The Informal Media Economy [Paperback]

How are grey market imports changing media industries? What is the role of piracy in developing new markets for movies and TV shows? How do jailbroken iPhones drive innovation?
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The Informal Media Economy provides a vivid, original, and genuinely transnational account of contemporary media, by showing how the interactions between formal and informal media systems are a feature of all nations  rich and poor, large and small.
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Shifting the focus away from the formal businesses and public enterprises that have long occupied media researchers, this book charts a parallel world of cultural intermediaries driving global media production and circulation. It shows how unlicensed, untaxed, or unregulated networks, which operate across the boundaries of established media markets, have been a driving force of media industry transformation. The book opens up new insights on a range of topical issues in media studies, from the creative disruptions of digitisation to amateur production, piracy and cybercrime.

Introduction

1. Formal and informal media

2. Entrepreneurs

3. Work

4. Geographies

5. Regulation

6. Brands

7. Metrics

Conclusion

References

Index

The Informal Media Economy may be the most significant media studies volume published this year. Reaching beyond the tired platitudes and self-interested rhetoric of media piracy debates, Lobato and Thomas examine the elaborate interdependence between formal and informal media economies. The book ranges across seemingly discrete corners of the media economy, examining such issues as innovation, circulation and value. Along the way, the authors deliver lucid, thoughtful and provocative insights regarding topics tlÓ