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The world according to iTunes: mapping urban networks of music production
Author(s) -
WATSON ALLAN
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
global networks
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.685
H-Index - 65
eISSN - 1471-0374
pISSN - 1470-2266
DOI - 10.1111/j.1471-0374.2011.00357.x
Subject(s) - studio , centrality , social connectedness , interdependence , social network analysis , urban agglomeration , music industry , production (economics) , bespoke , musical , digital audio , visual arts , economic geography , regional science , geography , advertising , sociology , computer science , business , art , telecommunications , music education , social science , psychology , social capital , mathematics , psychotherapist , macroeconomics , combinatorics , economics , audio signal , speech coding
In this article, I present a social network analysis that explores and maps relational urban networks of production within the global recorded music industry. Within the analysis, recorded music albums are viewed as temporary market‐based projects that bring together teams of skilled creative workers in recording studios across the globe. New tools and techniques for networking studios in geographically distant locations give mobile musically creative workers the ability to coordinate musical recordings on a global scale, resulting in new relational geographies of music production. An innovative approach is taken to the social network analysis to assess the connectedness of cities and determine the centrality and power of cities within networks of production for three major Anglophone digital music markets. The result is a mapping of the relational urban networks of music production as indicated through the interdependencies between projects, studios and local urban agglomerations.