This participatory culture includes the emergence of the idea "Do-it-yourself," paving the way for the early embrace, quick adoption and diverse use of new media. YouTube is arguably the first mass-popular platform for user-created media content. YouTube as a site of participatory culture has been created by the corporate, professional, everyday and organisational users who upload content to the website, and the audiences who engage around that content. (Jenkins, H 2007 Blog) Each of these participants approaches YouTube with their own, frequently conflicting, purposes and aims; and they have collectively if not collaboratively shaped YouTube as a social network and a popular archive. (Jenkins, H 2007 Blog) Jenkins believes that there are all these pre-existing communities that have gravitated into the space of youtube and are sharing their media not only among themselves but with each other. An innovation sped up by the flow of these ideas from one subcultural community to the next is what the real excitement of youtube has been. (Jenkins, H 2007 Lecture)
The internet was created in the late 1960s so that the US Department of Defence researchers could share information with each other. (Unknown, 2004) The researchers saw potential in the new technology as it allowed networks of people to communicate anywhere in the world over a computer. The internet was created to be a free aid on communicating and sharing information. It enabled people to become a democracy with no influence over what they communicated and shared. This revelation of the World Wide Web has seen companies use it as a huge financial gain. These researchers predicted even back then that the internet will be weakened by the exact purpose of the internet. Thousands of companies across the world expertise in computer technology, these days’ company’s websites stay in business purely because of advertising sales on the site. Every corner of the internet- someone is profiting off. Social media networks have recently been brought to the attention of the internet - with millions of global visitors daily. They interact, communicate, upload pictures, videos, comment etc. Creators of such sites are now worth billions. If you upload a video on youtube and receive a certain amount of views-youtube pay you. Is the internet business culture overstepping the original intention of the internet- to communicate in a free world? The term "Web 2.0" is commonly associated with web applications that facilitate interactive information sharing, interoperability, user-centred design, and collaboration on the World Wide Web .(O’Reilly, T 2005) Web 2.0 has already gone through an interesting cycle. 2006 was a year of enormous excitement about Web 2.0. 2007 saw more and more tension as communities were speaking back to web 2.0 companies in a variety of ways and challenging the implicit social contract of that underlying web 2.0. It often looks like labour as being transferred into the hands of consumers, but wealth production is in the hands of media companies. (Jenkins, H 2009 Interview)
Cyberculture is a subculture formed from the use of computer networks, communication, entertainment and business. (Bell, D & Kennedy B M, 2000) It is also the study of various social phenomena associated with online communities and online multi-player gaming. For the purposes of the essay, we pay special mention to online communities, in particular fanfiction. This idea of "fan fiction" is to provide a home of creators of one of the first “user generated" genres, fan stories written using popular movie and TV characters and storylines. Members can upload stories, embed promos and build communities around their favourite shows, books, movies, games etc. Fanfiction sites provide "challenges" asking fans to write their own conclusion to their favourite shows season finale. Members can shift from one community to another as their interests and needs change and they belong to more than one community at the same time. (Nightingale and Ross, 2006)It’s this idea that stories are spread across media platforms, almost without regard to technical barriers. People seem quite eager to flow these stories and pursue bits of information about them.
In a networked society, people are increasingly forming knowledge communities to pool information and work together to solve problems they could not confront individually. We call this “Collective Intelligence." (Nightingale & Ross, 2006) This is the world of discussion list. A type of cyberculture. Pierre Levy tells us "nobody knows everything, everyone knows something, and when any given member knows is available to the group at a moment's notice." Levy sees "collective intelligence" as a vehicle for democratisation, feeling that it provides a context through which diverse groups can join forces to work through problems. (Jenkins, H 2006 Blog)Lost presents one of the first examples of a TV show that leverages the collective intelligence, giving viewers the opportunity to create a community around the show online that discusses the show, the many secrets and mysteries it contains, and allowing fans to feel far more involved than was previously possible.
