Winner, 2020 Outstanding Book Award, given by the International Communication Association
Honorable Mention, 2020 Nancy Baym Book Award, given by the Association of Internet Researchers
How the transformation of social media platforms and user-experience have redefined the entertainment industry
In a little over a decade, competing social media platforms, including YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat, have given rise to a new creative industry: social media entertainment. Operating at the intersection of the entertainment and interactivity, communication and content industries, social media entertainment creators have harnessed these platforms to generate new kinds of content separate from the century-long model of intellectual property control in the traditional entertainment industry.
Social media entertainment has expanded rapidly and the traditional entertainment industry has been forced to cede significant power and influence to content creators, their fans, and subscribers. Digital platforms have created a natural market for embedded advertising, changing the worlds of marketing and communication in their wake. Combined, these factors have produced new, radically shifting demands on the entertainment industry, posing new challenges for screen regimes, media scholars, industry professionals, content creators, and audiences alike.
Stuart Cunningham and David Craig chronicle the rise of social media entertainment and its impact on media consumption and production. A massive, industry-defining study with insight from over 100 industry insiders, Social Media Entertainment explores the latest transformations in the entertainment industry in this time of digital disruption.
Industry Reviews
A seminal book that captures and contextualizes the rapid emergence of an evolutionary media form by connecting the past with the present, while successfully arguing for the legitimacy of Social Media Entertainment as a foundation of our future. -- Jordan Levin, Former CEO of Awesomeness and The WB television network
If you really want to understand the convergence between Silicon Valley and Hollywood, read this book. Stuart Cunningham and David Craig have written a superb book on the global transition towards online screen culture. -- Jose van Dijck, author of The Culture of Connectivity and The Platform Society
Its easy to say & everythings changed. But its monumental to actually develop a map of the changing economic and cultural dynamics of entertainment production in the age of social media. Cunningham and Craigs masterful book will be foundational for scholars and students for years to come. -- Tarleton Gillespie, author of Custodians of the Internet
Provides a remarkably broad, detailed, and necessary guide to these new organizations, economies, and personalities that rival the mass media. This book will guide the future of Media Studies. -- Nancy Baym, author of Playing to the Crowd
This is a bold, important book full of thoughtfully researched arguments about how to move the field of media studies forward to address the forms and delivery systems of today. -- Ellen Seiter, author of The Creative Artist's Legal Guide
Stuart Cunningham and David Craig have developed a deeply informed, theoretically contextualized set of arguments that come to this: SME is shaking up the media landscape. * International Journal of Communication *
Cunningham and Craig examine how social media has changed Hollywood and Silicon Valley ... a good read for students who want to go into broad-casting or online media. * Communication Booknotes Quarterly *
[This] is a book that digs into what our privacy means in the digital era. The text looks at what is considered privacy by means of the internet, the government, and ourselves as users [...] This book is a good reader for anyone who is a user of one or multiple accounts on the internet whether it is business or personal. * CBQ *
