Posts Tagged ‘Fandom’
the performance of anti-fandom
13 Jan, 2010 • posts i've written • No comments
Over at The Extratextuals, Jonathan Gray deconstructs why people go see Avatar when they know they’ll hate it.
We can at times foolishly suppose that people always go to see movies that they want to like, whereas we should be honest that there is at times a pleasure in disliking. Such viewers may offer a catalogue of things they disliked about the movie after they’ve watched it, but they watch because it’s enjoyable to create that catalogue. A bad acting performance, a silly bit of dialogue, and offensive character – these all become pleasurable. I’m not talking about camp – though that is of course another way that one might enjoy the film – or about relishing badness; I’m talking about the pleasures of knowing that one can distinguish good from bad.
Certainly, just as fandom can have a pronounced performative element to it, so too is anti-fandom often heavily performative. The pleasures of fandom can often come from the communal discussions that follow, not simply from the experience of watching alone, and many fans would quickly disavow a beloved text if they weren’t allowed a community around it. So too with anti-fandom, where many of these people hating Avatar are only too keen to pronounce their hatred, and to engage in discussions with others about how crappy it is. In doing so, they aim to perform a level of sophistication, to themselves and to others, but they are also making a pitch to community – they know that there are communities that will dislike Avatar, and the anti-fandom provides the password into said communities.
Exploring anti-fandom best exposes the core of fandom itself – we use our affinities, love or hate, to construct our identities, and we verse ourselves in the text/film/game/brand to collect those passwords into fan communities.
Walking out of Avatar, I searched my brain for the absolute best arrangement of words to describe my disgust (and showcase my verbal prowess) to Twitter.
obama to postpone state of the union for lost season premiere
11 Jan, 2010 • posts i've written • No comments
Just last Thursday I blogged about the importance of Lost Season 6 as an opportunity to study the power of a niche fan community.
Well, Lost fans just swayed the most powerful man in the world. How’s that for power?
Fans came together on Twitter and Facebook to state their case – and according to White House spokesman Robert Gibbs, they were heard.
Of course, the real challenge for brands and networks is in monetizing this kind of power… any ideas?
lost season six: solely for the fans?
07 Jan, 2010 • posts i've written • 1 comment
ABC’s “Everything You Need to Know about Lost in 8:15″
Lost season 6 begins Tuesday, February 6th.
Gawker posted the video with the following text,
A good refresher for devotees, but novices will be, well, completely lost. Good, this final season is only for full-fledged fans! Is it February 2 yet?
Which reminded me of this extract from my post, fans: lead users,
In Fanning the Audience’s Flame, (Ford, Jenkins, and others) the team writes that fans are often lead users for media properties and that “lead users are valuable to understand because their tastes anticipate untapped potentials within the marketplace.” (p 23) The team explains how fans and their efforts have helped science fiction programs like Lost which work on long and complex narrative threads sustain themselves when sci-fi was once entirely episodic.
As we ramp up for the sixth and final season, the activities of the Lost fan community (of which I consider myself a member) will either demonstrate an incredible ability at amplifying conversation, tune-in, ancillary revenue, and recruitment… or not. It’s an important time to be watching and studying fan behaviors and their affect on cult media properties.
becoming a mad man, revisited
15 Aug, 2009 • posts i've written • No comments
In a bit of “holy shit that’s awesome” news, I see that my report, Becoming a Mad Man, is part of Henry Jenkin’s syllabus for the fall course he’s teaching on Transmedia Storytelling at USC. It’s sure to be poked, prodded, and maybe even dismissed, but I’m incredibly honored for its inclusion in the course.
By the way, season three of Mad Men starts today.
In the 8 months since I published the report, I’ve been rather obsessed with fan culture and have done my best to dive deep into Henry’s research (and the research of many other brilliant people). If you’d like to learn more yourself, here’s a quick roundup of my previous posts. I’ve also had the pleasure of working with a cable network to create a fan based strategy for their digital marketing team, a strategy based on the 30 years of fan research that came well before me. It was a blast, and I look forward to working with that team in the future to refine the model.
I’ve come to believe that the whole Mad Men on Twitter incident may have been small in the annals of fan expression, but it was a critical moment in time for digital marketers to take notice, be curious, and perhaps learn something. Some have learned, and some haven’t. When Paul Isakson gave up the @don_draper account to AMC, I had hoped that the network or its digital agency would have done something with it besides let it sit idle for 8 months. Instead of engaging fans during the off-season with the account, on a platform that is obviously ripe for tv fan expression, they’ve done absolutely nothing at all with it (an update: now you can help Paul man the account). But to be fair, I was happy to see the art of Dyna Moe used (she was much beloved by fans for her illustrations) in marketing this new season.
I’m excited for this new season. The writing and acting behind Mad Men never disappoints. Be sure to tune into AMC tonight at 10PM/9C.
