What has been the impact of the internet on media production?
The impact of the internet has been revolutionary on media production, specifically the media areas of video games and film.
In the past video games production has been based convergence with other industries and competition with other companies. They also had to make physical copies of the games which cost a lot more to make and to run the factories compared with the current digital distribution market. Research was mainly based on competition from the other video games companies and was done by researching in physical reviews and copies of the games.
In the past we purchased physical consoles and games. For example our first games consoles were the Sega Megadrive and the Nintendo 64, with our first handheld consoles being Nintendo Gameboy Colour and Original Gameboy. These were all included in physical distribution, with no online presence to help sell or to add features to the game such as multiplayer gameplay. Marketing for these older cartridge based consoles would have been primarily television, word of mouth and magazines. Angry Birds definitely would not have existed in the past, because it uses the app store as an online distribution platform for mobiles. Games such as the EA Skate series could have existed, however only as offline competition/campaign/free skate mode. In the past Tony Hawks dominated the skateboarding game market.
Thanks to the Internet, there has been a recent increase in online distribution such as the EA store(origin), App Store and other mobile app stores and Steam. This allowed for smaller companies such as Rovio to create new apps such as Angry Birds to be distributed online. This then allowed for easy access to the game and future updates to be downloaded. The app store also shows another method of marketing allowing companies to place in game adverts in certain apps. Angry Birds also included many spin offs of its game and allowed for paid versions of the app with extra characters and levels. This is how the small company, Rovio, made their money. Being a online distributor of games, the app store saves money for companies by being able to sell the game just online and not making any physical copies. However after a few years of making the game it changed its distribution to multiple platforms which included PS3 and Xbox 360.
Skate is an example of a game series which has taken advantage of the Internet and its use of a social network. This is because Skate allows consumers to become prosumers by creating their own content for the game on skate.create and sharing it on their skate.feed. This distributes the game around their social network for their fellow skaters to share, comment, rate and consume the product. This all come from the use of web 2.0 and the fact it allows you to interact with information on the internet. This is also an example of 'change acceleration' because we as prosumers are pushing our own content 'horizontally' to each other instead of just the creators pushing the content 'vertically' down to us.
The future of video games is already happening now but at a slow pace. This is because companies like Onlive are creating streaming services that allow you to not even purchase a console. This also has created a new social network among the onlive crowd that allows you to be an audience to other gamers. There is also an increase in online distribution which seems to be pushing physical copies out of the way. The only limitation so far for this technology is the bandwidth of consumers internet. Most people don't have the internet speed to stream or even download games. The Oculus Rift is an example of a virtual reality console which attempt to pick up the failure of the past technology such as the Nintendo Virtual Boy. The future may also bring more prosumers creating their own content and putting the anonymity into the video games industry. This is because the line between being a professional and being a consumer is thin and soon there won't be a difference.
FIlm
In the past buying a camera was expensive for the consumer and so prosumer film production wasn't popular. The only usage of Super 8mm cameras was for holiday or home videos. There was no anonymity in the past because the difference between the professional and the consumer was clear. This is because there was no easy to use or affordable device that could come of use to become a prosumer. Thanks to the Internet this market has picked up. Without the Internet the main distribution method was on VHS or on the TV/Cinema. This shows that mostly professional films would have been shown and that Indie films were harder to get seen or noticed. Local film festivals would of screened indie films and would of been the only way to see them. Nelson Madison and Jonasson movies are independent film production companies that distribute their films onto YouTube. Without the Internet, their services would not have existed and many Indie Films would not have been seen.
Whereas now, we can see many Indie films online by looking on websites such as YouTube. Indie Rights distributes the film productions of Nelson Madison films. They distribute solely on YouTube and take advantage of their rental features. This has come from the easy to use cameras that now dominate the market and allow for normal consumers of professional films to become prosumers and create their own films. This creates anonymity in the film market because there is unknown interactions by who has made the film whether it be a professional or a normal consumer. Andrew Keen is a skeptic of Web 2.0 as he doesn't like the 'free-market' of consumers sharing low quality content on websites such as YouTube, as the 'amateurisation' is affecting the film industry.
The future will be tough for the film industry, consumers will continue to legally and illegally stream/download films using web 2.0 and the internet, and the industry will have to come up with different ways to get consumers back into the cinema watching films. Different technological changes in the industry will create an interest in going to the cinema, such as 48 frames per second, higher quality projections and larger screens; these changes will make people want to go to the cinema.
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