Making Sense of Mobile Media
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Making Sense of Mobile Media Institutional Working Notions, Strategies and Actions in Convergent Media Markets Vilde Schanke Sundet Doctoral thesis submitted for the degree of Ph.D. Faculty of Humanities, University of Oslo, April 2012 i ii Abstract This thesis is a study of how established institutions within the media and telecom industries act in times of change, using the first decade of the 2000s as its time frame. As an emerging field that has inspired high expectations but also much uncertainty, mobile media has been a leading subject of scholarly investigation. Located mainly within the management of technological innovation tradition, this thesis discusses how incumbent institutions, with their legacies from the traditional media and telecom industries, make sense of the mobile device as a media platform, as well as how they translate their perceptions into plans and actions. Furthermore, this thesis connects the development of mobile media to other, more far-reaching developments—technological, cultural and economic—within the media and telecom industries. Hence it considers how mobile-media perceptions and facilitations are related to the more general developments of media convergence, changing audience relations and challenging new- media business models. It concentrates on well-established institutions from the Norwegian media and telecom markets—the incumbent telecom operator Telenor, the public service broadcaster NRK, the tabloid newspaper VG, the commercial television channel TV 2 and the commercial radio channel P4 in particular. This thesis relies upon a multifold definition of the term “strategy” and distinguishes further among strategies as plans, patterns and perspectives. Hence, it analyses not only what these institutions say they plan to do (and what they actually do) regarding mobile media but also the foundation of these decisions—that is, industry perceptions and working notions. The latter term is given particular attention in this thesis, because analyses of strategies as plans or patterns can mislead us into believing that the institution’s decision-making processes are linear and rational and driven by well-documented goals and aims. On the other hand, studies that incorporate working notions—where different working notions compete and where the dominant working notion might even change over time—provide a more chaotic but ultimately more dynamic and realistic representation of reality. This thesis aims to substantiate why, and outline how, this is so. iii iv Preface This thesis is the result of a PhD project on mobile media initiated and financed by Telenor in 2006. During the project period, I have been involved in several research projects and networks, most importantly Participation and Play in Converging Media (PaP) at the Department of Media and Communication, University of Oslo. I have partaken in much collaborative work that has been important for this study. Not surprisingly, the PhD project has changed over time, regarding both its subject and its conceptual framework. The project began with an interest in mobile media and the ways in which key industry players acted towards this emerging field. It took a detour to address media convergence, audience participation and new media business models more generally, before it again went back to the field of mobile media—now with the aim of combining these various elements in a study about how incumbent institutions perceived and facilitated change and innovation with mobile media as the chief subject of study. The project is here presented as a so-called article-based thesis. It consists of two main parts: a “final” contribution (in Norwegian called “kappe”, which could be translated as either “cloak” or “casing”, in part I) and several articles (in part II). The article-based thesis is a relatively new genre in Norwegian media studies, and it is still working on finding its form. Although several other article-based theses do exist, no dominant style has yet presented itself. It is therefore not only a difficult format to write but also, most likely, to read, as it comprises several different texts, written at different times, with different scopes, in somewhat different styles. A few words of advice on how to read it might therefore be appropriate. The final contribution is typically written last, yet it is presented first. It is intended to be more than an introduction; it is a metatext that is supposed to summarise the thesis, contextualise it, point to its main conclusions and present it as an integrated whole. It is based on analyses and findings from the articles, although these are presented afterward. Hence the final contribution involves the difficult tasks of both bringing together the overall research project as it has developed over time and elaborating upon the implications of its findings. My final contribution consists of seven chapters, all presented in the first part of the thesis. Chapter 1 introduces the subject of interest, relevant research questions and theoretical framework, mainly from within the management of technological innovation scholarly tradition. Chapter 2 presents the research strategy and methodological foundation for the thesis. Chapter 3 gives a brief history of the Norwegian mobile media market, as it developed in the analysed period from 2000 to 2009. Chapters 4, 5 and 6 relate key mobile-media working notions, plans and actions to the more overarching tendencies of media convergence, changing user patterns and new media business models, respectively. Chapter 7 summarises key findings from the thesis and points to its theoretical implications. v The articles form the foundation for the final contribution and represent my main empirical investigations. They are all written with a dual purpose: to form the basis of the overall PhD project and be part of the thesis, and to be published as independent journal articles or book chapters. They have been written at different times and reflect therefore the various, somewhat independent stages of the PhD project. Six research articles make up the second part of this thesis. Three of the articles are single authored (articles I, IV and V), and three are co-authored (articles II, III and IV). Article I analyses how and why the four selected media institutions accommodate mobile media through their WAP portals and argues that platform expansion strategies are driven by industry perceptions of media convergence. Articles II and III look at how executives in the Norwegian media industry perceive and accommodate audience participation, in particular via SMS and mobile technology; they thus relate mobile media to larger developments in audience participation. Article IV investigates how the public service broadcaster NRK perceives and facilitates mobile media in its Rubenmann project, addressing the broadcaster’s working notions of the mobile phone as a media platform as well as its future in new media. Article V analyses how the telecom incumbent Telenor both perceives and approaches the mobile-media landscape using its mobile music and mobile football services as objects of study. Finally, article VI analyses how new media platforms—and the mobile phone in particular—can be addressed as “substitutes” capable of challenging existing media and telecom institutions and their business models. As a new PhD genre, the article-based thesis has both benefits and challenges. On the plus side, it allows for the division of a larger project into more manageable parts, for co-writing and collaboration with others, and for journal publishing during the project period. On the minus side, it is clearly challenging to synthesise, as it consist of different types of texts, written at different times and with somewhat different purposes. Because I have been involved in a number of larger research projects, the benefits of the article-based thesis stood out as more profound than its challenges. Yet this thesis has been difficult to write nevertheless, in particular because both the article-based genre and collaborations with others tend to draw attention away from the core of an individual PhD project. Still, it proved true that learning how to collaborate and co- write with other and more experienced researchers while building on the cumulative knowledge of a range of research projects outweighed the challenging aspects of collecting various texts and then present them as a cohesive whole. vi Acknowledgements This thesis would never have come to be without the support and contributions of a wide range of people and institutions. Wholehearted thanks go to my three supervisors, Trine Syvertsen, Tanja Storsul and Anders Henten, for wisely guiding me through the PhD period. I particularly thank Trine for staying with me in the last, toughest phase. My thanks also go to Telenor for financing this thesis as an external research project, and to the Norwegian Council of Applied Media Research (Rådet for anvendt medieforskning) for additional funding in the early phase. My work has mainly been conducted from the Department of Media and Communication at the University of Oslo, and I would like to thank the department for providing both supportive and inspiring working conditions, including a good PhD programme. Thanks also to Jonathan Aronsen at the Annenberg Centre of Communication for letting me stay at the University of Southern California for some lovely spring months in 2007, and to my current workplace, the Norwegian Ministry of Culture, for being so supportive. An important part of this thesis was simply talking to people who were working in the convergent media industry, and I would like to thank all of my sixty-four informants for finding the time to participate in this study. Hopefully, you will recognise the reality I describe in my analysis. During the PhD period, I have been lucky to be involved in several research groups and networks that have contributed to my thoughts and work, most importantly Participation and Play in Converging Media (PaP) but also NIPS and Amateurs # Professionals. Much collaborative work has been done in these groups and networks, and I would like to thank all of the participants for making research such a social and fun thing to do.