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1 What do We Understand Under Media Convergence?

One of the challenges of studying media convergence is that the concept is so broad that it has multiple meanings. As a result the academic literature in this area is diverse and underdeveloped from both a theoretical and an empirical perspective (Wirth, 2006). In this introductory chapter we will try to take the different interpretations of media convergence—which will be evident in the various book chapters—into account, but attempt to make them converge into some common ground, which we already investigated in Dal Zotto, Galichet, and Lugmayr, (2011), Lugmayr and Dal Zotto, (2013), AIS SIG eMedia (SIG-eMedia n.d.) http://aisnet.org/group/SIG-eMedia, and the International Ambient Media Association (iAMEA) (Anon n.d.) http://www.ambientmediaassociation.org.

According to the Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary the general concept of convergence refers to “the act of converging and especially moving toward union or uniformity” (Mish, 1993). Within the media field, which is the research area that we are addressing in this book, convergence can be identified with the “ability to deliver different media channels via one digital platform” (McPhillips & Merlo, 2008). Previously broadcast media such as radio, television (e.g., Lugmayr, Niiranen, & Kalli, 2004) and the Internet, as well as print media have been distributed via different and well-distinguished platforms. Today content is becoming more and more digitalized: No matter the type of signal, any content can be transformed into undifferentiated bits of data that converge onto the same platform (McPhillips & Merlo, 2008). Media convergence is therefore rather a process more than an outcome. However, digitalized content can be distributed on different digital platforms with little or no impact on costs. Content convergence can lead to distribution and thus consumption divergence. As such, the media convergence concept does not only refer to a technological shift but it includes changes within the industrial, cultural and social paradigms of our environment reflecting both media convergence and divergence processes.

Indeed media convergence alters relationships between technologies, industries, audiences, genres and markets. According to Rheingold (2000) advances in technology enable technological convergence, which in turn has “social-side effects” in that “the virtual, social and physical world are colliding, merging and coordinating”. Jenkins (2006) states that media convergence is “the flow of content across multiple media platforms, the cooperation between multiple media industries, and the migratory behavior of media audiences” suggesting that media audiences nowadays play a crucial role in creating and distributing content, and convergence therefore has to be examined in terms of social, as well as technological changes within the society. Thanks to new technologies consumers are encouraged to actively seek out new information and make personalized connections among dispersed media content. Thus, media convergence requires media companies to rethink existing assumptions about media from a consumer’s point of view, as these affect not only marketing but also production decisions (Krumsvik, 2013; Urban & Bodoky, 2013). With the proliferation of different media channels and an increasing portability of new telecommunications and computing technologies, we have entered into an era where media are constantly surrounding us. Furthermore, technology has empowered consumers who not only consume content from many different sources but also participate and contribute to content production activities. The subsequent oversupply and commoditization of media content have led to an efficiency decline of the traditional media business model (Picard, 2000; Picard & Dal Zotto, 2006; McPhillips, & Merlo, 2008; Dal, Dichamp, & Sommer, 2012). As direct consequence the initial revolutionary digital paradigm shift presumed old media to be increasingly replaced by new media. However, the currently emerging convergence paradigm suggests that new and old media would interact in more complex ways than previously predicted (Wirtz, Schilke, & Ullrich, 2010).

Already in 2006 Jenkins saw media convergence as an ongoing process that should not be considered as a displacement of the old media, but rather as interaction between different media forms and platforms (Jenkins, 2006). Supporting this argument, Deuze (2011) suggests that media convergence should be viewed as ‘cooperation and collaboration’ between previously unconnected media forms and platforms. This holds even more true when we consider that, due to the multitude of available content on and off-line, the newly empowered consumers search for trustable media products and services. This has pushed media firms to develop into reputable brands that can offer content in a number of different forms and platforms. Newspapers for instance produce and sell books, or market a radio or web TV under their brand umbrella; the movie industry exploits the name of successful movies to produce and sell books, video games, or cartoons (Tameling & Broersma, 2013).

