Skys Control of Sports Rights - Research Paper Example

Drawing on the conceptual frameworks and by researching specific examples of cultural industries, explore: Sky’s control of sports rights  Sky is a digital TV channel which is quite a new breakthrough in the entertainment industry. Sky is all encompassing ranging from news, sports, music, films, soap operas and a lot more. The Sky produces numerous TV content and also owns a number of TV channels. It is the UK’s largest pay TV provider. The present Sky is the product of 50:50 financial mergers between Rupert Murdoch’s Sky Television and British Sky Broadcasting which took place in November 1990. The reason for overwhelming success of the Sky is its monopoly on the Premiere football leagues. The company had paid an amount as high as 300 million pounds and took the rights of Premiere football league and in the course beat the BBC and ITV in the competition and since the initiation of Premiere league Sky has its monopoly. From then on for the first time viewers had to pay for watching a live football match. This monopoly of Premiere League has made Sky the richest TV channel and in the recent times it is also the owner of football clubs. The sports rights of Sky has focused our attention to the term culture industry which is a term coined by Adorno and Horkheimer of the Frankfurt School. The culture industry can be rather explained as the effects of capitalism in culture rather the commoditization of culture. The scholars have said that the popular culture is analogous to a factory producing standardized cultural goods through popular media like the TV, films, magazines and radios to manipulate the masses to passivity so that the mass starts believing that whatever is shown through the popular media is correct and needs to be followed, it actually makes the mass dependant on the media content and the media content directly or indirectly becomes the popular culture. The culture industry gives rise to needs which are not the actual ones and such needs are motivated by the capitalism or it would be better to say the growing globalism trends. Adorno and Horkheimer argued that mass culture or the culture industry has a political connotation and the single culture which is created by the culture industry actually is market based in the sense it is in line with the growing commercial market rather it would be simpler to say that it is such designed that the masses become market obedient. Both Adorno and Horkheimer were influenced by the theories of dialectical and historical materialism of Karl Marx which pays a major focus on the growing capital markets. It can be deciphered that the culture not only represents the face of a society but also shapes a society by commoditizing and standardizing objects rather than subjects. The culture industry tries to serve the need of the consumer or aptly speaking tries to shape the need of the consumer. Culture Industry may also be called popular form of art. The culture industry makes us believe that the customer is the king which in reality is not the case. It makes us feel so because that will help in popularizing the concept of capitalism. In the present age the products of the culture industry rather the commodities of the mass culture is solely for the profit motives of the creators of such culture. The culture industry has become so important a industry that it can be said that the revenue of other industries to a certain extent is dependent on the culture industry as because the advertisements are a major source which transmits the message of a commodity to the mass community and advertisers play a major role in shaping the desires and wants of people, it is the product of the culture industry which makes the transgressions of a product possible from the stage of luxury to the stage of necessity. Culture Industry more often turns into a kind of public relations which allows the creators of popular commodities be a familiar name in every household. One strange thing about the culture industry is that the more dehumanized its operations and content are the more successfully and diligently the content is made to propagate because the mass people is made to believe that particular thing is correct and has to be followed, such is the case because the presentation of the content is eluding or I should say more like an oasis, something which can never be felt closely. When the truth of the culture industry is asked the answer is as if obvious and this is because the truth is wrapped in such a covering that our eyes cannot permeate through it. The culture Industry is such that it puts the viewer into trouble and again takes the viewer out of trouble harmoniously through its commodity and unfortunately the consumers are not in a position to decipher it. (Horkheimer, and Adorno, 1976; Adorno, 1991)  If we come to the psychological aspects of sports activity the results are endless. Sport is an activity which is closer to our selves and a strange kind of passion is related to sports which originate from the subtle feelings of patriotism. It is unlikely for people to miss important sports shows like Premiere League matches and we have a lot of hype towards such shows as a result what happens we stick to our television sets and in the process watch all the advertisements which happen in the mean time. Psychologists say that even if we have a flash of something for a few seconds it is retained in our memory for some time and if the flash continues repeatedly then it is bound to stay in our memory and it not only stays in our memory it transcends down to our subconscious.  