The first thing that comes to my mind when one says 'commercial television', is entertainment. The first thing that comes to my mind when one says 'commercial radio', is music and the first thing that comes to my mind when one says 'commercial print', is reading.
But never had I ever (before this lecture), really (in-depthly) thought a lot about the owners of the aforementioned media platforms, and what they associate each (platform) with. But I can tell you.
Money.
The Commercial Media industry is everywhere, selling the eyes and ears of the Australian public to advertising (hence the ridiculous number of ads between my guiltily tuning in of Big Brother… daily). In a sense, to know that the owners and producers of such media platforms (News Limited, FairFax Media, APN, Nine Entertainment, WIN Corporations, Southern Cross Broadcasting, Seven West Media and Ten - to name a few), are completely driven by profit - disappoints me to some extent. Simply in knowing that these companies are sacrificing quality, social importance and sometimes morality of the content, for profit, is questionable. Ultimately, they are sacrificing viewer dissatisfaction with profit, thus not broadcasting with the audiences best interests at heart. - On the other hand, we have the Public Media (ABC, ABC 2, ABC News 24, 3 ABC fm, SBS, and SBS 2, etc) - Government funded, audience orientated broadcasting.
In fact, Commercial Media was summed up quite accurately in the lecture.
"Commercial = corrupt; lack of quality; profit overrides social responsibility"
With profit as the sole intention of Commercial Media, we can see the 'dumbing down' of society. We can also see the influence of hyperlocalisation (exposing specific audiences to advertisers) in every commercial platform and broadcaster, feeding society with propaganda, which can distressingly - yet quite easily - sway the public's thinking, beliefs, expectations, opinions and morals. - Considering Commercial Media releases whatever crap they can get a profit out of, I find this some what concerning...
It makes us wonder whether or not Commercial Media will eventually change its ways. Will it always be about profit? Or will reputation for its appropriate content and positive viewer satisfaction be more important?
"Commercial = corrupt; lack of quality; profit overrides social responsibility"
With profit as the sole intention of Commercial Media, we can see the 'dumbing down' of society. We can also see the influence of hyperlocalisation (exposing specific audiences to advertisers) in every commercial platform and broadcaster, feeding society with propaganda, which can distressingly - yet quite easily - sway the public's thinking, beliefs, expectations, opinions and morals. - Considering Commercial Media releases whatever crap they can get a profit out of, I find this some what concerning...
It makes us wonder whether or not Commercial Media will eventually change its ways. Will it always be about profit? Or will reputation for its appropriate content and positive viewer satisfaction be more important?
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