Prof. Mark Balnaves

Biography

Professor Mark Balnaves started his career in the media as a news production assistant and journalist in print and television, in Canberra and northern Victoria, and then moved to Broadglen Publishing, Melbourne. As an academic he has taught at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Courses include cultural studies, communication and media research methodology, media audiences and public relations (theory). He has obtained funding for postgraduate scholarships and has supervised a number of PhDs, Masters and Honours students, as well as examining at all levels.

He has served on a range of school and university level committees at current and past universities. He served for two years as the Chair of the Mass Communication Program at Murdoch University and was program director for the BA Communication for two years at the University of Canberra where he developed courses for domestic and international programs. His research interests now include ethnography of design; history of media research; application of immersive media environments and global networks to design; broadcasting and related media fields; and social media and its role in e-governance; public opinion and news. He is a member of the Australian and New Zealand Communication Association (ANZCA), the European Consortium of Communication Research (ECCR), and the International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR).

Professor Balnaves has been a theme editor for Media International Australia and is a reviewer for the Journal of Communication Management. He has published over 90 refereed papers, including book chapters, with leading journals and publishers in the field. He has published a number of books with Penguin, Sage, Bloomsbury Academic and Palgrave MacMillan. These include Mobilising the Audience (2002), Media Theories and Approaches: A Global Perspective (2008), A New Theory of Information and the Internet: Public Sphere Meets Protocol (2011) and Rating the Audience: The Business of Media (2011). In 2011 he was invited as a ‘World Thinker’ to the annual Festival of Thinkers in the United Arab Emirates to debate and discuss media issues.

Qualifications

• PhD, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, 1991

---

Research

Research keywords

• Audience Research
• Diffusion and Adoption of New Media
• E-Governance and Participatory Media
• History of Audience Measurement
• History of Media
• Immersive Media
• Social Equity and Media Policy
• Social Games
• Social Media

Research expertise

Professor Balnaves's major research interests and expertise are in:

• immersive media;
• future of media production (news, broadcasting, design);
• e-governance;
• history of media;
• media and audiences;
• diffusion and adoption of new media; and,
• social equity and media policy.

Professor Balnaves research expertise portfolio includes:

Telstra/EIP and ACTEW:

At RMIT Professor Balnaves received $240,000 through the Telstra Fund for Social and Policy Research. This project was taken over by Patricia Palmer when I moved to Canberra. I received in Canberra a $15,000 competitive grant in 1994 from the Telstra Fund for Social and Policy Research in Telecommunications to begin preliminary planning of the longitudinal evaluation of Telstra Multimedia's broadband pilot in Gungahlin. Telstra Multimedia provided $94,000 for the baseline research. Telstra Multimedia suspended its trials of broadband in August 1996. The baseline study conducted for Telstra Multimedia was completed successfully in July 1996 and data has been provided in publications. Telstra's proposed broadband project was taken over by ACTEW, Canberra's energy and water utility. Professor Balnaves received $50,000 to undertake ACTEW’s baseline research. Both investigations led to the creation of actual services. In the case of Telstra the Gungahlin project was used in planning the establishment of BigPond. In the case of ACTEW the project was used for the establishment of TransACT.

Professor Balnaves also received an Evaluations and Investigations Program (DEETYA) grant of $350,000 to complement research in Gungahlin.

AOLAA:

At Murdoch University I have set up the Australasian Online Advertising Archive (AOLAA) with the Advertisers’ Federation of Australia (AFA) and the New Zealand Advertisers’ Federation (AAA). This was supported by a $48,000 grant to purchase a Sun250 server and equipment for digitisation.

Governing Media Audiences:

Together with Professor Tom O’Regan at the Key Centre for Cultural and Media Policy, Professor Balnaves received funding to undertake a historical study of Australia’s television audiences. ACNielsen provided $20,000 additional support for interviews in a SPIRT bid.

Australian Research Council (ARC):

I have ARC LIEF, Linkage and Discovery Grants in the Communication and Media and Cultural Studies FOR Codes.

ARC LIEF D63170 Interactive Television Audience Laboratory

This grant established Australia’s first dedicated public research laboratory for assessing consumer motivation, evaluating program usability and theorising audience response to Interactive Television applications. Curtin/Murdoch/ECU and UWA were the joint funders. The laboratory features specialised testing equipment designed to emulate real-world digital broadcasting environments, enabling rich data on viewing behaviour to be collected and analysed.

ARC Discovery LP0349033 Smart Communities – Applied research into integrated government services and regional networked neighbourhoods to support children and young people at risk

This applied research project investigates and provides directions for improvement in the life choices available to children and young people at risk in remote, rural and urban areas of Western Australia. It does this by (i) conducting a detailed study of children and young people at risk, as identified by government and non-government agencies (ii) conducting quantitative and qualitative fieldwork into the communication patterns and information-seeking behaviour of children and young people at risk; (iii) exploring strategies and interventions through inter-agency co-operation in the provision of content and technology (as geographical or virtual communities).

