3) Has globalisation benefited or damaged major news institutions?

I believe that it has benefited the major news institutions and this is because now they have a journalist in every country this is because audiences prefer news to be about different countries as they want to see what is happening around the world rather then there own. this means that they do not need a journalist in every area which saves them costs and having journalist in every country keeps them updated with the news and keeps there channels going as major institution like BBC news talks about news in different countries.

On the other hand globalisation has also damaged major news institution and this is because if news channels are in a global area it is hard for them to stand out as nearly all the news institutions have moved worldwide and get worldwide news for them which is hard to see which ones stands out the most. as being local would have made them stand out as they would be only one of them and loads of the ones in global

exam response

Q2 exam response

i believe vampire movies such as eclipse and let the right one in are popular because audiences such as teenagers from the age of 14-24 prefer movies that have a bit of a drama and also a romance movie together which contains a lot of suspense and enigma code of 'barthes theory' the characters that vampire movies contain fit the movie with trailers actors come from the outside such as docter who which is an outsider is also a popular show that audiences prefer and links to vampire type movies as those types of shows are also different and unique. i believe teenagers are most attracted to vampire movies as they can maybe relate to them. Outsiders such as docter who are also very popular the way vampire movies are because these types of programmes/movies are presented differently and in a unique way which catch the audience attention as those movies have a mix off different things that create enigma code for the audience and are very popular due to the fact the way they present the characters acting in those types of movies make it more interesting to see. As mulveys theory talks about the 'male gaze' of when there are women actors in those movies which attract the audience to watch it. 

News Values

A reminder of Galtung and Ruge's news values:

Galtung and Ruge, in their seminal study in the area put forward a system of twelve factors describing events that together are used as a definition of 'newsworthiness'. Focusing on newspapers and broadcast news, Galtung and Ruge devised a list describing what they believed were significant contributing factors as to how the news is constructed. Their theory argues that the more an event accessed these criteria the more likely it was to be reported on in a newspaper. 

Immediacy: has it happened recently? is more important than ever due to news breaking on Twitter or elsewhere on line. However, this in turn changes the approach of other news sources such as newspapers as the news will probably already be broken by the time the paper is published so different angles might be required.

Familiarity: is it culturally close to us in Britain? 

Amplitude: is it a big event or one which involves large numbers of people?

Frequency:  did the event happen fairly quickly? is more important than ever due to news breaking on Twitter or elsewhere on line. However, this in turn changes the approach of other news sources such as newspapers as the news will probably already be broken by the time the paper is published so different angles might be required.

Unambiguity: is it clear and definite? Audiences never know if it is for definite until the event has actually happend this includes the news showing a footage or image in order to make it more believable. Furthermore this can now be accessed anywere such as mobile phone, tablets, laptops and PC's which has made the newspapers even more in decline

Predictability: did we expect it to happen? This has changed galtungs and ruges theory as now whatever we see we have expected it to happen as new and digital media has been expanding and getting better therefore we do expect a lot of things to happen

Surprise: is it a rare or unexpected event? It is important for media to give suprises to the audience as this will be part of there wow and shock factor in order to 'wow' the audiences and in 2014 i believe that this value has gone even more high as there have ben some suprise news in the up coming months

Continuity: has this story already been defined as news? Once a story is ready it is important to make sure the story is defined as a news and not some random story that will be no use when published as some storys we see are ignored but the ones that interest ones always comes in

Elite nations and people: which country has the event happened in? Does the story concern well-known people? The news always cocerns some type of people how the media put in the most popular and well know people foreward in order to get audience to watch it and tweet or facebook about it

Negativity: is it bad news? In order to gain the audiences attention it is now vital for the news people to form some type of bad news as 'moral panic' and 'negativity' in order to gain the audience attention using all there new ways of news which includes news websites