”This isn’t a gold rush, it’s an arms race”

- A critical discourse analysis of 2019’s “streaming war(s)” discourse in television trade press

Julia Lindblom

Department of Media Studies Master Thesis 30 hp Media and Communcation Studies Global Media Studies (120 hp) Spring Semester 2021 Supervisor: Miyase Christensen 2021-05-21 ”This isn’t a gold rush, it’s an arms race”

- A critical discourse analysis of 2019’s “streaming war(s)” discourse in television trade press

Julia Lindblom

Abstract

Streaming services such as Netflix have changed how television is produced and consumed. In 2019, the online video on demand market was topical, with big launches such as Disney+ and Apple TV+. This period in the streaming market was popularized in the press as the “streaming war(s).”

Previous research on the streaming market has aimed at understanding the industry, often with a focus on innovative features. Some studies have articulated a need to look beyond the current narrative used to describe the market. This study examines this very discourse, as no studies have concentrated on the discourse surrounding the streaming market or the relationship between the streaming industry and television trade press. Such a study object may illustrate how market discourse is currently formed and understood under neoliberalism, as well as create an understanding of how the streaming industry is understood and functions.

This study aims to examine the reporting on the streaming market in television trade press in 2019, with special interest to ideological biases and the portrayed power geometry between actors within the industry. It approaches the subject with a political economy perspective and conducts a critical discourse analysis on articles from The Hollywood Reporter, Variety, Deadline Hollywood, Indiewire, and Financial Times. The sample contains only articles using the phrase “streaming war(s)”. The data is approached by asking questions about how the phrase is used, how the power relations of the streaming market are portrayed, and what ideological implications can be found in the texts.

The results find that the phrase “streaming war(s)” is widely used, although no agreed meaning exists. The phrase works as a conceptual metaphor, shaping a discourse where the streaming market is viewed as a war. This portrayal of the market as harsh conflict and competition is motivated by economic interests, which the television trade press helps reproduce. The “streaming war(s)” fetishizes the streaming market and conceals the responsibility held by large media conglomerates.

The actors on the streaming market are found to be positioned against each other, further portraying the market as a war. Netflix and Disney are represented as the most powerful participants because of their relations to flows of capital, content, and users. The streaming service audiences are given no agency, while the market is portrayed as having an agency of its own.

Keywords

Streaming wars; trade press; ideology; power geometry; television industry; SVOD; Netflix

2 Table of Contents

1. Introduction………………………………………………………………………………….5 2. Aim & Research Questions………………………………………………………………….8 3. Background………………………………………………………………………………...10 3.1 “Streaming War(s)”…………………………………………………………………………10 3.2 The Players (and Owners)…………………………………………………………………...11 4. Theoretical Framework & Literature Review………………………………………………15 4.1 Power & Ideology…………………………………………………………………………...15 4.2 The Streaming Market in Literature…………………………………………………………17 4.3 Market Discourse……………………………………………………………………………19 4.4 Political Economy…………………………………………………………………………...20 4.4.1 Neoliberalism…………………………………………………………………………...22 4.5 The Importance of Trade Press……………………………………………………………...23 5. Material & Sampling……………………………………………………………………….26 5.1 Material……………………………………………………………………………………...26 5.1.1 The Television Trade Press in Question………………………………………………...26 5.2 Sampling…………………………………………………………………………………….28 6. Method……………………………………………………………………………………..30 6.1 Critical Discourse Analysis………………………………………………………………….30 6.1.1 Metaphors……………………………………………………………………………….31 6.1.2 Critical Linguistics…………………………………………………………………...…32 6.1.3 CDA as Dialectical Reasoning………………………………………………………….34 6.2 Limitations of The Method………………………………………………………………….34 7. Results……………………………………………………………………………………...36 7.1 The Use of “Streaming War(s)”……………………………………………………………..36 7.1.1 The Trade Press Articles………………………………………………………………...36 7.1.2 The Meaning of “Streaming War(s)”……………………………………………………36 7.1.3 The Metaphor of War……………………………………………………………………38 7.1.3.1 Explicit Conceptual Metaphor?...... 39 7.2 The Power Relations of the Streaming Market………………………………………………40 7.2.1 The Actors of the “Streaming War(s)”………………………………………………….40 7.2.1.1 The Actors Positioned……………………………………………………………...41 7.2.2 The Flows of the Streaming Power Geometry………………………………………….42 7.2.3 Portrayal and Responsibility…………………………………………………………….43 7.2.3.1 The “Streaming War(s)” as an Actor and the Missing Actors………………………44 7.3 Ideological Implications……………………………………………………………………..45

3 7.3.1 What and Whom Are They Fighting For?...... 45 7.3.1.1 Concern for the market………………………………………………………..46 7.3.1.2 War in Whose Interest?...... 47 7.3.2 The Ideology in the Discourse of the Television Trade Press………………………….48 8. Conclusion and Discussion…………………………………………………………………50 8.1 “Streaming War(s)”?...... 50 8.2 The Power Relations of the Streaming Market………………………………………………52 8.3 The Ideology of “Streaming War(s)”………………………………………………………..53 9. Afterthought & Further Research…………………………………………………………..55 10. List of References…………………………………………………………………………56 11. Appendix: Articles………………………………………………………………………...59

4 1. Introduction

In a podcast episode named “Streaming wars! (Don’t call them streaming wars!) and everything else we learned in 2019”, the following exchange could be heard between the participating journalists:

“[Peter Kafka:] 2019, I think if we had to sum it up, is the year of the 'streaming wars'. I'm putting 'streaming wars' in air quotes, because some people don't like that term. Where do you fall on that? Do you like 'streaming wars' as a term or do you think it's ridiculous?

[Lucas Shaw:] I'm opposed to the rampant use of military terms in describing something as kind of squishy as media entertainment. That being said, it is very catchy and it's hard to avoid using it, so it's one of those phrases where, […] I was about to use it and I had to find a way around it.

[Peter Kafka:] What did you use instead? […]

[Lucas Shaw:] Competition between large media conglomerates. I don't know. Something that doesn't sound nearly as good.“ (Vox, 2019)

Online video on-demand services, especially subscription video on demand (SVOD), has rapidly changed how we watch television. The global streaming video on demand market (hereafter: the streaming market) has become a regular feature in the media landscape. American online services have established platformization as the standard structure for consuming and producing content (Vlassis, 2021, p. 11). In 2019, the average U.S. citizen subscribed to three SVOD services (Spangler, 2019). This transition of power from linear television to streaming has been cemented during the COVID-19 pandemic, with the impact the lockdown measures have had over the global digital content flows (Vlassis, 2021, p. 2). With the COVID-19 lockdowns, many platforms gained even more subscribers. During the spring and summer of 2020, a quarter of the television time spent in U.S. households was spent on streaming content (Nielsen, 2020). The streaming market’s leading tech companies have grown significantly, all while being less regulated than their rival companies in media and while capturing great amounts of data about their consumers (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 289). As streaming services get greater reach, more companies try to gain revenue from the situation. Big entertainment companies such as Walt Disney and Warner Media, as well as

5 tech giant Apple, have all launched streaming services of their own. In many cases, content owners try to minimize licensing by creating their own streaming platforms (Shaw, 2019). These newly launched platforms’ relationship to already established streamers such as Netflix and Amazon has been named the streaming war(s). The concept has become common in the English language press writing about the technological or economic development of the VOD market. As the cited podcasters above mention, using a military term to describe media entertainment is not obvious. It assumes actors fighting each other for some victory.

Most academic work on the streaming market has mapped out the industry by focusing on, for example, the various functions and processes of SVOD (Doyle, 2016; Hallinan and Striphas, 2016). However, some studies have articulated a need to look beyond the current narrative used to describe the streaming market (Rios and Scarlata, 2018, p. 476; Sanson and Steirer, 2019, p. 1223). But this very discourse surrounding the streaming market, the one that allows phrases such as “streaming war(s)” to become common jargon, is yet to receive scholarly attention. By focusing on streaming market coverage in television trade press, this study hopes to fill that gap. With the streaming market’s increased presence and power in our lives, the need for medial reporting and examination of this market increases. This study focuses on The Hollywood Reporter, Variety, Deadline Hollywood, Indiewire, and Financial Times’ reporting on the “streaming war(s).” It analyzes exactly that medial reporting and examination, which has become increasingly necessary.

Trade press can be distinguished from other publications in that all that they publish, from news to advertising, is aimed for executives and professionals of a certain industry (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2755). What is written in trade press attracts symbolic value within the industry in question and is circulated as occupational discourse, pointing to what is valued within a field (Edwards and Pieczka, 2013, p. 10). Because of how trade press is a media text linked to communication practitioner communities, it is of particular interest for media studies. However, little research has been conducted on trade press reporting and the ideologies reproduced through it (Edwards and Pieczka, 2013, p. 6). The relationship between the streaming industry and its trade press is so far understudied, although such a study object can illustrate how market discourse is currently formed and understood under neoliberalism. Assuming that texts hold ideology, with the potential to affect the reader’s worldview, television trade press holds the possible power to affect how the streaming industry views itself and, possibly, how to act on the streaming market. Financial Times is a widely read publication of economy news that does not write solely about

6 the television industry. The inclusion of Financial Times in the sampling thus works as an example of how the discourse plays out in the broader public, economic, and financial sphere.

This study draws upon a political economy perspective, with interest in how media ownership and organization shape, and are shaped by, media texts under capitalism (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2752). The approach sees societal structures as possible to reveal and understand by studying the discourse they shape, and how it is formed by capitalism and its ideological presuppositions (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2754). McChesney points out that media studies tend to lack criticism and thus accept presuppositions about the justness of the corporate media system (McChesney, 2004, p. 59). Instead, the critical approach of this study requires a comparison of current discourse and possible discourses, discussing what serves business interests and what serves society as a whole (McChesney, 2004, p. 48). Every text presupposes something, a worldview embedded in the use of discourse (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 328). Every discourse thus carries different interests, commonly referred to as ideology. Ideology can be seen as a synonym to dominant interests, or – as Emmison argues, ideology is born when dominant interests are concealed and taken for granted (Emmison, 1986, p. 82). Ideological biases then relate to the question of power distribution. Hesmondhalgh points out that studies on ownership and structure are important to understand the power within the cultural industries. It that it is also necessary to study what goes on within and between different corporations and how their power is mobilized after certain interests (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 207). Studying trade press coverage becomes a way to critically analyze what happens between the corporations of the streaming market and how they are positioned in relation to each other. How different actors are portrayed and positioned might show ideological biases and perceived power relations. As help with the analysis of power, this study leans on Massey’s concept of power geometry. Power geometry explains how different actors relate to global flows of, for example, capital and digital content (Massey, 1993, p. 61). An analysis of how trade press positions actors of the streaming market within a power geometry shows how the systems of our daily media consumption are understood - and, in the worst case, taken for granted.

7 2. Aim & Research Questions

This study aims to examine the reporting on the streaming market in television trade press in 2019, with special interest to ideological biases and the portrayed power dynamic between actors within the industry. The use of the phrase “streaming war(s)” narrows down the focus of this study from the vast reporting on the streaming market in general to a specific discourse: the one that views the streaming market as a battlefield. With the help of critical discourse analysis, the “streaming war(s)” is placed in its greater social context. This study moves critical discourse studies forward into current issues of the media industry while being grounded in the material approach of political economy.

The concentration of this study is important for several reasons. Firstly, the streaming market holds great power and thus should be extensively reported on and scrutinized. Critical research is yet to determine whether the television trade press holds a place for that. Secondly, through understanding trade press discourse, we may understand biases and attitudes within and about the streaming industry. Thirdly, the phrase “streaming war(s)” rapidly gained great popularity as a way to describe the streaming market. The use of the phrase has rarely been problematized but instead accepted as neutral. This makes the phrase of interest for discourse studies, as it, especially in 2019, has come to stand in for the situation of a whole market, and by extent, the current media system. If there is a war, the natural questions are: between whom and what are they fighting for? Therefore, this study concentrates on these research questions:

RQ1: How is the phrase “streaming war(s)” used in examples of television trade press? RQ1 sets out to gain knowledge of the context in which “streaming war(s)” is used and what events or opinions the articles are meant to communicate to the readers. The analysis needed to answer this research question is situated on the text level, the part of critical discourse analysis most focused on grammatical structure and explicit meaning (Bergström et al., 2017, p. 222). The question is answered by examining the wording surrounding “streaming war(s)” before analyzing what the phrase represents in the trade press article as a whole. The use of “streaming war(s)” is of particular interest because it is a metaphor. A metaphor is a way of transferring ideas from one subject area to another and can give clues about the worldview of the speaker (Boréus and Bergström, 2017, p. 148). Without

8 understanding how the metaphor “streaming war(s)” is supposed to be understood, it is harder to answer any other questions with more critical claims.