Branding encourages the expansion of a successful media concept into multiple platforms and therefore stimulates media industry convergence (Matteo, Spolaor, & Dal Zotto, 2013). However, this process does not enhance the creation of new ideas and further leads to technology divergence in the hardware industry: hardware needs to be specific to each function, so it diversifies in order to accommodate media convergence requirements. It thus appears that, in order to regain efficiency and success, media business models should not only react and adapt to the convergence trend, but also—and first of all—proactively factor in causes and effects of the media convergence process: this means to understand the multifaceted meaning of media convergence, including divergence and coexistence effects, develop a more customer oriented vision as well as to innovate by merging traditional with new elements, too.

2 Evolutionary Paths of Media Convergence

The development of media convergence processes is mainly due to the following three factors: (a) digitalization, (b) deregulation of media and communication markets, and (c) changes in user preferences. Digitalization offers new opportunities for the creation, presentation, storage and distribution of media products (Rayport, & Jaworski, 2001). The standardization of storage media that were previously separated enhances the exploitation of economies of scope in preceding and subsequent stages of the value-creation chain (Wirtz, 2011). Further, with the conversion from analog to digital data communication, differing communication networks can be used for data transmission and become substitutable among each other. Internet access is for instance now possible via telephone, cable, satellite, mobile networks as well as wireless LANs.

As to the deregulation, since the middle of the nineties measures have been introduced for liberalizing the telecommunication sectors both in the US and Europe. This has led to the emergence of competitive structures in the information, media and communication industries (Dal & van Kranenburg, 2008; Dal Zotto & Dowling, 2003). As a result the supply of media services has increased while audiences and media consumption were fragmentating. During the last decade consumers have been using an increasing number of different services to satisfy their information and entertainment needs (Rayport & Jaworski, 2001; Aitamurto, Sirkkunen, & Lehtonen, 2011). A clear change in user preferences towards personal information and communication tools can indeed be identified (Wirtz, 2011).

Media convergence has empowered users to produce and distribute their own content, viewing and listening schedules can be personalized via on-demand or search content and mobile services, users can engage with one another via peer to peer technology. Even if consumers can be distinguished between early adopters—the media literate and technology savvy ones—and late adopters—those who are happy with their current media experience—there is no doubt that such changes in user preferences together with the digitalization and deregulation of media and communication markets represent factors with a considerable impact on the competitive environment that media firms are facing (Picard, 2010). Depending on this impact we can distinguish different types and evolutionary paths of media convergence, as we illustrate below.

Technological convergence, that is the tendency of different technological systems to evolve towards performing similar tasks due to digitalization, leads on one hand to the convergence of different functionalities into a new product—product convergence—and on the other hand to an aggregation of markets that were previously distinguished from one another (Yoffie, 1997). In the market for communication services cable network and telecommunication companies, as well as mobile and satellite providers compete with each other. In order to differentiate themselves from each other they often pursue integration strategies in the area of content production: by enriching telecommunications products—such as Internet access or voice communication—with content, these operators provide consumers with accessory uses (Wirtz, 2011) and become a competitive threat to media companies. Once users consider products either substitutes or complements and as a consequence such products end up converging into a new product, we talk about competitive or complementary convergence (Dowling, Lechner, & Thilmann, 1998; Greenstein & Kanna, 1997; Picard, 2000; 2009).

Product level convergence can lead to business level convergence when a company realizes that it would be more advantageous to integrate convergent areas of business either within the company or through outside cooperation. This can stimulate economies of scale and innovations can emerge from a recombination of individual business units’ performances (Wirtz, 2011). If the convergence of previously separated services concerns not only a business unit but the whole enterprise, this can lead to cooperations or mergers between previously separated companies. In this case we talk about strategic or industrial structure convergence (Chan-Olmsted & Kang, 2003; Thilmann & Dowling, 1999; Wirtz, 1999). Convergence is transforming the media and telecommunication industries from vertical businesses—telephone, television, computers—into horizontal segments—content, packaging, transmission network, manipulation infrastructure, and terminals. Established media firms have for long dominated the entire value chain, from creative inception to production, packaging, marketing and finally distribution. Thanks to technological progress production costs have substantially diminished and the Internet is providing an open-source route to market. Thus content producers are now able to easily bypass mainstream media and distribute their content independently (McPhillips & Merlo, 2008). In this case strategic convergence may lead to industrial structure divergence.

