Socio-technical challenges in the development of DMB:A survey of Korean mobile television development

摘要

This paper examines the prospectus of Digital Multimedia Broadcasting from therntechnical, economic and regulatory issues. This paper attempts to gain a betterrnunderstanding of how DMB will evolve and stabilize in next generation networkrnenvironments. Two research questions guide this study: (1) How does DMB trigger arnchange in policy, market and industry structure? (2) What are the driving forces of thernrapid DMB development in Korea? As these questions involve socio-technical issues,rnthis study uses a socio-technical perspective to investigate the complex relationsrnbetween the social and technical aspects of DMB by highlighting the co-evolving nature,rndiversity, and interface between different driving forces and policy. The finding is thatrnKorean DMB is the outcome of a proactive strategy of a telecom carrier and the Koreanrngovernment’s industrial policy to support such strategy. Amongst the push-orientedrntrajectory, however, non-technical issues such as users, market and regulation are leftrnbehind, which reveals the disjunction of the DMB development in terms of the sociotechnicalrnsystem perspective. The development of DMB sheds light on the growingrnchallenges in the dynamics of industry, regulation, and technology.