RQ2: How are the power relations of the streaming market portrayed in examples of trade press articles using the phrase “streaming war(s)”? RQ2 is of relevance to gain knowledge of who is believed to take part in the “streaming war(s)” and their position within it. The question is answered by examining how the participants are mentioned in the data and analyzing the portrayed relation between these. Differences in portrayal may be found in, for example, how certain actors are personalized, collectivized, or anonymized (Hansen and Machin, 2013, pp. 126–128). The way actors are portrayed describes the power geometry of the streaming market. Power geometry refers to how power is constituted through global flows of, for example, capital and information (Massey, 1993, p. 14). This definition of power paints a picture of flows and thus creates a more complex image of relations than just positioning one actor on top would do. RQ2 is interested in how television trade press presents this power geometry and how it positions actors within it.

RQ3: What ideological implications can be found in examples of articles using the phrase “streaming war(s)”? While RQ1 is concerned with the explicit meaning communicated through the use of the phrase “streaming war(s),” this research question is instead concerned with meanings implicitly communicated. RQ3 is of relevance to gain knowledge of the values communicated through texts using “streaming war(s).” Assuming language use may support a certain group’s interest, critical discourse analysis is used to reveal those ideological biases and underlying worldviews in the text (Hansen and Machin, 2013, p. 119). The goal is to show and critique how discourse is related to the broader social reality (Fairclough, 2017, p. 13). RQ3 questions the motivation behind “the streaming war(s)” in order to understand whether the phrase and the articles using it maintain or presuppose a certain power structure.

9 3. Background

3.1 “Streaming War(s)” The origins of the phrase “streaming war(s)” are not clear, but it is said to have been popularized in the press and among Wall Street professionals (“Netflix’s Ted Sarandos Talks Ratings, Paying Film Talent And HBO’s Emmy Haul,” 2019). Early uses of “streaming war(s)”, originating in the 1990s and the early 2000s, are few and refer to the competition between different music and video streaming software (“Future of the Internet,” 1996; “Streaming Wars,” 2001; Ojeda-Zapata, 1996). In 2010, The Business Insider wrote that “Netflix has won the streaming war”(Cuban, 2010). That might not have turned out to be completely accurate since the phrase “streaming war(s)” was just about to enter its new use as standard vocabulary for journalists covering the streaming market. It is not until 2013 that “streaming war(s)” reaches substantial usage in the press, and its popularity has only increased since then. The phrase grew almost four times as popular in 2019 compared to 2018, and its popularity only slightly increased in 2020. The last half of 2019 held several big launches on the streaming market, including Apple TV+ and Disney+, providing a possible explanation for the rise of popularity for “streaming war(s)” during that time.

Some instances of the phrase being used refer not to the video streaming market but to that of music streaming. These examples seem to become fewer the longer the phrase has been established. To make clear which streaming market the phrase is used to describe, it is sometimes defined as “the video streaming wars” (eg Leong, 2013). This need to define which kind of streaming the author is referring to seems to decrease as the video streaming market comes to almost completely take over the phrase.

“Streaming war(s)” can be seen as a completely new technological discourse, but that would not be the whole truth. Although the use of “war” to describe media markets may not be frequent, there has been previous technological development portrayed as conflicts, both within the television industry and in the trade press. When new media technologies are introduced, there comes “the inevitable avalanche of predictions regarding how these technologies will affect the existing media industries” (Napoli, 1997, p. 417). One such technology was VCR, believed to have the potential to be a disaster or blessing for neighboring media industries (Napoli, 1997, p. 418). Another example is the entry of cable television, becoming topical

10 foremost during the late 1960s, threatening small broadcasters’ profits (Streeter, 1987, pp. 176– 177). What distinguishes “streaming war(s)” from these examples is that it is foremost seen as a battle between different actors within the streaming industry rather than a conflict with older technologies. However, streaming industry companies mainly originate from other areas of the media industry, making it possible to claim that the battle is between new (e.g., Netflix) and already established technologies (e.g., Warner Media). Nevertheless, technological innovation has always been a way for companies to compete (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 127).

3.2 The Players (and Owners) Mapping out the streaming market is not the focus of this study. However, properly analyzing the trade press data requires an understanding of what the streaming industry that was reported about in 2019 looked like. Therefore, this chapter offers a brief introduction to the biggest names of the streaming market.

In late 2011, Vivendi, Walt Disney, Comcast, News Corporation, Time Warner, Sony, and Bertelsmann were the biggest businesses within the cultural industries. They came, because of this, to be called “the Magnificent Seven.” Their strong presence, foremost in North America and Europe, made their products reach hundreds of millions of people (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, pp. 235–236). Out of the Magnificent Seven, only Bertelsmann is not involved with the streaming market to any extent. News Corporation does no longer exist, and Walt Disney bought the parts most associated with streaming in 2019 (Szalai and Bond, 2019). Time Warner is now called Warner Media and is owned by AT&T since 2018 (Gold and Stelter, 2018). The Magnificent Seven, although slightly different, are still successful corporations today. As this example shows, the streaming market is to a big extent controlled by global conglomerates, owning streaming platforms of their own or producing content. This is further illustrated by that in 2013, 90 percent of US television content was controlled by nine companies. Through vertical integration, content producers and cable service providers survived the transferring of audiences from television to the internet, despite tech companies like Netflix and Amazon entering the industry (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 228). The increasing presence of tech companies in television and film is unique compared to other neighboring industries. For example, music tech giant Spotify has not made major investments in music production for their platform, while the norm in the SVOD industry is to provide original content (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 311).

11

Netflix and Amazon are commonly named as the two early tech companies on the streaming market. They both started streaming in 2007 and commissioned their own content for the first time in the early 2010s (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 307). Netflix originally started in 1997 as an online rental service for DVDs (Fagerjord and Kueng, 2019, p. 169). It now holds the biggest share of the streaming market, and in 2018 it held 15 % of the downstream volume of internet traffic worldwide (Morris, 2018). The platform is available in all but four countries globally (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 392). In 2020, Netflix surpassed 200 million subscribers. One hundred million was surpassed in 2017 (Feiner, 2021). Netflix seems to have benefitted from the COVID-19 lockdowns, as the first half of 2020 saw almost as many new subscribers as the whole of 2019. Netflix’s strategy to not have wide theatrical releases of their films also gave them an advantage during COVID-19, compared to most Hollywood studios (Vlassis, 2021, p. 3). Amazon, on the other hand, began – and is still active - as an online retailer, although they now also spend larger amounts than HBO on content production (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 21). Amazon Prime’s streaming service is a part of a bigger subscription service, offering more services than streaming video.

As previously mentioned, Warner Media is currently owned by the world’s largest telecommunications company AT&T. Warner Media owns several prestigious broadcasting networks; most notably in this context is HBO, and content producer Warner Bros (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 238). Warner Media launched their American SVOD service, HBO Max, in May 2020, although similar HBO branded streaming services had been available in regions abroad years before that.

Disney+, owned and launched by Walt Disney Company in 2019, gained over 73 million subscribers its first year. The expectations seem to have been high among the consumers, as 10 million signed up on Disney+’s first day (Bursztynsky, 2020). During the COVID-19 lockdowns of the beginning of 2020, Disney+ gained 32 million new subscribers (Vlassis, 2021, p. 4). Disney+ is, however, not Walt Disney’s first streaming service. They own the majority of American streaming services ESPN+, with 10 million subscribers in 2020, and Hulu, with 36 million subscribers in 2020 (Bursztynsky, 2020). Hulu, introduced in 2008, is controlled by Disney, although NBCUniversal is still an equity stakeholder. Another Disney-controlled streaming service is Hotstar, primarily available in India and Indonesia.

12

The telecommunications conglomerate Comcast bought NBCUniversal in 2011 and thus owns the NBC television network and the Universal film studios, among other companies (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 238). NBC-Universal’s American streaming service Peacock launched in July 2020.

YouTube is the world’s leading streaming service (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 328). Although Hesmondhalgh calls Google’s acquisition of YouTube in 2006 “the most significant early intervention by IT companies into the cultural industries,” Google is not frequently named one of the “streaming war(s)” contenders (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 224). One reason for their absence in the television trade press might be that subscription services are more of interest for television trade press journalists. The SVOD function of YouTube is yet to gain any significant popularity compared to the SVOD services provided by other companies. Most of the content on YouTube is produced by the consumers themselves. This large portion of YouTube creators is not considered to be the professionals the television trade press wants to reach. Another reason for the lesser coverage in television trade press might be that although Google has invested in content production, their headquarters are still located in Silicon Valley, retaining Google as a tech company (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 20). Another big tech company with its headquarters in Silicon Valley is, of course, Apple. Although they still are viewed primarily as a tech company, they are moving more into content production. Before the launch of Apple TV+ in 2019, Apple gathered talents in cultural production to advertise and help create content (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 21).

Noteworthy is that most corporations mentioned here are American. US-based tech companies are dominant in the global digital market. This can be seen not only in the popularity of these services but also in their content. For example, two-thirds of the movies available on Netflix in Europe typically originate from Hollywood (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 392). Today’s only worldwide services on the streaming market are American (Vlassis, 2021, p. 3). USA’s global cultural domination can be explained by the active role the US state has historically played in promoting its cultural industry, which initially grew big because of the large domestic market for entertainment (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 380). The US cultural export has had great success globally, but especially within the same geocultural market (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 384). This market contains, for example, Western Europe, which shares a predominantly white population and a culture rooted in Christianity with the USA. As

13 of today, North America and Europe are the world’s largest markets for the cultural industry (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 236). The only pan-European platforms available are American, making the European market an essential part of the US entertainment economy (Vlassis, 2021, p. 8). The trade press examined in this study is primarily invested in this geocultural market, even though others are occasionally covered. This is, of course, partly explained by the trade press chosen is in English.

14 4. Theoretical Framework & Literature review

4.1 Power & Ideology Before this study goes any further, it is best to define the concepts of power and ideology as they are being used in this study.

Although not easily defined, power is a central concept when studying media texts and the organization of media production. As they are referred to in RQ2, power relations naturally position actors against each other based on their power. But what is power? The most basic definition of power is about impact. Power as impact is the power to change something, creating a result that would not have been if that power had not been exercised (Strömbäck, 2000, p. 52). Another common definition is power as possibility, meaning power – and positions of power - still exist even if its impact is never exercised (Petersson, 1987, p. 13). Further, power in media studies often refers to the power media may have in impacting its audience. This is the power over thought processes, executed by defining problems or world views (Petersson, 1991, p. 7). In this study, the power over thought processes is primarily relevant concerning the possible impact trade press may have over its industry. Although power over thought process is important, it is not the kind of power referred to in RQ2. This study’s interest lies primarily in the power relations and the power dynamic between participants in the so-called “streaming war(s).” This power is not so concerned with impact or possibility, but rather with power as status – actors positioned or portrayed as more powerful than others. The power dynamic of actors on the streaming market is then, in large, a question of interrelationships between corporations, making the kind of power media have over an audience less relevant in this study. Therefore, the concept of power geometry is helpful in this study because it paints the picture of flows, capital, and effects, creating a complex image of power dynamics.

The spatialization of today’s world gives physical space declining importance. Instead, the map can be painted by flows of capital, messages, and people (Mosco, 2009, p. 14). Power geometry describes the different positions that different social groups, individuals, or actors have in relation to flows and interconnections globally (Massey, 1993, p. 61). The concept, as originally used by Massey, refers to how people move or not move through the world and how much control they have over it (Massey, 1993, p. 62). Although Massey is primarily occupied with

15 how locations are constituted by their social processes, the concept of power geometry has lived on beyond that.

The power of streaming services transcends national borders through digital, economic, and information flows. How this is portrayed in television trade press paints a power geometry, where some companies may be portrayed as more powerful and legitimized than others in relation to these flows. Positions of power are always positioned within a power geometry. When we see power as constructed by social interactions, power is nothing as static as possibility or impact but a result of processes (Massey, 1993, p. 66). The concept of power geometry does not presuppose any certain type of power or flow but instead keeps doors open regarding the ways actors of the streaming market are positioned against each other. Thus, the power relations mentioned in RQ2 concern the power geometry, the interrelationships between different actors in the streaming market portrayed in television trade press.

Ideology is a complex concept, although all possible meanings in some way or another refer to a set of values or ideas that can be communicated or inform actions. Ideology may manifest in features of discourse, such as the frame and style of a text (Fairclough, 2010, pp. 60–61). However, ideology is also produced implicitly through the structures behind the production of a text. Not all texts are intended to be ideological. There is a distinction between texts created to promote ideology-serving discourses and those discourses that serve ideology but are created as such without intention by people for whom the ideas in question appear as common sense. Texts might, then, work in ways that the author did not intend (Fairclough and Fairclough, 2012, p. 101). This is because ideology does not only equate to the existence of dominating interests in texts but is born when these dominating interests are concealed as such (Emmison, 1986, p. 82).

This process is best explained in the Marxist tradition of thought. Marx saw ideology as a way for the ruling class to neutralize the concept of capital by creating a mythical understanding, a false consciousness, about it (Sussman, 2017, p. 319). A producer of ideology might come from any class fraction, although the ruling class ideologists tend to create illusions about themselves (Rodino-Colocino, 2017, p. 293). A mystified view of production makes the relations appear as natural and objective facts. Ideology represents social relations as being unchangeable and inevitable (Downey et al., 2014, p. 880). Marxist ideology critique, then, aims at a systematic examination of values masked as “common sense” (Lindberg, 2017, p. 97).

