WhatsApp is the most popular messaging platform in over 80% of countries in West Africa, and a daily port of call for a wide range of information and services. This edited collection seeks to examine the impact that this transformative technology has had beyond the much-discussed role it has played in the spread of misinformation, and explore more widely the fundamental changes that WhatsApp has brought to many citizens' lives in social, economic and political contexts. Ranging across subjects including political organisation, religious practice, and family relations, each author in this volume brings direct knowledge and testimony of the impact of WhatsApp across West African society.

"The most important book to be written in more than 40 years about the rise of Canadian literature... Arrival: The Story of CanLit brims and crackles, in equal measure, with information and energy." - Winnipeg Free Press A Globe and Mail Top 100 Book National Post 99 Best Books of the Year In the mid-twentieth century, Canadian literature transformed from a largely ignored trickle of books into an enormous cultural phenomenon that produced Margaret Atwood, Alice Munro, Michael Ondaatje, Mordecai Richler, and so many others. In Arrival, acclaimed writer and critic Nick Mount answers the question: What caused the CanLit Boom? Written with wit and panache, Arrival tells the story of Canada's literary awakening. Interwoven with Mount's vivid tale are enlightening mini-biographies of the people who made it happen, from superstars Leonard Cohen and Marie-Claire Blais to lesser-known lights like the troubled and impassioned Harold Sonny Ladoo. The full range of Canada's literary boom is here: the underground exploits of the blew ointment and Tish gangs; revolutionary critical forays by highbrow academics; the blunt-force trauma of our plain-spoken backwoods poetry; and the urgent political writing that erupted from the turmoil in Quebec. Originally published to coincide with the 150th anniversary of Canadian Confederation, Arrival is a dazzling, variegated, and inspired piece of writing that helps explain how we got from there to here.

This important volume examines European perspectives on the historical relations that women have maintained with information and communication technologies (ICTs), since the telegraph. Features: describes how gendered networks have formed around ICT since the late 19th Century; reviews the gendered issues revealed by the conflict between the actress Ms Sylviac and the French telephone administration in 1904, or by 'feminine' blogs; examines how gender representations, age categories, and uses of ICT interact and are mutually formed in children's magazines; illuminates the participation of women in the early days of computing, through a case study on the Rothamsted Statistics Department; presents a comparative study of women in computing in France, Finland and the UK, revealing similar gender divisions within the ICT professions of these countries; discusses diversity interventions and the part that history could (and should) play to ensure women do not take second place in specific occupational sectors.

Convergence: User Expectations, Communications Enablers and Business Opportunities offers a user-centric and business-oriented analysis of the rapidly changing communications industry. Clear summaries of key technology areas provide the backdrop for an extensive analysis of the expectations set by users and the challenges and opportunities this presents to companies.

The process of convergence is characterised by complex interactions between different technical fields, business areas and end-user relations, where traditional telecommunications services, internet-based services and media broadcast services are blending into a continuum of rich new offerings. With these changes the existing hardwired links between user services and specific industry segments are rapidly dissolving. Presents guide to end-user market trends and expectations Includes models and analysis of new industry structures and dynamics Contains comprehensive discussion of innovation as a business driver Provides wide range of references to reflect the cross-disciplinary scope of convergence Offers motivation and suggestions for refocus of key business strategies

Convergence bridges the fields of business, economics, technology and social studies and analyses business models and practices from across a range of industry segments. The wide scope makes the book an ideal text for technically-minded executives, business-oriented engineers and anyone with an interest in the intricacies of the convergence triggered market changes.

The triumph of image over reality and reason is the theme of this book. New communication technologies have made possible the transportation of images and words in real time to hundreds of millions of people around the world. We thought we witnessed the Gulf War as we sat, mesmerized by the imagery. But the studies from the many countries assembled for this book suggest that it was not the war in the Persian Gulf that we witnessed but rather imagery orchestrated to convey a sense of triumph and thus to achieve results that reality and reason could never have achieved.The book offers contributions from thirty-four authors in eighteen countries, including short samplings from the media of several regions. The authors explore the social, economic, and political context of media coverage in their countries, the domination of one image in most of them, and the struggle for alternative perspectives. The authors probe the dynamics of image-making and pose some challenges for the future as well as provide us with a unique glimpse of how the world outside of the United States (as well as many Americans) viewed the war in the Persian Gulf and how the dynamics of image-making and information control operate."Triumph of the Image" will be useful to scholars and students in communications and mass media, international relations, political science, cultural studies, propaganda, censorship, and contemporary history as well as to the general public.

