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The dissertation explores the issue of culture and power on the Internet. Specifically, using an ethnographic approach to a website of a Korean drama, primarily its BBS section, the dissertation focuses on examining the utopian discourse of the Internet as free, equal, and democratic space and as a revolutionary user-centered medium. This study finds three aspects of the Internet in terms of culture and power. First, the Internet is a communal but exclusive space: although the participants tend to construct the BBS as a community, the community is not so much free, equal, and democratic as the utopians emphasize. In the process of constructing and maintaining the BBS as a community, the participants create new forms of identities, hierarchies, and disparities within the BBS. And the new forms of identities, hierarchies, and disparities are related to those in embodied world. In other words, the Internet is another hegemonic space and thus another space for hegemonic struggles over power. Second, the Internet is a participatory but one-way space: the users of the website as the audience are very active and even aggressive for interacting with the production side of the drama and for participating in the production process of the drama. However, the production side of the drama has a non-participatory and indifferent attitude to interact with the users. In other words, the website is not an interactive space but still a one-way space. This result problematizes the utopian assumption of the Internet's interactivity and its role as empowering audiences over the production of media content. The result also reminds us that the issue of the interactivity of media should be understood not only as the issue of technology but also as the issue of overall media structure and industry. Third, the Internet is a diverse but hegemonic space: although the participants' interpretations of the drama are diverse, they seem not to be free from the authorship of the drama unlike the utopian assumption of the Internet's hypertextuality and its role. The participants in particular produce an overwhelming number of dominant readings that reinforce dominant Korean culture. Most of the patterns that the participants produce in these dominant readings are significantly related to the logics of the narrative structure of the drama. The results of my research warn us to equate the participants' activeness on the Internet with the participants' power over the production of meanings of hypertexts.

In August of 1974, the French broadcasting system underwent a change in organizational structure. L'Office de Radiodiffusion-Television Francaise was reorganized into seven companies, each with a specific responsibility. The extent of the change is debatable but there is little doubt that Valery Giscard d'Estaing's intent was to effect a system freer from governmental control and bring about fiscal responsibility. The extent of the achievement of these goals is the subject of this dissertation. Chapter One examines the social, cultural, and political climate of France. The chapter reveals a country with contradictory philosophies and a strong desire to hold on to the past. Chapter Two reviews the literature in the related fields of economics, sociology, political science, history, and communications. The historical perspective highlights contradictions in systems theory, especially in the areas of goals and organizational structure. Chapter Three describes the French system with particular emphasis on organizational structure. The West German system is also cited for comparison. Chapter Four examines government documents which indicate that the system does not function efficiently. Financial reports indicate the new system became more and more dependent on commercials and tax revenues. Both increases were counter to the intent of the reorganization. Chapter Five summarizes the dissertation and offers the following conclusions: (1) Reorganization or initiation of a media system must take into account the culture, heritage, economic traits, and political philosophies that have contributed to the uniqueness of that country. (2) Reorganization should be undertaken with consideration of international as well as national implications. (3) Reorganization should involve the entire country rather than a political power structure. (4) Reorganization should begin with a goal-oriented agenda. (5) Reorganization must be structured to permit internal flexibility. (6) The new structure should be technologically compatible to existing systems and if possible to one universally established system.

Traumatic, cataclysmic events, whether caused by man-made or natural forces, threaten the safety, stability, and resilience of a community or state. Additionally, massive media exposure given to documenting and providing information, place the media consumers at psychological risk. As an alternative to broadcast news reports, online memorials and disaster archives provide the public the means and central locations for witnessing catastrophic events, as well as collectively commemorating and mourning the tragic losses. According to psychological and ethnographic research, narrativizing the trauma through shared memories and artifacts of mourning produce multiple therapeutic benefits, including the likely development of cognitive awareness, empathy, and catharsis. Complicating these benefits, however, are psychological risks of secondary trauma resulting from archiving and curating disaster collections, and the potential for economic and political exploitation. The participatory disaster archives are embedded in trauma culture, serving as public witnesses to survivors of trauma and reinforcing the medical, social, and civic infrastructures associated with a community's recovery from and resilience to calamities. Ironically, the confluence of public archive/memorials with medical and other socio-technical institutions that facilitate recovery from crises, also contribute to trauma culture's sustenance. This dissertation investigates the effects of digitally archiving and memorializing traumatic events through an interdisciplinary methodology of critical cultural studies and ethnography. I argue that participatory disaster archives may both mitigate psychological risks and augment social benefits through adopting protocols of best practice.

According to the Nielsen Music 360 Research Report, 67% of all music consumers in the United States used digital music streaming services to listen, discover, and share music online in 2014 (The Nielsen Company, 2014). As such, communications scholars and music industry professionals are beginning to recognize the importance of understanding the factors that influence digital music listener behavior. Therefore, this study proposes an expanded theory of planned behavior model (TPB) by incorporating music streaming motives, social identification, and technological engagement into the original TPB model framework in an effort to gain a better understanding of people's intentions to use digital music streaming services as well as the amount of time spent listening to them. Results suggest that both the original TPB and expanded TPB models can be successfully applied within the context of digital music streaming service use. Specifically, attitudes as well as convenience emerged as positive contributors to intention to use digital music streaming services, while entertainment along with social identification, technological engagement, and behavioral intention emerged as positive contributors to streaming behavior. Additionally, information seeking and pass time emerged as negative contributors to these two behavioral outcomes. However, adding these additional components only improved the overall ability of the expanded model to predict streaming behavior. Both models also explained a larger percentage of intention to use digital music streaming services as compared to total time spent listening. As a result, this study implies the practical importance of understanding the fundamental differences between what drives listener intentions to use digital music streaming services as compared to what drives the actual amount of time listeners spend using digital music streaming services.

Nostalgia is a complex cognitive and affective experience and has been described by some as a "social emotion" (Goulding, 2002; Merchant & Rose, 2013; Wildschut et al., 2006). Through nostalgic media experiences, people can develop connections to prior eras or periods in society which are accompanied by a range of emotions and feelings. Perceptions of the past are influenced by experiences in the present. Because of this, it is possible that people's perceptions of their current political climates and society play a role in how they seek and react to media experiences, including nostalgic media experiences. Considering how the political climate is interwoven in our everyday lives, it is valuable to investigate how sociopolitical experiences might influence the motivations to seek nostalgic media experience and the outcomes of this media experience. The purpose of this study is to explore how different affective states related to appraisals of the present sociopolitical atmosphere might influence an individual's media choice, particularly the exposure to historical nostalgic media content versus non-nostalgic media options and how it affects an individual's affective state, bittersweet emotions, media enjoyment and social connectedness. The results revealed that a significant relationship exists between nostalgia proneness and historical nostalgia media interest, yet there was not a significant positive relationship between negative affect and historical nostalgia media interest. The results also demonstrated that the bittersweet emotion and media enjoyment responses of those who were in a negative affective state and then exposed to historical nostalgic media content were significant compared to those exposed to non-nostalgic media options.