16 The phenomenon of commodity fetishism illustrates Marx’s view on ideology. The fetishizing of commodities means that they are viewed as things with exchange value, concealing the relations between people and the labor that has created the commodity. This mystifies and obscures the production process and aspects of inequalities, which benefits the ruling class and legitimizes the social relations of capitalism (Rodino-Colocino, 2017, p. 297).

In critical discourse analysis, the method of this study, the view on ideology roots from Marxism. In their chapter on critical discourse analysis, Hansen and Machin use ideology to refer to biased ideas in discourse and how these values are communicated (Hansen and Machin, 2013, p. 119). Through ideology, certain discourses are accepted, obscuring from alternative social realities featuring alternative power distributions (Hansen and Machin, 2013, p. 120). As Fairclough and Fairclough mention, groups whose interests are not represented in dominant beliefs still accept them because of naturalization (Fairclough and Fairclough, 2012, p. 100).

Building on the theories mentioned, this study treats ideology as a message of values in a text, which reveals biased interests. Ideology is not always explicitly stated but rather lies in what is taken for granted or made natural in the text. Asking for ideological implications relating to the use of “streaming war(s),” as in RQ3, means a will to find out whose interests are dominant and presented as facts regarding the relations of the streaming market.

With power and ideology defined, the study now continues with a look at related academic fields.

4.2 The Streaming Market in Literature This study will concentrate on the discourse surrounding the streaming market, something that has not been given much scholarly attention. Academic work about the VOD industry commonly aim at mapping out or understanding the market, often with a focus on one or a few of the biggest SVOD services (Elberse and Cody, 2019; Fagerjord and Kueng, 2019; Pottinger, 2019; Sanson and Steirer, 2019; Vonderau, 2015). The scholarly attention for the new television landscape comes from various academic disciplines, including law (Pottinger, 2019), business (Elberse and Cody, 2019), and media studies (Wayne, 2018). One regular feature of VOD studies is a focus on one - often technical – aspect, examining how this one aspect has changed with the entry of SVOD. Hallinan & Striphas study how algorithms help change the concept and practice of culture (Hallinan and Striphas, 2016, p. 130). Doyle finds the processes of

17 content distribution for maximized profit have changed, symbiotic with content production (Doyle, 2016, p. 641). Wayne focuses on the branding of Netflix and Amazon, concluding that contemporary television branding is an interplay of old and new practices and identities (Wayne, 2018, p. 737).

Rios and Scarlata (2018) compare the industrial practices of Australian SVOD service Stan and the Mexican equivalent Blim. They categorize these services as being in two semi-peripheral zones, compared to the American Netflix’s dominant force, trying to establish itself as a global service (Rios and Scarlata, 2018, p. 476). Stan and Blim have focused on localized content production, which has brought them success in their respective countries. Despite that, the international television industry has since long been compared to the United States (Rios and Scarlata, 2018, p. 485). This comparison and competition, especially to Netflix, impact the development of local television production (Rios and Scarlata, 2018, p. 476). Because of this, Rios and Scarlata ask for more scholarly work to look beyond big American services like Netflix and instead take in more perspectives to truly understand SVOD globally (Rios and Scarlata, 2018, p. 485). Focusing on the dominant player in the SVOD market will not necessarily create a full picture (Rios and Scarlata, 2018, p. 477). Sanson and Steirer (2019) claim that Netflix and Amazon have shaped the understandings of SVOD, both in the press and academic work. These understandings are the notion of streaming as a global game, played by global media giants, reshaping the way in which television is produced and distributed. Sanson and Steirer make these claims to motivate their own study on Hulu, which they point out have a different model than Netflix and Amazon, and yet is widely overlooked (Sanson and Steirer, 2019, p. 1211). The scholarly work on digital television has instead focused on Netflix, Amazon, and to some extent, YouTube and is overly simplistic in its description of current and future television (Sanson and Steirer, 2019, pp. 1211– 1212). These simplistic descriptions are based on tech-company discourse where some companies are believed to have a simpler structure with which they are taking over the world, at the cost of every other company (Sanson and Steirer, 2019, p. 1215).

This study is motivated by Rios and Scarlata’s wish for scholarly work not to focus on the big players of the SVOD market and Sanson and Steirer’s claim that there is a particular tech- company discourse in academia and the press where media giants are given much attention. Therefore, this study does not research the streaming industry itself but instead the very discourse of the trade press covering it. This study examines whether a similar discourse, with

18 a concentration on media giants, exists in the television trade press of 2019. The focus on the phrase “streaming war(s)” has been chosen to narrow down these intents. Apart from being a military term used in a non-military topic area, “streaming war(s)” has become a common way to describing the streaming market, pointing to an existing and shared discourse.

Previous studies mentioning the phrase “streaming war(s)” seem to find it a factual and neutral way to describe the current market relations of the streaming market (Diemer, 2019; Elberse and Cody, 2019; Pottinger, 2019). None of these studies questions the phrase or analyze its use. This study hopes to question the neutrality of the wording “streaming war(s)” by critically analyzing the use and implications of it, instead of assuming its neutrality. The lack of studies on television trade press in general, and trade press coverage of the streaming market in particular, means a lack of understanding of how the television industry views itself and its development. This study hopes to fill that gap through critical analysis, investigating if there is indeed a tech-company discourse and which interests may be preserved through it. A focus on the phrase “streaming war(s)” works as a gateway into the recent discourse surrounding the streaming market.

4.3 Market Discourse Even though the discourse surrounding the streaming market has yet to receive extensive scholarly attention, there is a tradition of studies on other market or economy discourses.

In the 1980s, Mike Emmison conducted studies on discourses constituting economic life and their relation to ideology. Emmison aimed at showing how media representations of economic life are accompanied by ideological mechanisms (Emmison, 1986, p. 81). This was done using the Marxist concept of commodity fetishism, operating as an ideological mechanism in which economic entities are made into objects or given personified qualities. Fetishism thus conceals the social relations operating behind “The Economy” (Emmison, 1986, p. 83). “The Economy,” representing a country’s economic activity, was not constituted as a linguistic concept until the 1930s. The complex relations and processes behind a country’s economy are thus fetishized and become “a thing – a machine, a beast, even a person” (Emmison, 1986, p. 84). When “The Economy” is fetishized, the state does not become responsible for pursuing interest-based actions but instead curing the economic “body” (Emmison, 1986, p. 85). Emmison found dominant metaphors used to describe the economy as a body, in discourses drawn from

19 medicine or fitness - explained as being a result of the financial crises beginning in the 1970s, when a “cure” for the economic situation was sought after (Emmison, 1986, p. 86). Emmison is supported by Habermas’s idea that the state attempts to depoliticize its actions and to deny responsibility by claiming not to be pursuing any political goal, but rather to be giving neutral solutions to technical problems, seemingly without any interest (Emmison, 1986, p. 84). The economic discourse of “The Economy” conceals what the capitalist economy is about: a group that owns the means of production, exploiting another group for the produced surplus-value. Instead, fetishism leads to class-motivated action being transformed into a “body” with “needs.” Emmison writes: “the ability to articulate what these needs are lies with one sectional group whose own needs are in effect identical” (Emmison, 1986, pp. 86–87). The discourse surrounding the economic life of a state thus serves and conceals ideological class interests.

In their study on The Irish Times, Preston and Silke examine neoliberal ideology in news media. They define ideology as the ‘master framework’ that forms agendas and news reporting (Preston and Silke, 2011, p. 50). Journalistic routines such as framing, agenda-setting, and sourcing can all be ideological processes (Preston and Silke, 2011, p. 51). Ideology may be reproduced by media acting to favor certain narratives over others or biased sources. Further, by not mentioning certain issues, media may create ideological “significant silences” (Preston and Silke, 2011, p. 52). Significant silences missing from neoliberal discourse include social structures such as class and race, as well as policy issues that are considered illegitimate under neoliberalism (Preston and Silke, 2011, p. 56). The media produced under a neoliberal ideology might, in return, influence economic and financial processes (Preston and Silke, 2011, p. 47). Preston and Silk argue that through this relationship, the media has become an element of economic practice. The reporting is more than a reflection of the market - it becomes a part of market decisions through ideological processes (Preston and Silke, 2011, p. 51).

4.4 Political Economy McChesney argues that communication studies risk being irrelevant and trivial without a political economy perspective (McChesney, 2004, p. 42). McChesney characterizes the political economy of communication as an examination of the relationship between media systems and social relations, with a particular interest in the political effect of economic factors.

20 Further, the political economy of communication is interested in how policies and ownership influence media consumption, technology, and content (McChesney, 2004, p. 43). As the perspective has Marxist roots, that is where the understanding of capitalist social organization is borrowed from (Lee and Jin, 2017, p. 40). This creates a holistic view of society and media, tying the organization of media systems together with the structures of corporate capitalism and the texts produced within these systems (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2751). Political economy questions the contemporary notion of capitalism being the only possible system since no economic system is natural or eternal (Lee and Jin, 2017, p. 50). This study uses a critical political economy approach in its interest in the representation of ownership structure, media organization, power relations, and business norms under current late capitalism. The global streaming market features IT corporations trying to extend their power and influence (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 289) while significantly impacting the global audio-visual economy (Vlassis, 2021, p. 2). The big American platforms work as gatekeepers and trendsetters of the global market (Vlassis, 2021, p. 9). As with these examples, conditions of the SVOD industry naturally raises questions of ownership structures and power distribution, as well as of other possible ways to organize a market. Therefore, political economy is a suitable direction from which to approach the streaming market, as it is a large part of how capitalism works in today’s media system. However, political economy may not be the natural choice for a study on the discourse surrounding the streaming market. Mosco criticizes discourse studies from a political economy standpoint, meaning a focus on discourse tends to have a much too essentialist view on communication. Mosco instead proposes a view on communication as integral to societal processes, such as politics and the economy, because of how it is constituted in capitalism (Mosco, 2009, p. 66). Because of the holistic view a political economy approach offers, it helps the critical discourse analysis of this study to remain rooted in the material realities of the television trade press and the industry that it covers. It also helps to put the texts in the data in their societal context. Political economy acknowledges that the social processes of which communication is a part do not end with communication but still exists, outside of the organization of the media in question (Mosco, 2009, p. 67). Further, the phrase “streaming war(s)” is of special interest in a political economy approach since it is used to name complex relationships between media conglomerates. The ideological implications of the phrase would be difficult – and maybe even needless - to study without an interest in the relationship between media content, corporate capitalism, and ownership structures. With interest in these relationships the phrase “streaming war(s)”

21 becomes important as a gateway to understanding how the organization of the streaming market is understood and constructed.

Just like communication studies in general, a political economic approach holds democratic values and social justice as its goal (McChesney, 2004, p. 44). Therefore, the political economy of communication scholars try to reveal elusive and possibly harmful structures through confronting and interpreting empirical data, helped by history and theory (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2753). One goal is to present alternative ways to organize society (Lee and Jin, 2017, p. 50). Political economy is critical in its nature, meaning it does not take any structures for granted or believe that they exist because they are natural or good (McChesney, 2004, p. 46). Critical scholarship, by definition, investigates ideologies – the dominant interests embedded in society. Today, the dominating ideology - especially in the West – is neoliberalism (McChesney, 2004, p. 47).

4.4.1 Neoliberalism Neoliberal ideology began to materialize in Western countries in the 1970s, as a means to maintain the class power of the capital, after challenges created by the working class and student revolts, as well as the ongoing economic crisis (Garland and Harper, 2017, p. 223). McChesney defines neoliberalism as “the contemporary ideology that the market can do nothing wrong” (McChesney, 2004, p. 45). Under neoliberalism, the society is organized around the free market (Preston and Silke, 2011, p. 53). Neoliberalism works under capitalism but should not be mistaken for capitalism itself, although it is sometimes understood as extreme capitalism (Garland and Harper, 2017, p. 229). One liberal idea of capitalism before neoliberalism was that competition and few regulations would result in efficient markets, which neoliberalism brought to the conclusion that the creation and preservation of free markets should be the primary aim (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 51). As an ideology, neoliberalism conceals class relations and masks the importance of the free market as natural and essential. An example of this is given by Downey et al., who describe how a recent neoliberal challenge has been to justify neoliberalism after the financial crisis starting in 2008, which could easily have proven that the market has failed. By shifting the blame to state intervention and proposing a transfer of wealth from the working class to the capital, neoliberalism worked ideologically, saving the idea of the “free market” (Downey et al., 2014, p. 883).

22 Preston and Silke classify neoliberalism as a hegemonic ideology in that it has established itself as universal and credible, accepted by the media as default assumptions (Preston and Silke, 2011, p. 54). For the communication industries, neoliberalism has meant a great push for marketization (Hesmondhalgh, 2019, p. 117). Because of how the idea of the free market is present in every media trend or policy decision, it should not be overlooked or, by default accepted by scholars. Critique and understanding of neoliberalism are crucial to a study of media systems, something that a political economy approach is well suited for (McChesney, 2004, p. 45).

