29 - Smythe wants to start a debate that Western Marxists have focused solely on interpretive analysis (ideological) and have neglected economic and political significance in mass media systems
Smythe says that the notion that ideology holds capitalism together is too idealist (ex. watching content that embraces capitalism and commercials selling goods is not strong enough to hold capitalism together) (I suppose the hegemony is not powerful enough for Smythe)
What should be asked about mass comm systems is "what economic function for capital do they serve."
-attempt to understand their role in the reproduction of capitalist relations
30 - Western Marxists have failed to take a materialist approach to communication
-especially since advertising and marketing have become the principle economic policy of western media
what is the commodity produced in this capitalist system?
The Bourgeois idealist views is the messages: information, entertainment, manipulation
-held by Adorno, Baran & Sweezy, Schiller, Murdock, Golding
-McLuhan also idealist who look past this to focus on the medium of TV itself
31 - Materialist View is the audience
-all non-sleeping time is work time
-work time is devoted to the production of commodities
-time of audiences is sold to advertisers by mass media
workers (audience): 1. perform essential marketing functions for the producers of goods (manufacturers)
2. work at the production and reproduction of labor power
These two duties itegrate both, the superstructure and the base:
superstructure - product demand is produced and satisfied in purchases
base - work is sold by stations to advertisers
32 - process of "demand management" -begins and ends with the commodity market
Baran & Sweezy fail to analyze demand management via advertising in a materialist way;
they call it psychological manipulation, which is essentially hegemony (idealist view)
Smythe argues that advertisers buy audiences with predictable specifications (demographics) who will pay attention (attention economy) in predictable numbers
33 - To be sure, there are measurement companies, such as Nielsen
TV stations produce the commodity which advertisers buy; but so do families which permit advertising (and allow themselves to become commodities)
programming is the bribe or "free lunch" used to recruit audience members and maintain their attention
34 - central purpose is to ensure attention to products and services
Smythe mentions flow of audiences
The work that audiences do is to learn to buy certain brands of goods
Audiences "work to create the demand for advertised goods which is the purpose of the monopoly capitalist advertisers".... by doing this, audiences are reproducing their own labor power!
35 - labor power (creates the capacity to labor) and labor in productive use (creates a material commodity)
Marx - the principal aspect of capitalist production was the alienation of workers from the means of producing commodities
Smythe - today (1977) the principal aspect of capitalist production is the alienation of workers from the means of producing and reproducing themselves
Livant - it is a mistake to think that just because the laborer sells his/her labor power, it does not mean he/she produces it.
I suppose what is going on here is that the TV stations are capturing the labor power of audiences and selling it as a commodity to advertisers?
36 - Smythe assumes all "non-sleeping time under capitalism is work time." (for which I disagree - sleeping time is also work because you are reproducing your capacity to labor)
Livant - you must use (A) labor power to (B) create labor power to (C) labor.
(A) Labor power > personal possession, can't sell; off-work time > creates a commodity (labor power (B)) that the person does not sell but it is sold by a media company to advertisers
(B) create labor power > personal possession that can be sold; work-time > needed to labor
(C) Labor > act of creating a material good that the person does not sell (although the company does)
Mass media play a large role - guiding consumption & ideological teachings in shows and commercials
38 - Leisure time has increased 1850-1960, but more free time is dedicated to the consciousness industry's activities (marketing, shopping, etc)
Smythe is critical of Baran & Sweezy who use psychanalysis to call this "passively absorbable amusemement"
Smythe's two issues with Baran & Sweezy:
1. they ignore monopoly capitalism sales efforts
2. they prefer casual bourgeois observations (ideology embedded in messages) instead of historical materialism (study of economics, society, and history as proposed by Marx)
39 - the nature of workers' reaction to advertisers: (through demand management) Advertisers:
1. establish the existence of a problem facing the worker
2. establish the existence of a product commodity to solve said problem
3. motivation to choose a particular brand within that class of products
40 - with thousands of commodities, the audience lacks the objective skill to develop a rational shopping list out of this irrational situation
thus, the work done by audiences is used towards "impulse purchasing"
-reduced time, reduced research, commercial give quick insight (quasi-information), build brand loyalty, make purchase
Thus, the bourgeois notion of free time is only available to people with no disposable income & for those that are so wealthy that other people do their buying for them. For everyone else, "free time" in monopoly capitalism belongs to the same lexicon camp as "free market" "free speech" etc
The productive work of the audience is learning cues which are then used to make a shopping list to spend income
46 - to summarize: principal purpse of mass comm systems:
1. produce audiences who work at learning to consume goods & support demand management systems (which compel you to need a product)
2. produce audiences who theory and practice confirms monopoly capitalism ideologies
3. produce public opinion supportive of the state
4. operate profitably to ensure unrivaled respect within economic system
47 - consciousness industry through advertisements produce alienation for audiences:
1. alienation from result of work "on the job" which is a disconnect from the result of their labor power (commodity)
2. alienation from commodities which they are marketing to themselves
3. alienation from labor power they produce & reproduce in themselves (because it is sold by other parties like TV stations)
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