Networks revisited: Social media, inequality and network culture in the independent television production sector

Abstract

This article revisits an earlier investigation of the impact of networking practices on social inequality and creative work in the British independent television production sector. The original study analysed the role of networking as a means of finding work and developing a career, as well as highlighting the exclusion of individuals without high levels of cultural and social capital. The present study updates the earlier research, exploring how the rise of social media platforms has transformed the nature of social interactions and the implications of this for the television industry. The analysis focuses on the experiences of six of the original cohort of interviewees and six people who have entered the industry since 2015. The article examines interviewees’ social class through social origin, utilising the NS-SEC 3 class classification system, to explore the role that social class plays in networking, and whether the largely middle-class and exclusive milieu of TV production culture in the mid-late 2000s has become more or less inclusive in recent years. Through qualitative analysis of interviews, the study explores differences between the two groups in their experiences of networking, the affective costs of labour intensification, their attitudes towards inequality, and their tactics for navigating a highly socially stratified labour market. The article aims to contribute to a better understanding of the complex relationship between social networks, the television industry and wider social inequalities. The study suggests that the rise of social media has been a catalyst for a transformation in how social networking takes place in the television labour market, potentially opening up the industry but also reinforcing existing inequalities.