This systematic review examines how media innovation labs are conceptualized, implemented, and sustained within contemporary news organisations. Following PRISMA 2020 guidelines, a protocol was registered in OSF, and comprehensive searches were conducted in Web of Science and Scopus (2010-2025), applying strict PICOS-based inclusion criteria that required studies to be peer-reviewed, open-access, empirical, and focused explicitly on media labs. Two reviewers independently screened all records in blinded mode, extracted data using a structured template, and assessed methodological quality with the MMAT 2018. Of 39 records identified, 14 studies met all eligibility criteria. The synthesis shows that media labs operate as protected experimental environments characterized by interdisciplinary collaboration, agile prototyping, and knowledge transfer. Strengths include institutionalized experimentation, cross-functional coordination, and strategic foresight; weaknesses involve siloisation, resource fragility, and cultural resistance; opportunities arise from emerging technologies and open-innovation ecosystems; threats relate to financial precarity, organizational inertia, and superficial innovation cultures. Overall, the evidence base is predominantly qualitative and geographically concentrated in Europe, limiting generalizability. The review highlights the need for longitudinal and comparative research to clarify how labs contribute to sustainable organizational transformation.
The media value chain is experiencing a transformation from linear models to dynamic platform ecosystems, enabling direct interactions between creators, distributors, and consumers. Drawing on a decades-spanning literature review and co-citation network analysis, this paper investigates key trends shaping media value-chain evolution. Through an evolutionary theory lens, a conceptual model for the emerging media value chain is developed based on the mechanisms of variation, selection, and retention driving the re-configuration of industry activity. This interdisciplinary approach provides a deeper understanding of the dynamics shaping contemporary media ecosystems, offering insights for both further research and wider industry practice. This study contributes both to understanding the evolution of media value creation structures and to mapping how scholarly perspectives on these transformations have co-evolved over time.
Grounded in the brand consistency perspective and diffusion of innovation (DOI) theory, this study sheds light on the role of film titles as brand names in the context of international branding. By conceptualizing two dimensions of brand consistency, namely brand consistency by 1) sound and 2) meaning, this study investigates effective branding strategies for films in culturally and linguistically different markets. An analysis of U.S. films released in South Korea reveals that effective international branding decisions for films go beyond whether to standardize or adapt original brand names (i.e. film titles). Instead, marketers should adjust the extent to which they should preserve how the original brand name sounds and what it means, considering whether such branding strategies could exploit cross-market effects that travel from the home market to the host country to maximize films' foreign performance. Specifitcally, the effects of brand consistency dimensions on films' foreign performance are moderated by sequels, the complexity of original brand names, electronic word of mouth in the home market, and release time lags between the home and the host country.
Drawing from literature on how declining industries adapt to shifting markets, the paper analyzes how three leading newspaper chains in Finland have responded with intra-group collaboration to the decline in revenues. First, based on document analysis, we examine what forms of institutional cooperation the firms have developed to increase their sustainability. Second, we use content analysis to examine to what extent the analyzed press chains utilize content duplication. Third, we interview the editors-in-chief to find out how they legitimize the increased collaboration. Although the practices vary, the editors-in-chief consider content duplication necessary, and the news overlap is found to rise to over 40% of news supply.
This study empirically investigates dynamic managerial capabilities (DMC) in the context of social media influencers (SMIs) operating in digital ecosystems and examines individual-level strategic orientations as antecedents of these capabilities. Survey data from 335 UK-based SMIs collected in February and March 2025 were analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). Results show that all three DMC dimensions (human capital, social capital, and managerial cognition) contribute to business model innovation and performance, with managerial cognition emerging as the most critical driver. Market, technology, and entrepreneurial orientations emerged as antecedents of DMCs. In contrast, relative creative orientation (opposed to business orientation) shows a negative effect on DMC development. The study extends DMC theory to solo entrepreneurs in creative industries and provides guidance for creative entrepreneurs seeking to sustain innovation and performance in platform-driven markets.
Journalists and news organizations are concerned about keeping their outlets viable. Many are turning to digital formats to reach their audiences. Most published research about digital business models has focused on Europe and North America, but this is the first study examining Central Asia, specifically Kazakhstan. Twelve journalists and managers were interviewed about their organizations. The results show these outlets adjusted to the authoritarian government, adopted technological changes, found an information niche, and reached out for guidance. While a few profit from their businesses, the majority are still seeking a model that enables them to operate without government support.
In the domain of media management research, the term "platform" is utilized in a variety of ways, resulting in a certain degree of ambiguity surrounding its precise definition. In order to enhance construct clarity around the term in media management, this literature review of 474 media management articles dealing with platforms comprises an overview of the various definitions and conceptualizations of the term (base, two-sided market, infrastructure, channel, internet/ tech company). Despite the differences in these conceptualizations, there are notable similarities. The synthesis of multiple platform definitions shows that three core activities underlie all platforms: enabling, coordinating, and governing. Moreover, the study identifies design attributes of platforms that can be used to describe platforms. Further, the study's findings indicate the existence of three distinct streams within media management research: the economic stream, the critical stream, and the distribution stream. Each of these streams adopts a different perspective on platforms. The review concludes by providing paths for future research in media management using the three streams of literature and the core activities of platforms, and calls for clear definitions to be provided when the term is used.
Gatekeeping in the media industry has historically been exercised primarily by publishers and editorial actors but increasingly shifted toward platform companies and their algorithmic infrastructures with the rise of digital platforms. The affordances of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI), however, introduce new points of control across the full media value chain, challenging this assumption. This paper examines how GenAI reshapes gatekeeping across the media value chain through a qualitative multiple-case study of seven European publishers based on a data collection in 2024. Our analysis identifies five GenAI-induced, affordance-driven gatekeeping mechanisms spanning along the media value chain. Collectively, these mechanisms produce a redistribution of power among publishers, AI providers, and audiences, in which publishers cede control upstream to infrastructure providers and downstream to users. We argue that GenAI constitutes a systemic structuring force that redefines not only where gatekeeping occurs, but also how media work is organized around provision, generation, and interaction. In doing so, it fundamentally alters how value is created and captured across the media value chain.