Media Economics: Theory and Practice focuses on the basic principles of economics in the business sector and applies them to contemporary media industries. This text examines the process of media economics decision making through an exploration of key topics, such as industrial restructuring, regulatory constraints upon media operations, and changing economic value, providing key insights into media business activities. With the structure and value of media industries changing rapidly and sometimes dramatically, this text moves beyond a basic documentation of historical patterns to help readers understand the mechanics of change, offering insight into the processes reproducing contemporary trends in media economics. Thoroughly updated in this third edition, Media Economics focuses on the primary concerns of media economics, the techniques of economic and business analysis, and the overall characteristics of the media environment; and explores contemporary business practices within specific media industries, including newspaper, magazine, television, cable, movie, radio advertising, music, and online industries. New for this edition are chapters on the advertising, book publishing, and magazine publishing industries. Chapters contributed by expert scholars and researchers provide substantial discussions of the crucial topics and issues in the media industry sectors, and emphasize both domestic and international businesses. Offering a thorough examination of the economic factors and forces concerning the media industries, Media Economics is appropriate for use as a course text for advanced media management and economics students. It also serves as an indispensable reference for scholars and researchers in media business arenas.

Provides an introduction of the data industry to the field of economics This book bridges the gap between economics and data science to help data scientists understand the economics of big data, and enable economists to analyze the data industry. It begins by explaining data resources and introduces the data asset. This book defines a data industry chain, enumerates data enterprises business models versus operating models, and proposes a mode of industrial development for the data industry. The author describes five types of enterprise agglomerations, and multiple industrial cluster effects. A discussion on the establishment and development of data industry related laws and regulations is provided. In addition, this book discusses several scenarios on how to convert data driving forces into productivity that can then serve society. This book is designed to serve as a reference and training guide for ata scientists, data-oriented managers and executives, entrepreneurs, scholars, and government employees. * Defines and develops the concept of a Data Industry, and explains the economics of data to data scientists and statisticians * Includes numerous case studies and examples from a variety of industries and disciplines * Serves as a useful guide for practitioners and entrepreneurs in the business of data technology The Data Industry: The Business and Economics of Information and Big Data is a resource for practitioners in the data science industry, government, and students in economics, business, and statistics. CHUNLEI TANG, Ph.D., is a research fellow at Harvard University. She is the co-founder of Fudan s Institute for Data Industry and proposed the concept of the data industry . She received a Ph.D. in Computer and Software Theory in 2012 and a Master of Software Engineering in 2006 from Fudan University, Shanghai, China.

Institutions in Recife, Brazil, have restructured subsidies in favor of encouraging musicians to become more entrepreneurial. Falina Enriquez explores how contemporary and traditional musicians in the fabled musical city have negotiated these intensified neoliberal cultural policies and economic uncertainties. Drawing on years of fieldwork, Enriquez shows how forcing artists to adopt "neutral" market solutions reinforces, and generates, overlapping racial and class-based inequalities. Lacking the social and financial resources of their middle-class peers, working-class musicians find it difficult to uphold institutional goals of connecting the city's cultural roots to global markets and consumers. Enriquez also links the artists' situation to that of cultural and creative workers around the world. As she shows, musical sponsorship in Recife and the contemporary gig economy elsewhere employ processes that, far from being neutral, uphold governmental and corporate ideologies that produce social stratification. Rich and vibrant, The Costs of the Gig Economy offers a rare English-language portrait of the changing musical culture in Recife.

Freedom of information is a principle commonly associated with the United States' First Amendment traditions or digital-era technology boosters. Barriers Down reveals its unexpected origins in political, economic, and cultural battles over analog media in the mid-twentieth century. Diana Lemberg traces how the United States shaped media around the world after 1945 under the banner of the "free flow of information," showing how the push for global media access acted as a vehicle for American power. Barriers Down considers debates over civil liberties and censorship in Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and elsewhere alongside Americans' efforts to circumvent foreign regulatory systems in the quest to expand markets and bring their ideas to new publics. Lemberg shows how in the decades following the Second World War American free-flow policies reshaped the world's information landscape, though not always as intended. Through burgeoning information diplomacy and development aid, Washington diffused new media ranging from television and satellite broadcasting to global English. But these actions also spurred overseas actors to articulate alternative understandings of information freedom and of how information flows might be regulated. Bridging the historiographies of the United States in the world, human rights, decolonization and development, and media and technology, Barriers Down excavates the analog roots of digital-age debates over the politics and ethics of transnational information flows.

