component 2 section c- Online Media (Clay Shirky)

MOST DIFFICULT TYPE OF QUESTION

Clay Shirky states 'The future presents by the internet is the mass amateurization of publishing and a switch from 'Why publish this?' to 'Why not?'.

To what extent is this concept of 'amateurisation' applicable to Zoella and Attitude and to what extent can meaningful interact with these products 

Amateurization- the process of making something that was once professional the domain of amateurs and those who are inexperienced 

Online media is prone to the notion of amateurisation, as it is an open platform resources, both universal, inclusive and democratic (everyone can get involved) 

-Zoella presents her self as a relatable amateur for her target audience 

-Attitude online is a carefully curated and maintained website serving a valuable purpose   

Many opportunities for meaningful interaction 

Though arguably interactions themselves are limited  

Zoella and Attitude both sell an ideology and a lifestyle

Comments, response videos, email, PO box, Instagram, twitter, subscriptions, internet forums, blogs/vlogs

However this theory should be criticised, arguably the media industry is just as exclusionary as they have always been and audiences are less 'producers' than 'unwitting advertisers' promoting pre-exsisting products 

CLAY SHIRKY- END OF AUDINECE  

Audices are not producers when interacting with Zoella but marketers and distributors 

Youtube is a closed system, self regulated by youtube themselves and motivated by profit and power. While it seems to give users the opportunity to create products and become their own boss, only very through users actually meet the criteria for monetisation. Zoella constructs a fake and hypereal persona to her target audience, meaning that her audindince have little idea of who she really is. 

Zoella uses a business model based on algorithmic knowledge, each of the thumb nails for her videos provide the audience with a carefully selected unclose image of her face with a hyperbolic expression of joy which resembles a cartoon character. Thos confirms and reinforces Zoellas status as an amateur. 

She utilises commodity fetishism in order to provide audinces with escapism and capitalist values/ fantasy

Allows audiences to construct their own identies though her products and output, audinces ca identify with suggs and can take pleasure in the inclusive relationship with her 'gay' best friend and a metter native about friendship and inclusion  

pick and mix theory- Gauntlet 

component 2 section c- postmodernism Q

Jean Baudrille suggests that "we live in a world where there is more and more information and less and less meaning" Evaluate the extent to which the postmodernist statement applies to Zoella and attitude 

HYPERREALITY:

a representation of nothing which is more real than real

'More style than substance'

Zoellas 'mistakes' are left in e.g.. at the beginning of blogs  to make her more relatable and funny (hard just and out takes)

Zoellas picnic: intertextual references to Disney princess movies, all perfectly presented on wooden platters with a pastel coloured teepee tent 

mise-en-scen of uneaten food!

Zoella apartment: pink and perfect 

commodity fetishism- the packaging of her owns brands candles

Zoella is sexless making her  hyperreal issuing her being innocent and pure role model of women (chased- hegemonic idea of perfection of teenage girls)

Zoellas 2010 weeks- 'tranny, lesbo, skank'

Attitude representation of gay men is buff and good looking and over sexulised images e.g.. boys section (diminutive and condescending)

voyeristic perspective on both gay and straight men 

Attitude online: sections on theatre, clothing, gay holidays all aspects of line that the gay man 'should' be impressed in

also tapping into the pink pound

escapism

represnation 

binary opposition

codes 

hypereality

reception 
shot types/camera angles 
simulacrum- representation of something that doesn't exist 
hyper hypermodality 


both use Web 2.0- white, clean and simple format, currently fashionable 

eg. use of 35mm camera filter, over saturated filter 

poisoning the audience in an escapist fantasy in a voyeristic feature 

magazines- comp 2 section B- Industry and Audience

Explore how set edition of Woman magazine constructs its target audince (15)

-cultivation and reception

Woman magazine cultivates an ideology for the target audience by manipulation

'Are you an A level Beauty?' 

