Final observations
7. Final observations
It was the objective of the case studies work to check the general trends and developments
observed in the other MUDIA studies in a number of concrete media organizations
in different European countries. The case studies are spread over traditional mass
media, new start up media companies and non sector information initiatives. The table
below gives a summarized overview of the studied cases. It situated them according to:
their origin (newspaper, broadcaster, net native & non sector initiative);
their nature (public, private, non profit);
their revenue model (profitability, self sufficiency, cost model);
the predominant platforms they use (TV versus PC based Internet);
the degree of newsroom convergence (90 180 270 360 ) as explained in the
MUDIA Benchmarking Study on the change over from single to multimedia news
production (D2.2).
Last but not least, the question is answered if flexible delivery of content via
mobile or PDA is offered or planned in the future, as touched upon in the
MUDIA Mobile News Study (D1.4).
e VRT
Guardian
TOL
UK Govt Online
VilaWeb
Unlimited
Origin
Broadcast
Newspaper
Net only (ex
Government
Net native
print magazine)
Nature
Public (state
Private trust
Non profit
Government
Private company
owned)
organisation
(partnerships)
Revenue
Cost model (finding
Self sufficiency
Self sufficiency
Cost model (finding &
Profitable business
mode
& accountability)
(intention)
(intention)
accountability)
Platform
TV
PC based internet
PC based
PC based internet
PC based internet
internet
Converging
90
0
(teletext &
180
0
(collaborarions
Web only
Web only
270
0
(integrated
newsroom
DHP pilot)
print & web)
(diversification)
(aggregation)
newsroom)
Flexible deliver
Future
Future
Experimental
Future
Today (multi platform
(mobile, PDA)
phase
publishing)
The overview shows an interesting spread of companies with different origins which
all deal, in their own way, with multimedia innovation enabled by digital
technologies. For some of them, like Transitions Online (TOL) and Vilaweb, online
news and information make up their core business. The shift from printed magazine
towards a Net only company was for TOL the only way to survive. Vilaweb as a net
native company, would of course, not exist without the Internet. Both cases
illustrate that low entry levels towards content production (partly) and distribution
(mainly) make it possible for new content players to emerge.
A competitive information market with new content players
The evolution towards an open, more competitive information market whereby new
players compete with the existing media companies was raised as one of the
conclusions in the MUDIA WP1 Validation Workshop Report (D4.2).
24
It was argued
24. A competitive information market is thought to favour change and innovation in the media,
providing the context is right (See MUDIA D4.2). The latter relates to the promotion of open
standards and the importance of industry forums to support open standards and to support
collaboration between different actors (e.g. between telecom and media for the mobile delivery
of news and information). In the E VRT pilot, this is also acknowledged in relation to the MHP
standard for set top boxes.
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