4.5 The Importance of Trade Press To expand the knowledge of political economy methods, Corrigan provides justification for political economy scholars to study trade press. Trade press is defined as publications with news and opinion about a particular industry, written for its professionals. The most popular trade publications within an industry are often viewed as required reading by practitioners because of how important sources of information they are (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2753). While general media create a discourse linked to public opinion, what is written in the trade press is a discourse operating within an industry in the broader sense (Edwards and Pieczka, 2013, p. 7). The functions of the trade press can be divided into three; providing professionals with industry news, providing advertising and promotion internally within an industry, and providing a space for professionals to negotiate their shared values (Corrigan, 2018, pp. 2755–2756). Specialist reporting, such as in the trade press, can help create reality within that specific context or industry where it is relevant (Edwards and Pieczka, 2013, p. 6).

To study power structures in media systems, it is essential to access the type of data that trade press offers. As a scholar, one can approach trade press in one of two ways – as a research topic or as a source of information for studying closely linked practices. Corrigan notices that political economy scholars rarely use trade press as their research topic but instead highlights the chance of using trade press to gather data about business practices or similar topics (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2756). This study, however, concentrates on the trade press reporting in the hope of understanding how the streaming industry is portrayed, and to some extent – because of how trade press negotiates values within an industry – how the industry might view itself.

23 Corrigan suggests two different ways for scholars to use trade press data. The first, called “burrowing down,” is not the main interest of this study. This approach uses trade press to find reports, industry data, and other information that might be hard to come by as an industry outsider. The other approach is called “listening in” and refers to the practice of treating trade press as a way of “eavesdropping” on conversations among industry elites (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2757). Corrigan suggests a close reading of trade press in order for the researcher to get familiarized with industry players and their jargon before trying to crystalize meanings and create interpretations (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2764). Trade press analysis in political economy should deconstruct what is said and not, as well as place the discourse structurally and historically (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2763). This study listens in to the trade press and critically analyzes the discourse found in order to identify the ideological beliefs possibly being reproduced for the streaming industry. Any study with the aim of studying discourse surrounding a certain industry would have a hard time doing so without engaging with the trade press and the discussion being held there.

Because of how trade press creates a discursive space primarily for practitioners of a certain industry, Edwards and Pieczka conducted a critical discourse analysis on the publication PR Week, asking how the occupational identity of public relations practitioners is constructed (Edwards and Pieczka, 2013, p. 6). They found that trade press is powerful in creating archetypes for an occupational field, showing interests aligning with those of powerful organizations and institutions within that industry. However, trade press does not offer a variety of voices or perspectives (Edwards and Pieczka, 2013, p. 21). Thus, it is important to remain critical. Trade press covers an industry in a timely and accurate way, but they do not only speak about industries but also for them. Because of the close relationship between a media industry and the trade publications covering it, the press has a tendency not to be too critical. When covering subjects that might be sensitive to the industry in question, the trade press coverage may reflect industry interests (Corrigan, 2018, p. 2760). This bias has become historically apparent in studies such as Napoli’s investigation of the trade press’s function as technology forecaster in the case of VCR. Napoli’s study compares advertising and broadcasting trade press and found that the advertising trade press was more accurate in their predictions of the impact of VCR technology (Napoli, 1997, p. 418). The broadcasting trade press, on the other hand, was much more pessimistic, an opinion in line with the industry itself (Napoli, 1997, p. 420). This suggests that the discussion held in broadcasting trade press was made to maintain confidence among stakeholders of an industry under possible

24 threat by new technology (Napoli, 1997, p. 421). The advertising industry, however, showed more interest in the possibilities of VCR (Napoli, 1997, p. 424). Napoli thus asks the question of whether trade press is a passive outlet for industries or sources of objective analysis and concludes that the answer is probably somewhere in between, which makes trade press important for continuous studies (Napoli, 1997, p. 425).

25 5. Material & Sampling

5.1 Material This study’s research questions refer to television trade press articles mentioning “streaming war(s).” Therefore, the only appropriate material to answer these questions is articles from television trade press. After the sampling process, described in more detail below, the number of articles analyzed is 54. The 54 articles come from five sources: The Hollywood Reporter, Variety, Deadline Hollywood, IndieWire, and Financial Times.

5.1.1 The Television Trade Press in Question The Hollywood Reporter (THR) was founded in 1930 and is today owned by the holding company MRC, a company that, besides owning a couple of well-known publications, also produces television and film (MRC Entertainment, 2020). THR reports on the mainstream entertainment industries, especially film and television. As the name suggests, the production is centered in Los Angeles. THR’s competitor Variety has a similar profile, reporting on the mainstream entertainment business, offering news as well as analysis. However, Variety is some twenty years older than THR, and initially, it covered only theater. Variety themselves claim that their publication is “the most authoritative and trusted source of entertainment business news, reaching an audience of affluent influencers” (Variety, 2020). Worthington (2018) highlights:

“As commercial media themselves, [The Hollywood Reporter and Variety] adopt the language and perspective of the readership they seek, thereby offering a glimpse into entertainment media industry discourse. […] Variety, in particular, is known for coining terms that attempt to capture the essence of Hollywood culture in what the publication calls its ‘slanguage.’” (Worthington, 2018, pp. 1530–1531)

Given these perspectives, THR and Variety are essential sources in a study focused on understanding television trade press discourse.

Deadline Hollywood has been covering the entertainment industry, mainly the one in Hollywood, since 2006. In contrast to THR and Variety, Deadline Hollywood exists only online. They call themselves an “authoritative source” and claim to be among the top entertainment websites (Deadline Hollywood, 2020).

26

IndieWire reports on the film and television industry, with a more specialized focus on independent filmmaking than the previously mentioned sources (IndieWire, 2020). IndieWire is owned by the same company that owns Deadline Hollywood and Variety - Penske Media Corporation (“PMC: Penske Media Corporation | PMC,” 2020).

Financial Times (FT) claims to be “one of the world’s leading news organisations”, reporting economy news for the global business community (Financial Times, 2017). FT has a global reach with a circulation of 1,5 million for its print version (Steiner-Khamsi et al., 2018, p. 193). FT was founded in the United Kingdom, thereby standing out from the rest of the sources in this study, the others being American. Nikkei, a Japanese holding company, owns FT today (Financial Times, 2017). FT further stands out from the rest of the media sources since it is not a trade publication strictly for television or entertainment industries. However, FT has a broad and global readership and impact, with the possibility to affect numerous industries and investors, making it a powerhouse among trade press. Among these industries and investors are the ones engaged in the streaming market. Furthermore, this study is focused on the concept of “streaming war(s),” meaning the material is narrowed down to the part of FT’s reporting that is concentrated on the streaming market, thus constituting trade press reporting on television.

Together, these publications form a broad example of trade press aimed at the television industry, adaptable to help in answer the research questions of this study. However, the trade publications chosen are all from western countries, FT being the one with the most international focus. This may lead to a different analysis than would a study with publications from a large variety of countries. Most companies frequently discussed as participants of the “streaming war(s)” are, however, American, so it should be no surprise that the material has a slight American bias. The language limitation is another aspect of this. It is possible to argue that all media outlets used should be American since American companies dominate the reporting. However, the American equivalent of FT, Wall Street Journal, is not accessible in full through the chosen database. Additionally, the streaming market is at large global, and FT gives the study a slightly more global focus, although Europe and America share the same geocultural market, as mentioned in the background chapter. It is possible that a study with all American data would produce other conclusions than this one, but

27 then again, this study does not actively focus on the United States, but on the reporting on the “streaming war(s).”

5.2 Sampling Using a narrow focus when sampling the data for this study makes sure the articles in the data are about the same topic, making it easier and more relevant to point out a certain discourse. The focus on “streaming war(s)” makes this study able to investigate the presentation of industry conflict, rather than just the industry itself. The chosen phrase is the name the press has chosen for this supposed conflict, meaning the data gathered naturally suggests conflict to some degree. Other phrases or search terms could be used to narrow down the vast data that is television trade press, and the result of such a study might not find a conflict portrayed in the reporting. However, as the introductory quote of this study points out, 2019 can be considered the year of the streaming wars. This means that the concept of “streaming war(s)” was made popularized to the point where it was discussed publicly. Being such a big part of the industry jargon makes “streaming war(s)” worthy of closer investigation, at least in a study such as this, which is trying to fill the gap of studies on television trade press discourse. The use of “streaming war(s)” here works as a case study for trade press discourse at large. The background chapter further discussed the popularity of “streaming war(s)” in 2019. As that argumentation suggests, the phrase was considered extra relevant in 2019, thus making a perfect time frame for this study. 2019 being recent leads to the possibility of this study being able to make conclusions currently relevant.

When finding articles to use as material for this study, a database was deemed a practical tool in order to find several sources in one place online. NexisUni was chosen as the database because of its accessibility and its vast supply of media sources. To source the sample, the search term “streaming war” was used to find articles in English from 2019 on NexisUni. Thus, the search result includes both articles mentioning a single “streaming war” and “streaming wars” in the plural. After trying out the search, the media sources were investigated. The sources were narrowed down to the five outlets mentioned above because of how they all can be considered the relevant television trade press compared to the additional sources of the database. It is possible that other choices of outlets, or a search conducted on another database, would have produced a sample of different qualities that would have led to other results.

28 After the search result was narrowed down to contain the sources as mentioned above, every fifth article was picked to form the final sample. This was made to ensure the sample was as random and representative as possible. When sampling every fifth article, the search result was put in order of its publication date, with the earliest one first. The search result included articles not mentioning “streaming war(s)” but instead some other kind of war on the streaming market, or mentioned the movie franchise Star Wars in the context of streaming. Those articles were skipped during the sampling since they do not help answer the research questions of this study. Duplicates were also skipped. In the end, 54 articles remained. The table below shows the spread of articles from the five publications. Even though IndieWire only ended up with one article in the sample, it is still kept, since it is still a valid publication. If the chosen sampling had been every fifth article from each source, more articles from IndieWire would undoubtedly have been analyzed. The distribution of articles results from a randomized sampling where articles from all outlets were sorted after publication date.

Source Number of articles in data Financial Times 19 The Hollywood Reporter 14 Deadline Hollywood 12 Variety 8 IndieWire 1

Although all the chosen publications update their websites regularly, there are some differences in their physical publication. FT provides a daily newspaper, while Variety and THR publish weekly paper issues. Their publication frequency may be one reason behind the number of articles for each publication in this sample. Another possible reason is that it might differ in how willing or different prone editors are to use the phrase “streaming war(s).”

No images are included in the search results from NexisUni; thus, the analysis will be concerned only with written text, excluding a multimodal analysis. Similarly, all articles are presented in the same format when read through NexisUni, meaning no consideration will be put on the text’s visual presentation or placement in the following analysis.

29 6. Method

6.1 Critical Discourse Analysis

A study of discourse can problematize what otherwise is taken for granted in everyday communication. A discourse can be defined as a semiotic practice concerning a certain theme in a certain social context (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 308). According to Fairclough, discourse is how people construct and express the state - or desired state - of things. Additionally, discourse helps establish relations between groups and creating identities (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 309). The possible power of discourses makes them an essential object of study for any scholar interested in media texts and their relation to society. In this study, television trade press discourses are of interest to understand how the non-economic phrase “streaming war(s)” is used to describe the economic realm that is the streaming market,and how that may help shape the understanding of the market itself.

Because of how this study sets out to study the power relations and ideological implications in texts relating to the streaming market, critical discourse analysis (CDA) is chosen as its method. When conducting CDA, the researcher critically examines the content of a discourse or text, puts the content in its social context, and positions it within societal power structures with the aim to change social relations (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 308). In the words of Wodak (2007), the critical approach means that CDA seeks “not only to describe and explain, but also root out a particular kind of delusion” (Wodak, 2007, p. 187). Fairclough (2017) describes one approach to CDA as “dialectical reasoning,” meaning the opportunity of CDA to offer a critique of discourse combined with an explanation of the discourse in relation to other aspects of reality, leading to normative conclusions (Fairclough, 2017, p. 13).

The critique aspect of CDA is conducted first on the text level, with a concentration on grammatical structure and other linguistic characteristics (Bergström et al., 2017, p. 222). On this level, the analysis examines what is explicitly stated in the text compared to what can be implicitly understood(Bergström et al., 2017, p. 223). The tools offered to analyze the grammatical structure of a text are vast and many. A predominance of a certain kind of words in a text might invite or exclude different groups of readers and can point to an ideological bias (Hansen and Machin, 2013, pp. 121–122). All language includes some presupposition, meaning a certain level of understanding is taken for

30 granted. By looking at what is taken for granted in a text, it is possible to analyze what aspects of the social world are reconstituted (Hansen and Machin, 2013, pp. 133–134). A text about a company experiencing economic growth might, for example, presuppose that economic growth is desirable. The way people and phenomena are named draws attention to certain aspects, while others are silenced (Hansen and Machin, 2013, p. 125). Questions to ask are whether agents are personalized or impersonalized, individualized or collectivized, specified, anonymized, or generic. The way agents are named can reveal if a group is humanized or made responsible (Hansen and Machin, 2013, pp. 126–129). In the case of suppression, an actor is missing from a text. Hansen and Machin (2013) make an example of statements about the market without agents mentioned. This gives the impression that market-based economies are natural and not produced through political decisions (Hansen and Machin, 2013, pp. 130–131). Giving non-human objects human qualities or abilities is referred to as personification. Similar to suppression, this can make agents invisible (Hansen and Machin, 2013, p. 143).

