Videogames and Agency explores the trend in videogames and their marketing to offer a player higher volumes, or even more distinct kinds, of player freedom. The book offers a new conceptual framework that helps us understand how this freedom to act is discussed by designers, and how that in turn reflects in their design principles. What can we learn from existing theories around agency? How do paratextual materials reflect design intention with regards to what the player can and cannot do in a videogame? How does game design shape the possibility space for player action? Through these questions and selected case studies that include AAA and independent games alike, the book presents a unique approach to studying agency that combines game design, game studies, and game developer discourse. By doing so, the book examines what discourses around player action, as well as a game's design can reveal about the nature of agency and videogame aesthetics. This book will appeal to readers specifically interested in videogames, such as game studies scholars or game designers, but also to media studies students and media and screen studies scholars less familiar with digital games.

The book has high potential for course adoption globally in the areas of creative arts marketing, arts management, creative industries, and marketing; Fully updated to include international case studies from throughout the world, including emerging markets, as well as tools for practical application; Offers an alternative or complimentary approach to the existing textbooks which have a more mainstream marketing management perspective; Includes contributions from leading academics in the field of arts marketing

The keyguide is divided into three parts: Part One is an overview of the literature, covering the mass media in general, telecommunications, broadcasting in all its forms, cinema and video, the press, advertising, publishing and ethical issues, such as government policy and influence, legislation, codes of practice, censorship and reportage issues; Part Two is an annotated bibliography; and Part Three is an international directory of organizations. A detailed index completes the work.

The Routledge Companion to Media and Human Rights offers a comprehensive and contemporary survey of the key themes, approaches and debates in the field of media and human rights. The Companion is the first collection to bring together two distinct ways of thinking about human rights and media, including scholarship that examines media as a human right alongside that which looks at media coverage of human rights issues. This international collection of 49 newly written pieces thus provides a unique overview of current research in the field, while also providing historical context to help students and scholars appreciate how such developments depart from past practices. The volume examines the universal principals of freedom of expression, legal instruments, the right to know, media as a human right, and the role of media organisations and journalistic work. It is organised thematically in five parts: Communication, Expression and Human Rights Media Performance and Human Rights: Political Processes Media Performance and Human Rights: News and Journalism Digital Activism, Witnessing and Human Rights Media Representation of Human Rights: Cultural, Social and Political. Individual essays cover an array of topics, including mass-surveillance, LGBT advocacy, press law, freedom of information and children's rights in the digital age. With contributions from both leading scholars and emerging scholars, the Companion offers an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary approach to media and human rights allowing for international comparisons and varying perspectives. The Routledge Companion to Media and Human Rights provides a comprehensive introduction to the current field useful for both students and researchers, and defines the agenda for future research.

This book addresses the persistence of the optical media piracy trade in the Philippines and Vietnam. It goes beyond arguments of defective law enforcement and copyright legal systems by applying sociological perspectives to examine the socio-economic forces behind the advent of piracy in the region. Using documentary and ethnographic data, in addition to resistance and ecological theories in sociology of law and technology as the overall theoretical framework, the book investigates factors that contribute to this phenomenon and factors that impede the full formalization of the optical media trade in the two countries. These factors include the government's attitude towards the informal sector and strong resistance to tougher IPR protection, unstable and sometimes conflicting policies on technologies, burdensome business registration process and weak enforcement of business regulations, bureaucratic corruption and loopholes in law enforcement system as well as trade ties with China. In addition to that, the book highlights the social background of the actors behind the illegal business of counterfeit CDs and DVDs, thereby explaining the reasons they continue to persist in this type of trade. It invites policymakers, law enforcers, advocates of anti-piracy groups, and the general public to use a more holistic lens in understanding the persistence of copyright piracy in developing countries, shifting the blame from the moral defect of the traders to the current problematic copyright policy and enforcement structure, and the difficulty of crafting effective anti-piracy measures in a constantly evolving and advancing technological environment.