In every field of mass communications-advertising, entertainment studies, journalism, public relations, radio-television-film, tourism, and visual reporting-professionals understand the importance of storytelling. Regardless of whether the finished product is a commercial, an in-depth investigative piece, a public service campaign, an independent documentary, a travelogue, or a collection of photographs, effective storytelling requires a combination of creativity, empathy, and expertise. Through the innovative technologies and techniques described in this textbook, students will learn how to turn passive readers and viewers into engaged and regular users. The sixteen chapters each include a brief introduction, assignments, simple-to-follow step-by-step exercises, and sources for additional information in which users will learn to produce apps, informational graphics, quick response codes, quizzes, simulations, smartphone and table icons, social media campaigns, three-dimensional pictures, and video. Students will work with the following programs: Blogger, Dreamweaver, Excel, Facebook, GeoCommons, Google Maps, Illustrator, Imgur, iMovie, Infogram, iShowU, JavaScript, JustGive, Kaywa, Kickstarter, LinkedIn, Onvert, Photoshop, Pixel Resort, QuickTime, Reddit, Second Life, SurveyMonkey, TheAppBuilder, Twitter, Vizualize, Wikipedia, Word, WordPress, and YouTube. When digital innovations are added to traditional print and screen presentations, a media user is not only allowed to interact with the information but can also physically engage with the story displayed. Giving students the tools they need to transform their storytelling in this manner is the ultimate goal of this textbook.

Convergence has gained an enormous amount of attention in media studies within the last several years. It is used to describe the merging of formerly distinct functions, markets and fields of application, which has changed the way companies operate and consumers perceive and process media content. These transformations have not only led business practices to change and required companies to adapt to new conditions, they also continue to have a lasting impact on research in this area. This book's main purpose is to shed some light on crucial phenomena of media and convergence management, while also addressing more specific issues brought about by innovations related to media, technologies, industries, business models, consumer behavior and content management.
This book gathers insights from renowned academic researchers and pursues a highly interdisciplinary approach. It will serve as a valuable reference guide for students, practitioners and researchers interested in media convergence processes.

Making Media Theory is about the study, practice, and hands-on design of media theory. It looks at experimental research methods and engages in media analysis, inviting readers to respond to and shape the materiality of media while carefully considering the implications of living in a technoculture. The author walks readers through the creation of digital objects to think with, where critical design practices serve as tools for exploring social and philosophical issues related to technological being and becoming.

By investigating the Southern Weekly Incident, in which censorship of the prominent Chinese newspaper Southern Weekly triggered mass online contention in Chinese society, Resistance in Digital China examines how Chinese people engage in resistance on digital networks whilst cautiously safeguarding their life under authoritarian rule. Chen's in-depth analysis of the Southern Weekly Incident ties together overlapping debates in internet studies, Chinese studies, social movement studies, political communication, and cultural studies to discuss issues of civic connectivity, emotions, embodiment, and the construction of a public sphere in digital China. Resistance in Digital China demonstrates a valuable methodology for conducting in-depth empirical examination of an act of resistance in order to explore political, cultural, and sociological meanings of Chinese people's resistance within party limits. Fruitfully combining 45 interviews with key players in the Southern Weekly Incident with largely Western-based communications theory, Chen develops an understanding of the ongoing formation of the Chinese public sphere as elite-led and emotional, at once invoked and rejected by Chinese citizens.

The star of the highest rated opinion show on cable television, Bill O'Reilly has overcome humble beginnings to become a best-selling author and the most famous pundit on TV today and more powerful than the majority of the politicians he covers. While his style has become legendary and some of his on-air confrontations have become classics, this is a chance to learn what "factors" influenced him at a young age to become the brash, influential, opinionated superstar he is today.

Petros Iosifidis addresses an increasingly prominent subject area in the field of media and communications, and one that has attracted increased attention in areas such as sociology, economics, political science and law: global media policy and regulation. Specifically, he considers the wider social, political, economic and technological changes arising from the globalization of the communications industries and assesses their impact on matters of regulation and policy. By focusing on the convergence of the communication and media industries, he makes reference to the paradigmatic shift from a system based on the traditions of public service in broadcast and telecommunications delivery to one that is demarcated by commercialization, privatization and competition. In doing so, Iosifidis tackles a key question in the field: to what extent do new media developments require changes in regulatory philosophy and objectives. It considers the various possible meanings of the public interest concept in exploring the different regulatory modes and the interplay between the local and the global in policy-making.