CDA also includes discursive practice, meaning how the text is produced and distributed (Bergström et al., 2017, p. 222). This is because the forms in which a text is produced and distributed might invite different kinds of consumption and thereby different understanding and function. A text’s intertextuality, meaning its relation to other texts, further says something about its production circumstances (Bergström et al., 2017, pp. 223–224). Finally, the analysis takes in the broader social practice, how the text is related to other texts, and society as a whole. This places the text within its social context and shows how the discourse in question can be understood as a manifestation of social practices situated in a larger structure. It is through this level of analysis that CDA can be used to criticize ideology and power (Bergström et al., 2017, p. 224). CDA is used to find whose interests are embedded in those values, assuming that specific groups’ interests are upheld through ideological power manifestations in language (Hansen and Machin, 2013, p. 119).

6.1.1 Metaphors Through metaphors, something is described in terms of something else. In the process, meaning is transferred from one area to another without clearly stating that this transfer is made, as it is in the case of similes (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 314). These meanings are transferred between areas not usually associated with each other and can, therefore, illustrate how we perceive society (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 315). Through linking meanings from

31 different areas, a thought process and worldview are made explicit. By understanding and accepting a metaphor, we also understand and accept a certain view of the phenomenon in question (Boréus and Bergström, 2017, p. 148). Although a text is not fully understood only through the analysis of metaphors, they are compelling study objects combined with other methods, such as CDA (Boréus and Bergström, 2017, p. 154).

What first comes to mind when thinking about metaphors is probably the common metaphorical expressions. However, there are also what is called conceptual metaphors. Conceptual metaphors illustrate collective ideas within which a phenomenon is repeatedly conceptualized as something else (Boréus and Bergström, 2017, p. 148). In a way, conceptual metaphors constitute the rule, which metaphorical expressions follow. This rule makes other metaphors understandable since it constitutes shared ideas about the phenomenon in question. Boreús and Bergström (2017) use the English expression “Time is money” to illustrate how conceptual metaphors function. If “Time is money” is the conceptual metaphor that makes up the rule, other metaphorical expressions follow. “He was wasting my time,” “This delay will cost me an hour,” and “That is how I wish I could spend my days” are examples of metaphorical expressions that all are understandable because of the shared idea that “Time is money.” Notice how this original, conceptual metaphor does not need to be explicitly mentioned to understand the metaphorical expressions because the idea that “Time is money” is collectively shared. Whether we are conscious of them or not, conceptual metaphors guide our thoughts in specific directions. Another example made of a conceptual metaphor by Boréus and Bergström is “Markets are oceans,” which they found metaphorical expressions in economy news to support. This metaphor conceals how markets are not unruly forces of nature but regulated by men. This is why conceptual metaphors are interesting to study: they highlight or conceal certain aspects of the phenomenon in question and thus help shape our collective understanding of it (Boréus and Bergström, 2017, p. 149).

6.1.2 Critical Linguistics CDA was born out of linguistics (Hansen and Machin, 2013, p. 115). Thus, critical linguistics has been viewed as an early form of CDA (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 327). It can be used as a separate method, but in this study, tools and concepts are borrowed from critical linguistics and used in the CDA, foremost on the text level. The theoretical assumption behind critical linguistics is that how we use language is linked to how we view the world (Boréus and Bergström, 2017, p. 147). Because of this, every time someone expresses or describes an

32 experience, they choose between different models of thought. The choice of model is noticeable through the words chosen and the construction of sentences. Different models create and show different perspectives on the world (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 328). In other words, there always exist other ways of describing the same thing, some more complete than others. This use of different models is called transformation (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, pp. 334– 335).

Critical linguists analyze a text’s use of grammar and thereby make the chosen thought model visible. More specifically, the use of circumstances, processes, and participants in a sentence are analyzed (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 328). Circumstances place a process within time and space or express how and why something happens (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 333). Processes can be mental, verbal, or material. Mental actions happen within a person and cannot be seen, as in the verbs “see” or “think.” These processes are usually not the result of anyone acting, but rather someone experiencing. Verbal actions are connected to verbs that describe how someone utters something. Material actions, on the other hand, are acts that change something in the physical world. Further, processes can be divided into conditions, events, and actions. Conditions describe the state of things, almost always through the verb “are.” Events happen without anyone’s involvement or responsibility, whereas actions result from someone or something acting deliberately (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, pp. 330–331). By describing something as an action, one or several participants are given responsibility. Instead of being described as an event, it is portrayed as something that happens by itself (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 335). This is important when analyzing actors and power in texts. For example, there is a connotative difference between a streaming market scattered with events simply happening and a streaming market characterized by people making strategic decisions. Participants are, of course, those who get affected by or cause a process (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 331). When analyzing the participants of a process, it is noteworthy who is described to affect others by their actions and whose verbal processes are reported. By looking at who is acting and who is affected by a process, themes of power and responsibility can be revealed in the text (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 335). Through passive instead of active verb forms, participants may be erased from an event when they, in fact, caused the reported thing to happen (Boréus and Bergström, 2017, p. 159).

33 6.1.3 CDA as Dialectical Reasoning To achieve the previously mentioned dialectical reasoning, the critique elements of discourse analysis must be combined with explanation. This becomes crucial when considering how discourses are both the cause and effect of other social elements. Without explanation, the focus is solely on power in discourse, without considering the power behind discourse. The explanation bridges the gap between people and their practices on the one hand and the beliefs and ideas about them on the other. CDA itself analyses discourse, not the wider society and its institutions, such as capitalism and racism. To provide an explanation, other theories or disciplines with a focus on societal analysis are beneficial to use in combination with CDA (Fairclough, 2017, p. 14). In this study, political economy functions as the theoretical field where the streaming market and its news coverage exist, and CDA functions as the tool to examine it. Political economy provides the theoretical depth needed to explain, for example, capitalism. Studies focusing on ideology, must be focused on explanation. To critique ideology, an explanation of why a particular discourse maintains a certain power structure within a specific social order is crucial (Fairclough, 2017, p. 15). By showing how discourse is related to institutions, power, and ideology in a broader social context, CDA should present critique that relates to the discourse and the societal institutions under which it exists (Fairclough, 2017, p. 13). Fairclough (2017) suggests four steps that characterize the argumentation in CDA as dialectical reasoning. Fairclough argues for a normative critique of discourse, followed by explanation of the discourse in relation to the existing state of reality, which in turn calls for explanatory critique of the existing state. After these steps are conducted, the study should advocate for action to change the existing state of reality (Fairclough, 2017, p. 16). Although CDA is normative in its nature, the advocated solutions are often implicit (Fairclough, 2017, pp. 18–19). CDA and political economy theory share the normative goal of using intellectual work to suggest changes to and critique the existing state of affairs. This makes a potent combination of theory and method, covering a broad field of power and ideology studies.

6.2 Limitations of the Method Traditionally, a study’s reliability refers to whether the research can be replicated to ensure the same results. That might be too much to ask of a qualitative study such as this one since meaning and reality are not constant or universal. This makes CDA hard to replicate. A similar study might come to other results based on the different lenses with which each researcher conducts their analysis. Reliability for qualitative studies should instead refer to

34 whether the results are consistent with the data collected. The results must make sense when considering the data in order to be consistent and dependable (Merriam, 2009, p. 221).

The validity of a study refers to whether the method chosen is the correct one for the study issue at hand – the accuracy with which research is conducted. Internal validity refers to how the results match reality. Again, it is essential to remember that reality is not fixed. Texts and other types of data are not reality itself but representations of it. There is always an interpreter needed to read and understand data, with their own understanding of reality (Merriam, 2009, p. 213). What this study is researching is not reality itself but people’s constructions of reality. Reality can be constructed in multiple ways (Merriam, 2009, p. 214). That goes for trade press journalists writing articles as well as for scholars analyzing them. Therefore, reality is not as sharp as a measuring tool as one could ask for. Instead, one should ask if the results are credible, considering the collected data (Merriam, 2009, p. 213). This study aims to be transparent about the analytical tools used and the data collected to ensure high credibility and validity. CDA is sometimes critiqued for seeking conclusions that align with the researcher’s own political bias. Because of this, the argumentation and explanation must be transparent and open to evaluation (Fairclough, 2017, p. 19). Other research traditions might claim neutrality, but since reality is not one-sided, all research is socio-politically situated and biased. The difference is that in CDA, the normative argumentation is made explicit (Hansen and Machin, 2013, p. 150). In this study, randomization in the sampling of data is further used to decrease the researcher bias.

External validity refers to whether the study results are generalizable and may be applied to other situations (Merriam, 2009, p. 223). This is a complicated aspect for all qualitative research since it does not set out to make generalizable claims but to investigate a phenomenon. This study can say something about the television trade press articles regarding the streaming market of 2019, but maybe not about the reporting any other year, or even about articles from other sources than the ones sampled. However, through using five data sources, the external validity is higher than it would have been with only one since more of the supply is covered. CDA is used to place the results of this study within existing societal structures. Thus, it could be argued that CDA can increase external validity since it argues for a particular discourse’s credibility under certain structures. Then, similar discourses may exist and work similarly in other areas under the same structures. Clarity and transparency are again needed in the analysis to prove this aspect of external validity.

35 7. Results

The articles constituting the data are all numbered, as shown in the appendix of this study. When one specific article is referred to, its number from this list is mentioned or put in parenthesis.

7.1 The Use of “Streaming War(s)”

7.1.1 The Trade Press Articles The data of articles using “streaming war(s)” are representative of television trade press in that they all are about aspects of the television industry. However, the main interest of the articles differs. Many articles focus on a specific event or market strategy, meaning they report on what may be considered television industry news. A large part of the articles focuses mainly on specific executives or creatives within the industry, often reporting from conferences or interviews, or informing about big corporations’ hirings. Another significant part of the articles offers some analysis of the market. The analysis is either about the market at large or concentrating on a specific actor and their chances. A few articles have a specific international focus, zooming in on a non-American streaming market such as Spain, Scandinavia, or India. The articles focusing primarily on a new launch on the streaming market can be counted on one hand. However, launches of streaming services are often mentioned in passing in articles with other focuses. The only two articles that cannot be considered fitting into any of the objectives mentioned above aim to summarize the year 2019 and mention the “streaming war(s)” as an important trend. Thereby, they can be argued to focus as much on the market as the discourse itself.

7.1.2 The Meaning of “Streaming War(s)” No easy answer is found as to how the “streaming war(s)” should be understood when looking at the articles, the formulation of the sentences including “streaming war(s),” and the meaning given to the phrase. A few different meanings can be found when examining what the phrase itself is trying to communicate in the context of the trade press articles. Only two articles define the phrase themselves. From them, one learns that the “streaming war(s)” is “the fight for the best films and TV series as a growing number of companies launch their own video-on-demand

36 subscription services” (31) or “where Apple TV+ and Disney+ will launch against WarnerMedia’s HBO Max and NBCUniversal’s Peacock to battle Netflix” (38). In more than half of the articles, the phrase is used as a name for a streaming market that is tough or hard. These are articles about actors competing in a market where great losses can be expected because of the rivalry between them. In large part of the articles, although not as many, “streaming war(s)” is used to refer to a market with many actors, but one that is not by default hard or tough. In these texts, competition does exist, but the wording, in general, is not negative or even pointing out difficulties in such a market. Some of these articles even point out the possibilities that may occur when many actors are willing to get on board. In several articles, “streaming war(s)” does not refer directly to a market with many actors or a market of tough competition, but rather to a point in time. These articles use the phrase as a way to position the reported events in the context of “streaming war(s),” but do not explain or imply the conditions such a war brings. The phrase instead becomes a marker of where in space and time the events take place, mentioned quickly in passing. Similarly, in a few articles, the phrase does not seem to be given any meaning at all. These articles use the phrase, but no explicit meaning can be deciphered just from reading the articles in question.

Further, there are disagreements in the data about the characteristics of the “streaming war(s).” A few articles position the phrase as something topical for 2019, seen in wordings such as “the great streaming wars of 2019” (40). Many articles agree that the “streaming war(s)” is something ongoing but imply that it is only getting worse or bigger as time passes. These articles mention how the war is, for example, “heating up,” “escalating,” or “intensifying.” This time frame is, however, not something all reporting is agreeing on, as several articles mention the “streaming war(s)” as something that is coming, rather than something that is already here – seen in wordings such as “the forthcoming ‘streaming wars’” (13), or “the streaming wars to come” (15). A common characteristic given to the “streaming war(s)” is, however, that it is great or tough. In formulations such as “the coming streaming wars […] will be a brutal one[sic]” (38), and “analysts compare the streaming wars to a ‘gold rush’ and wonder who will survive” (50), one can sense that the wars in question are indeed serious and create victims. A few articles agree that the “streaming war(s)” is hard but rather points to the inconvenience and difficulties it may bring. For example, the “streaming war(s)” is portrayed as “expensive” and “bitter.” However, if the trade press reporting is to be trusted, not all is bad and dangerous in

37 the streaming market – there are also new possibilities. The “streaming war(s)” is “igniting green lights for new projects” (17) and has “led to a reappraisal of independent producers” (32). Some articles take the disagreements regarding the characteristics of the phrase a step further and do not seem to be sure about the concept itself. In a few examples, “streaming war(s)” is written inside quotation marks, and four articles precede the phrase with “so-called.” These articles seem to question the use of “streaming war(s)” as a metaphor, although the journalists have still decided to use it.

