See also creative industries; compare cultural industries.
1. Taken collectively, all the businesses involved with the financing, production, distribution, exhibition, and retailing of media products. Media industries comprise independent media institutions that may be commercially run or not-for-profit concerns.
2. The aspects of the media studied by media economists. Media industries manufacture entertainment and informational products often according to a production-line ethos. The paradigmatic example of this is the Hollywood studio system. Media industries can be divided into two tiers: large corporations that control the majority of the market and small companies that fight for a share of the remainder. Media industries serve a dual market, selling both to audiences and advertisers, which leads to conflicts of interests. Since the 1980s the trend has been towards more media mergers, creating huge global media corporations like Viacom and Time Warner.
3. The UK media training body, Skillset, divides the creative media industries into ten categories: animation; videogames; film and television facilities; film; interactive media; corporate and commercials production; photo imaging; print and electronic publishing; radio; television.
http://www.skillset.org/skillset/role/article_2643_1.asp Creative media industries
