This thesis investigates the implications of Media Prima Berhad’s (MPB) corporate growth. MPB is the largest media group in Malaysia and is highly influential due to its ownership status. The expansion has been influential as it has transformed the local television industry into a concentrated state with the potential to create a monopoly and limit competition in the small market. The study aims at addressing two main research questions. What are the transformations that have taken place in the local TV market and content industry since MPB consolidation? How do media practitioners employ space for freedom of expression and generate new ideas in television production? The study also intends to discover the differences of MPB TV networks programming in terms of local and imported content and informative and entertainment content since MPB conglomeration. The investigation is executed using a political economy framework that highlights the interrelationship of state governance in the development of the communication industry for national prosperity. The historical approach of the Malaysian television industry blends the key state policies and incidentals that contribute to the restructuring of the industry. Semi-­‐structured interviews were conducted to address the issue of MPB’s transformation in the post-­‐conglomeration era, whilst content analysis of MPB TV networks’ programming identifies the implications of MPB’s corporate expansion for its television programming, particularly entertainment, informative, local and foreign programmes. Two main findings were identified. MPB’s corporate expansion had concentrated the local television market. The adoption of a cost-­‐saving strategy and sharing of resources have been the keys to success. MPB is an integrated media corporation that has performed horizontal and vertical integration to strengthen its performance within the local broadcasting industry. The platform for creative expression and information remains limited. Repositioning of 8TV and TV9 has transformed the stations’ programming since conglomeration, whilst Chinese and religious programming emerged from the corporate expansion strategy.

This project is based around three main themes, which are developed in seven chapters. Firstly, we trace the development of a conventional wisdom about television, following 300 years of theory about public goods. This has now been comprehensively challenged, to the extent that today, the only convincing rationale for public intervention is that it should provide something distinctively different. Markets have proved to be very successful at delivering television, although they fail to provide a full range of programme types, or to serve the full range of tastes. There is argued to be a role for a "gap filling" social planner. This role must be seen in a broader context than usual, because gap-filler also causes indirect, spill-over effects onto other broadcasters. More subtle effects depend on how distinctive is the public broadcaster's programme profile, and whether it also sells advertising. We show this with a model of product differentiation in the tradition of Hotelling and Cournot, with special features that capture the unusual nature of the television market: in particular the role of third-party payment by advertisers. We embed this in a practical context, by designing and applying a series of quantitative performance indicators, measuring the extent to which British and New Zealand public broadcasters are truly distinctive. Thirdly, this project examines the quasi-market mechanisms introduced into television's finance and delivery. New Zealand and Britain offer two extremely different versions of these new kinds of economic arrangements, which emerged widely throughout the public sector in the 1990s, in attempts to marry the benefits of markets and competition with traditional ideals and mechanisms of public service. This gives us a unique laboratory with which to examine their effects, with all the more resonance given that television has always been one of the "classic" public goods. Their experience has been less encouraging than expected, which we argue occurred because the quasi-market objectives in both countries were ambiguous, and not backed up with appropriate mechanisms for monitoring and reward. This theme is particularly topical, given intensifying recent calls for British public broadcasting to follow the very radical New Zealand model. We conclude by asking whether television is still the best vehicle through which to deliver public service, given the potential of new technologies such as the Internet.

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This thesis examines the ascendancy of MTV (Music Television) in Europe. It concentrates, above all, on the period between 1987-1996, which represents the phase when the channel was transmitted as a single pan-European network. This thesis is an interdisciplinary study that offers a reading of music television texts in relation to the institutional context in which messages are produced and the different cultural contexts in which they are received. The analysis begins by locating the phenomenon of MTV within the political economy of the music and media industries. The factors which constitute the 'novelty' of MTV as a particular type of TV (i.e. a branded channel) in relation to a particular type of audience (i.e. the 'youth' who were traditionally out of the reach of terrestrial broadcasters) are assessed. The panEuropean dimension of MTV is subsequently incorporated by way of a comparative analysis of the relative failure of the EC's initiatives to develop a pan-European broadcasting strategy and the relative success of MTV in this venture. A separate chapter explores the possibility of creating a sense of being European through shared tastes in music. The proposed arguments are then illustrated by case-studies conducted across the contrasting terrain of selected Western and Eastern European countries.

Recent changes in the broadcasting industry and emerging digital media technologies have “disturbed” the traditional economic models supporting the media industry over the last decade, with viewers migrating from traditional media outlets to digital ones causing a severe drop in revenues. Consequently, the competition for viewers’ ratings has intensified dramatically over recent years, with new economic models being introduced and others still under development. In this context, the research presented in this thesis describes in detail an innovative computer model for optimising television programming and scheduling to maximise revenues under given constraints. The research methodology combines academic work along with practitioners’ experiences to build an integer programming model that helps expert programme schedulers to place television programmes in time slots where they achieve optimum ratings within the limitations of the resources available. In building the model, an extensive literature review and media industry experts’ interviews and focus groups discussions were conducted. The value of the model was demonstrated by applying it to a real case as well as hypothetical scenarios for a television station and showing that the model increased potential viewership, on average, between 38% and 63%. The software package used to solve the model should enable the media industry to solve large scale optimisation models using thousands of variables and constraints. This should help media planners and decision makers to plan for months, if not years, ahead.