As a consequence of this evolution we have already been witnessing a consolidation phase among technology, media and telecommunication firms. Current structural changes point to a few major media players dominating the mass market and a few niche operators serving specialist areas. Middle size operators seem to be struggling to find scale enough to compete with larger firms. Media convergence seem thus to lead to a polarization of the industry structure with global conglomerates and small independent media owners co-existing (Picard, 2010). Media ownership concentration, that is the control of media concentrated in the hands of a few private owners, is one of the major concerns when examining positive and negative consequences of media convergence (Jenkins, 2006). On the one hand, media ownership concentration—and thus industrial structure convergence—may cause the decline in the diversity of media products and service offerings and result in a tendency not to take into account voices of those lacking economic power (Horwitz, 2005; Valcke, Picard, Süksöd, & Sanders, 2009). On the other hand, it is argued that market driven media owned and controlled by big media corporations, thanks to their disposal of financial resources, can actually improve the value of the service, the plurality of topics and the competence of the contributors as well as enable technological developments, change the elitism of media professionals and create new general awareness (Barwise & Picard, 2012; Dal Zotto & Picard, 2015; Picard & van Weezel, 2008; Valcke, 2011).

3 The Convergence Process Between Advantages and Disadvantages

As mentioned above media convergence seems to represent an evolutionary process that accompanies the development of information technologies, telecommunications, media products and services, media industry and firm structures as well as media professionals. According to Stöber (2004) there are three stages of media evolution: invention, innovation and institutionalization. In the media evolution case of convergence, the invention stage consisted in the ability to convert differentiated bits of analogue data (such as voice, text, audio or visual) to undifferentiated bits of digital data. The innovation stage refers to the possibility to distribute and consume different media types, whether radio, TV or internet through the same platform and this phase is clearly completed. Indeed, the media industry is now finally moving towards the institutionalisation phase of convergence, which is defined as the adaptation to the environment to create a new « system entity » (McPhillips & Merlo, 2008). Such phase acquires more a revolutionary than an evolutionary character, as divergence rather than convergence processes can emerge as a result.

Stöber (2004) argues that four factors of change need to simultaneously occur to shape a new system entity and a viable business model: technological, cultural, political and economic factors. The first three are already in motion. Advancements in technology usually correspond to reductions in cost and significant increases in functionality. In the media industry this pattern can be identified with improvements in speed of data transfer for broadband, in quality of mobile devices as well as in costs of data storage. The high rate of adoption of broadband and other digital services confirm improvements of the perceived value of technological advancements. Furthermore, the time spent on consuming media services based on converged technologies such as mobile phone calls and Internet surfing, text messages, traditional and web radio listening as well as TV has rapidly increased and most of these consumption activities take place simultaneously. This is a clear sign of a cultural shift away from single source consumption patterns (McPhillips & Merlo, 2008) and denotes a device diverging trend. From a political point of view media technology convergence is enhanced by governments’ encouragement if not enforcement of digital broadcast adoption.

A fourth critical factor of change towards the institutionalization phase of media convergence is the economic factor, which is still evolving. The emergence of an appropriate business model will determine the future of the media industry (McPhillips & Merlo, 2008). For the moment we have just seen media convergence leading to an over-supply and commoditization of media content, the decline of advertising effectiveness due to media fragmentation as well as the over-exposure of audiences to an infinite number of advertising touch points leading to the decline of the current media business model (Dal et al., 2012; Picard & Dal Zotto, 2006; Matteo & Dal Zotto, 2015). Increasing the number of vehicles, touch points and the volume of advertising may increase revenues in the short term but it eventually leads to a downward pressure on margins in the medium-long terms (McPhillips & Merlo, 2008).

