Kick-Starting Media

Thursday 8 June 2016

Recent public debates over funding in the media industries seem tied to the impact of digitisation, which has provided a catalyst for change in terms of how media is now produced and consumed across multiple platforms. As such, business models for funding media are changing too. Trends such as crowdfunding and co-creation – as well as subscription-based platforms like Netflix and video-on-demand services such as iTunes – have all made media more sharable and personal in the digital age, but all of these trends and services also raise further questions about the funding priorities, strategies and policies in the arts, media and culture sectors.

It is thus timely to take stock of cultures of funding in contemporary media industries, and this symposium provides a platform for analysing impacts of these contemporary funding trends, be it on texts, audiences, technologies, cultures or industries.

It is with these broader aims and questions in mind that Kick-Starting Media: Cultures of Funding in Contemporary Media Industries examined cultures of funding in different media sectors, with panels cutting across everything from global cinema and television funding to public service broadcasting, from transmedia and transnational production cultures to the crowdfunding strategies of videogames, comics and anime, and from radio and music business models to funding priorities in global journalism sectors.

A number of papers from the symposium have subsequently been published in a special issue of The International Journal on Media Management. Guest Edited by Matthew Freeman, the special issue, titled ‘Funding and Management in the Media Convergence Era’, is available to read online.