Another example of the emphasis fanfiction has on an audience is Survivor. Survivor, a reality TV show first aired in 2004 where 16 strangers were to ‘survive’ each other. Around every carefully crafted episode emerges another contest between the producer and the audience. As Survivor was the first to kick start the reality TV trend; Survivor is known as television for the Internet age; designed to be discussed, dissected, debated, predicted and critiqued. (Jenkins H, 2006)
The most hard core fans are known as “spoilers,” they go to extraordinary lengths to search the answers. They watch taped episodes frame by frame for any hidden information. The concept of “Collective Intelligence” allows this sharing to happen. Online forums and fanfiction sites offer an opportunity for participants to share their knowledge and opinions. Pierre Levy comments in Convergence Culture (Jenkins, H 2006) that such knowledge communities as central to the task of restoring democratic citizenship. He sees the sharing of knowledge around the world as the best way of breaking down the divisions and suspicions that currently shape international relations.
The word spoiling goes as far back as the beginning of the internet. Spoiling emerged because of the geographies of old and new media. People on the East Coast saw a series three hours earlier than people on the West Coast. With each new Survivor season, Mark Bennett, CBS and the production team have had to tighten security, further closed off leaks, anticipated hackers and made it much harder to play the game. The audience- sees this as a challenge. (Jenkins H, 2006) Spoiling is an adversarial process - a contest between the fans and the producers, one group trying to get their hands on the knowledge the other is trying to protect. CBS like many other production companies monitor the discussion lists for information about the audience. “In the first season, there was a ground swell of attention in there, we started monitoring the message boards to actually help guide us in what would resonate in our marketing. It’s just the best marketing research you can get” (Jenkins H, 2006). One fan comments on spoiling. “I like to dig. I like to look at primary source information. I like to find official manuscripts of an event. I like to find out who were the people there, what did they see. I want to hear it from them. That’s the part of my love for spoiling. I like to dig at the bottom. I like it when people don’t just say here’s who gets booted- here you go, but elaborate a little bit about where they get their information.” (Jenkins H, 2006)
Fans are the pioneers of cyberculture. – Henry Jenkins claims.
This brings a lot of discussion about whether it was the fans or the companies that own these "fan sites." Who started it? According to Karen Hellekson and Kristina Busse (2006), authors of "Fanfiction and fan communities in the age of the internet" fandoms were developed in the early 1900s. Developing their culture through traditional ways from zines, letters, conventions and later on- the internet. Fans created centralised online fandom-specific archives for their fanfiction - sites created by the fans. Fans were the first to write software that would automatically format and store fiction in searchable databases. (Hellekson K & Busse K, 2006) The Forever Knight (1992-1996) fandom can claim the first online mailing list, ForKNI-L, started on December 9th 1992 by Jean Prior - a fan. Members would receive information inviting them to join other fanfiction sites. The hardest thing about fanfiction prior to the internet was the geographical barriers. The new digital environment increased the speed of fan communication. (Nightingale and Ross, 2006) If fans once traded ideas through the mail, they now see the postal service too slow, to satisfy their expectations of immediate response. Fans goes online to discuss new episodes immediately after the episode's transmission time or even during ad-breaks perhaps in order to demonstrate the 'timeliness' and responsiveness of their devotion. Nightingale and Ross (2006) explain it where fans might have raced to the phone to talk to a close friend; they can now access a much broader range of perspectives by going online. This access to the internet supports the lack of geographical closeness, yet there are still arguments about international fans being additionally disadvantaged because of their first time experience of the episodes is 'spoiled' by learning too much from the online discussions. So why do these people go on the online discussion, if you don't want the episodes "spoiled?"
In a MIT Enterprise Forum interview with Peter Zak, Henry Jenkins explains that if you want to know where technology is going, see what people are doing now-when it’s hard and they’re struggling to achieve it, and make it easier for them to achieve. (Jenkins, H 2009 Interview) This ties back with the notion that fanfiction and ultimately the concept of cyberculture (fan communities) date back decades ago, however once it was on the internet, companies saw it as an investment opportunity and 'made it easier for them to achieve.' Jenkins tries to explain what consumers are doing with media and understand how they’re doing it over enormous difficulties; this can explain much more precisely the technical needs that are going to go on. As the early adapters proceeded, known as the lead users, they're adapting technology to their own needs. As the technology becomes easier to use, it becomes more wide spread across the population. In a sense, culture proceeds technology, but technology amplifies the trend of the culture -and makes it readily available to a much larger segment of the population. (Jenkins, H 2009 Interview) In a lecture to Cambridge University in 2007, Jenkins explains that the problem with the new age internet is that they start to believe that they created participatory culture. (Jenkins, H 2007 Lecture) “They start to imagine they built fanfiction sites and instead of accepting that there’s a whole history behind any of these communities, this decade long history of a push for participatory culture media that fuels the engagement of participation in something like fanfiction creates” Jenkins said.