Similarly, as the attention that consumers can dedicate to media is limited, the direct consequence of media fragmentation, or consumption divergence, is not only the erosion of advertising revenues but also the decline of subscription revenues. Information media have reacted to this effect by cutting budgets and costs. Technological and product convergence can thus have negative effects as it is the case for journalism and journalistic products (Deuze, 2004; Dupagne & Garrison, 2006; Fioretti & Russ-Mohl, 2009; Huang, Davison, Shreve et al., 2006; Huang, Rademakers, Fayemiwo, & Dunlap, 2004; Lawson-Borders, 2006; Meier, 2007). Online information media have a 24-h constantly updated news cycle and require staff to be able to work multiplatform. Further, not only content is constantly updated—thus reducing staff’s time to research, report or even think about their work (Jarvis, 2009; Klinenberg, 2005)—but it is also developed across multiple platforms and channels, a phenomenon called multimedia storytelling (Gray, Bounegru & Chambers, 2012; Jenkins, 2001). This inevitably calls for a cultural and organizational change within media firms (Boczkowski, 2005) and increases the level of uncertainty among employees. Within web-driven newsrooms journalists have for instance less time to talk with sources and check facts (Porlezza & Russ-Mohl, 2013; Thurman & Myllylahti, 2009), they will therefore tend to report news that have already been or are being reported by other colleagues in other media in order to reduce uncertainty. As a result information becomes standardized in its format and uniform in its content making it difficult for media firms to distinguish themselves from each other and gain a competitive advantage. Furthermore, multiplatform content production and distribution reflects a process of editorial convergence: a converged newsroom provides content for multiple distribution platforms thanks to the contribution of different, complementary and multiskilled media professionals. In order to accommodate and take advantage of cross-platform media strategies journalistic and editorial work withing newsrooms needs to be reorganized while staff recruiting, training and development measures become fundamental.

4 Managing the Media Convergence Process: Outline of the Book

So far we have learnt that factors such as digitalization, deregulation and the subsequent changes in user preferences enhance the media convergence process. Depending on the impact of those factors different types of media convergence can be distinguished, even if they may be complementary and share evolution paths.

Indeed, media industry convergence is the result of technological convergence and the subsequent need for media firms—which are characterized by high fixed costs and low marginal costs—to reach economies of scale. As we have seen, technological development has led to an increasing fragmentation of media and audiences, denoting in this case a divergence process, and subsequently to a products and services’ price deflation. A viable way to address this inevitable price deflation seems to be the application of competition policy, allowing industries to become more concentrated and so reduce competitive pressures. Considering that the loss of pricing power quickly leads to a decline in industry profitability, the only possible reaction for the media industry has been a horizontal consolidation or vertical integration to gain gatekeeping power (Noam, 2006 and 2009).

Furthermore, both technological and industry convergence leads to experience and social convergence at consumer level, as well as to cultural and editorial convergence within media organizations (See Fig. 1). Due to multimedia and multiplatform content production and distribution environments different professional cultures and tasks are thus melting together. It is therefore clear that, in order to successfully manage media convergence processes, not only technological and media economics aspects but also human resource and organizational development related aspects need to be taken into account.

Fig. 1
figure 1

Impact of media convergence at different levels

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In this handbook we have tried to touch upon all four main levels of media convergence—technology (e.g., information systems level (Lugmayr, 2013), industry, consumer and organizational level—in order to show its multidisciplinary and multifaceted character (see Fig. 1). As contributions were many and converging around two main areas, we decided to organize them into two volumes, one focusing on the journalism, broadcasting and social media aspects of convergence, and a second one highlighting the perspectives of media firms and users.

