CONVERGENT JOURNALISM: OPPORTUNITIES AND PERSPECTIVES IN THE MEDIA SPACE OF THE REPUBLIC OF MOLDOVA Marginal notes to a PhD thesis
Andrei DUMBRĂVEANU Universitatea de Stat din Moldova
Abstract
Under the conditions created by digital communication technologies, media convergence in the Republic of Moldova
(RM) confidently penetrates the media institutions and subjects them to organisational, structural and management changes; it influences the process of media production, the psychology of journalistic creation, the presentation of reality and its per- ception by the consumer audience. The new phenomenon takes over the information space, in accordance with certain laws that are formed objectively as a result of reactions that occur on multiple levels: technological innovations, political and economic interest, cultural states and social implications. In the RM, media convergence has the same evolutionary milestones as in the US and the EU. First, there was the convergence of services of the limited liability economic structures, which were formed in the early '90s of the last millennium and were offering cable television programmes. The convergence of services has developed due to digital networks and terminals and has acquired economic and cultural dimensions. The evolution of technical means of telecommunication stimulated the convergence of networks that led to the transition from analogue to digital signal. The convergence of technical engineering systems, the production of small electronic computers, incorporated in telephones, equipped with cameras, has offered great opportunities for obtaining, processing and disseminating information, for interactive communication between the journalist and the audience. Altogether, they have generated new dimensions to the media convergence phenomenon, which started from merging radio and television stations. The operations of merging media institutions were carried out in the RM by politicians and businessmen. This has created chain effects and, being catalysed by power struggles, spread over the entire media system, the quality of journalistic products, and the producer – data consumer relationships.
Keywords: convergence, media, technical systems, journalism, holding, internet, research, politics, product, relationships.
