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ABSTRACT
China has embarked on a radical transformation of its online and mobile games industry since its government announced its ambition to be a global sporting power. This study investigates Chinese electronic sports (eSports) in the context of platform governance and platform capitalism, through a case study of the platformization of Tencent, one of China’s largest media conglomerates. We employ a boundary analysis of platform documentation, a document analysis of policies, financial data, and ethnographic interviews to examine the interactivity and flow of power arising from direct state control and the processes of commercialization and professionalization. To support our proposal that the state and corporations, while genetically different, are mutually constitutive, we explore concepts of the platformization of infrastructures and infrastructuralization of platforms. This study proposes that the Chinese eSports industry has an umbrella-like structure and challenges the assumption that China is an authoritarian system with a one-size-fits-all policy. Our results imply that games industry professionals invite funding bodies to work jointly with government to develop alternatives for the eSports industry. Meanwhile, we show how Tencent utilizes its expansion of capital fluidity and data-driven multidimensionality, moving toward an ecosystem of platform dependency, organizational homogenization, and deep power asymmetries.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes on contributors
Yupei Zhao (PhD University of Leicester) is an ‘Hundred Talent Program Young Professor’ and doctorial tutor in the College of Media and International Culture, Zhejiang University (PRC), researchers in Chinese Characteristics Socialism Research Center in Zhejiang University (PRC). Her research interests widely include political communication, intracultural communication and popular media. Her research has appeared in International Journal of Communication, Social Science Quarterly, Sage Open, Social media + Society, Media International Australia etc.. Email: 519254310@qq.com
Zhongxuan LIN (Ph.D.) is a Professor at the School of Journalism and Communication, Jinan University, Guangzhou, China. His research interests include game studies, cultural studies and communication studies. His work has appeared in Asian Journal of Women’s Studies; Media International Australia; Chinese Journal of Communication; International Journal of Communication; Media, Culture & Society; Information, Communication & Society; and New Media & Society among others. Email: lzhongx55@sina.com
Notes
1 The Ministry of Public Security; the Ministry of Culture; the Ministry of Education; the General Administration of Sport of China; and the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television of the People’s Republic of China; National Development and Reform Commission
2 The Ministry of Public Security; the Ministry of Culture; the Ministry of Education; the General Administration of Sport of China; and the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television of the People’s Republic of China; National Development and Reform Commission
3 ‘Internet Publication and Service Management’ (wangluo chuban fuwu guanli guiding) and ‘Online Mobile Games Publication and Service Management’ (guanyu yidong youxi chuban fuwu guanli de tongzhi).
5 Tencent Animation, Tencent Literature, Tencent Film and Tencent eSports
6 Pan-entertainment is a significant concept, the term having been coined by the vice president of Tencent, Mr. Chengwu, in 2011. It refers to the fan economy of celebrity intellectual property and is based on the multi-domain symbiosis of the Internet and the mobile Internet.