Sport personalities used as a product ambassador is bound to attract our attention because especially the young generation have a tendency to treat the sport personalities as their icons. Hence the services or the products which they emboss is bound to get more market salability compared to others; one more reason for such an attitude is that it is in culture across the globe that sports is something fair, hence those engaged to sports will be fair and we can confidently trust them and go for the products which they emboss. In such a scenario we can say that the products or services which show their advertisement during important sport shows naturally earns higher profit than others because that is part of the culture industry. Therefore the channel which allows the creators of such services and products to broadcast their advertisements during such prime hours earns very high revenue because the advertisement during prime hours is more highly priced than during normal hours. In this case one important thing to be noted is when a particular channel has a monopoly over a particular sports show then what happens, the revenue do not get the chance of getting shared it solely comes to the monopoly player; therefore we can say that Sky which is a monopoly player in showing the Premiere League matches earns all the revenue from those who advertise through Sky and not only that they also earn revenue from those who get the chance of watching the revenue. Thus we can estimate the amount of revenue which Sky will earn and the reason it spent 300 million pounds to buy the monopoly of the Premiere League defeating all other major players like the BBC and the ITV in the due course. (Miller, Lawrence and McKay, 2001) As such a step was taken by Sky it had to face several criticisms, the first being that such an action by Sky has turned out all the rivals or it is better said in the manner that the element of competition has completely vanished from the media market, and if there is no element of competition it is very clear that the quality of the product do not enhance because the fear of losing the market do not exist hence the theory of monopoly applies here very aptly which says that monopoly destroys the urge to search and hence the analytical skill gets blunt and gradually it loses the power to innovate, hence competition is a necessary pre condition for a fair market and in the absence of competition we lose the urge to be in constant innovation rather it can be said that a fair competition keeps us constantly updated about the market.  It is also pointed out that Sky charges higher price for the products it sells compared to all others but Sky on the other hand says that its customer is benefiting a lot from the growing variety of choices and they are becoming aware of the new edge innovation.   (Douglas, 1999) Therefore it is very clear that Sky has used the concept of “culture industry” to maximize its revenue as because it has been found that the popular form of culture industry makes the thought process of the people almost numb and hence they tend to do go by the concepts of that popular culture and in the due process the manufacturers of services and products earn high revenues. Thus we can say that the culture industry here plays an important role and it is closely intertwined with the Sky’s control of sports rights because that is the origin which runs behind the overwhelming success of Sky and we can in no way negate the effect of culture industry or popular culture which was an old adage used by Adorno and Horkheimer from the Frankfurt School. Credits should be given to Sky for its acumen as it has proved its powerful thought process through which it has capitalized the popular culture or the capital industry well relating it to sports in order to gain personal gains and in the manner become a leader among the other big players. The fact remains that lawfully it is not possible for a particular group to have the sole of monopoly because as we have seen earlier it is not a healthy process but today’s world understands the power of money and fortunately or unfortunately Sky had the power of immense money hence to get the deal was a piece of cake for Sky. Complaints have been raised by various other media channels like the Virgin Media that they are badly losing in the market due to the monopoly rights of the Sky. It is also said the amount of money which Sky charges the producers of programs are much higher as compared to others yet they are forced to go with Sky because that is the only channel through which they will be able to broadcast their programs. No effort in the right direction has been taken to stop the monopoly rights of Sky and hence programmers as well as the viewers are under the pressure of higher charges because they do not have an alternative. This is a way to force the consumers to take whatever it has to deliver and in the due course popularize certain products and services which are direct products of globalization and usher the consumerist culture all over. The consumerist culture is an essence of the capitalist society and the more consumerist a society becomes it moves more towards capitalism and resultantly the vicious circle continues in which the richer goes on becoming richer and the poorer becomes all the more poor and that is the ultimate goal of the those in the power position because they do not want the dialectic structure in which the there is an alternative change of power position as they feel it is their hegemonic right to be in the power position and they will not tolerate any threat to their power position. Interestingly enough we can say that the popular culture entices the entire population towards a certain living standard but do not give them the means to achieve that particular standard of living as a result they get disillusioned and start believing in the power of the rich class and is also under the illusion that they are the ones who will provide for all their needs but that does not turn out to be the reality, the reality is far from this as those in the power position find ways and means to squeeze those in the less powerful zones to add to their wealth. (Grant, n.d.)  