More likely than not you would have picked the first story or the last, and as I learned in yesterday's lecture, the influence of commercial media has a lot to do with that decision.Thanks to the "dumbing down" of news, shows like A Current Affairs and Today Tonight, news is no more serious political stories than it is stories of cat's being run over (thanks for that one lecture girl!). News has been tabloidisated, which is why you would more likely read a story about a twelve year old girl being arrested than a story about asylum seekers. That isn't to say that you wouldn't read those stories. It's just more likely that you'd read the gossipy ones first.
As profit driven media production, commercial media's main goal is to appeal to the masses. Appeal to every single academic, teenager, elder, dole bludger and his best friend. Newspapers, cable TV, film, magazines, radio, tele-comms, outdoor advertising are all aspects of commercial media that influence the masses everyday. It's become 'Mickey Mouse News'. (I really like that term. It brings to light a whole new concept for me to use: to mickey mouse-ify something. I plan on using it a lot).
In 2010, on the 3rd of April, Apple released it's very first iPad. Much anticipated, much speculated about, much published (read ADVERTISED) the iPad sold 3 million units in the first three months. Would the iPad, or for that matter any Apple product, be sold in such large quantities or be such a well known brand if it wasn't for a) advertising and b) the rivalry between it and Windows/MP3 players/any-other-brand-who-happens-to-make-a-similar-product-to-Apple?
Probably not.
In much the same way, commercial media uses rivalry to swing the viewers, to promote its greatness above all others. Just imagine if news was told because stations wanted to give truthful, comprehensive, intelligent information about the day's events? Imagine! Instead, we're stuck with stations fighting with each other, trying to get the best ratings, trying to demonstrate that only they have the real, hard hitting, serious news of the day, that they and ONLY THEY are the station that you should be watching/listening too. Commercial media survives or fails on business success.
Commercial media dominates over public media because it gives society what it wants. It answers the beckoning yell from the masses about what it wants to watch/listen to/read about. And through the world of online media now, publishers can look at what people are clicking on and see that, "Hey! This is popular, let's do more of these shows!" increasing their commercialistic revenues.
No one is safe. Commercialism is out to take over the world.
Or has it already?
In 2010, on the 3rd of April, Apple released it's very first iPad. Much anticipated, much speculated about, much published (read ADVERTISED) the iPad sold 3 million units in the first three months. Would the iPad, or for that matter any Apple product, be sold in such large quantities or be such a well known brand if it wasn't for a) advertising and b) the rivalry between it and Windows/MP3 players/any-other-brand-who-happens-to-make-a-similar-product-to-Apple?
Probably not.
In much the same way, commercial media uses rivalry to swing the viewers, to promote its greatness above all others. Just imagine if news was told because stations wanted to give truthful, comprehensive, intelligent information about the day's events? Imagine! Instead, we're stuck with stations fighting with each other, trying to get the best ratings, trying to demonstrate that only they have the real, hard hitting, serious news of the day, that they and ONLY THEY are the station that you should be watching/listening too. Commercial media survives or fails on business success.
Commercial media dominates over public media because it gives society what it wants. It answers the beckoning yell from the masses about what it wants to watch/listen to/read about. And through the world of online media now, publishers can look at what people are clicking on and see that, "Hey! This is popular, let's do more of these shows!" increasing their commercialistic revenues.
No one is safe. Commercialism is out to take over the world.
Or has it already?
Image available: http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Mickey_Mouse
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