The platformization of Chinese cinema: The rise of IP films in the age of Internet+

This article interrogates the recent rise of the so-called ‘IP films’ in the Chinese media industry as an indication of a profound transformation in the cultural and economic organization of Chinese cinema, a process that is characterized as platformization. The article examines this process by studying the discursive formation and industrial formulation of the notion of ‘IP’, analysing it as less a novel strategy for filmmaking than a new logic of content generation and labour management, which are mediated and controlled by digital platforms. By studying how the concept was invented, interpreted and utilized in the media industries, I interrogate the interwoven and contested relationship between platforms and content, and examine how the operational logic of platforms changed the ways in which cinematic content is created, distributed and consumed in a transmedial process. The article demonstrates that the transmedia system of IP operates as an assembled network of ‘affective modules’, where affective contacts with and among the audiences are generated, captured and framed by the algorithmic infrastructure of platforms. Such is the process of platformization of cinema; it entails radical transformation not only in content generation also in labour management, a shift from paid professional workers to unpaid participatory fans.