• condescending title, direct mode of address reinforces patriarchal hegemonic norms of beauty 
• A-levle insinuates high school qualification therefore suggests that the aspirations of the target audience are limited 
• Audience is constructed through the condescending lexis of 'girls' inappropriate for a middle aged target audience
• The mise-en-scene of the series of diagrams and complex information creates a highly manipulative and and highly singular and stereotypical construction of idealised hegemonic beauty norms   
• removes diversity and encourages audience to follow rules and guidelines   

'A Present for your Kitchen' 

• personification of the kitchen ensures the audience knows how important the kitchen is for the house wife 
• Kitchen symbolises the domain for the house wife, a place of ownership in a partriarcel society
• 'it slots so any girl can assemble it quickly'- reinforces hegemonic and sexist stereotypes
• could promote DIY target however one sentence later 'get a man in your life to glue the units together then paint them' cultivates gender binary 

Contents Page     

• highly stereotypical in terms of content: fashion, knitting, cooking and beauty
• Reinstates hegemonic ideal of being a house wife
• lack of representation of LGBT community and BME representation  

Explore how Adbusters utilised digital convergence to facilitate production (15)

-power and regulation 

Adbusters utilise digital convergence in order to create synergistic modes of production and distribution. This is primarily achieved through the relationship between print magazine and the digital website.

• website advertises the magazine
• multimode interface links in social media accounts
• selling of merchandise, including anti capitalist shoes- commodity fetish 
• taget audience of adjusters is both niche and unclear
• website and magazine have oppositional and different audiences and layouts 
• buy print copy, download pdf format  

Humans and Le Revenaunts question 2

Component 1 section B

i) How do the producers of video games ensure financial success for their product?

ii) How do the producers of media products  ensure financial success?


How do you get marks in an Industry questions
-Statistics
-Dropping names
-Facts

In what ways are Humans and Le Revenants shaped by specialised forms of production, distribution and circulation?

Knee jerk reaction: both set texts are fundamentally shaped by their contexts of production, distribution and circulation at a technical, narrative  and an audience level. In both instances the show can be seen to be standasied products, shaped by industrial contexts to ensure maximum profit. 

Horizontal integration
Vertical integration
multimedia integration 
Conglomeration
production values
digital Convergence
cult audience
success for their genre
budget and funding
marketing and advertising  
Trailers: missleading?
websites
reality vs fiction
themes of paranoia = make audience feel uncomfortable
Intertextuality
referential codes


Curran and Seaton: Power
Hesmondhalgh: industry integration/structure
Livingstone and Lunt: Regulation (or lack of)

Controversial aspects in Humans: Niskas vape/sex scene in Brothel
Controversial aspects in Le Revenauts: young Lena sex scene

cast: Gemma Chan- British Asian type cast? (Anita)
Katherine Parkinson- British (Laura)



Atypical of horror/zombie genre- no blood gore or slow walking corpses
Atypical of sci-fi genre- set in modren 21st century day

-Both text feature relatable middle class families-

both distributed by Channel 4

avalblibe on DVD and blue ray

LR was avalble on netflicks briefly

Channel 4 initially started 1982 as a subversive ideology tv channel however far more mainstream now

both mid budget

(11.5 mil for LR)

6.1 mil views on first eposides of Humans 

English Humans vs Swedish Humans 

• The look of the actors
• The setting and style of house
• The opening of the show was far more hard hitting
• tone of the show- more tongue in cheek
• far more explicit and violent 

exported to the US: fits into exotic sci-fi like DR Who and Sherlock

Channel 4 are selling audience to advertising companies through ad breaks
make revenue through selling adverting space and through franchising series
motivated by profit and power

Nearest competitors for Humans includes Doctor Who, Black Mirror 

Standardised production:

clear standardised narrative eg. begging middle and end

Narrative theory: Todorov 

Equilibrium- disequelibruim -restoration of equilibrium 

range of clear and identifiable character arcs

clear serial narrative, cliff hanger ending 

range of enigmatic hermeneutic code