AI-driven recommendation algorithms are a signature feature of video streaming services and ideally contribute subscribers' utility. However, that is not always the case. Given the default nature of recommendation algorithms, this study investigated the antecedents of reliance on recommendation algorithms by integrating the heuristic-systematic model with motivational orientations. A survey of 497 U.S. Netflix users revealed that the perceived accuracy and diversity of algorithmic recommendations, trust in AI, and attachment to the streaming platform increase algorithm reliance. Further, the perceived accuracy of recommendation algorithms has a stronger effect on algorithm reliance for those who have a greater attachment to the platform.
The online news offers of public service media (PSM) are contested across Europe, leading to debates about the remit and funding of PSM in digitalized societies. Private media companies maintain that PSM's freely available news offers lead to a crowding-out of commercial players by negatively affecting audiences' willingness-to-pay (WTP) for news. Research looking into the alleged crowding-out is still scarce. Taking the case of the Swiss German online news market, this study combines a representative survey and a choice-based conjoint (CBC) analysis to understand whether and how PSM's online news offer "SRF News" affects private media. Market simulations show that free news sites are crowding out paid offerings, benefiting most from a hypothetical discontinuation of "SRF News," while subscription-based media would only see marginal gains. Overall, a restriction of PSM online would result in a lower news reach, especially among households with low income, low educational attainment and journalistic media use.
We analyze the complex innovation process that led to the development of automatically written soccer match reports for the Sportschau, a sports magazine produced by German Public Service Medium (PSM) Westdeutscher Rundfunk (WDR). From the perspective of innovative learning culture (ILC), we ask via guideline-based interviews which of its characteristics and conditions could be observed. Findings show that almost all the characteristics of ILC were present, such as the team being allowed by WDR to be experimental and creative in its approach, as were ILC's conditions, such as open communication and shared goals, which were mainly managed by WDR's Innovation Hub.
This study investigates the reconfigured dynamics of international TV show flows in the global OTT era. Our analysis proceeds in two stages: we first conduct a data-driven exploration of 136,800 observations from Netflix's daily Top 10 lists across 80 countries to empirically identify dominant consumption patterns. This focus on top-ranked titles allows for an analysis of content visibility in the new "attention economy" where content access is abundant. This exploration reveals a global-regional structure, with the U.S. acting as a central global hub alongside distinct regional hubs (UK, Korea, Mexico/Colombia). Building on these observed patterns, we then test a model using established economic (GDP, self-sufficiency) and cultural (language, geographic and cultural distance) factors to explain the mechanisms driving these flows. Results show that while the global hub's content transcends many of these factors, the success of regional hubs remains highly dependent on linguistic and geographic proximity. The study demonstrates how OTT platforms do not erase traditional economic and cultural drivers but instead reconfigure them, creating a complex media landscape where global standardization and regional preferences dynamically coexist.
Intense competition among major SVOD providers in the United States, such as Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, HBO Max, Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+, has driven a focus on acquiring and creating high-performing superstar series to attract subscribers. However, the impact of superstar series on subscriber numbers and overall audience demand remains unclear. This article explores the superstar effect, a concept introduced by Rosen (1981), which suggests that top performers can command significantly higher rewards despite only minor differences in talent. This effect results in notable disparities in market dominance and earnings. Using a novel dataset from Parrot Analytics, which measures daily audience demand through downloads, views, searches, and social media posts in the United States, we apply a Berry et al. (1995) structural demand estimation. We define "superstar series" as those with an average relative demand ranking in the top 1% for each quarter in an annual year. To assess how many superstar series a provider has compared to other providers, we calculate the percentage of a provider's series that are classified as superstars. Our analysis reveals that while superstar series do impact subscriber numbers, consumers generally prefer a catalog with consistently popular series. Furthermore, consumer demand is relatively inelastic to changes in catalog popularity and even less responsive to the proportion of superstar series. Simulations indicate that enhancing the average popularity of content can lead to higher prices and more new subscribers, having a greater effect than merely adding superstar series.
In the evolving landscape of subscription-video-on-demand (SVOD), a growing disconnect has emerged between content popularity, production budgets, and the stock prices of streaming platforms. This study explores how audience demand, as measured by Parrot Analytics, aligns with production budgets and stock valuations across major SVOD services, including Netflix, Disney+, HBO Max, Hulu, Apple TV+, and Amazon Prime Video. Drawing on the Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH), we investigate whether audience demand and high-budget series serve as reliable signals of firm value in streaming markets. Using a rolling standard deviation and linear regression across 35,000+ observations for 110 shows from 2021 to 2022, we find weak correlations between audience demand and both stock prices and production budgets. Despite industry reliance on marquee content to drive attention and investor confidence, our results reveal that stock valuations often move independently of real-time viewer engagement and budget allocation. These findings challenge assumptions of market rationality and call for more transparent, multidimensional valuation frameworks in the digital media economy.
This study examined the news repertoires of mobile app users across offline, social, and mobile media platforms, the relationships among these channels, and factors influencing the complex dynamics. The results showed that news apps played both a substitutive and a complementary role. While users appreciated news apps as a valuable supplement to offline news sources and social media, the news apps had a greater displacing effect on traditional news outlets than social media. Additionally, the findings indicated that the perceived displacing and complementary effects varied depending on users' attitudes toward app features, content quality, user perceptions, and motivations for news consumption.