4.1 Volume One

The first volume of this handbook starts with a closer look at the meaning of media convergence by presenting at the same time three different perspectives on the concept. As mentioned at the beginning of this introductory chapter, in order to analyze cause and effects of media convergence and thus conceive solutions to current media industry challenges, it is necessary to first understand the multifaceted meaning of media convergence. In the first part Arango-Forero, Roncallo-Dow and Uribe-Jongbloed address the idea of convergence both as an abstract concept and as a word ascribed to specific phenomena. They point out a divergent conceptualization of convergence in the literature so far and the necessity to disentangle the abstract concept from the working definition of convergence which refers to current geo-economic and culturally bound phenomena. The evolution of media convergence from its first stage of merging technologies to its second catalyzing stage is problematized by Marie-José Montpetit in the second chapter. Through a thorough discussion of network and device convergence, she explains how the advent of social connectivity has disrupted the media consumption experience and pushed convergence away from basic functional effects into a richer set of interdependent elements such as hardware, software, content and user interaction. Shantanu Dey concludes the introductory perspectives part on convergence by highlighting that media convergence does not necessarily lead to “power convergence”—i.e., “economic power” in terms of media ownership concentration is not necessarily being imposed on “cultural power”. He claims that the existing open architecture of the Internet allows the articulation of divergent powers and proposes an “affirmative public ownership” policy at network infrastructure and applications level in order to maintain the structural openness of the system and enable free speech.

The volume continues by specifically addressing three media fields: journalism, broadcasting and social media. Focusing on convergence challenges in journalism and publishing, part two discusses the impact of news media online shift on journalistic quality. Christian Wellbrock argues that this shift is preventing mass media do adequately fulfill their function within democratic societies and suggests that public service broadcasters should be allowed to expand their activities online. On the same line, by discussing the implications of convergence on human resources and labor conditions, according to Spyridou and Veglis emerging convergence skills might reduce professional autonomy and journalistic performance. Kay Hamacher compares blogs and traditional media in order to see if digitalization increases the degree of content diversification, while Veglis, Dimoulas and Kalliris investigate technological issues when implementing cross-media publishing. Pointing out that media publishing channels differ in terms of production and consumption, they propose a modular model to appropriately manage cross-media publishing automation while respecting the peculiarities of the different publishing areas. Moving towards the consumer perspective, Mustic and Plenkovic highlight that the graphic representation of information affect the perception of content and this information credibility. Ebner, Schön and Alimucaj present a new print-on-demand service that can improve the perceived quality of open access online journals by allowing readers to assemble different articles and print their “personal book”. Finally, the last paper in this chapter problematizes the fact that, in order for new business models to emerge and for the online shift to have success, media professionals need to reconsider their belief system.

Part three concentrates on broadcasting. In particular, Matteucci discusses intellectual property rights within the context of digital TV convergence in the European Union. He indicates how patent portfolio strategies and control of crucial copyrights become increasingly central for competing in a converging TV sector. Deliyannis looks at presentation requirements for a converged interactive television through some real-life case studies; Tuomi approaches mobile devices as second screen idea to enhance consumers’ television experience in our present century, while Ala-Fossi problematizes existing divergences within converging radio and television newsrooms by highlighting the different approach followed by Europe and the USA on one hand and Japan on the other hand.

Social media aspects of convergence are the topic of part four. Villi, Matikainen and Khaldarova discuss technology-enabled user distributed content by exploring how the convergence enables a participatory audience to disseminate news media online content within social networks. Their study draws on the analysis of fifteen news media within seven different countries. On the same path Duh, Meznaric and Korosak examine the possibility to use different social media channels for the automatic generation of interactive social media news streams. Zlatanov and Koleva argue that the raising information quantity determines the superiority of technology savvy and communication experienced individuals, as well as their subsequent major influence on information spread within online social networks. The authors point out that technological convergence might thus lead to social divergence. The tension between technological convergence and social divergence is problematized by Damasio, Henriques, Teixeira-Botelho and Dias, too. Their paper concludes the first volume of this handbook and focuses on mobile technology. According to the authors mobile Internet access facilitates more interactive and participative activities on one hand, but it results in network-based individualism on the other hand.