7.1.3 The Metaphor of War As explained in the method chapter, a metaphor is meaning transferred between different subject areas (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 314). In order for a metaphor to be understood, it either has to be explicit in its nature or be used within a community with the shared values needed to understand the correct meaning of the saying. Calling the state of the streaming market “streaming war(s)” is using a metaphor. Since war is a topic everyone can associate with, the metaphor is quite explicit in its meaning. Still, it can carry slightly different connotations. War may be perceived as forceful and determined action carried out by war heroes in epic battles. War may be constituted of strategic plans, planned and executed with trickery and meticulousness. But war also brings destruction, losses, grief, and tragedy. Wars are conducted for noble causes, as well as for imperialistic ones. Without the context within which the phrase “streaming war(s)” exists, the desired meaning of the phrase may be lost in translation. As mentioned earlier, the context of the texts in which the phrase is used differs. Some articles mention the war in relation to deliberate actions taken or strategies implemented by different actors. This brings connotations of strategic warfare and determined action. Nevertheless, the war is not only that, as many texts point out the other side of strategic warfare: the creation of winners and losers and the accompanying tragedies and losses. There are concerns about “what happens when the streaming war produces winners – and the vast destruction of value is tallied up among the losers” (48), or even more serious ones about the “heavy casualties [that] can be expected in the streaming wars” (15). The creation of losers and losses brings negative connotations to the “steaming war(s)” metaphor, as not all actors participating will reach their desired outcomes. The war seems to be the effect of corporations trying to get bigger, seen in formulations such as “[Hulu] is still in land-grab mode as the streaming war intensifies” (46). This kind of war can be read as one with an imperialistic or greedy goal, as actors are searching to take control over new markets. The formulation “the domestic streaming wars spreading

38 oversees[sic]” (3) creates an understanding of a domestic war that is now becoming international, something that seems to have progressed further by article 12, as it describes the “escalating streaming wars globally.” These texts create an image of the war spreading, not only bringing the conflict to places outside of the original location but also creating bigger arenas for the participants to fight at. Although the war metaphors are sometimes used closely connected to actions on the streaming market, common use of the metaphor seems to describe the war as inescapable. Formulations such as “a great streaming war is upon us” (2) describe the inevitability of war as something big that is upon us, almost as if it has its own agency.

It is noteworthy that the only other explicit war metaphor mentioned in the texts is “bidding war,” a phrase also related to business. Bidding as a practice is, however, a much more obvious act than the vaguer “streaming.” A bidding war can quite easily be understood as warfare conducted by bidding, while “streaming war(s)” is harder to understand as warfare conducted by streaming. The deeper motivations for using “bidding war” as a metaphor are, however, not obvious since it is difficult to see how the difference between a bidding war and simply normal bidding could be especially large.

7.1.3.1 Explicit Conceptual Metaphor? One especially interesting aspect of the television trade press’s use of “streaming wars(s)” is that through the use of the phrase, a conceptual metaphor is made explicit. As explained previously, conceptual metaphors create other metaphorical expressions borrowed from the same subject area as the conceptual metaphor. Without the conceptual metaphor of “time is money,” expressions such as “spending/wasting time” would not be understood. The conceptual metaphor does not usually need to be mentioned since the worldview required to understand the metaphorical expressions is already shared through repeated conceptualization (Boréus and Bergström, 2017, p. 148). “The streaming market is a war” works as a conceptual metaphor in the data as there are plenty of metaphorical expressions tied to the phenomenon of war. Two of the most reoccurring metaphors in the texts are “fight” and “battle.” The battle metaphor also inspires other metaphorical expressions: “battleground,” “battle front,” and “battle plans.” Other metaphorical expressions closely related to war are seen in wordings such as: “Disney has been on a marketing blitz” (36), “heavy causalities can be expected in the streaming wars” (15), “The streaming wars drew in more well-funded combatants” (53), or the use of metaphors in article

39 26 describing both how “Netflix faces an onslaught of competition” and how “Netflix […] invaded US living rooms”. Article 10 goes as far as writing, “As they hear all of those sabers rattling, [Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon] are dipping deeper into their war chests,” thus bringing concepts from old-fashioned warfare to the conceptual metaphor of “the streaming market is a war.” Not all articles take the concept of war as far, and instead uses metaphors or wordings that are not directly linked to war, but, when read in the context of “streaming war(s),” still guide one’s thoughts in that direction. This category includes expressions of “aggressive” or “fierce” behavior, actors that are “survivors” or “victims,” and verbs such as “retreat,” “defeat,” or the often-used “take on.” Some articles contain more war metaphors than others. Article 39, for example, describes an “arms race” of the media industries, where “Hollywood is in the midst of a costly land-grab” as they “fight back against technology groups that have ravaged their business.” Article 39 further covers “the streaming battle” where “there will be carnage.” These quotes all include metaphors linked to war and thus fall under the umbrella constituted by “the streaming market is a war” as a conceptual metaphor. The conceptual metaphor itself does not have to be mentioned in the text for these other metaphorical expressions to make sense for a reader that has already accepted that the streaming market is indeed a war. What makes “the streaming market is a war” such an interesting metaphor, apart from the fact that it describes a market as a place of aggressive struggle, is that although it works as a conceptual metaphor, it is also made explicit in the data, through the phrase “streaming war(s).” On the most basic text level, “streaming war(s)” can be understood as a war on the streaming market. Thus, in the data, “streaming war(s)” is made an explicit conceptual metaphor.

7.2 The Power Relations of the Streaming Market 7.2.1 The Actors of the “Streaming War(s)” The main participants mentioned in the television trade press are the different companies on the market. The most mentioned participant is Netflix. When Netflix is not the sole subject of an article, it is used as the default participant representing an already established actor with a tech background. Amazon is also sometimes mentioned in those contexts, but not close to the number of times Netflix is used as an example. The second most mentioned participant is Disney, or the companies owned and controlled by Disney. If Netflix is the default established contender, Disney+ is the newcomer that is given the most attention. Another default example of a newcomer is AT&T’s HBO Max.

40 These two mentions of new streaming services are the most common but are followed by Apple, as well as Comcast. The streaming services mentioned in the background chapter are the ones mentioned the most or given the most significance in the trade press data. A few other services are mentioned, but they are seldom mentioned alone without being positioned against these big giants.

7.2.1.1 The Actors Positioned The trend of being mentioned in relation to other participants is not something unique for smaller companies, as the same goes for the bigger actors. When an actor is named, the text usually names a few more companies. This sometimes takes the form of comparison as in formulations such as “Disney’s launch was seen as more impressive [than others]. Yet Netflix suffered fewer customer defections than feared” (53), or “Putting [Netflix] in a category with Facebook, Amazon, and Google as one of the adored US tech stocks” (26). In the first example, Disney +’s launch is compared to other launches in 2019, while Netflix’s user numbers are put in relation to the launch. In the second example, Netflix is being compared to other American tech companies on the stock market. But more common than comparison between actors is the positioning of actors in relation to one another, and most prominently, against each other. One common power relation portrayed is legacy media corporations against tech companies. This is evident in examples such as “WarnerMedia gets set to launch HBO Max against Netflix, Apple + and Amazon Prime” (47). These formulations do not necessarily portray legacy media or tech companies as more powerful but rather state a conflict between the two. The clearest line of conflict is drawn between Netflix and the rest. Several texts describe how other corporations aim to “take on Netflix,” which is sometimes the only motivation mentioned for a company to launch a streaming service. “The largest media companies […] are all in the midst of launching their own streaming services to battle Netflix” (36), and the headline “Nordic Streamers Fight Netflix With Local Content” (43) are further examples of this line of conflict. Netflix is repeatedly portrayed as having great power to influence the streaming market, sometimes with reference to how Netflix “changed the way we watch TV” (26) or “invented” the streaming market. Such wording leads to the conclusion that Netflix is portrayed as especially powerful because of how early they got a strong position in the streaming market. The trade press seems to hold a special place in its heart for Netflix, as the data contains several articles analyzing the company’s future. These articles contain a tone

41 that is almost worried about whether Netflix will continue its success saga. Even though the aim seems to be to critically analyze the changing media landscape, the articles show great respect and admiration for Netflix. One article mentions how “Netflix is proud of the transparent, decentralized corporate culture it has created, and executives credit employee freedom for its ability to move fast and grow so quickly” (19). Further, executives from no other company are given as much attention in the data as executives from Netflix. This lies close to what Sanson and Steirer call tech-company discourse, where tech companies are believed to have a simpler and smarter structure and, therefore, deserve more attention (Sanson and Steirer, 2019, p. 1215). Netflix is pointed out both as the leader and as the future winner of the “streaming war(s)” on several occasions in the data. Other possible winners pointed out are Amazon, Apple, AT&T, Comcast, and Disney. Hulu and Amazon are named as leaders of the market together with Netflix.

The only losers in the “streaming war(s)” or the streaming market explicitly stated in the data are neighboring industries, such as cinema and linear TV, although these are questioned to lose. Max Conze, chief executive of German broadcaster ProSieben, is quoted in an article saying, “’Our entertainment business is basically valued as a cancer patient… that will not exist in so or so many years from now” (23). The portrayed losers in the conflicts on the streaming market are thus older media technologies and not the streaming corporations. This is peculiar since the “streaming war(s)” is portrayed as carrying high stakes for everyone involved.

7.2.2 The Flows of the Streaming Power Geometry

Power geometry refers to how different global flows and interconnections relate to people and groups, giving them more or less power and control (Massey, 1993, pp. 61–62). The two flows given the most significance in the data related to the actors are money and content. Money here refers to capital in the form of earnings, spending, and funding. Content refers to the videos available on the different platforms, their popularity, their movements between platforms, and the audience they might bring. The third most important flow in the trade press reporting relates to users, the audience watching or paying for the content on the different streaming platforms. The last of the significant flows is talent, here meaning powerful creatives or executives connected to the different corporations. When examining how these flows and connections are written in the text in relation to the participants, it is possible to see which actors are considered most powerful and for what reasons.

42

Netflix and Disney are the two companies most frequently named in relation to flows of money. AT&T, Apple TV+, and Amazon are also portrayed as powerful in relation to money flows. These mentions are most times about how much they spend or earn. Netflix’s relationship to flows of money seems to depend on that they have been around on the streaming market for long and have well-established routines for content production. Disney+, on the other hand, is seen as the new contender on the market to look out for because of how well funded it is. Disney is also the corporation portrayed as most related to flows of content, as they have a large and popular back catalog, which they withdrew from other platforms prior to launching their own. However, Netflix is not far behind in relation to flows of content, followed by AT&T and its advantages as owners on the prestigious HBO. Apple TV+ is also connected to flows of content, although not as much. Content is the flow most associated with Comcast, which is rarely mentioned in relation to any other flows. When it comes to the flow of users, Netflix is the clear leader. This should come as no surprise, since it is the biggest company on the market, being launched for long, in contrast to many the other frequently mentioned participants on the streaming market. Disney is portrayed as the runner-up when it comes to control of flows of users, followed by AT&T. The flow of talent between the companies is the flow that the trade press portrays as the most evenly distributed, as it is mentioned in relation to Amazon, Apple TV+, AT&T, and Netflix. Overall, Netflix and Disney are portrayed as the most powerful of the market if power is measured by the connections to, and control over, flows. And since information in itself is a flow, the six companies mentioned the most in the data – Netflix, Disney, AT&T, Apple, Amazon, and Comcast – are all made powerful through the frequency with which they are featured in television trade press.

7.2.3 Portrayal and Responsibility A group that is constantly collectivized, in the case they are even mentioned at all, is the audience, or as they are more frequently called, “users,” or “subscribers.” They are never reported to act in any way other than opening up their wallets. Further, the words “user” and “subscriber” refer directly to their position in the system of production. They do not seem to have any sense of agency or power other than that they are what the commercial actors on the streaming market fight for.

43 Another group commonly collectivized is analysts, even though they are in some cases individualized and named. Executives from streaming corporations are always individualized and often personalized, giving them great importance in the market. But what stands out the most in the way the participants are portrayed is how the corporations are written about. They are named in every article, although sometimes phrases such as “content providers” or “international giants” are used for variation. Corporations are hard to characterize on the text level since they are individual companies that are named in the text, but a company itself is by definition a collective. It thus becomes a hybrid of a single entity and the group behind it. When repeatedly reading company names, one becomes used to seeing corporations being actors. It is almost as if the corporation itself becomes responsible for its actions, obscuring that they are owned and controlled by people and hold significant capital. When executives are personalized in the text, they are given some responsibility, but they always act from the position of being a part of the company they work for. As such, the company becomes a singular entity, more significant than the people controlling it. The way corporations are said to act on the market works as a way of personification, meaning they are given human abilities (Hansen and Machin, 2013, p. 143). They are portrayed as acting or thinking out of a free will. The sentence “AT&T is telling investors it has the intestinal fortitude to win in the streaming wars” (33) does not only propose that companies can talk but that they also can have human characteristics such as fortitude. This very example becomes even more absurd since it refers to “intestinal fortitude,” which in its literal meaning requires a body, something AT&T does not have.

