1) What does the term 'Cultural Industries' actually refer to?
Refers to the creation production and distribution of products of a cultural or artistic nature.
2) What does Hesmondhalgh identify regarding the societies in which the cultural industries are highly profitable?
Societies which support the conditions where large companies and their political allies make money.
3) Why do some media products offer ideologies that challenge capitalism or inequalities in society?
Cultural industry companies constantly need to compete with each other to secure audience members.
4) Look at page 2 of the factsheet. What are the problems that Hesmondhalgh identifies with regards to the cultural industries?
Risky business, creativity vs commerce, high production costs and low reproduction costs, semi-public goods; the need to create scarcity.
5) Why are so many cultural industries a 'risky business' for the companies involved?
Companies can't completely control the publicity the product will receive. It is difficult to achieve high levels of profit for individual or independent companies.
6) What is your opinion on the creativity v commerce debate? Should the media be all about profit or are media products a form of artistic expression that play an important role in society?
I think it should be a good balance between the two. People should be able to profit off of their product and it should have some sort of creative effort.
7) How do cultural industry companies minimise their risks and maximise their profits? (Clue: your work on Industries - Ownership and control will help here)
By creating and working with what the company is sure that audience will like. This can be done though sequels of movies as the audience is already familiar with the characters and genre and have an idea of what to expect.
8) Do you agree that the way the cultural industries operate reflects the inequalities and injustices of wider society? Should the content creators, the creative minds behind media products, be better rewarded for their work?
Yes, I think those that put this effort into being innovative and having those artistic talents should gain more credit instead of those who just sell the products.
9) Listen and read the transcript to the opening 9 minutes of the Freakonomics podcast - No Hollywood Ending for the Visual-Effects Industry. Why has the visual effects industry suffered despite the huge budgets for most Hollywood movies?
They were unable to survive in the small margin and makes it almost impossible to make profit.
10) What is commodification?
The transforming of objects and services into commodities.
11) Do you agree with the argument that while there are a huge number of media texts created, they fail to reflect the diversity of people or opinion in wider society?
I think this has improved massively in recent years, for diversity especially. As for the opinion in wider society, that is very controversial and there are currently newspapers which are aimed at people's political stance which encompasses the specific opinion.
12) How does Hesmondhalgh suggest the cultural industries have changed? Identify the three most significant developments and explain why you think they are the most important.
Digitalisation - the internet and mobile phones have multiplied the ways audience can gain access to cultural content. This has made small scale production much easier for millions of people.
Powerful IT and technology companies now work with cultural industries to understand and produce cultural production and consumption.
Huge increase in the amount companies spend on advertising which has helped to fuel the growth of the cultural industries.
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