Indigenous terrains and the threat of cultural erosion

The author explores the conflict between indigenous and academic discourse, noting the extent to which the former continues to perceive television as culturally intrusive while the later discounts this threat on the basis of a wide range of studies which have empirically examined the issue. The author revisits these studies to demonstrate that while the arguments in each study refuting any significant transcultural effects related to television have been consolidated to form a meta-argument discounting this threat, those findings documenting effects have been left in isolation. The author proposes a new model of cultural erosion which, he maintains, better accommodates previous findings by framing the question with geological constructs associated with erosion. Four specific processes associated with such ‘cultural erosion’ are explored: Cultural abrasion, resulting from friction between the contrasting values reflected in a cultural terrain and a foreign media agent; cultural deflation, whereby those facets which are least consolidated within a culture are most vulnerable to foreign influence — a process facilitated by agents of displacement which can weaken consolidating factors within a terrain; cultural deposition in which foreign beliefs, practices and artifacts supplement the local cultural landscape potentially, at times, providing for cross-cultural fertilization; and cultural saltation, where social practices appropriate communication systems in response to the perceived threat of a foreign media agent. the author concludes with a brief discussion of potential policy implications associated with the new model

An analysis of Zaikai influence in Japanese telecommunication liberalization

On April 1, 1985, legislation was enacted in Japan which made it the world's third liberalized telecommunications market. While much has already been written in English concerning the American and British experience in liberalization, very little examination has been given to the forces leading to such policy reform in Japan. Moreover, almost no scholarly study to date has analyzed the influence of Japanese big business (zaikai) in the evolution of this new telecommunications environment. [...]Communication, Jack J. Valenti School o

Beyond exposure: Interactive television and the new media currency

Significant effort in advertising is directed towards maximising exposure — to ensure that, for example, a broadcast audience is exposed to an optimum number of messages in a media planning schedule. ‘Interactivity’ as it is emerging, however, has a dramatic effect on traditional assumptions about frequency and reach (how many times the message is repeated and how extensively it is received). Interactivity potentially shifts choice back to the audience, allowing a ‘bypassing’ of attempts to repeat messages. Audiences, given the choice, simply will avoid advertisements that are designed primarily for exposure. Audiences in an environment where they can personalise and customise a medium according to their preferences — and indeed become ‘producers\u27 of content themselves — will be looking for content that is designed for elaboration, rather than only repetition. There is a background to this emerging trend and it is explored in this paper

How coviewing reduces the effectiveness of TV advertising

In the present study – a naturalistic laboratory experiment – coviewing of TV commercials reduced their effectiveness (delayed proven ad recall) from 63%, obtained by single viewers, to 43%, for both coviewers. During coviewing, the ‘mere presence of another’ apparently distracts each coviewer’s attention from the screen. The reduction in TV ads’ effectiveness due to coviewing is equivalent to the loss from channel-change zapping, which reduces ad recall to 45%. More deleterious but less prevalent modes of digital video recorder-enabled ad avoidance are skip-button zapping, which reduces recall to 35%, and moderately fast zipping (X 8 fast forward), which reduces ad effectiveness almost entirely, leaving only 6% recall. This study concludes with some practical suggestions for improving the effectiveness of TV commercials seen by a coviewing audience

Synced Ads: Effects of Mobile Ad Size and Timing

Data from four studies that manipulated the effects of synced-ad size and timin

Unlocking the "reminder" potential when viewers pause programs : results from a laboratory test of a new online medium

The branded pause advertisement is a recently developed online television-advertising format that displays a full-screen still-image banner ad whenever a viewer pauses a streaming-video program. This study used a controlled lab experiment to compare the effectiveness of branded pause advertisements with normal online television advertisements. The results demonstrate that branded pause advertisements are effective but only when combined with a long-exposure advertisement for the same brand. Despite their short exposure time, pause advertisements function as effective reminders, building awareness through repeat exposure. The findings of the current study were similar regardless of whether pause advertisements were activated as a result of viewers’ pausing at a time of their own choosing or whether viewers were interrupted

Brand safety: the effects of controversial video content on pre-roll advertising

Newspapers have reported instances of famous brands' ads running as pre-rolls to terrorist videos on YouTube. Subsequent brand safety fears have led to advertisers pulling their YouTube ads. This study, a lab experiment, tested the effects of program quality and content—particularly violent, sexual or extremist content—on pre-roll ads. The experiment used measures from studies showing significant broadcast TV content effects on mid-roll advertising, using more extreme cable TV content to increase the chances of finding significant effects on pre-roll ads. Overall, the effects were minimal, with no effects on brand attitudes, ad liking, or three ad memory components—encoding, storage, and retrieval. In contrast to research showing program context effects on mid-roll advertising, context effects (e.g., on brand safety) do not seem an issue for pre-roll ads. A brand's reputation might suffer negative effects from pre-roll advertising in other ways, however. A limitation is that this study did not re-test the effects of controversial content on mid-roll advertising