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In media, vertical integration doesn't work

AnonusAnonus
in Talk
At least, not as intended

It sure seems to lead to managerial weaknesses and weaker products

Comments

  • TatterhoodTatterhood
    I refuse to believe this means anything
  • Imipolex GImipolex G
    Touch the cow. Do it now.
    "products"
  • KlinotaxisKlinotaxis
    kill living beings
    does this mean like, the filmmaker owns an acting school
  • AnonusAnonus
    I've learned to tolerate drama...except on the boat
    Nah, like, how all the TV networks have in-house studios and such
  • Sredni VashtarSredni Vashtar
    “I'm surprised. Those clothes… but, aren't you…?”
    So like Pioneer cranking out all those Tenchi Muyo OVAs to varying results.

    Still, you do realise that this sounds like gibberish to most people, right? And you've been making, like, multiple threads every day for a week now when they scarcely warrant it, being too serious to work as joke threads or whimsical one-offs and too insubstantial or esoteric to dig into for most people here.
  • TachyonTachyon
    imagei will watch the heck outta this pumpkin patch
    TBF "vertical integration" is a standard economics/business term, not something esoteric or specific to the media.  And, well, Google exists.

    Still, @Anonus, maybe some more concrete examples of how it leads to weaker products and worse management would help us better understand where you're coming from with this?
  • TatterhoodTatterhood
    Tachyon said:

    TBF "vertical integration" is a standard economics/business term, not something esoteric or specific to the media.  And, well, Google exists.

    I refuse to believe any standard business term means anything.
  • BeeBee
    Tatterhood said:

    I refuse to believe any standard business term means anything.


  • glennmagusharveyglennmagusharvey
    edited 2018-04-16 22:45:34
    Tachyon said:

    TBF "vertical integration" is a standard economics/business term, not something esoteric or specific to the media.  And, well, Google exists.

    Yeah.

    "Vertical integration" just means "buying up companies that do things upstream or downstream of what your company does in the process of making a finished product for consumers."

    Contrast "horizontal integration" which means "buying up your competitors who do the same thing you do, such as the stage of that process".
  • lee4hmzlee4hmz
    ⚠ THIS MACHINE KILLS FASCISTS
    Taking this seriously for a second: I understand the management struggles, but weaker products?
  • TachyonTachyon
    imagei will watch the heck outta this pumpkin patch
    i suppose it follows that mismanagement can result in a reduction in quality

    still i should like specific examples of what Anonus has in mind here
  • AnonusAnonus
    I've learned to tolerate drama...except on the boat
    lee4hmz said:

    Taking this seriously for a second: I understand the management struggles, but weaker products?

    Tachyon said:

    i suppose it follows that mismanagement can result in a reduction in quality


    still i should like specific examples of what Anonus has in mind here
    I was thinking largely of Time Warner and the trainwreck that Cartoon Network has been since Betty Cohen left - and even since the merger, really
  • AnonusAnonus
    I've learned to tolerate drama...except on the boat
    Like, how from about 1997 to 2000, Hanna-Barbera - by then effectively CN's in-house studio - was an operating division of Warner Bros., and in 1998 moved out of 3400 Cahuenga and into WB TV Animation's building

    WB and CN were not on great terms, which of course damaged CN's pipeline (and provided an opening for indie studios, though CN retained all the rights to their shows in perpetuity) - and even after H-B's staff was spun out into Cartoon Network Studios (which already existed as part of H-B, it was just separate now), WB and CN hated each other and have fought endlessly

    Also I would argue that being directly under CN's control has fucked things up at CNS (e.g. the reanimated corpses of PPG and Dexter, the lobotomized post-McCracken final seasons of the original PPG, the complete mishandling of the Cartoonstitute)
  • lee4hmzlee4hmz
    ⚠ THIS MACHINE KILLS FASCISTS
    In that case I'm not sure it's as much vertical integration that's the problem (CN always had some form of it) as WB's ham-handed attempts at horizontal integration/consolidation.
  • AnonusAnonus
    edited 2018-04-17 02:00:26
    I've learned to tolerate drama...except on the boat
    How so

    (also, CN has always had some form of it, but the MTV Networks suits brought in to head up the network at its outset resented being forced by corporate to rely on H-B for programming - especially since Seibert had not yet begun to institute its transformation into the Cool Studio in Town)
  • lee4hmzlee4hmz
    ⚠ THIS MACHINE KILLS FASCISTS
    Well, WB wanted to combine H-B and WBA, and by doing so it made CN's output less reliable and less good.
  • TitleNameTitleName
    Bee said:

    Tatterhood said:

    I refuse to believe any standard business term means anything.


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