Policy makers at all levels are discovering the notion of creative industries: the music industry, literature and book market, art market, film and television industries, performing arts, design, architecture, advertising, software / computer games - from economic and innovation strategies to education policy and urban development, the creative industries are being described as a model for success. However, strategies for real, practical implementation remain vague. This publication provides a greatly needed overview of the concepts and specific characteristics of this sector. It analyzes the international discourse, presents up-to-date empirical-statistical Europe-wide analyses, derives models and draws conclusions for the current debate in Switzerland, and places special emphasis on the innovative potential of the creative scene and its dynamics for the entire creative industry.

This illuminating Handbook presents the state of the art in the scientific field of experience economy studies. It offers a rich and varied collection of contributions that discuss different issues of crucial importance for our understanding of the exp

This text analyzes the impact of culture across the European continent, shedding new light on those countries with a rich and famous heritage such as Italy and France, but extending the study to newer forms of creativity.

Creating Experiences in the Experience Economy focuses on the creation of experience from a business perspective. In doing so, the book establishes a more solid foundation for making better and more complex analyses of experience creation, paving the way for the development of analytically based and innovative experiences in experience firms and institutions. The contributors emphasise that experience creation is not an easy task with a straightforward formula and examine how marketed experiences are constructed, developed and innovated. Presenting diverse and innovative perspectives, the contributors discuss and present models for how experiences are designed, produced and distributed. With its cross-disciplinary approach to experience creation, this fascinating study will appeal to researchers and academics of business administration, services, culture and tourism.

Bits and Pieces tells the story of chiptune, a style of lo-fi electronic music that emerged from the first generation of video game consoles and home computers in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Through ingenuity and invention, musicians and programmers developed code that enabled the limited hardware of those early 8-bit machines to perform musical feats that they were never designed to achieve. In time, that combination of hardware and creative code came to define a unique 8-bit sound that imprinted itself on a generation of gamers. For a new generation of musicians, this music has currency through the chipscene, a vibrant musical subculture that repurposes obsolete gaming hardware. It's performative: raw and edgy, loaded with authenticity and driven by a strong DIY ethic. It's more punk than Pac-Man, and yet, it's part of that same story of ingenuity and invention; 8-bit hardware is no longer a retired gaming console, but a quirky and characterful musical instrument. Taking these consoles to the stage, musicians fuse 8-bit sounds with other musical styles - drum'n'bass, jungle, techno and house - to create a unique contemporary sound. Analyzing musical structures and technological methods used with chiptune, Bits and Pieces traces the simple beeps of the earliest arcade games, through the murky shadows of the digital underground, to global festivals and movie soundtracks.

The book develops a new approach to urban development in which leisure, pleasure or experiences are seen as key drivers. History, authenticity, urban qualities, local culture and leisure offerings or a vibrant retail sector are thus assets in local development also outside of the big cities. Globalization and high mobility are necessary aspects of the development, which entails the development of high urban profiles in a globalized and highly competitive world. Apart from experiential qualities a critical urban size, is also required. Experience qualities can be connected to urban design, where particular designs stimulate citizens’ learning and activity in the urban space. They can also be connected to more tourist related large scale projects of experiential mass consumption with fun parks and shopping. A combination of the two approaches has been developed to promote for example car brands and cities through experiential car museums. New stakeholders, new network based forms of cooperation and new entrepreneurial strategies are connected to urban development in ‘the experience economy'. In particular new network based approaches are needed if small and rural places should also reap the fruits of the experience economy. This book was originally published as a special issue of European Planning Studies.