Over the last decade, the Internet has become one of the most popular vehicles facilitating a variety of communication and information-sharing tasks worldwide. Its growing popularity as a new medium of communication has resulted in changes in use of traditional media. The purpose of this study was to better understand the uses of online news compared with news use via traditional media. In light of the niche theory and the theory of uses and gratifications, a new medium survives, grows, competes, and prospers by providing utility or gratification to consumers. In doing so, it may have effects on existing media by providing new solutions to old needs or to more contemporary needs. Data were collected in a telephone survey with 211 respondents in the Columbus, Ohio (Franklin County), metropolitan area. The results clearly indicate that the Internet has a competitive displacement effect on traditional media in the daily news domain with the largest displacements occurring for television and newspapers. The findings also show that there is a moderately high degree of overlap or similarity between the niches of the Internet and the traditional media on the gratification-opportunities dimension. In addition, the results suggest that the Internet has the broadest niche on the gratification opportunities dimension, providing users satisfaction with more needs than any of the traditional media on this dimension.
This study examines transnational media corporations' (TNMCs') strategies in the Chinese media market after its WTO entry, employing a theoretical model that involves the interactions of a company's risk in terms of environmental uncertainties and control in terms of equity ownership. Interviews were used as the primary research method, with 15 informants from three global media giants-Disney, News Corporation and Sony. Findings suggested that in response to the risk they perceive, TNMCs have plans for increasing control through engaging in higher forms of ownership, developing connections with governments and distributors, localizing their products, and differentiating the products vis-a-vis their competitors. These plans comprise a roadmap for TNMCs' long-term development in China.This study examines transnational media corporations' (TNMCs') strategies in the Chinese media market after its WTO entry, employing a theoretical model that involves the interactions of a company's risk in terms of environmental uncertainties and control in terms of equity ownership. Interviews were used as the primary research method, with 15 informants from three global media giants-Disney, News Corporation and Sony. Findings suggested that in response to the risk they perceive, TNMCs have plans for increasing control through engaging in higher forms of ownership, developing connections with governments and distributors, localizing their products, and differentiating the products vis-a-vis their competitors. These plans comprise a roadmap for TNMCs' long-term development in China.