Oh, and keep an eye on Bud Melman. I hear he’s got something up his sleeve.
fans: we are wizards
15 Jul, 2009 • posts i've written • No comments
I’m quite late to this one, but thanks to Jinal Shah for pointing it out to me. We Are Wizards, released in 2008, chronicles the expansive and deep fan culture of Harry Potter and the Rowling universe. I’ll be watching this later tonight, and hopefully the new film sometime this weekend.
fans: the rising tide
08 Jul, 2009 • posts i've written • No comments
Plenty of brilliant folks have carried the banner of fans long before I jumped in – and I’m beginning to see more mainstream (or simply more popular) voices echo the sentiment: fans are the future of digital marketing.
Two posts on fans today, the first from Seth Godin, asks “how big is the gap between customer and die-hard fan? In other words, between engaging and loving, between attending and craving?” (alright that one might be less about fans, and more in the normal Seth vein of saying ‘you could go status-quo, or you could be super awesome fantastic’)
The second post, from MediaPost, really hits the goomba on the head:
What makes top brands so valuable? It’s not just that they sell a lot of volume. The most valuable consumer brands are successful because of the relationships they form with their customers.
And while ‘relationship’ is the promise of the social Web, most brands have missed the boat when it comes to their social marketing initiatives. Instead of investing in relationships, brands have largely invested in a token presence on Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace. It’s no wonder they haven’t seen an ROI.
….
It’s clear why this matters to brands and should matter to you: your biggest fans are your most valuable and authentic social marketing vehicle. If you invest in a true relationship with them, you’ll be able to move and react quickly to their ever-changing needs, and even ask them for help. It doesn’t take much to keep them happy – just creating a special and honored place and engaging in honest dialogue. When you invite them in, you unleash their willingness and desire to recruit other fans that will gush and rave online with them.
Well said.
fans: read these blogs
02 Jun, 2009 • posts i've written • 1 comment
If you’re interested (or obsessed as I am) in media fandom, I highly recommend the following blogs. My two criteria for making the cut: 1) a blog specifically focused on media and/or fandom and 2) recent updates. Please add anyone I might have missed in the comments.
Henry Jenkins
http://www.henryjenkins.org/
Nancy Baym
http://www.onlinefandom.com/
Grant McCracken
http://www.cultureby.com/
Jason Mittell
http://justtv.wordpress.com/
Joshua Green
http://weightandmass.wordpress.com/
Dr. TV
http://drtelevision.blogspot.com/
The Extratextuals
http://www.extratextual.tv/
Craig Jacobsen
http://www.diegeticexports.blogspot.com/
the green lantern fan made trailer
26 May, 2009 • posts i've written • 1 comment
Created by Jaron Pitts, this fan made trailer includes cuts from almost 30 films and some nicely done after effects. Uploaded only four days ago, the video currently has over 100k views, 1400 ratings (currently 5/5 stars), and 800 comments.
When is a fan made trailer so successful that it demonstrates an unfulfilled demand? When should it spark DC Comics to release a Green Lantern movie or animated feature, and when should they bring in fans like Jaron to advise in production and distribution? These are the questions that major studios should be grappling with, and by monitoring these fan creations, they could make educated and profitable decisions.
fans: rise of the machines
13 May, 2009 • posts i've written • 1 comment
You see those trending topics on Twitter? Those are fans talking about things they love, to their friends, and anyone else that will listen.
Oprah mentions Twitter and registrations surge. That’s not the power of Twitter, that’s the power of Oprah’s fan community. CNN and Ashton go at it for new followers. Again, that wasn’t Twitter, it wasn’t a virus, it was fans acting on a leader’s nudge, and to connect to each other to share information and social currency.
You don’t scan your tweets every day because of Twitter either. You’re looking for people you know, friends, and also people you’re a fan of. Twitter can connect anyone: you to Ashton, Ashton to your third grade english teacher, and so on. Twitter is a bit of technology that better enables what fans want and need to do: connect with each other, express their fandom/define their identity, gather information, and feel more connected to what they love.
Fandom makes or breaks technology. Meetup.com took off because fans of beanie babies needed a place to swap and collect. Friendster cracked down on fakesters and it reduced a way fans could engage. Facebook is the center of a brand’s digital world because users can now ‘fan’ things.
Still think focusing on fans is too narrow? Or do you mean, ‘we just don’t have any fans?’ Those are two separate things: one is bullshit, the other is fixable. One is kidding yourself, the other is killing yourself (or at least resigning yourself to a slow extinction, better hope for no meteor showers). Brands should be out there courting and supporting these vocal fan communities. They’re right there, they aren’t hiding; in fact they’re doing very much the opposite.
fans: format magazine on fan made films
11 May, 2009 • posts i've written • No comments
Right now, Format Magazine has a great post on fan made films about our favorite comic book heroes.
