The Culture and Business of Cross-Media Productions

Abstract Risk-adverse producers and investors seek to capitalize on marketing by co-launching concepts through multiple media: the game, film, novel, animated movie, T-shirt, action figure, perfume, amusement park ride, and so on. In this article, I explore the relation between such media content and cross-media production. Furthermore, I critically discuss the implications for cultural theory and present a model of cross-media content transfer. The model shows what must be left behind in content–concept migrations across media, and presents the role and importance of games as a nexus in this exchange. I conclude that cross-media transfer happens relatively smoothly between forms that are alike, such as books and films, but less so between forms that have strong structural differences.