7.2.3.1 The “Streaming War(s)” as an Actor and the Missing Actors The phenomenon being most subjected to personification is the “streaming war(s)” itself. The streaming war is made an actor on the streaming market with its own agency. For example, in article 53, one can read that “The streaming wars drew in more well-funded combatants.” The combatants in question are by this process stripped of their responsibility.

The process of commodity fetishism mystifies the structures behind production by making them into an object (Rodino-Colocino, 2017, p. 297). As mentioned earlier, the meaning of “streaming war(s)” is not completely clear, but it does always refer to the streaming market to some extent. The “streaming war(s)” is, as such, a fetishism of the streaming market. By becoming an actor, it is not only made an object but a participant in its own right. As in the quote from article 53 above, the “streaming war(s)” are portrayed to work in mysterious ways,

44 luring innocent companies. This obscures the fact that the real actors, the corporations and their owners, have made deliberate decisions of existing on the market.

When the “streaming war(s)” are said to “ramp” or “heat” up, it can be understood either as an action, meaning a participant is responsible for it, or an event, something that happens by itself (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 335). If it is an action to “heat up,” then the “streaming war(s)” is responsible for doing so. But if it is an event, it describes a market where things just happen. In either case, it describes a market outside of anyone’s control, where the streaming market both affects and is affected by itself. This portrayal is a form of suppression, meaning it excludes an actual actor, distracting from whoever is really responsible (Hansen and Machin, 2013, p. 130). The trend of suppression is persistent in the television trade press. One interesting example is the sentence, “Vast sums are being thrown at new content, with platforms hoping big names will draw in viewers” (42). Here, large sums of money “are being thrown,” without any real actor or agency. This obscures the power behind capital flows since we do not know who is throwing the money at whom. The second part of the sentence can be understood as an explanation of agency, but what really is being said is that the “platforms hoping” happens simultaneously as the money being spent. The verb “hoping” suggests that streaming platforms have the ability of hope and that they are passively praying for success instead of actively working to achieve it by, as suggested, spending money on talent.

7.3 Ideological Implications

7.3.1 What and Whom Are They Fighting For? In article 30, one can read that “Netflix and Amazon splurge on original content to win streaming supremacy.” The short answer to the question of what the “streaming war(s)” is fought for thus seems to be: supremacy. Supremacy implies that the goal is to be the biggest participant in the market. The question then becomes one of how big these companies can become. In article 2, it is suggested that six “behemoths will survive this war,” and in article 39, Discovery executive David Zaslav is quoted as wanting to be “the third man standing with Netflix and Amazon.” Another text says, “the choice is to win the steaming battle against the likes of Netflix, or face commercial oblivion” (39). These discourses paint the market as tough competition, aimed at becoming the biggest and last corporation standing. If participants are obliviated, there will only be a few competitors left, and the streaming market would become

45 close to monopolized. The cultural industries operate on a market that would suffer tremendously from a monopoly. If there were a monopoly on the streaming market, the control over the consumption and production of video would be in the hands of one or a few powerful corporations. Although a free and unregulated market can lead to monopolization, monopoly is in a way an enemy of neoliberalism since there is no longer a competitive market to protect. Therefore, the neoliberal system should be concerned with a market at risk of being monopolized.

7.3.1.1 Concern for the Market There is a concern for the market expressed in most trade press articles concentrated on market analysis. But this concern is not aimed towards monopolization. Article 50 reads, “Some analysts compare the streaming wars to a ‘gold rush’ and wonder who will survive in what may be an oversaturated market.” The biggest concern portrayed in the television trade press is just that market may be oversaturated. The articles describe the market as a “boom” and mention how the amount of spending is “unsustainable.” Oversaturated markets are indeed a reality under capitalism, as no accumulation of capital can last forever. Article 39 lets us know that in the “streaming war(s),” “Like any period of fast innovation there will be winners and losers.” Experiencing losses of capital is framed in the data as the worst possible outcome for any participant in the streaming market. So maybe a more accurate answer to the question of what the “streaming war(s)” is fought for is: not losing. One of the clearest values communicated in the television trade press data is that losing is bad. No company or company executive is willing to see themselves as a possible loser in the wars. AT&T executive John Stephens admits in article 47 that “the economy has its ups and downs” and that the streaming market is a “competitive environment” but concludes that AT&T be successful since people will continue using their phones. Smaller participants do see the streaming market as tough competition but portray themselves as standing outside of this competition, offering services that customers will use “complementary” or “layered on top.” An unnamed executive shares the concern about losing in an oversaturated market:

”’This isn’t a gold rush, it’s an arms race. We don’t know if there is any pot of gold […] Once the music stops, there will be carnage. It might take three to five years, but there has to come a point when we come to our senses.’” (39)

46 The “arms race” metaphor, of course, leads back to the conceptual metaphor of “the streaming market is a war.” The competitive nature of the streaming market is described in article 10 as a “landscape […] getting more crowded than the last act of Avengers: Endgame.”, suggesting a big battle.

7.3.1.2 War in Whose Interest? If every participant is fighting not to lose, it does not seem to be the best option to get into a war. But the notion that “the streaming market is a war” might not only be born out of structures formed under competitive capitalism but also help reconstruct the understandings of the market as a war. This goes in line with what Preston and Silke argue: that media texts constructed under neoliberalism might in return work as ideological processes behind market decisions (Preston and Silke, 2011, p. 51). If trade press discourse holds the possible power to create the realities and values within an industry (Edwards and Pieczka, 2013, p. 7), and discourse is how the desired state of things is expressed (Boréus and Seiler Brylla, 2018, p. 309), it could mean that the television trade press helps construct the very competitive streaming market environment they are concerned about, because they wish to do so. When no company wants to be ruled out of the streaming market, and a market characterized by competition does not automatically mean sending losers to oblivion, the discourse of “streaming war(s)” becomes a way for the television trade press to keep suspense in the reporting. This creates a fetishization of the streaming market as unpredictable. The trade press is not alone in wanting to keep the “streaming war(s)” discourse; the same will is found within the television industry. In an interview, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings is asked:

“if he finds the concept of ‘streaming wars’ […] to be a valid one [.] Hasting said he does, insofar as it helps popularize the idea of streaming […] ‘The advantage of having something catchy like ‘streaming wars’ is that it draws more attention and because of that consumers shift more quickly from linear TV to streaming TV.’” (14)

Hastings, and Netflix, thus have an economic interest in portraying the streaming market as a war, something that the trade press mirrors. Hastings has also expressed that he is not “’worried’ about the imminent launch of Disney Plus” and that Disney is the competitor they have “the most to learn from” (37). It is thus in Netflix’s interest to keep the illusion of war while it sees

47 other corporations as allies. Netflix can do so because they are not afraid to lose, based on the solid position they already have, just as AT&T will not lose because of how the conglomerate structure makes sure they have enough capital to survive.

7.3.2 The Ideology in the Discourse of the Television Trade Press The aim of CDA and ideology critique is to question delusions in what is taken for granted (Lindberg, 2017, p. 97; Wodak, 2007, p. 187). In the discourse surrounding the streaming market, several economic and societal structures are naturalized. It is taken for granted that the streaming market should be free and characterized by competition. This view of the market presupposes that competition makes the market tougher and that some companies will suffer when others are introduced. But the idea of this market also builds on the ideological view that corporations will want to participate in such a market, even if it may mean economic loss. It is presupposed that economic loss is something bad and that all companies aim to grow. If there is a political will, a market can be stopped or changed. But because of the neoliberal idea that the free market is what society is built around, the solutions to possible problems on the market have got to come from the market itself. Neoliberalism is, thereby, made a default assumption in television trade press, just as Preston and Silke suggest (Preston and Silke, 2011). This should not come as a surprise, as trade press works so closely interlinked with the industries that it reports on. It is also important to remember that the television trade press does not stand unaffected by the capitalist organization of the media market, and neither does the television industry. As Mosco points out, communication is integral to societal processes through the link of capitalist organization (Mosco, 2009, p. 66).

Through the personalization of the market and its companies, it is concealed that corporations are controlled by people, who in turn are controlled by economic interest and their relation to other flows. It is concealed how the state of “war” in a market is not created by nature and that this market does not have an agency of its own. The “streaming war(s)” might not even exist; it is just a name given to describe a certain time in the global streaming market. This, in turn, means that the oppositions between the actors of the “streaming war(s)” are not real. Emmison found in his study from 1986 that when the economy is fetishized, the capitalist organization of society is concealed. It instead becomes interested in tending to the economic “body” and its “needs.” The ruling class defined this problem while they benefitted from the actions taken (Emmison, 1986, pp. 86–87). The fetishization works similarly under

48 the “streaming war(s),” when the power behind the leading conglomerates is concealed behind the concerns of the “onslaught” on the market.

49 8. Conclusion and Discussion

8.1 “Streaming War(s)”? The phrase “streaming war(s)” is used widely in television trade press, in any type of article that can be found in such a publication. No one specific meaning or characteristic that the trade press can all agree on is given to the phrase “streaming war(s),” although most of the data points to an understanding of the concept as related to hard competition. The lack of common understanding of the phrase does not stop it from being used in the reporting. Some articles even use “streaming war(s)” without offering any context to understand the phrase. These articles, as well as ones using “streaming war(s)” as a marker of time and space, seem to take for granted that the reader is already familiar with the trade press discourse and comes with previous knowledge and attitudes towards the phrase. The reporting thus takes great risks, not creating the context needed to make sure the reader makes the desired interpretation of the text. For someone reading television trade press blindly, without prior knowledge, experiences, or thoughts of the subject, it would be hard to pinpoint exactly what the “streaming war(s)” is. However, it could be argued that the trade press is for specialized readers with prior knowledge. But the aspects that make the phrase even more complex - the few texts that question the phrase, the lack of consensus on whether the phrase is positive or negative, or even which parts of the streaming market are indicated – may make even someone in the television industry confused. This is, of course, if the television industry, along with its trade press, has not all agreed on a shared meaning of “streaming war(s).” If that is the case, it has not become evident through the analysis of the data in this study. It could be argued that journalism should abstain from using a concept with no agreed-on meaning or characteristic, especially general press with large readerships such as FT. Communicating meaning using such a phrase may arise problems, especially if it is used to such an extent as “streaming war(s).” Complex meanings in reporting are not necessarily a bad thing, but it can create confusion, especially when it happens on the most explicit text level. But at the same time, few concepts are born with their collective meaning already in place. The question then becomes how long the phrase is going to be used, printed, and thereby negotiated before a common use is established. All discourses are under construction every time they are communicated or interpreted. In the case of “streaming war(s)” in television trade press, this process becomes more evident since it takes place in front of open curtains.

50 Metaphors make thought processes visible, transferring ideas from one subject area to another. Understanding a metaphor, one accepts a certain worldview (Boréus and Bergström, 2017, p. 148). By understanding the metaphor of “streaming war(s),” one accepts a view on the streaming market as a place characterized by conflict and fighting. However, the analysis of this study argues that the metaphor is given different meanings and can mean anything from victory to carnage, thereby illustrating many possible sides of a war. This makes it hard to pinpoint a single use for the metaphor “streaming war(s).” The use of a military term to describe a market is in itself not obvious. A market under neoliberalism is by default free and characterized by competition. Competing corporations on such a media market are not literary conducting war against each other; that would imply some kind of sabotage – an aspect none of the trade press articles bring up. Creative language, such as metaphors, can make a text more interesting and appealing, a strategy that should not be held against trade press journalists as they are working in a field of reporting that may often seem dry and uninviting. However, the specific use of metaphors still says something about the worldview of the trade press and the industry it covers. It seems to have been agreed that the streaming market is a war and therefore should be written about as such. The conceptual metaphor “the streaming market is a war” becomes explicit through the extensive use of “streaming war(s).” The conceptual metaphor invites to further use of metaphorical expressions linked to war in descriptions of the streaming market. Since the sampling is made to feature only articles mentioning the “streaming war(s),” all articles naturally make the conceptual metaphor explicit. Because of its narrow focus, this study can not establish if metaphorical expressions linked to the conceptional metaphor “the streaming market is a war” are used in articles that do not make the conceptual metaphor explicit through the use of “streaming war(s).” This study can, however, rule that “steaming war(s)” has been established as a conceptual metaphor for the streaming market. The reason conceptual metaphors are important to study is that they highlight and conceal certain parts of our understanding of a phenomenon (Boréus and Bergström, 2017, p. 149). The metaphor of “streaming war(s)” highlights the competitive and possibly hostile nature of the streaming market. At the same time, it conceals characteristics of the actors on the streaming market. In some cases, the actors are concealed because of the focus on the ways of the war, erasing their agency. When the conceptual metaphor is used to describe the hardships of the market, it may also conceal the great advantages some of these actors may have. And, maybe most importantly, the conceptual

51 metaphor “the streaming market is a war” conceals what the major actors of the streaming market have in common. It conceals how most of them are big conglomerates, with the same interests, benefitting or disfavoring from the same regulations or subzidations. Through the concept of war, the major actors of the streaming market become first and foremost competitors, concealing how they stand on the same side in the capitalist organization of the media system. . 8.2 The Power Relations of the Streaming Market Corporations active on the streaming market are the most frequently named participants in the trade press data. Among these, Netflix, Disney, AT&T, Apple, Amazon, and Comcast are given the most attention. These are also the companies that are portrayed as expected to “win” the “streaming war(s).” The corporations of the streaming market are repeatedly compared to each other as if the discourse around them cannot function without competition.

