What impact does media ownership have upon the range of products available to audiences in the media area you have studied?

To a certain extent, media ownership largely impacts the range of media products which are available to audiences of film. For one, film ownership is mainly dominated by ‘The Big Six Hollywood Film Companies’ which comprise of Paramount, Fox, Walt Disney, Columbia, Universal Studios and Warner Brothers. These 6 institutions are all huge conglomerates which control a substantial proportion of the film industry and usually produce high budget and commercially successful films such as Frozen (Disney) made for over $150M and is now making over $1bn in its first year after release and The Avengers Assemble (Paramount) made for $220M and is now grossing over $600M in its first year after release.

This being said, films made by the big 6 tend to have high production budgets which means in order for the company who had made the film to make any sort of profit they must distribute their film effectively. This is where Synergy comes into play. Large film conglomerates tend to be internally and horizontally integrated which means that the entire film making process is controlled by them and is in house. Not only does this almost guarantee success for the film and great coverage but it also allows synergy to take place through its subsidiary businesses. Synergy is when the company is able to advertise their media product far and wide to reach every corner of the globe. A real life example of this is the hugely successful Disney film Frozen (2013). As you may know Walt Disney is a huge media conglomerate and probably the most well known globally too. Frozen was produced, Distributed, Exhibited and Marketed all by Disney through its own production company’s, in its own studios which then got distributed and exhibited to its own cinemas and was marketed on its own television programmes and websites. It was then sold in its own stores (The Disney Store) and shown on its own TV channel (Disney Channel). Furthermore, Disney was able to exploit its subsidiary businesses in order to gain benefits from Cross media convergence through its mobile App, website, cinemas and own TV channel. This internalisation and clever use of synergy and cross media convergence has guaranteed success for all Disney films, thus enabling Disney to produce even more films thanks to a huge gross profit. This exemplifies that to a large extent the ownership of film does effect the range of films that a film company can produce and also the range that they are available through, (i.e. on a tablet, on TV, In the cinema etc).  

On the flip side, however, it could also be said that it doesn’t matter what type of ownership you have, you will still be able to produce a range of different media products. For example , while small, the British film industry is growing. Most films do not reach anywhere near the colossal budgets that can be seen from large Hollywood studios and ‘The Big Six’. This however has not stopped British films gaining critical and commercial success. An example of this is the movie Bridget Jones’s Baby (2016) produced by Working Title Pictures and distributed by Universal Studios . This film was a collaboration between America and The United Kingdom and a continuation of the popular Bridget Jones Franchise. Although Budgets were low at only a mere $35M, the film gained a respectable amount of critical and commercial success making over $170M in its first year after release which is a lot for a British made film. However, the distribution of the fil and the production of the film are  carried out by two different businesses which arise the issue that the distributors, being Universal, get the rights to any revenue from the movie for the first 10 years. This means Film companies will not start making money till after 10 years after its release meaning that smaller independent companies do not have the capability to produce and create as many movies as large media conglomerates such as the big six as they must rely on other companies to distribute their films in order for it to get recognised. The danger of not using a large media conglomerate is that the film would not have the coverage needed to become successful. This said, without coverage, there will be no profits from the film which means the production company would not be able to make enough money back after the films release to cover production costs. This would mean that they would not be able to produce a large range of films or distribute to a large range of different media devices.

Finally, I believe that ownership plays a quintessential role upon the range of films which a film company can produce. Essentially, the more money and coverage a film company has the more films, it can produce and distribute which is exactly why the big 6 are the big 6!