Master Thesis (One-Year, 15 ECTS) Media and Communication Studies: Culture, Collaborative Media and Creative Industries
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Master Thesis (One-Year, 15 ECTS) Media and Communication Studies: Culture, Collaborative Media and Creative Industries _____________________________________________________________________ The influence of streaming services on the German television landscape – A comparative critical discourse analysis through the example of Netflix based on newspaper articles from: Süddeutsche Zeitung, BILD Zeitung and taz, die tageszeitung ______________________________________________________________________ Written by Melitta Capolei Student ID: 90009T268 Semester: 2 (Spring 2016) E-Mail: [email protected] Submission: 25th of May 2016 Supervisor: Jakob Dittmar Amount of words: 16.057 Table of Contents Abstract .................................................................................................................................... 1 1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 1 1.1 Objective and aim of present thesis ....................................................................................... 2 1.2 Theory and existing research .................................................................................................. 4 1.3 Structure of the present thesis ................................................................................................ 5 2 The development of discourse studies ....................................................................... 5 2.1 Discourse theory by Foucault .................................................................................................. 7 2.2 Siegfried Jäger's critical discourse analysis ......................................................................... 8 3 Discourse analysis ............................................................................................................. 8 3.1 Applied critical discourse analysis ...................................................................................... 10 3.2 Discourse and power .............................................................................................................. 12 3.3 Media discourse and Agenda-Setting-Theory .................................................................. 13 4 The importance of German television ..................................................................... 16 4.1 German public and private service broadcasters ............................................................ 17 4.2 Streaming services vs. classical television .......................................................................... 18 4.3 Netflix ........................................................................................................................................ 20 5 Critical discourse analysis of German newspaper articles ............................... 24 5.1 The German press .................................................................................................................. 25 5.1.1 Süddeutsche Zeitung ........................................................................................................................ 27 5.1.2 BILD Zeitung ...................................................................................................................................... 28 5.1.3 taz, die tagseszeitung ....................................................................................................................... 28 5.2 Methodological Approach ..................................................................................................... 29 5.3 Critical discourse analysis of articles: Süddeutsche Zeitung ........................................ 31 5.4 Critical discourse analysis of articles: BILD Zeitung ..................................................... 33 5.6 Critical discourse analysis of articles: taz, die tageszeitung .......................................... 35 5.7 Discussion ................................................................................................................................. 38 6 Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 40 References ................................................................................................................................ I Appendix ................................................................................................................................. V Abstract The following master thesis analyzes to which extent streaming services in particular Netflix influence the German television landscape and how this discourse is covered in German newspapers. The work shows that online streaming services with their non-linear content have an impact on German television. The theoretical base of the work is the critical discourse analysis by the German linguist Siegfried Jäger. His work analyzes relevant social discourses with its own method based on the theory of the French philosopher Michel Foucault. The present thesis refers to Netflix as a streaming service and analyzes the aspect of how it influences the television landscape since its introduction on the German market in 2014. For deeper understanding before conducting the critical discourse an initial analysis of the German television market is presented. The base of the analysis are newspaper articles. Furthermore, the relevant aspects of the publishing landscape in Germany are introduced to provide the reader with relevant background knowledge. Moreover, the thesis contains an analysis of newspaper articles from three leading newspapers in Germany: Süddeutsche Zeitung, BILD Zeitung and taz, die tageszeitung (following referred to as taz). 15 representative articles were chosen and afterwards analyzed with the method of critical discourse analysis. The results of all three newspapers on the Netflix discourse are compared to each other. In conclusion, the work shows that the influence of streaming services, especially Netflix on German television is stronger then expected. And even if television is still seen as the leading medium in Germany, public as well as private broadcasters have to be aware of the new competitor on the market and adapt to constant changes especially in the online segment. 1 Introduction Reading through the online presence of various German newspapers in the beginning of March 2016 the high number of articles about the start of the fourth season of House of Cards, original series produced by Netflix was remarkable. After the season premier on the 4th of March the interest did not decline and discussions about the happenings in the live of the fictive characters from the previous evening arose in different contexts. The presence of the series and consequently Netflix as the producer in the media discourse in newspapers shows how the streaming service provider managed to have a noticed 1 role in the German media landscape. Since its entry in the German market one and a half years ago Netflix reached 1.2 million subscribers (Statista 2015) and over 30 million views (Schröder 2016). With its presence Netflix altered the German television landscape and constitutes an additional competitor on the market. Therefore, the following master thesis is going to analyze to what extent streaming services in particular Netflix influence the German television landscape and how this discourse is covered in German newspapers. 1.1 Objective and aim of present thesis Every year the Landesmedienanstalt1 (LMA) publishes a study about the economic position of broadcasting in Germany in which all private television and radio broadcasters answer their survey. In 2015 the latest version was made public and in this edition streaming services and especially Netflix were mentioned for the first time since the survey was first published 11 years ago. Moreover, Netflix was named an important influencing factor on German television. Therefore, they state that television lost the uniqueness as a medium (LMA 2015: 16). Television in Germany is still the strongest media when measuring the opinion-forming influence. According to the German LMA-Medienkonvergenzmonitor 2 television contributed with around 36% to the formation of opinion. The second most influential media are still newspapers accounting for a total of 21% in 2015. The Internet is in third place with 20.6% only slightly behind the medium of newspapers (LMA 2015: 12). However, as the following diagram illustrates both television and newspapers lost influence in the period of seven years of about 5% each. By comparison the influence of the Internet grew by around 7.5% in the indicated period. 1 Institute for the Federal Media in Germany 2 Institute for the Federal Media that publishes a monitoring report about media convergence including 2 Institute for the Federal Media that publishes a monitoring report about media convergence including data of all existing LMA of each federal state in Germany 2 Image 1: Opinion-forming importance of media from 2009–2015 (TNS Infratest: Medien Vielfalts Monitor 1/2015) Television is still the leading media in Germany, however these numbers show that the Internet rapidly caught up and the same development is expected to repeat itself in the coming years. Based on this development and my working experience in the German television industry video on demand and streaming services (e.g. Netflix, Sky) are what television producers fear the most. Especially during the last ten years the television landscape changed drastically due