Whilst some like Henry Jenkins believe that fans are the pioneers of cyberculture, others take an entirely different approach. Many argue that although the basis of cyberculture is the fan communities and online games and that these "communities" were introduced back in the early 1900s- theorists such as David Bolter and William Gibson argue that they the communities were there on the internet as a community, but without companies investing money in making it more recognisable with website after website, investing millions for fanfiction and online games - cyberspace would not have emerged. (Bell, D & Kennedy B M, 2000) Maybe cyberspace would not have emerged, but cyberculture is an entirely different thing. It's a culture, a way of life- the cyberspace (websites) has just made this more readily available. Jenkins declared cyberspace a new frontier of civilization, a digital domain that could and would bring down big business, foster democratic participation, and end economic and social inequalities. (Bell, D & Kennedy B M, 2000)
The reasons behind such a claim by Jenkins and the reasons that this claim is indeed correct are supported by arguments that fans and fan communities date back to the early 1900s. Without too much detail, you can understand the extraordinary lengths fans go to stay in touch with fellow fans. Letters that may have taken months, conferences that were held annually demonstrate the dedication an audience can have on a show, book, band or film. If there weren’t any fans, there would be no fanfiction, without fanfiction would be no online communities. The fans make it what it is, thus highlighting that fans are in fact pioneers of cyberculture. This idea does not just rely on fanfiction but any online discussion forums. If you answered a question posted by someone on yahoo or google, than you participated in cyberculture. So would there be these forums if they were no questions being posted by people?
Our previous lives where we were told what we can or cannot read, watch or listen to – is now a thing of the past. The term ‘participatory culture’ is just that-participate. The audience are now the creators, the critics. Although fanfiction dates back to the early 1900s, the evolution of the internet and in fact cyberspace will mean fanfiction will have a bigger purpose in a lot more lives. If there weren’t any fans, there would be no fan communities, without fan communities there would be no such thing as cyberculture.
References
- Jenkins, H (2006) ‘Collective Intelligence vs the wisdom of crowds.’ Confessions of an ACA-FAN blog. From
- Unknown, (2004) ‘Why was the internet created?’ Science and Invention.’ From Retrieved 15.9.2010
- O’Reilly, T (2005) ‘What is Web 2.0’ O’Reilly. From
- Jenkins, H (2007) ‘From YouTube to YouNiversity’ Confessions of an ACA-FAN blog. From
-Jenkins, H (2009) Interview –Talks about media landscape. Conducted by Peter Zak and Highest Common Denominator Media Group Retrieved 26.9.2010
- Jenkins, H (2007) ‘Lecture – Cambridge University. From Retrieved 26.9.2010
-Jenkins, H (2006) ‘Spoiling Survivor’ Convergence Culture –Where new and old media collide. Published by NYU Press. pp.25- 59. Retrieved 17.9.2010
- Nightingale V & Ross K, (2006) ‘Interactive Audiences,’ Critical Readings: Media and audiences. Published by Open University Pres. Retrieved 15.9.2010
- Bell D & Kennedy BM, (2000) ‘Cyberspace- First Steps.’ The Cybercultures reader. Published by Routledge London. pp. 29-35 Retrieved 17.9.2010
- Jenkins, H & Thorburn D, (2003) ‘Culture of Democracy,’ Democracy and new media. Published by MIT Press Cambridge. pp. 1-21 Retrieved 17.9.2010
- Hellekson K & Busse K, (2006) ‘Construction on fanfiction,’ Fanfiction and fan communities in the age of the internet. Published by McFarland & Company. pp 134-140. Retrieved 26.9.2010