The year is 1942, and while America is reeling from the first blows of WWII, Osgood is just a nine-year-old boy living in Baltimore. As the war rages somewhere far beyond the boundaries of his hometown, he spends his days delivering newspapers, riding the trolley to the local amusement park, going to Orioles' baseball games, and goofing around with his younger sister. With a sharp eye for details, Osgood captures the texture of life in a very different era, a time before the polio vaccine and the atomic bomb. In his neighborhood of Liberty Heights, gaslights still glowed on every corner, milkmen delivered bottles of milk, and a loaf of bread cost nine cents. Osgood reminisces about his first fistfight with a kid from the neighborhood, his childhood crush on a girl named Sue, and his relationship with his father, a traveling salesman. He also talks about his early love for radio and how he used to huddle under the covers after his parents had turned off the lights, listening to "Superman, The Lone Ranger, The Shadow, and, of course, to baseball games. "Defending Baltimore Against Enemy Attack is a gloriously funny and nostalgic slice of American life and a moving look at World War II from the perspective of a child far away from the fighting, but very conscious of the reverberations.

Over the past two decades, the face of the world consumer has truly changed. Goods are more available, information about these goods is more open and accessible, and the ability to buy these goods from any corner of the earth has become possible. As a result, international marketing is more important now than ever before. In this book, Josh Samli explores the challenges facing modern international marketers. He explains what it is to have successful communication with the target market: using social media to share consistent information about products and services, communicating directly with culture-driven consumers who already communicate online amongst themselves and with competitors, and mastering people-to-people communication with both privileged and non-privileged consumers. Any company dealing with international marketing must learn how to handle these new challenges in order to survive in the 21st century.

This comprehensive Reader brings together seminal texts in media and communication from both traditional as well as more recent scholarship.

Readings are drawn from an international range of scholars and organized to reflect the growing internationalization of the field, with clearly defined sections covering key aspects of global communication. In addition to the core academic readings, key policy documents are also included to demonstrate the development of the political, economic and technological infrastructure that underpins the global system of media and communication.

The Royal Society has initiated a series of meetings to discuss the effect advances in technology will have on our way of life in the next century. The two previous meetings have been concerned with housing and waste treat ment. The subject of the third meeting, communications, is no less critical to life, but it offers particular problems and uncertainties, especially in the forecasting of future trends. Indeed, some have doubted if there can be profitable debate on long-term development in such a fast-moving field. The importance of the topic justifies an attempt, and the reader will judge whether the authors have met the challenge. Communications today bears little resemblance to that of the 1970s. Then we knew about satellites and optical fibres, and we had seen lasers and silicon chips, but most of us could never imagine the potential of the new technologies within our grasp. We had also not assessed the thirst of the popUlation for more and better ways of talking and writing to each other. It was the combination of market need and technical capability that created the com munications revolution."

Deregulation, privatization and internationalization of the telecommunications industry has brought about enormous changes within both the European and world economy. The dynamics of the Internet and the recent wave of innovations in the telecommunications and computer industry have given rise to new opportunities for entrepreneurship, employment and growth. No doubt, the dynamics and imperfections of today`s information markets raise crucial challenges for Western Europe. The changing patterns of innovation in the digital economy have forced governments to consider new strategies to promote innovation, network effects and growth. In response to these developments this text presents new approaches to macroeconomic modelling, growth theory and trade analysis. Still further, the deregulation policies of OECD-countries are analyzed. An indispensible text for academics and professionals who want to deepen their knowledge of how the New Economy revolution continues to change the economy.

"Political scientists by and large ignore cultural industries and technologies whereas they are prominent in other disciplines. This book provides insights from local, societal, national, and international levels in understanding cultural industries, technologies, and policies and integrates these perspectives into the study of political science"--Provided by publisher.

1928. White, a journalist, worked for various Kansas newspapers before purchasing the Emporia Gazette, which he edited for the next 49 years. A staunch Republican, White's Masks in a Pageant is his account of leading politicians including Grover Cleveland, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Harding, Coolidge and William Hale Thompson.

