Discuss the impact of globalization on the creative/cultural industries This essay is going to discuss globalisation with cultural industries,

specifically focusing on the sub-sector, music. The cultural industries have moved closer to the centre of the economic action in many countries and across much of the world. Cultural industry companies can no longer be seen as secondary to the real economy, where durable, useful goods are manufactured (Hesmondhalgh, 2007). Globalisation is the internationalisation of products and markets and it is described as a process of integration on a worldwide scale. Because of the advances in technology a lot of sectors and products are moving away from nation targeting and using the technology of mass communication to target internationally at the masses. Another reason for increased globalisation across all sectors is the increased flexibility of transporting goods between countries and it not costing as much, this, on the whole, has been beneficial for countries such as japan and increased a lot of income for the country. On the other hand for some closed countries, countries that are not allowed to import and export goods due to internal laws, this has had the negative effect and made countries poorer, such as some in Africa (Worthington and Britton, 2006). Music has definitely been globalised. Globalisation in music is a huge factor in the success in this industry, especially in the UK and America as it allows their music to spread to an even bigger audience. Because of this countrys such as France and Canada have a quota on their radio stations, meaning they have to play a certain amount of their own countries music each day, E.g. 40% of music played on French radio stations will be from France. The reason for this is because of the domination from the UK and USA in the music industry as 80% of the 38 Billion US dollars revenue comes from the five major record companies that are based in Europe, USA and Japan. These provide the globe with their music, mainly the material one hears in the charts in the UK (Letts, 2003). Another important factor on the globalisation of music is immigration, with migrants comes their music. With war happening around the world, the more people are fleeing their countries and bringing their music with them (Letts, 2000). Because of this music has hybridised so a standard English/American sounding genre has mixed with the likes of less popular sound of Indian sounding music for instance. For example Jai Ho from slumdog millionaire and the Pussycat Dolls version (youtube, 2009). Another way music has been globalised is due to the export of physical sound recordings, but unfortunately in the low cost countries there is a lot of piracy, as they dont have as many laws to enforce action on these people. But the pirates get over to the UK and other more expensive countries, which is causing a big problem. So even though globalisation is causing more people to hear the music it hasnt had a major increase on income for the bands like it should do. On the other hand it has caused a bigger demand for some bands so touring around other countries does generate more income. Bands would of used to just play UK venues are now playing big festivals in places such as Czech Republic, Spain etc (Letts 2000) Music in Sheffield is very predominant, bands such as artic monkeys, milburn, pulp, Def Leppard, Jarvis Cocker and many more were born and became first known in Sheffield and went on touring the UK, Europe and even the world. Arctic Monkeys got to where they are today with the help of myspace that Globalised them and got them known so quickly (contact music, 2008). Looking at the information in the 2001 census of Sheffield, Sheffield have a lot of different ethnic groups including, asian, African, Caribbean, Chinese, middle ease and arab people. All of these different ethnic minorities are likely to bring their different types of music over to the UK, which will have influence on the music industry, and music events that are held in

Sheffield (furd.org, 2001). Looking at event Sheffield website (2011) it shows that there are a selection of world events that are put on in Sheffield, including African drumming, Sheffield music culture and others. This would be the beginning of the globalisation for these different cultures music, which then might get used in music that we all hear on radio stations and Television. Positives effects globalisation has had Firstly increased competition has had a positive impact due to it improving quality, as one could argue some of the artists that made it 50 years ago wouldnt have the same impact now because of this. The music industry will be striving to be better and better in all countries to keep up. Another positive impact is that artists are performing all around the world, like Rod Steward playing in Thailand in 2008. This is good for the countries economy and it raises the employment levels in the countries. It also increases the investment in the countries and the capital flow. The technical know how within music would not be the same if it wasnt for globalisation and music wouldnt of developed like it has today. It has also helped word spread for the best education within music as if there was a talented musician in India and wanted to make a lot of money from his talent he may have to travel to a more developed country and now because of technology and it being easier to travel this isnt a problem. Negative effects globalisation has had Before it was stated that it increased jobs but on the other hand it has decreased jobs in the UK and alike due to outsourcing to other countries and because of this is has caused exploitation to labour, such as child labour and people working in inhumane conditions. It has also caused the rich to get richer and the poor to become poorer, as stated earlier in the essay that the main recording companies are who are benefiting from globalisation, not the small labels. (Buzzle, 2010) The music Value chain has advanced over the years and has become a much more complex theory, especially since digital music has come about. The first element of the value chain is production which is the invention, writing, performance, recording and editing of the material. The Artist themselves will be apart of most or all of these functions and the producers would enhance the quality. The next stage of the value chain is marketing, this is where they need to know what the market wants and making their content to what is wanted to increase demand. The artist themselves would market with live performance and then there is radio, merchandising, printed media and labels will also market if the band is at that stage, from this they would wanted to of increased demand and to of informed the market. After this there is the distribution, which isnt usually down to the artist. Retailers, distributors, wholesalers take care of this with it being funded primarily by the labels. Lastly there is the consumption of the music in cars, on television, on CD players etc Digital has affected this chain as it has made things quicker and easier and at a lower price. It also allows artists to sound a lot more perfect than they really are, so if in Japan they hear a UK band on CD they could get a false impression of the band. Marketing is a lot easier as you can get in contact with thousands of people by a click of a button and see how many people are noticing your artists new material. But because of all this being so easy it has made copying material illegally a lot easier which has caused a lot of piracy.

(Greenhall, 2003) Piracy is a problem that has not been helped by globalisation. It is a problem that is not going to go away very quickly and has been proven that even though people think it is immoral to illegally download people will still do it (Bonner, 2010). Asking Alexandria, a York based band that are often over in the USA have had serious problems with illegal downloading of their newest album and have had to turn to merchandising and touring to produce their income. The CD was leaked before its release date so a lot of people had the album before anyone was supposed to have heard it. Ben Bruce from Asking Alexandria stated with people illegally downloading music its a real shame, the Internet is a great thing, but there are consequences, and he said it is the same as walking into a shop and stealing it from the shelves. (The Writers Byline, 2009). This shows that globalisation can be seen as very negative even though a lot more people are hearing music worldwide. To conclude, the positives seem to just out way the negatives in the music sub sector of globalisation. On the other hand it has caused music sales to go down considerably as shown in the graph below where you can see that sales have gone down 17 million physically by the digital attribution has added 4.6 million on top of this.

Globalisation hasnt affected Sheffield music industry in an obvious way as there is the same music coming out of Sheffield regularly, similar to what was being produced when globalisation wasnt as predominant. The sale of CDs over the past decade has risen by 150% but each year now sales are starting to fall worldwide and this is down to piracy and it could be argued that if it wasnt for globalisation piracy would not be about. The introduction of CD-Rs didnt help the piracy increase as it made it easy for people to copy and sell CDs as they wish. Because of this 90% of CDs sold in china are pirate copies and this has a big effect on artists (BBC, 2011). Piracy is the biggest negative and radio is probably the biggest positive, radio allows songs to be heard to influence people to buy the product, it is important for record companies to get their artists music played on the main radio stations to influence listeners to purchase the artists singles and albums. Word Count : 1821

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