Sponsored by the Communication, Information Technologies, and Media Sociology section of the American Sociological Association (CITAMS), Volume 19 of Emerald Studies in Media and Communications draws on global case studies that examine media use by millennials. By bringing together contributors and case studies from four continents to examine millennial digital media practices, the volume charts out multiple dimensions of Gen Y's digital media engagements: smartphone use among Israelis, the activities of Brazilian youths in LAN houses, selfies in the New Zealand context, and American millennials engaged in a variety of digital pursuits ranging from seeking employment, to content creation, to gaming, to consuming news and political content. Through these case studies we see parallels in the mediated millennial experience across key digital venues including Twitter and YouTube, and MMOs. None-the-less, contributors also prompt us to keep in mind the importance of those millennials without equal access to resources who must rely on public venues such as libraries and LAN Houses. Across these venues and arenas of practice, the research provides an important collection of research shedding important light on the first generation growing up with the normative expectation to perform digital identity work, create visual culture, and engage in the digital public sphere.

The Economics and Financing of Media Companies employs business concepts and analyses to explore the operations and activities of media firms and the forces and issues affecting them. The book is a wide-ranging survey of the structures and operations of various media, including their business characteristics and business models, how they differ from other products and services, how they are structured and operated, why failure rates are so high and how media companies cope with that failure, how digitalization has helped and harmed media, the changing roles of audiences and advertisers, and how distribution systems affect company structures, costs, and operations. The book contains a wealth of information important for both those who work in and study media industries and companies. It goes beyond simplistic explanations to explain how various internal and external forces direct and constrain decisions in media firms and the implications of the forces on the type of media and content offered today.

Mukiwa opens with Peter Godwin, six years old, describing the murder of his neighbor by African guerillas in 1964, pre-war Rhodesia. Godwin's parents are liberal whites, his mother a government-employed doctor, his father an engineer. Through his innocent, young eyes, the story of the beginning of the end of white rule in Africa unfolds. The memoir follows Godwin's personal journey from the eve of war in Rhodesia to his experience fighting in the civil war that he detests to his adventures as a journalist in the new state of Zimbabwe, covering the bloody return to black rule. With each transition Godwin's voice develops, from that of a boy to a young man to an adult returning to his homeland. This poignant compelling memoir describes the savage struggle between blacks and whites as the British Colonial period comes to an end, set against the vividly painted background of the mysterious world of southern Africa.

The Political Marketing Game identifies what works in political marketing, drawing on 100 interviews with practitioners. It also shows that authenticity, values and vision are as much a part of a winning strategy as market-savvy pragmatism.

As the media converges with the telecommunication industry leveraging content becomes key for both formerly separate industries. As new channels are offered and used to distribute various contents - from music to games, from text to videos - companies have to think about innovative ways to even more profit from providing the channels or from providing the content or from providing both. New business models are emerging that are made for leveraging content and finding their way to the customers. This book explains why and how more content leverage becomes reality.

Currently, around one to two billion users are able to connect to the Internet, most of them living in the industrialized parts of the world. However, if we want to improve the quality of life of the world population with the help of access to information and education, it is necessary that in the next decade an additional five billion people gain access to the Internet. The next five billion Internet users are mainly living in emerging economies. Therefore, the main challenge is to lower the economic barrier using new approaches for infrastructure deployment and service delivery to billions of people. This book reflects the discussions of the challenges from the M nchner Kreis with representatives from the ICT industry, academia, non-governmental organizations and governmental development organizations, among them many representatives from emerging economies in Africa and Asia. They had highlighted the real demand for ICT, and what impact ICT creates for the wealth and lifestyle of the people.

The Twenty-First-Century Media Industry: Economic and Managerial Implications in the Age of New Media examines the role that new media technologies are having on the traditional media industry from a media management perspective. Consumer behaviors and consumer expectations are being shaped by new media technologies. They now expect information on-demand and on-the-go as well as at their finger-tips via the Internet. In order to stay relevant, traditional media managers and practitioners are adapting to these consumer demands and expectations by developing new business models and new business philosophies to stay competitive. The contributors to this volume explore the business strategies being implemented by some media industries such as newspapers and the recording industry who are struggling to not only remain competitive and profitable, but also to survive. The Twenty-First-Century Media Industry provides an intriguing examination of how traditional media industries are adapting to new media technologies and evolving in the twenty-first century.