DIGITAL MEDIA CONVERGENCE & MUSIC VIDEO ONLINE
Digital media convergence truly is a phenomenon. Defined
as the ‘coming together’ of old and new media - old media meaning traditional
processes of communication and expression of information, and new media meaning
the digitally developed forms of these communication and information processes,
digital media convergence is a revolutionary shift and advance in media
technology.
Jenkins defines convergence as “the flow of content across multiple media platforms, the cooperation between multiple media industries, and the migratory behaviour of audiences (2006:2). There are various forms of convergence, these being technological convergence – such as smart phones, Facebook, online newspapers and media centres, industrial convergence – combining multiple media platforms such as TV shows screening previous episodes online, cultural convergence – the breaking down of barriers between different cultural groups, global convergence – the connectivity of trans-national media audiences, and finally social convergence – spaces where people come together for example Facebook, Twitter or online forums.
The key aspect of convergence is the improvement and development of technology, through its practicality and appeal to a wider audience. As explained by Jenkins, prior to this development of convergence, “each media had its own distinctive functions and markets...companies that published newspapers, magazines, and books did very little else” (Jenkins 2006). As technology developed over time, various forms of media have been combined to create efficiency, mobility and ease of access.
Music Videos and Digital Media Convergence
To address the phenomenon of digital media convergence, the changing nature of music videos and their distribution is a perfect example to employ. To begin, it is important to understand how the whole craze for music videos began. The phonoscene era, from the early 1900’s, where short films incorporated actors lip-syncing to songs, was the first time that both image and music were combined. It then progressed to movies incorporating certain popular songs, followed by the success of musicals of the 1950’s. From thereon, the concept of music videos began to be a growing form of entertainment.
The creation of many music video programmes, including MTV in 1981, Australia’s ‘Video Hits’ in 1987, and Channel V in 1994 boosted the music video popularity, especially targeting the younger demographic through its use of popular songs often heard on the radio. These television programmes were the perfect way to promote both the artist and their music, and were extremely successful up until the point where the internet started to deliver music videos through various websites – the most successful being YouTube.
YouTube
YouTube may be categorised under both social and technological convergence, as it is a space where people can share their videos for the global public to see, whilst also socialising, through its ability for viewers to post comments expressing their opinion (a form of communication convergence), sharing the video through other networking sites like MySpace or Facebook, or even downloading videos through websites such as keepvid.com or keep-tube.com.
Many of the social network sites are working together or converging for example YouTube and iTunes, where often we see below a music video on YouTube, the link to download the song from iTunes. Another example of this type of convergence is the establishment of VEVO and its partnership with YouTube.
VEVO
VEVO exclusively deals with original music videos and the artists. VEVO’s success is vastly due to YouTube’s support. This type of deal or partnerships was very successful because the 2 firms working together produced a greater profitable success for both VEVO and YouTube. The most successful video on YouTube and VEVO is ‘Baby’ by recording artist Justin Bieber, followed by ‘On the Floor’ performed by Jennifer Lopez featuring Pitbull.
The huge success of ‘On the Floor’ was primarily through YouTube and its ability to promote the song and video through numerous networking sites. The view count for ‘One the Floor’ to date is 587,999,775 (31st August 2012, 1:40pm). No longer are television music video programmes the main source of viewing music videos. Shows like Video Hits, have been taken over by YouTube – because of its versatility for consumers - being able to view its content at any given time. The mobility of smart-phones, tablets and laptops are what make viewing media on the internet much more appealing as they carry ‘the promise of private and personalized viewing’ (Orgad 2009).
Television is losing its popularity with each new generation as smart phones offer an environment where ‘viewing times and schedules are not necessarily relevant’ (Orgad 2009).
In January 2012, Australia’s channel 11 created a new approach to the TV music video market. ‘The Loop’, not only airs the songs which make up the iTunes top 20 chart of the past week, but also the most popular videos from YouTube, trending ‘tweets’ and previews of upcoming movies.
An online article states that Beverley McGarvey, Network TEN’s Head of Programming, expressed her views on the developments of the show stating, “The Loop is taking the next step in music entertainment programming by stretching its reach to the online world... [a] young and innovative approach” (Knox, 2012), showing that sales and marketing executives of the television network are searching for new ideas and processes to continue the music video market on television whilst also breaking into the online market, where in this day and age, is the most successful. This is because the internet is a place where ‘the customer is in charge and makes the choice to pull only the information he or she selects’ (Lawson-Borders 2005) meaning we don’t have to view all the other information we are not interested in when using the internet. This is the approach that network 10 chose when creating their show ‘The Loop’. ABC’s music video programme ‘rage’ too has expanded into an online market establishing rage online, rage on mobile, rage on radio, dvd and as a smart-phone application.
Although global technological and social convergence, and its shift towards the internet has made it increasingly difficult for TV networks to make a successful and profitable music video programme, the advances in technology has made accessibility much easier and therefore has brought a flexibility and mobility for entertainment, purely for the benefit of the public. And although the popularity of television itself is shrinking with each generation, it has still not deteriorated yet. We will just have to wait and see what is next.
References:
Jenkins, H. (2006) Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide, New York, New York University Press, pp 1-24.
Knox, D 2012, New Presenter For the Loop, Podcast, TV Tonight, viewed 31 August 2012, http://www.tvtonight.com.au/2012/01/new-presenter-for-the-loop.html
Lawson-Borders, G 2005, Media Organizations and Convergence: Case Studies of Media Convergence Pioneers, Taylor & Francis Inc.
Orgad, Shani (2009) 'Mobile TV : Old and new in the construction of an emergent technology' Convergence, vol 15 no 2 pp 197 – 214
Video:
Jennifer Lopez Feat. Pitbull – ‘On the Floor’ accessed 31st August 2012
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4H_Zoh7G5A
Images:
Casablanca poster – accessed 30th August 2012 http://classicflickchick.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/casablanca-poster.jpg/
The Loop poster – accessed 30th August 2012 http://eleven.com.au/theloop-song-request.htm
Video Hits poster – accessed 30th August 2012 http://mozetteslibrary.blogspot.com.au/2011/08/video-hits-say-goodbye.html
VEVO logo accessed 30th August 2012 - http://www.techzed.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/vevo-logo-l.jpg
Facebook 'Like' button - accessed 31st August 2012 https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkU4pAygCwCqAERpw9Hcd-7ZFfe3SVYmbusdJ-1cJvMUMuzcyTpLfOXU9ErCkMHlx_89QMMh5lDW-uRK6HNwNRbyVXeJrdUfQdP0olCmkZNzfCF4q7XqFWeUNoveZJF6mEmhk0cpBjKW4q/s1600/Facebook-Like-Button-big.jpg
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