It was the Frankfurt School which first found out the relation of the culture industry and our society. They were the first ones who showed that media is completely controlled by those who have a lot of interest in the society’s economy and polity, again the products of the Frankfurt School showed us how the leisure time of the people is very tactfully used by those big shots in order to gain their political as well as economic gains. In history we have seen how the fascists had utilized the media in the year 1930 so that they could give rise to a market economy and a democratic polity. The critics have taken the term “culture industry” as a means to give rise to an industrialized mass that are moved by the force of globalism and their wants and desires are molded by the force of industrialism and globalism. It was believed that the function of culture industries was to legitimize the existence of capitalist societies. The culture industries were gradually telling upon the working class a consumerist culture and were finding out ways of political transformation and an altogether change in the society as a whole. Although our society is demand dominated yet Adorno and Horkheimer argue that the consumers rather the demand of the consumers are manipulated by the mobilizing cultural technology by those who are sitting at the highest rung of the ladder of economic production, they maneuver the demands of consumers according to their advantage because their main aim is to receive the maximum profits. (Durham and Kellner 2001)  Sports were basically developed as a fruitful pastime in which the people could involve when they had ample leisure. It was also used as a method of nation building and hence it was given a   heavy weightage and also it was argued that sports was such an activity that it initiated an air competition among nations which in turn contributed to the solidarity of the nations. In (Miller, Lawrence and McKay, 2001, p. 11) it has been said that “It has been argued from the Left that ‘[f]or all the horrors of globalism, one more nail is driven into the coffin of cultural nationalism with every step towards a sporting circus’.” This actually means that in the present age sports are more an activity which promotes more of globalization and less of cultural nationalism that is, it no longer serves the purpose of solidifying a nation. In the recent age sports has become more of a consumer good and plays an important role in shaping the popular culture because sports is such a medium which may go beyond class , race or gender and even language and hence can be the most effective means of reach ability to the people. More than the nations, the various club are more famous and the groups which own these clubs like the Nike which owns teams like Italy, Brazil and Nigeria.  To own a team is now a status symbol and it requires a lot of capital and so it can be understood as to why the owner of Sky, Rupert Murdoch has started owning a club. Sports is the embodiment of  cultural industry because now even the live sports have become mobile due to the breakthrough of various satellite channels and sports which is more or less an international event makes full use of its broadcasting through various advertisement campaigns, promotions, marketing and various celebrity endorsements. As sports travels beyond geography and culture it can be best medium of transport. For example the game of cricket is known to have a cultural connotation (Lazarus, 1999) in the sense that it defined class relations in the pre-capitalist society and explained the reaction related to the game. Similarly all other games have some or the other cultural association and that is the reason why sports play a central role in the culture industry and it can be well capitalized to achieve socio-economic as well as socio-political gains.  Conclusion  Thus we can see that the Sky’s ownership of sports right in relation to the cultural industry has far reaching effects in relation to the our socio-economic scenario. That is the reason why Sky tried and managed to achieve the monopoly rights of the Premiere League.  We have seen in the discussion above that the effects can reach beyond our imagination. Sports which is an integral part of our life plays an important role in shaping our desires, wants and our aspirations and as sports is considered all fair we tend to get more influenced by sports and that particular opportunity has been very well honed by Sky. As sports is watched and enjoyed by all we generally stick to our television sets. During this time whatever is shown in the TV attracts our attention and we try to give it quite a lot of importance and for products and services that is the best time to market as it is embedded in our minds that things shown during sports shows need to be as important as the show itself in the process what happens the industrialization through globalization slowly creeps into our minds and we try to own all the products of industrialization hence the pockets of the owners of such products and services gets filled and the channel which helps the owners to become rich also becomes rich  by earning revenue from them and also becomes the sole player in the media market and hence the demand for it increases and according to simple economics when the demand for a product increases the price of it also increases , similarly Sky which is the sole player has paved an easy way for itself to earn revenue in leaps and bounds.       References 1. Adorno T.W. 1991, Culture Industry Reconsidered (from the culture industry: selected essays on mass culture), London: Routledge 2. Douglas, T. (1999-03-12), “Murdochs rise to the top”, BBC News, available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/special_report/1999/03/99/murdochs_big_match/167937.stm (accessed on May 19, 2009) 3. Durham M, Kellner D, 2001, Media and cultural studies, NY: Wiley-Blackwell 4. Garrison R, Rizzo M, 2007, The economics of time and ignorance, London: Taylor &  Francis 5. Grant B. n.d., “The Commodification of Culture and Its Implications for the Television Industry: An Examination of the Culture Industry Thesis”, Egoist, available at: http://barneygrant.tripod.com/cultureindustry.htm (accessed on May 19, 2009)   6. Horkheimer, M. and Adorno, T.W. 1976, The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception, London: Continuum International Publishing Group 7. Lazarus, N. 1999, Nationalism and cultural practice in the postcolonial world, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 8. Miller T, Lawrence G, McKay J, 2001, Globalization and sport, London: Sage Publications Ltd                     Read More