Agenda 2020: Research Opportunities with Managerial and Economic Impact

The Journal of Media Economics is a leading journal for the media discipline. It publishes relevant insights from rigorous original research on the economics and policy of mediated communication, focusing on firms and institutions as well as on markets and societies.

The journal has been established in 1988 and was managed for more than three decades by conscientious editors from communication research or media economics. The quality of the journal is reflected in the impressive list of international authors that worked together with the ad hoc reviewers, the editorial board, and the editors in publishing their work. As the new editors, we congratulate you for your excellent work.

The Journal of Media Economics is now edited by two researchers that work on the interfaces of innovation, marketing, information systems, and media. We both recognize the initial focus of the Journal of Media Economics on policies promoting social and political objectives because they continue to have significant economic impacts on media. We aim to keep this research tradition alive. In the following, we elaborate on our vision regarding the future scope and structure of the Journal of Media Economics.

Research opportunities and topics

We strongly encourage submissions covering the following areas.

New technologies and the impact on the media industry: The media industry has changed massively since the Journal of Media Economics was established in 1988. New technologies lowered the entry barriers to produce and distribute content – for everybody. For instance, the internet offered new companies the opportunity to democratize content creation and distribution – challenging traditional players from the media industry. Artificial intelligence is capable of automatically producing texts, music, and movies – a challenge for creative human capital. Finally, the increasing diffusion of voice assistants (e.g., Amazon’s Alexa or Google Home) enhances the way consumers search for content – challenging current branding strategies for artists, because conversational search differs from traditional search. The new technologies raise regulatory issues. The impact of new regulations on markets are very interesting research areas. The Journal of Media Economics welcomes research that studies the impact of new technologies on the production, distribution, marketing, and consumption of media products or services.

The role of media on societies: The relevance of media has been growing over the years and global, national, but also local media brands have a substantial responsibility – especially in the times of crisis. During the Covid19-outbreak, for example, newspapers observed a substantial increase in demand and subscribers and news shows on television reached record numbers. Thus, media markets have a substantial social relevance, which results in a strong responsibility for journalists, managers, and policy makers. The Journal of Media Economics invites research that studies the impact of media on societies, especially in turbulent times such as political, economic, environmental crises.

The role of media for cultural markets: New business models have revolutionized the distribution of artistic work and provide interesting research opportunities for media economists. For example, the rise of streaming services in music markets raise the question of how to allocate the subscription fee across artists. The economic incentives of the various remuneration models discussed in the industry result in demand and supply dynamics impacting artistic work. The Journal of Media Economics welcomes research that studies the impact new technologies on markets for cultural products and services and even fine art.

Managing media products and services: The role of public institutions and regulations on media markets is substantial. The impact of regulations on market players and consumers has always been a subject for media economists. However, given that certain demand and supply patterns change over time (e.g., due to new technologies), new regulations are often called for by firms that have not adjusted to the new market situations. Hence, a deep understanding of the market dynamics and the impact of management decisions on market outcomes remains a highly important topic. The Journal of Media Economics encourages research that studies the impact of management decisions by media managers on market outcomes.

Entertainment science: The term “entertainment science” was introduced by Hennig-Thurau and Houston (2019) and describes the particularities of entertainment products of services to market outcomes. With costs exceeding 200 USD million for a new movie or a new game, a single flop on the market may risk the existence of large firms. The Journal of Media Economics welcomes research that studies the economic aspects of entertainment markets (including sports, gaming, gambling, or theme parks).

Of course, we also encourage submissions that deal with topics outside of these areas but cover the economics and policy of mediated communication.

Relevance and rigor

Strong papers that are highly cited are papers that are (1) addressing new topics, (2) interesting for a broad audience, (3) methodically sound, and (4) relevant for managers and policy makers.

As new editors, we follow the tradition of the journal in being open for disciplinary and interdisciplinary papers and welcome all methods and instruments. We are especially interested in the application of new methods (e.g., machine learning or mining unstructured data) to relevant problems. We are also very interested in the outcome of (natural) field experiments and in new insights from the field of behavioral economics. We strongly encourage authors to submit papers in this field.

As editors, we will strongly enforce relevance and rigor. We will desk reject papers with insufficient data or with outcomes that are stating the obvious. When testing for hypotheses, we will not only look on the outcome of the hypothesis test (that typically focuses on the significance and direction of a variable), but also on the effect size. For example, testing a hypothesis whether advertising will increase demand is not interesting. However, it is interesting to discuss the effect size of advertising compared to other variables. Thus, we strongly encourage authors to discuss the effect sizes (e.g., elasticities) and to provide insights that are generalizable beyond the specific media or market setting under research.

Furthermore, we invite submissions reflecting the insights of diverse disciplinary perspectives and research methodologies, both empirical and theoretical. Impactful papers also focus on the question of whether prior findings in media economics can be generalized. The need for generalizations has been regularly stated by scholars. For example, Bass (1995) and Ehrenberg (1995) emphasized the necessity of empirical and analytical research focusing on generalizing prior research findings. These will provide further insights for new research topics. Thus, we seek papers that provide meta-analyses of relevant issues in our field.

Overall, the Journal of Media Economics welcomes research that applies new methods applied to innovative and interesting research problems resulting in novel insights for managers and policy makers. Interesting papers will make readers say that they will change something in their decision making, or that they learned something new. Ideally, they also say that it was fun to read.

