News From You

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Week ending March 16, 2013

VPRT - Keine Kommerzialisierung der öffentlich-rechtlichen Mediatheken - March 13, 2013
from Gesa Klebe/VPRT

Der Verband Privater Rundfunk und Telemedien e.V. (VPRT) hat die Forderung des ZDF, als eine der Rahmenbedingungen für einen Jugendkanal die „Öffnung des Telemedienangebotes“ zu verlangen, deutlich zurückgewiesen. „Die Kommerzialisierung der Mediatheken steht nicht zur Disposition des ZDF“, so VPRT-Geschäftsführer Claus Grewenig.

Das ZDF hatte sich für einen Wegfall der 7-Tage-Regelung und die Möglichkeit, auch Kaufserien und Spielfilme in der Mediathek zeigen zu können, ausgesprochen. „Fernsehrat sticht Intendanz: Wenn man die jüngsten Äußerungen insbesondere des Gremienvorsitzenden liest, könnte man den Eindruck gewinnen, dass die Anstalten bei den Einstellfristen immer an sieben Tage gebunden wären. Das ist nicht der Fall. Der Drei-Stufen-Test lässt Abweichungen in Telemedienkonzepten ausdrücklich zu. Davon haben ZDF und die ARD auch in großem Umfang Gebrauch gemacht.“ Etwas anderes gelte – aus gutem Grund – für Fremdproduktionen und Lizenzware: „Kaufserien und Spielfilme sind in großer Vielfalt im Markt verfügbar – werbefinanziert und als Bezahlmodelle. Verweildauerkonzepte und inhaltliche Begrenzungen des öffentlich-rechtlichen Angebots sind daher eine sorgfältige austarierte Grenze, die beihilferechtliche Vorgaben der EU-Kommission umsetzt und die Marktauswirkungen auf privatfinanzierte Medien berücksichtigt.“

Die privaten Anbieter seien ausdrücklich offen dafür, mögliche Optimierungen im Drei-Stufen-Testverfahren gemeinsam zu diskutieren. Dies gelte jedoch nicht für die Auswertungsverbote: „Mit ZDFneo greift das ZDF bereits heute massiv in den bestehenden Programm- und Rechtemarkt mit den Privaten ein. Eine Fortsetzung dieser Strategie in gebührenfinanzierten Mediatheken ist nicht zulässig.“

University of Westminster launches new Centre for Social Media Research and MA in Social Media - March 12, 2013
from Chiara Barreca for Uni Westminster

The University of Westminster has launched a new Centre for Social Media Research (CSMR) and a new Masters degree in Social Media. The CSMR will conduct and coordinate research into social, cultural, and political-economic aspects of social media, and will also explore how social media might transform the practice of research itself.

The centre will be led by Professor David Gauntlett, and the MA programme by Professor Christian Fuchs and Professor Graham Meikle, who both joined the School of Media, Arts and Design in February 2013 to teach and research in the area of social media. They add to the existing strengths of Westminster’s media research community, which was top-rated in the last UK Research Assessment Exercise, joining other key social media researchers including Dr Anastasia Kavada and Dr Daniel Trottier.

Westminster’s MA in Social Media will welcome its first students in September 2013. “We’ll be using social media to explore theories and concepts,” said Professor Meikle. “Students will be blogging about course readings, posting online videos about ideas from their modules, sharing photo essays. It’s a rigorous theoretical degree and also an exciting and creative course.”

“Social media is a new frontier in theory and research,” said Professor Fuchs. “The Centre for Social Media Research is a leading environment for analysing the implications of social media for society. The new MA in Social Media will be based on research-inspired teaching conducted by leading scholars in this exciting interdisciplinary field of inquiry”.

Commenting on the new MA in Social Media, Geoffrey Davies, Head of the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication, said: “I’m very excited that we are adding this course to our excellent portfolio and have attracted such stellar names to teach on it. We already have postgraduates taking senior positions in social media and we can now equip them with an even greater knowledge.”

Asked whether ‘social media’ is a fashionable phrase with little longevity, Professor Gauntlett replied: “No, it’s actually a very good term for the kinds of media which are today transforming our social, cultural and economic worlds: media which rely on networks of human self-expression, where millions of people are creators rather than just consumers. As a phenomenon it’s quite new and it’s highly significant”.

The new Centre for Social Media Research will launch itself with a major international conference, Social Media, in London on 2-3 September 2013. The conference will be the fourth in the University of Westminster’s Transforming Audiences series, held every two years since 2007, attracting key scholars and researchers from around the world.

Previous News From You

News From You: Week ending March 9, 2013

News From You: Week ending March 2, 2013

News From You: Week ending February 16, 2013

News From You: Week ending January 26, 2013

News From You: Week ending January 12, 2013

News From You: Week ending December 15, 2012

News From You: Week ending November 24, 2012

News From You: Week ending October 27, 2012