Structural change

The information and communication technologies have accompanied globalization, privatization, multimedia convergence, restructuring, and mergers and acquisitions in transforming media and entertainment in industrialized countries very substantially, and to a lesser degree in developing countries. They have offered new employment, often of a different nature and quality than previous jobs, particularly for people providing creative content, and created new products, new forms of work and new occupations, while increasing productivity and technical quality. At the same time, these processes cut jobs, displace workers and replace older skills and technologies. The situation in developing countries often differs significantly from that in industrialized ones, and has greater potential for change in the future. It is therefore essential to analyse the realities at the national level on a case-by-case basis.

The impact of the technologies in these industries seems (if anything) to have improved women's chances in some fields, but information on this is too anecdotal to draw clear conclusions, while older workers appear to have been the group most affected by job losses.

Technological innovation has been accompanied by profound structural change within the industries. In some countries, limitations on cross-media ownership have been relaxed, allowing large media firms to acquire highly diversified holdings in film-making, music, radio and television broadcasting as well as book, magazine and newspaper publishing. This horizontal integration allows one media product to be commercialized in a variety of formats (books, films and sound-recordings) as well as in distinct end-markets (cinemas, television, and video rental shops, for example). It also concentrates control and marketing power in the hands of surprisingly few big players. In 1995, for example, just five record companies – Sony music, Warner, Universal, BMG and EMI – accounted for more than 70% of sales in the $40 billion global pre-recorded music market; in 2004, there were only four, Sony and BMG having merged, although the merger was under review in 2006.

Vertical integration is also occurring, though sometimes in new forms. Hollywood studios today oversee film products "from conception to consumption" by providing funding and distribution channels to independent producers, although actual film-making is carried out by networks of production companies and their subcontractors, linked to the studios through contract and investment, rather than through ownership.

The film, broadcasting and media industries are also dominated by major players – Disney, Time Warner, News Corporation, Viacom, Sony, Bertelsmann, Gannett, Havas, Lagardère, Quebecor, Fininvest, Pearson and others – and regional giants like Globo and Televisa in Latin America. These businesses are fiercely competitive and are becoming real power structures in their own right. Their success is often accompanied by the absorption of smaller players, a weakening of national and local enterprises and cultures, a reduction in trade union influence, increasing vertical integration, and growing standardization of global media and entertainment products. The merger of Sony Music and BMG and Sony's acquisition of MGM Studios are relatively recent examples of cross-sectoral market concentration in media and entertainment.

Just as technology has given large media and communications firms a global reach, it has also encouraged the proliferation of small players. Indeed, an industry structure is emerging based on major conglomerates and myriad small enterprises. Individuals, teams and small and medium-sized enterprises create high-quality multimedia products, such as CD-ROMs, or provide niche services, such as building Web sites or developing on-line advertising campaigns. A plethora of small electronic publishing and multimedia service companies generate much of the content, as well as much of the employment, of this emerging industry. Many of these might qualify as micro-enterprises composed of two to ten employees. Some are "virtual" enterprises, in which employees basically work alone, distant from each other, but connected by a modem and a telephone line. An editorial production firm, for example, can easily employ its writers, editors and art directors at different locations, as long as their computers can communicate to exchange and combine their work.

Structural change has also occurred within the trade union movement in these industries, with many mergers at the national and international levels. Until 1999, there were several international union groupings involved in these industries, including MEI (Media and Entertainment International), FIM (International Federation of Musicians), FIA (International Federation of Actors), the IFJ (International Federation of Journalists), the IGF (International Graphical Federation) and CI (Communications International). In January 2000, MEI, IGF, FIET and CI merged to form UNI (Union Network International).