Best paper award

We will launch a “Journal of Media Economics Best Paper Award” for papers published in the preceding calendar year to promote outstanding manuscripts. The awards will be presented biannually at the World Media Economics Conference.

A new type of papers in the dynamic field of media economics: Idea Forum

We will introduce a new type of paper to the Journal of Media Economics – the “Idea Forum”. Given the dynamic context of media, papers in the Idea Forum address novel and emerging topics or methods in our field – theoretically or empirically. Very new topics (e.g., the impact of Covid-19) that emerge with rather limited data available, but that are considered as important, novel, and worth to be discussed are of interest for this forum. These new papers should inspire (or even provoke) researchers to continue this path and may serve as a starting point for new research projects. We want to publish these papers fast to address emerging topics quickly. These papers may be shorter (10,000 words or less) but will be published alongside of traditional full papers. The Journal of Media Economics will begin accepting submissions to the Idea Forum in June 2020. Submitted papers in the Idea Forum will be reviewed by one editor and one member of the editorial board. We will decide in one round whether to (conditionally accept) or reject the paper. The decision will be driven by whether the readership will be inspired by the paper’s ideas. Please use the “Forum” submission process provided by the journal’s editorial management system.

New editorial structure

In the last months, we discussed the future of the Journal of Media Economics with previous editors, members of the editorial board, friends and colleagues from other disciplines, and the publisher. To reflect the broad scope of the journal, a new editorial structure is introduced.

Appointment of Area Editors: The Journal of Media Economics has appointed a number of Area Editors (AEs) that are outstanding experts in their field. Specifically, the AEs represent the research fields Media Economics, Econometrics, Analytics, Media Management, Entertainment Science, Media Strategy, Innovation Management & Digital Media, and Technology Management. As Area Editors serve:

Johannes Bauer, Michigan State University, USA

Sylvia Chan-Olmsted, University of Florida, USA

Benjamin M. Compaine, Northeastern University, USA

Brendan M. Cunningham, Eastern Connecticut State University, USA

Ralf Dewenter; Helmut-Schmidt University, GER

Gilian Doyle, University of Glasgow, UK

Lisa George, Hunter City University of New York, USA

Richard Gershon, Western Michigan University, USA

Thorsten Hennig-Thurau, University of Münster, GER

Hans van Kranenburg, Radboud University, NL

Dominik Papies, University of Tübingen, GER

Robert Picard, University of Oxford, UK

Angela Powers, Iowa State University, USA

Edlira Shehu, Copenhagen Business School, DK

Steve Wildman, Michigan State University and University of Colorado, Boulder, USA

Michael O. Wirth, University of Tennessee, USA

The new review process will be the following: After an initial review by one of the editors in chief (EICs), each submission is assigned to one AE that is specialized in the area of the submission. The AE assigns two reviewers to each submission and provides a summarizing review and a suggestion to the responsible EIC.

Editorial Board: The Journal of Media Economics appointed new members of the editorial board and we would like to sincerely thank the editorial board members who continue their service to the journal. The members of the editorial board are:

Leona Achtenhagen, Jönköping International Business School, SE

Nodir Adilov, Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne, USA

Simon Anderson, University of Virginia, USA

Elena Argentesi, Università di Bologna, IT

Sumiko Asai, Meiji University, JP

Alexa Burmester, University of Hamburg, GER

John Dimmick, Ohio State University, USA

Richard V. Ducey, BIA/Kelsey, USA

Michel Dupagne, University of Miami, USA

Lapo Filistrucchi, Tilburg University, NL

Albert Greco, Fordham University, USA

David Gunzerath, Media Rating Council, USA

Anne Hoag, Pennsylvania State University, USA

Jaemin Jung, KAIST, KOR

Myeong Hwan Kim, Indiana University-Purdue University, USA

Stephen Lacy, Michigan State University, USA

Stan Liebowitz, University of Texas at Dallas, USA

Qihong Liu, University of Oklahoma, USA

Andre Marchand, University of Cologne, GER

Bozena Mierzejewska, Fordham University, USA

Philip M. Napoli, Duke University, USA

Tore Nilssen, University of Oslo, NOR

Patrick Parsons, Pennsylvania State University, USA

Martin Peitz, University of Mannheim, GER

Patricia Phalen, George Washington University, USA

Björn von Rimscha, University of Mainz, GER

Charles J. Romeo, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, USA

George Sylvie, University of Texas, USA

Alfonso Sánchez-Tabernero, Universidad de Navarra, ES

David Waterman, Indiana University, USA

Helen Weeds, Imperial College Business School & Charles River Associates, UK

Christian Wellbrock, University of Cologne, GER

Conclusion

Our targets for the Journal of Media Economics are ambitious: By publishing interesting, innovative, and impactful papers as well as new creative ideas via the new Idea Forum, we want to be the first choice for researchers to publish insights on the various implications of mediated communication as well as for practitioners and policy makers to learn about it.

In the spirit of Picard (1988) founding vision for the journal to “stimulate research on economic topics involving all media and that it will play an important role in disseminating that scholarship to interested researchers in academic and media institutions”, we want the Journal of Media Economics to remain the prime journal of our field.