Presidential candidates have criticized the press since the days of Thomas Jefferson, with claims of media bias for one party or another being a recurring campaign complaint. In focusing on the presidential campaigns of 1984 and 1988, this study provides a comprehensive analysis of media bias in two particular elections as well as for presidential campaigns in general. Stempel and Windhauser have collected more data than in any previous study, and they have included newspapers, network television news, and news magazines in their evaluation. Their thorough analysis of the content and slant of each item provides a clearcut picture of just what the media covered and how the coverage differed when an incumbent was not running. The study is based on news items collected from 23 sources in the three media, covering the Labor Day through Election Day period of both campaigns. Seventeen elite newspapers, including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and Chicago Tribune, had their election coverage analyzed, as did the three major television networks and the three general news magazines, Time, Newsweek, and U.S. News and World Report. Each news item was classified by which candidate it primarily concerned, whether it was favorable, unfavorable, or neutral, and what major issue the story dealt with. The findings are presented in three separate chapters that focus on the different media, with additional chapters offering analysis of newspaper editorials in the two campaigns and the results of a telephone survey on public attitudes toward coverage. A final chapter provides a concluding look at the press, politicians, and the public. This comprehensive study will be an important reference for courses in political science, journalism, and American history, and a valuable addition to public and academic libraries.

The Kardashian family is a contemporary cultural touchstone, recognizable throughout the world connoting warrantless celebrity, voluptuous beauty, and social media savviness. Amanda Scheiner McClain explores the Kardashians' brand and celebrity via narrative discourse analyses of their hit reality television series, Keeping Up with the Kardashians, social media utilization, and popular press coverage. This triangulated study allows insight into contemporaneous American culture: societal norms, values, and ideologies, as well as structural and cultural aspects of cross-platform brand creation. The television series examination finds intrinsic paradoxes of sexuality/conservatism, family/business, beauty/unhappiness, narcissism/celebrity, intimate/transgressiveness, and traditional/nontraditional gender roles, as well as materialism and public vs. private spheres themes. In addition, a study of the Kardashian blogs and Twitter use finds that their careful participation amplifies celebrity and unifies the overall brand into a single, sellable image across media. Through interactive media and just being themselves, the Kardashians renovate banal status updates and hackneyed reality television into character-constructing building blocks of brand, celebrity, and profits.

Taking a unique approach in studying global media alongside a range of other globalized forms of communication, ranging from the individual to groups, civil society groupings, commercial enterprises and political formations. A wide-ranging theoretical and empirical overview suitable for upper-level undergraduate and graduate students of media and communication studies and those studying globalization within related disciplines such as sociology. Offers a clear, systemic overview with individual chapters focussing on different types of communication, but also offers a critical perspective on the achievements of globalization and global communication.

First published in 2006. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The subject of this book - whether or not to extend traditional telecommunications regulation to high-speed, or broadband, access to the Internet - is perhaps the most important issue facing the Federal Communications Commission. The issue is contentious, with academics and influential economic interests on both sides. This volume offers updated papers originally presented at a June 2003 conference held by the Progress and Freedom Foundation. The authors are top researchers in telecommunications.

This is the 3rd volume of Advances in Telecommunication Management, focusing on Information Technology and Crisis Management.

Print Journalism provides an up-to-date overview of the skills needed to work within the newspaper and magazine industries. This critical approach to newspaper and magazine practice highlights historical, theoretical, ethical and political debates and includes tips on the everyday skills of newspaper and magazine journalists, as well as tips for online writing and production. Crucial skills highlighted include: sourcing the news interviewing sub editing feature writing and editing reviewing designing pages pitching features In addition separate chapters focus on ethics, reporting courts, covering politics and copyright whilst others look at the history of newspapers and magazines, the structure of the UK print industry (including its financial organization) and the development of journalism education in the UK, helping to place the coverage of skills within a broader, critical context. All contributors are experienced practicing journalists as well as journalism educators from a broad range of UK universities.