Examining flows is helpful in seeing how the actors are portrayed as negotiating their power positions within a power geometry. Netflix is portrayed as the most powerful in relation to the flow of users, further retaining its power position in relation to flows of money and content. Disney is portrayed as the most powerful in relation to the flow of content, with its other strong position in relation to flows of money. AT&T shares its strong position within the power geometry with Disney – content, and money being its strongest associated flows. Apple TV+ is portrayed as a powerful actor because of its relation to flows of money, content, and talent. These flows are the same associated with Amazon, although Amazon’s position in relation to these flows are not mentioned as frequently in the television trade press. Lastly, Comcast is portrayed and mentioned as a powerful company mainly because of its control of flows of content.

The power relations of the streaming market are portrayed as consisting of big corporations, with Netflix being on the absolute top. Other actors are lacking to the degree that the companies themselves are personified, and the audience is robbed of its agency. When the companies are not portrayed as acting entities without any human interest behind them, the market itself is believed to hold great power. The concept “streaming war(s)” becomes a stand-in for the market under which it is portrayed as acting on its own. As such, the “streaming war(s)” may be portrayed as the most powerful actor of all since no one can control it, and it has the power to influence all other actors.

52

8.3 The Ideology of “Streaming War(s)” The central values communicated in the television trade press data are that the streaming market is tough as a battle and that losing financially is the worst thing that could happen. Competition in a market is natural under neoliberalism, but a battle is unnecessary if the goal is not a monopoly. Monopolization is the enemy of market competition, and as such, should be something that raises neoliberal concern. Nevertheless, those very neoliberal ideological processes work to keep the streaming market portrayed as a war for monopoly, as it benefits large media conglomerates. These conglomerates do not feel at risk of losing, because of either their position or sources of income outside of the streaming market, as with Apple, Comcast, Amazon, and AT&T. It turns out, the neoliberal loyalty lies with the capital first and healthy competition second. As one can expect from trade press working under these structures, the reporting mirrors this viewpoint. The television trade press features pieces aiming to critique the “gold rush” of the market and pointing out the losses ahead but is at the same time a large part in hyping the streaming market through discourses like the one surrounding “streaming war(s),” which helps reconstruct the race it aims to critique. The “gold rush” and the “streaming war(s)” are thus two formulations of the same practice.

When the trade press describes how ”the streaming wars intensify,” it might be meant to describe a situation that is now intensified because of actions taken, but that is not what is being said. It instead paints the “streaming war(s)” as its own entity with its own agency, meaning the streaming market is fetishized. This obscures the actions of executives and their wealthy corporations and instead poses the market as an uncontrollable war. As the expression goes: “all is fair in love and war,” and the metaphor of war helps justify the measures taken by media conglomerates.

The streaming market was a relatively new arena for the television industry in 2019, and the television trade press reporting shows that the industry was still working towards negotiating shared meanings and values. However, this negotiation takes place under the current societal structures of neoliberalism, where the market is always in focus. The very arena where the negotiation of discourse takes place, the television trade press, also works under these structures. Therefore, the television industry is not getting a chance to formulate their new

53 chapter of technological advancements and revolutionized consumer behavior under neutral terms but is instead grounded on previous power structures built on previous success sagas of large media corporations.

When googling “streaming wars,” Google provides you suggested questions asked by other users. The top three questions are “Is there a streaming war?,” “Will the streaming wars end?,” and “Who is winning streaming wars?” Based on the critical analysis of television trade press discourse in this study, the answers to those suggested questions would be “Only in discourse. The streaming market functions like markets do under neoliberalism,” “Yes, no market can experience eternal accumulation,” and “The large media corporations that may benefit from the discourse that makes you ask such a question.”

54 9. Afterthought & Further Research

A study with these conclusions raises questions about whether there is a neutral way to write about a market and if that would even be desirable. This very study uses large parts of the discourse it sets out to criticize. That is not necessarily a problem since it is done with awareness. This study is not produced to change language but can hopefully plant thought processes that will help in making informed future decisions about language use.

This study is conducted on the discourse of television trade press in 2019. It is possible that the discourse has changed or become even more established since that. A study sampling another time frame would, hopefully, get other results. The global COVID-19 pandemic has been an important economic factor for most industries, streaming television being one of them. This factor should be taken in, in studies conducted on television trade press discourse after 2019.

A smaller number of articles in the data would have enabled an even deeper analysis, able to examine more aspects of the texts. For example, this study has not gone into depth in the analysis about the numerous streaming video productions named in the texts because of space limitations. An analysis with a slightly different focus would probably be able to draw connections between different forms of content and strategies on the streaming market.

In a study like this, it is only possible to speculate about how prone different publications, editors, or journalists are to use the phrase “streaming war(s).” In a similar study, interviews with editors could be included to find out their reasoning behind normalizing or avoiding such a concept. A similar study could also use a comparative approach between the different media outlets, which would put the focus on the evaluation of journalism instead of this study´s focus on a certain discourse. A study with evaluation of trade press discourse as its core subject could also interview representatives from the television industry to see if their picture of the market corresponds with the trade press’. Such a study would be able to for sure determine whether the television industry and its trade press share the same values and worldview.

55 10. List of References

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58 11. Appendix: Articles

1. The Hollywood Reporter, “Netflix Sets Biggest Subscription Price Hike”, January 15th, 2019 2. Deadline Hollywood, “Curiosity Stream’s John Hendricks Predicts Survivors And Victims Of SVOD War”, February 9th, 2019 3. Deadline Hollywood, “Bela Bajaria To Lead International Non-English TV Originals For Netflix, Erik Barmack Segues To Producing”, March 6th, 2019 4. Deadline Hollywood, “Netflix’s Ted Sarandos Chides Apple & Disney For being ‘Very Late’ To Streaming”, March 18th, 2019 5. Financial Times, “Fox/streaming wars: fort worth”, March 23rd, 2019 6. Variety, “Jonathan Nolan, Lisa Joy Exit Warner Bros. TV for Massive Overall Deal at Amazon”, April 5th, 2019 7. Financial Times, “AT&T/HBO: creative differences”, April 11th, 2019 8. Variety, “UTA CEO Jeremy Zimmer Talks WGA Dispute, Diversity and Streaming Wars”, May 1st, 2019 9. The Hollywood Reporter, “Netflix’s Loss of Marvel Movies May Hurt Subscriber Growth, Poll Finds”, May 14th, 2019 10. Deadline Hollywood, “The Fresh Faces Of Streaming: How Will Existing Services Fare As Big-Budget Competitors Enter The Fray? – Deadline Disruptors”, May 20th, 2019 11. Financial Times, “Broadcasters open new front in streaming war”, June 13th, 2019 12. The Hollywood Reporter, “Starz COO Touts Global Streaming Expansion Amid CBS Takeover Speculation”, June 25th, 2019 13. Deadline Hollywood, “’Love Island’: ITV America Chief David George ‘Cautiously Optimistic’ About CBS Remake & Anticipates Unscripted Streaming Wars Boom”, July 8th, 2019 14. Deadline Hollywood, “Netflix’s Ted Sarandos Talks Ratings, Paying Film Talent And HBO’s Emmy Haul”, July 17th 2019 15. Financial Times, “The streaming market is heading for saturation; Many new services will struggle to secure subscribers on their own”, July 25th, 2019 16. Deadline Hollywood, “Netflix Acquisitions VP Amy Reinhard Shares View Of Global Markets, Streaming Wars: ‘It’s Going To Be Very Competitive’”, July 30th 2019 17. The Hollywood Reporter, “Emmy’s Senior Moment: The Veteran Actors Landing Noms in Peak TV Era”, August 5th, 2019 18. Deadline Hollywood, “John Landgraf On Launching FX Series On Hulu First, Ramping Up Volume & Looming Streaming Wars”, August 7th 2019 19. The Hollywood Reporter, “Netflix Under Pressure: Can a Hollywood Disruptor Avoid Getting Disrupted?”, August 8th, 2019 20. The Hollywood Reporter, “How Spain Became a Case Study for the Global Streaming Wars”, August 26th, 2019 21. Financial Times, “YouTube drops paywall for shows; Google-owned platform adopts ad-driven model? Netflix-led streaming war intensifies”, August 30th, 2019 22. Variety, “Sony Picture Chief on Spider-Man Split: ‘For the Moment the Door is Closed’”, September 5th, 2019 23. Financial Times, “ProSiebenSat.1 doubles down on free-to-air”, September 9th, 2019 24. IndieWire, “Facebook Watch Relying on Interactivity to Compete in the Streaming Wars”, September 13th, 2019 25. Financial Times, “Streaming battle heats up with $500m ‘Big Bang Theory’ deal”, September 18th, 2019

59 26. Financial Times, “How will the Netflix story end? Look vulnerable.”, September 20th, 2019 27. The Hollywood Reporter, “’Mad Men’ Global Rights Shopped as Streaming Wars Heat Up”, September 24th, 2019 28. Deadline Hollywood, “The Eyes Have It: Brian Grazer, Ted Sarandos Talk ‘Human Connection,’ Grazer’s New Book at Writers Guild Theatre”, September 26th, 2019 29. Variety, “Alfonso Cuarón Sets TV Overall Deal at Apple”, October 10th, 2019 30. Financial Times, “Streamers scour India for growth. Content push; Amazon and Netflix jostle with food delivery groups for slice of fast-growing market”, October 15th, 2019 31. Financial Times, “Oscar winner seeks scene-stealing London IPO”, October 16th, 2019 32. Financial Times, “Play a blinder Banijay closes in on deal to buy Endemol”, October 23rd, 2019 33. Variety, “AT&T to Spend Upwards of $2 Billion on HBO Max in 2020”, October 28th, 2019 34. The Hollywood Reporter, “How HBO Max May Approach Its Global Rollout”, October 30th, 2019 35. Financial Times, “Sony beats retreat in video streaming war”, October 31st, 2019 36. Financial Times, “Apple enters the streaming wars with TV+; Tech group aims to capitalize on the host of iPhone users by challenging Amazon and Netflix with high- budget shows”, November 2nd, 2019 37. Variety, “Netflix CEO Reed Hastings: Disney Is Streaming Competitor ‘We Have the Most to Learn From’”, November 6th, 2019 38. The Hollywood Reporter, “Dish Adds Subscribers for First Time Since 2017 on Sling TV Gains”, November 7th, 2019 39. Financial Times, “Television’s looming ‘car crash’; The media industry is witnessing an expensive arms race as companies spend tens of billions of dollars on programmes to take on Netflix. However not all the streaming services are likely to survive”, November 11th, 2019 40. Financial Times, “Disney: Bob hope”, November 13th, 2019 41. Deadline Hollywood, “Netflix Hit With Sex & Racial Discrimination Suit By Mo’Nique Over Comedy Special Pay”, November 14th, 2019 42. Financial Times, “Night of the living dead haunts the cinema; Digital cloning of James Dean threatens the future of real actors”, November 16th, 2019 43. The Hollywood Reporter, “Nordic Streamers Fight Netflix with Local Content”, November 19th, 2019 44. The Hollywood Reporter, “Apple Canceled ‘Then Banker’ Premiere Amid Sexual Abuse Claims Against Real-Life Subject’s Son”, November 20th, 2019 45. Deadline Hollywood, “WarnerMedia Sales & International Sets Exectutive Structure And Key Appointments”, November 25th, 2019 46. Variety, “Hulu Black Friday Streaming Deal; One Year for $1.99 per Month”, November 28th, 2019 47. The Hollywood Reporter, “AT&T CFO John Stephens Says TV Customer Losses Have ‘Peaked’”, December 3rd, 2019 48. Financial Times, “Cineworld: island in the streams”, December 4th, 2019 49. The Hollywood Reporter, “AMC’s Sarah Barnett: Streaming Wars Could Mean Focus on ‘Huge Business Interests’”, December 5th, 2019 50. Financial Times, “UK film and television are jewels in the crown; Success of the creative industries is prompting business investment”, December 7th, 2019

60 51. The Hollywood Reporter, “Peacock Streaming Service to Break Even by Year 5, Comcast CFO Says”, December 9th, 2019 52. Deadline Hollywood, “Netflix & India’s Viacom18 Greenlight Trio Of Original Series After Streamer’s $400M Content Pledge”, December 17th, 2019 53. Financial Times, “A year of deals, drama, spies and successes; Chine growth fell off and Germany descended into gloom but there were pockets of cheer and plenty of action”, December 21st, 2019 54. Variety, “The Biggest Tech and Digital Media Stories of 2019”, December 26th, 2019

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