Routledge Global Media Giants

Global Media Giants takes an in-depth look at how media corporate power works globally, regionally, and nationally, investigating the ways in which the largest and most powerful media corporations in the world wield power. Case studies examine not only some of the largest media corporations (News Corp., The Microsoft Corporation) in terms of revenues, but also media corporations that hold considerable power within national, regional, or geolinguistic contexts (Televisa, The Bertelsmann Group, Sony Corporation). Each chapter approaches a different corporation through the lens of economy, politics, and culture, giving students and scholars a thoughtful and data-driven guide with which to interrogate contemporary media industry power. Review "A brilliant conception, masterfully executed. The editors have given us a path-breaking survey of capitalist power over world communications - conglomerate by conglomerate, region by region, and product by product, from TV program ratings to smartphone apps." -Dan Schiller, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign "This authoritative and encyclopaedic volume provides a rich, systematic, and comprehensive analysis of one of the most devastating and significant developments of our century, the universal domination of culture, information, and communications by ever more powerful private corporations." –Peter Golding, Northumbria University "This is without doubt the essential guide to the communication companies that define today’s media-saturated world." –Vincent Mosco, author of To the Cloud: Big Data in a Turbulent World "This systematic global overview of the most powerful media corporations shows the present-day inequalities of global capitalism through the lenses of converging media and information services, revealing both the dominating forces and the on-going resistances." –Helena Sousa, University of Minho, Portugal About the Author Benjamin J. Birkinbine is an Assistant Professor in the Reynolds School of Journalism at the University of Nevada, Reno. His research interests are related to the political economy of communication, digital media studies, and open source technology. He completed his dissertation, "Incorporating the Commons: A Political Economic Analysis of Corporate Involvement in Free and Open Source Software" in August of 2015. Rodrigo Gomez is Senior Lecturer in cultural industries and communication policies at the Autonomous Metropolitan University (UAM), Cuajimalpa campus in Mexico City. He coordinates the Observatory of Cultural Industries, Policies and Consumption and is currently chair of the Political Economy section of the International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR). He is former president of the Mexican Association of Communication Research. Janet Wasko is a Professor and Knight Chair in Communication Research at the University of Oregon (USA). She is the author or co-editor of 19 books related to the political economy of the media, especially focusing on the US film industry, and more specifically, on the Walt Disney Company. She is currently the President of the IAMCR