From smartphones to social media, from streaming videos to fitness bands, our devices bring us information and entertainment all day long, forming an intimate part of our lives. Their ubiquity represents a major shift in human experience, and although we often hold our devices dear, we do not always fully appreciate how their nearly constant presence can influence our lives for better and for worse. In this second edition of How Fantasy Becomes Reality, social psychologist Karen E. Dill-Shackleford explains what the latest science tells us about how our devices influence our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. In engaging, conversational prose, she discusses both the benefits and the risks that come with our current level of media saturation. The wide-ranging conversation explores Avatar, Mad Men, Grand Theft Auto, and Comic Con to address critical issues such as media violence, portrayals of social groups, political coverage, and fandom. Her conclusions will empower readers to make our favorite sources of entertainment and information work for us and not against us.

This book explores a major media management topic on the basis of case study research conducted in European, US and Brazilian media companies. More specifically, it examines the dynamics of employee engagement, aiming at organizational development through change. The book contemplates the discipline of Media Management through a management lens and focuses on the concept of employee involvement and its value with regard to successfully introducing change and achieving organizational development. It concentrates on providing the necessary information and organizational arrangements from the points of view of media managers and employees and highlights how this involvement can encourage employees to create and innovate. The book is directed towards researchers and students, as well as practitioners/professionals involved with media organizations.

While considerable attention has been focused on how information technologies (IT) are affecting particular industrialized nations, the broader implications of the Information Revolution have begun to be appreciated only in the past few years. This volume represents an important first step in understanding and coming to terms with the global impact of these technological advances. Based on a series of recent conferences, it distills the collective wisdom of an international group of some forty specialists in communications, trade, finance, development, and diplomacy. The authors identify the potential repercussions arising from the worldwide dissemination of IT and explore the adjustments and collective responses that may help to maximize benefits and reduce harmful effects. The introductory essays make it clear that while information technologies have created unprecedented opportunities for growth, they are drastically altering economic relations and promoting forms of economic interdependence that may have very serious consequences for individual nations and the world economy as a whole. Among the economic issues addressed in this volume are regulatory policy; barriers against information trade; the effects of IT on financial markets and international financial flows; the unequal distribution costs and benefits between developed and developing nations; the supranational power of multinational conglomerates; and economically harmful competition. The authors examine institutional changes that are affecting banking, finance, and trade, as well as legal questions relating to data flow privachy and intellectual property rights. They discuss the need for international cooperation and revised trade agreements to handle these complex new problems. Social and political issues, including education, employment, and democratic participation are also considered. Several chapters are devoted to recent innovations and anticipated developments in technology that will further effect global interdependence. The most authoritative, up-to-date source of information on the subject, this volume is recommended for practitioners and scholars concerned with public policy, international trade relations, finance, communications, information technology, and a variety of related fields.

The issue of costing and pricing in the telecommunications industry has been hotly debated for the last twenty years and we are still wrestling over the cost of the local exchange for access by interexchange and competitive local exchange carriers, as well as for universal service funding. With the advent of competition, the historical costing schemes had to change. Federal regulators wanted to ensure that monopoly rates did not subsidize competitive offerings. As a result, various costing methodologies were devised to allocate costs among the dominant carriers' services. The issue of costs can be summarized as two-fold: the quantitative determination of the level of costs and the proper attribution of those costs. Both are fraught with questions. The amount of costs, for instance, can vary from book costs to marginal costs. The attribution of costs can vary from those that are directly attributable to those that are joint and common. Hence, the need for costing theories and models. The industry is constantly in search of theories and models that more accurately reflect the underlying costs of service. It is in this light that the papers have been compiled for The New Investment Theory of Real Options in Telecommunications. Real options theory attempts to consider management's flexibility in valuation analysis and corrects the deficiencies of the traditional discounted present-value and decision tree analyses. This book sets forth an introduction and overview of the subject, and then provides the reader with a primer on real options. The volume highlights the controversies that surround the application of real options in the telecommunications industry; however, the editors haveeffectively separated the issues of application from those of interpretation.