ARC Discovery DP0770606 The Emergence, Development and Transformation of Media Ratings Conventions and Methodologies in Australia, 1930-2008

Collaboration

Professor Balnaves has been the chief or lead investigator on grants totalling more than $2million, the majority from commercial sources plus ARC LIEF, Linkage and Discovery grants. He is an ARC assessor. Professor Balnaves's recent ARC grants include:

2011 Chief and Lead Investigator (with Gary Madden, Michele Willson, Tama Leaver, Philip Moore and Jonathan Noal) ARC Linkage LP110200026. $240,000. Online Money and Fantasy Games - an applied ethnographic study into the new entrepreneurial communities.

2010 Chief Investigator (with Janette Hartz-Karp and Dora Marinova) ARC Linkage LP100200803. $358,000. Transitions to a Sustainable City - Geraldton WA: An applied study into co-creating sustainability though civic deliberation and social media.

2006 Chief and Lead Investigator (with Tom O'Regan). ARC Discovery DP0770606. $265,000. The Emergence, Development and Transformation of Media Ratings Conventions and Methodologies in Australia, 1930-2008.

2005 Chief Investigator (with Lelia Green). ARC Discovery. DP0559707. $146,000. Australian responses to the images and discourses of terrorism and the other: establishing a metric of fear

Fields of Research

Code	Description	Percentage
200102	Communication Technology And Digital Media Studies	40
200199	Communication And Media Studies Not Elsewhere Classified	30
200104	Media Studies	30

---

Administrative

Administrative expertise

ADMINISTRATION

Custodial Guardian:

Communications Policy Research Forum

Australian Communications and Media Authority:

Reviewer for research projects.

Conference Organisation:

Convenor. Personal Construct Psychology Association Conference. University of Canberra, 1995, Communication and Constructivisim: Breaking the Orthodoxies in PCP.

Organiser. Crossing Cultural Frontiers, 28-29 April, Joint Rangsit University and University of Canberra Conference, 1997.

Editorial:

Editorial collective and reviewer. Continuum: journal of media and culture. Current.

Theme Editor. Ratings in Transition. Media International Australia, 105, 2002.

Editor. Centre for Communication Policy Research Research Series, University of Canberra, 1993-1996.

Fellowships:

Research Fellow. Centre for Research in Culture and Communication, Murdoch University.

Media: Series Contributor. In the Pipeline. Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).

SERVICE TO ARC

Workshop 5 advisor for Panel 11, RQF

ARC Reviewer

UNIVERSITY SERVICE

Edith Cowan University

Committees:

Academic Board

Faculty Board

Postgraduate co-ordinator, School of Communications and Multimedia, 2003.

AUSTRADE exhibitions and seminars, Emirates, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore 2002-2005.

Graduate Attributes Working Party.

Program Co-ordinator. UG, including PG program Hong Kong (LiPACE) and UG program at Malaysia (Raffles).

School Executive

International course creation:

Masters units for London School of Public Relations, Jakarta, Indonesia

Corporate communication for City of Jinan, China, 2006

Communication management for MDIS, Singapore

Murdoch University

Business, Information Technology and Law Appeals Committee Divisional Marketing

Committee.

Coordinator of twinned units in Media Audiences, Mass Communication II and Media

Research Methods, KDU campus, Malaysia.

Honours Committee.

Law Program Committee.

Program Chairs Committee.

University Marketing Committee

University of Canberra

Academic Board, 1994.

Chair, Information and Communication Services Committee, 2/94.

Chair, Faculty Building Committee 1993.

Chair, Inter-ACT: Interactive Services Consortium

Co-Convenor, Honours and PG.

Community Policy Reference Group, 1993-1994.

Co-ordinator Political Advertising Archives.

Director, Centre for Communication Policy Research, 1993-1997.

Faculty Appeals Committee.

Faculty Computer Needs Working Party, 1993.

Joint Co-ordinator, Asia-Pac

---

Teaching

Teaching expertise

TEACHING

• Edith Cowan University

Communication and Culture

Convergences

Advanced Communication Research Methods

Publication: preparation, research and writing

Issues and Crisis Management

Public Relations Theory/Perception Management

Professional Placement

Communication Research

• Murdoch University

Mass Communication II

Media Audiences

Media Planning (in conjunction with AIS Elliott Matthews)

Media Research

Writing for the Media

• University of Canberra

Intercultural Communication

Media Research (UG, Honours and PG)

Writing for the Media

Screen

• RMIT

Media Research

Power: its use and abuse