4.2 Volume Two

If the first volume focuses on the impact of digitalization on the media industry and thus on technology convergence, the second volume of the handbook considers structural/economic convergence issues as well as cultural convergence. Part one deals with the impact of convergence on media organizations and media markets. In the first paper Gershon examines media convergence effects on special design and operations within transnational organizations. Georgiades continues by addressing the critical issue of employees’ involvement and highlighting how divergent understandings of concepts such as communication and employee involvement itself may hamper organizational convergence processes. Karmasin, Diehl and Koinig argue that media convergence implies the need for media firms to develop new business models, appropriate organizational structures as well as new managerial competences. Vukanovic concludes the chapter by analyzing how media convergence can create opportunities and shape successful business models.

Chapter two and chapter three of the second volume of the handbook reflect both the impact of changes in user preferences as well as the intertwined issue of cultural change and cultural convergence within the media industry. Part two mainly discusses convergence in relation to media production activities. Denward’s contribution deals with participation enabling media production. By analyzing the design and implementation phases of a drama production in Sweden, the author approaches various types of convergence—industrial, technology, cultural and social—and the difficulties they created in the production process. Noronha e Sousa, de Lemos Martins and Zagalo investigate the practical implications of producing and consuming transmedia narratives from both the perspective of producers and consumers. Innocenti, Pescatore and Rosati approach narratives, too. By using conceptual tools borrowed from the media, economics and information architecture studies, the authors offer a cross-disciplinary perspective on serial narratives as audiovisual production niche within a converging media environment. Indrek Ibrus applies an evolutionary approach to media change to interpret recent Northern European examples of how audiovisual micro-companies are confronting the “convergence culture” and innovating their output via cross-media strategies and transmedia storytelling. Foster and Brostoff’s paper conclude the chapter discussing advances in 3D computer graphics technology and possible convergence enabled synergies between video game and urban design—two fields that share the goal of constructing a cohesive, credible and readable visual narrative about an alternative reality.

Part three focuses on user perspectives and experiences. Alexandre Fleury opens the chapter with an investigation about how convergence between mobile and television technology is experienced in highly connected societies. He explores current practices in Denmark and Japan and identifies a number of future trends for converging media solutions. Reichl continues by analyzing experience from a quality point of view. He addresses issues such as the development of laws as well as models to charge for quality of experience in converging communication systems. Tavares and Schofield deal with multisensory interaction design as critical success factor for a correct user experience of multiple devices, media and platforms. The following paper further addresses the implementation of a multimodal interface system within various media platforms to enhance the effectiveness of man–machine interaction. McKay points out though that effective media convergence depends on knowledge engineers’ understanding of the changeable nature of the human-computer interaction environment. Finally, user experience design is approached from a transmedia storytelling point of view, early in the creative writing process. Ghellal, Wiklund-Engblom, Obal and Morrison define transmedia storytelling as evolving storylines running across multiple platforms. This definition highlights the complexity and importance of transmedia design, including for instance interdisciplinarity, genres and emergent production models.

Last but not least, part four presents a few papers discussing future media convergence trends. Grüblbauer and Haric conceptualize how to design and build a convergence application to effectively showcase big amounts of information and data coming from diversified sources. By analyzing existing theory on converging media and media planning, Svahn, Wahlund, Denward, Rademaker and Nilsson present a model for evaluating converging media for advertising purposes. Giesecke analyses the business models of sixteen event ecosystem organizations in four different countries. His conclusions indicate that, in order to achieve convergence, the news media industry needs to learn from the entertainment media industry, build and bridge networks, and ensure affinity between content and advertisements. Finally, Giesecke and Immonen argue that mid-sized mass media companies suffer from a conservative approach to convergence, and encourage mass media company leaders to diverge and focus on business models based on a system approach. The future will show, if convergence will let media environments evolve towards more ubiquitous media or ambient media environments (Lugmayr, 2012).

5 Conclusion

All in all we believe that this handbook provides practitioners and researchers, experts and amateurs with an overview of the most important issues as well as with precious insights concerning media convergence processes. Furthermore, thanks to an in depth content analysis of all contributed chapters at the very end, the handbook contributes to the debate about causes and effects of the media evolution process by highlighting not only general trends in research but also and especially research gaps in the media convergence field.