The increasing flow of international and Western cultural and information input into Iran, via satellite technologies, has affected the traditional, cultural and religious heritage of the country. Considering the political, cultural and economic realities of Iran and the history of its media, this research intends to examine the uneven flow of information and entertainment of global media via satellite in Iran within the context of the international communication and cultural imperialism theory. This study attempts to revise the cultural imperialism theory through a case study and identifies its limitations and the areas that could be developed within its infrastructure such that it will be applicable to the current situation and contemporary arguments of the media flow. It reviews the cultural imperialism theory in the light of the active audience's perspective and analyses the mixed and contradictory dynamics of reconstruction, adoption and resistance of international media. This research analyses the emergence of Persian language satellite television news and entertainment in Iran. A mixture of political, cultural and economic pressures dominates the editorial conduct of those expatriate and Persian language satellite channels. Political pressures, however, seem to be playing the most apparent role in that process. This study critically analyses the activities of Jaam-e-Jam and VOA Persian language satellite channels and examines the factors that affect the editorial policies and practice of the studied channels. It addresses these issues by studying the evolution, style of ownership, organisational structure, and content as well as editorial and managerial power hierarchy of those channels. In order to asses the attitudes, and encoded messages of these stations, a combination of content and discourse analysis is used. This research also empirically examines the audience's response in a detailed focus group investigation to see how they perceive and interpret the encoded messages.

This thesis reports a study of the role of public service broadcasting with special attention given to the impact of the advent of digital television in Taiwan. The emergence of digital television has brought significant changes in the television landscape and is seen as a challenge to public service broadcasting. This thesis focuses on how the introduction of digital television influences public service broadcasting. Data were collected from a range of documents produced by government and public broadcasters’ reports as well as articles by journalists, academic writers and a number of other sources. Further data were obtained via in-depth interviews with nine expert informants who are the key actors in public service broadcasting or digital television fields in Taiwan. The main findings are discussed in three parts. First, the concept of public service broadcasting is dynamic, which can change over time and be interpreted in different ways in different contexts. Second, the impact of the introduction of digital television on public service broadcasting is examined from four aspects: [1] Organisational issues; [2] Financial issues; [3] Programming issues; [4] Regulatory issues. Although it is recognised that the arrival of digital television has influenced on public service broadcasting, the impact in Taiwan is not as strong as in Western Europe. In addition, the introduction of digital television is seen as an opportunity for the reinforcement of public service broadcasting. Third, the changes in public service broadcasting can be discussed from three aspects: [1] Institutional aspects; [2] Positions in the market; [3] Roles in society. A significant change is that the public broadcasters have expanded in terms of the increase in channels. However, the limited funding and uncertain policy present major problems for the public broadcasters. In conclusion, the government plays a vital role in the development of public service broadcasting in Taiwan.

This thesis investigates the infomercial phenomenon in New Zealand from 1994 to 2003. It critically examines the infomercial as a form of television by developing analyses using a combination of research methodologies. These analyses proceed from a political-economic standpoint, with particular reference to the regulatory framework for television in New Zealand and the economic model of the infomercial. This thesis situates the infomercial within the historical development of television in New Zealand and draws upon the insights of the marketing and advertising literature in which the infomercial is seen as a persuasive tool, rather than a media formation. My fundamental argument is that the infomercial does represent an alternative formation within commercial television that is separate from advertising and programming (or 'editorial'). This is based upon the fundamental model of communication which underpins the infomercial and, in turn, the duplicity upon which this model is based. This thesis will demonstrate the remarkable degree to which the infomercial became a constituent feature of the wider system of television in New Zealand. It will also show how advertisers deploy the infomercial, how broadcasters rationalise its place in their schedules, and how viewers respond to the messages it contains, even if they do not purchase the advertised product. Further, this thesis will demonstrate the effects of permitting a non-mainstream form of broadcasting to occupy such a central role, with particular reference to the cultural meanings that can be mobilised around the infomercial. The thesis will also investigate the consequences of the New Zealand experiment where almost total broadcasting deregulation allows for the presence of a form of commercial speech that relentlessly addresses viewers as individuated consumers.

This thesis addresses the broad question: To what extent is children's animation culturally specific? Despite the criticism and concerns about the lack of quality imprinted by globalisation and commercialism, children's animation is still a relatively marginal subject of analysis. Thus, the need to perceive what characterises a programme aiming both at home and international markets; the mechanisms underlying the globalisation of the genre; and its implications on cultural identity. The research is based on a triangular model that considers three levels of communication: production, message and reception. It makes use of semiotics, interviews and task-oriented techniques to analyse different moments in the communication process. The aim is to understand how animation professionals construct child audiences, and how such constructions are reflected in the media texts they produce and/or broadcast; while, at the same time, assessing how a group of Portuguese children 'use' animation. The results suggest that creatives of children's animation are aware of the importance of cultural relevant products, but may lack an informed knowledge of the child audiences. As a consequence, children do not always decode cartoon messages accordingly - particularly signifiers of 'cultural specificity'. In relation to the globalisation of children's animation, the data shows that market oriented productions can be made relevant for local audiences, and that their contents are often re-invented by children. The study calls for further research into animation contents and for a greater inclusion of young audiences both in academic studies and in programme production.