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Game of Screens

  • Tom Evens
  • Karen Donders
Chapter
First Online:
Part of the Palgrave Global Media Policy and Business book series (GMPB)

Abstract

The chapter describes the evolution of connected viewing, which represents a fundamental shift in the media ecosystem, putting pressuring on the power relationships within the contemporary television industry. It involves a massive shift in screen consumption and impacts the time and money viewers spend on television. The chapter discusses the functional equivalence of traditional and over-the-top platforms, questioning to what extent legacy and new television services are substitutes or complements. The chapter sheds light on the trends of cord cutting and cord shaving, and provides a number of factors that make local media markets more or less vulnerable to these threats. The final section focuses on the competitive responses of television incumbents to preserve their gatekeeping position and discusses some sources of structural power in the era of Internet-distributed television. A case note shows how Netflix pressures traditional media organisations to explore new capabilities that deal with algorithmic and data-driven models.

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© The Author(s) 2018

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.imec-mict, Department of Communication SciencesGhent UniversityGhentBelgium
  2. 2.imec-SMIT, Department of Communication SciencesFree University of BrusselsBrusselsBelgium

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