Case Study 15 - Own choice - 4oD

4oD

What is 4oD?: 4oD is Channel 4 on demand. Once you install the free application onto your computer, you can download any rentable programmes, either for free or for a very small fee, and watch them when you want.

A New Technology?: Recently, film and TV downloads have been popular amongst the internet due to the boom of illegal file sharing programmes such as LimeWire. 4oD is like a legal version these, providing easily accessible downloads to your home PC. It exploits new mediums of technology such as the high-speed downloads rates of home PCs (thanks to connectors such as broadband). All you need to access this innovative idea is:
· Be resident in the UK or Eire
· A Windows XP PC
· IE 5.5, 6 or 7
· Windows Media Player 10 or 11
· A broadband connection

4oD gives audiences the choice to watch ch4s most popular programmes such as:
· Ugly Betty
· Desperate Housewives
· The OC
· ER
· Kidnapped
· Chaos at the Chateau
· Peep Show
· Deal or No Deal
· Hollyoaks
· Wife Swap
· And more…

Some shows are free, bigger dramas are 99p an episode and films can come from £1.99

This is convenience at its best for audiences, they can choose when they watch, what they watch, and even on what device they watch it (be it the computer or the television).

For the industries: the fact audiences can miss out advertising now is worrying for industries. However for the television industry, providing audiences with exactly what they want, and as much choice as possible makes their brand seem far more appealing to audiences. They can build up a committed audience following. But specifically for Ch 4 4oD gives them more interest in their programmes, higher ratings, and their own, small version of a Sky+ box, developing their brand and ensuring they keep up with the ever-growing, converging television industry.

Interactivity, non-linear, personalisation, convenience,

Case Study 14 – NMT new phenomenon

Playstation 3

“Prepare for games more immersive than anything you've ever seen, Blu-ray Disc movies so crisp you'll think you're there, and a networked community that breaks new ground in interaction and communication. Prepare for PLAYSTATION 3.” - Playstation website

Playstation 3 is the newly-released games console, tipped to be one of the most amazing NMTs from this century. Its new high quality of gaming means it stands as a replacement for Sony’s Playstation 2, but it’s mainly so impressive due to the high quality of its extra features.

What the Sony Playstation 3 does

• Video – HD blu-ray playback on movies
• Music – acts as an MP3 sound system
• Photo – stores digital photos which can be shown to friends and family through the television
• Network – go online (online games, network with other players etc)
• Connects with the PSP
• ‘Real time processing’ - PLAYSTATION 3 acts like a super-computer, and is able to compute huge amounts of data in 'real time'. Real time processing refers to when different components of a game - the graphics, sound, physics, and so on - are worked out as events in the game as they actually happen - in 'real time'. Using real time processing allows games to react and change to what's happening - as opposed to using a pre-determined routine – meaning PS3 games are far more unpredictable, interactive experiences than any previous games.
• HD imagery
• Wireless controller

For the audience: Quality of experience. The technology is immersive and realistic. Playstation 3 offers more unpredictable game experiences, giving more interactivity, but also home entertainment which can last a long time. Converged media – music, film, gaming, internet all in one device. Convenience.

For the Industry: By investing and producing a huge new product with a greater quality of experience, audiences trust the product and will continue to invest in the brand. Creates competition in the market. They can invest in further technology and compete with other industries. They look like the new, innovative leaders in the gaming industry. The converged media involved all comes from Sony software (sony games console, sony sound system, sony dvd, sony games, a sony system which is compatible with other sony products such as a camcorder...and what better to play it on than a sony television?)

Interactivity, quality, convergence

Case Study 13 - one NMT activity involving audience consumption/production

Blogging

A blog literally describes a ‘web log’, where audiences produce journal-style web pages through a user-generated website.

Blogs can be used to give a commentary on any particular subject or interest to the individual, e.g.
· Food
· Politics
· Local news
· Fashion
· Travel
· Projects
· A particular job
· A hobby, or unusual occupation
· A personal, online diary

Blogs combine text, images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to its topic. Also a form of converged media - the internet allows websites to combine various media forms.

Different formats of ‘blogging’
· Photoblogs
· Sketchblogs
· Vlogs (video blogs)
· Podcasting (audio logs)
· Tumbleblogs (Blogs with shorter posts and mixed media)
· Moblog (blogs written via a mobile phone)
· Splogs (used for spamming)
· Corporate blogs

Interactivity: readers can leave comments in an interactive format on each others blogs, creating an online community, and providing smaller, niche audiences with a medium which can relate to their interests.

Popular blog websites include
· Technorati (which was tracking more than 57 million blogs in November 2006)
· MySpace (has 106 million accounts)
· Face-book (18 million members)
· Blogger

For the industries blogging is great for promotions and advertising; companies use it to give small insights into the products (for example journalists post small sections of the weekly articles, from which the full ones are only available from a specific magazine). Furthermore, the political industry are using blogs more and more to promote their parties, and reach the public on a personal level. E.g. Tom Watson a labour party MP uses his blog to keep youth involved in his political movements as a Labour MP.

For the audiences: Blogging is an amazing way to be a part of the media. Directly using the internet, its new high-speed connection rates (broadband) and its worldwide popularity, the average consumer could create a world famous webpage from a device right at their fingertips. Blogging could even become part of the audiences profession; programmes such as PayPerPost pay people to post interesting articles. Furthermore, prizes such as the LuLu ‘blooker’ prize or just general ratings and awards provided by various magazines and Newspapers (the Times, the Guardian for example) encourage people to get creative with the media and make blogs. For example, the Times tipped Xu Jinglei’s blog as one not to miss. Blogging is almost like a hobby - the audience can dip into it at their own convenience, read other people's blogs, develop their own, take it seriously or do it just for fun. Either way, the audience are not just consuming the media, but are taking it into their own hands, and are in fact creating and producing their own entertainment.

Key concepts of theory:
· Interactivity
· Niche audiences
· Immediacy
· Personalisation
· Convenience
· Democratisation
· Convergence
· Reach
· Regulation

Case Study 12 – one named converged, portable technology.

Nokia 7373

Convergence of media occurs when multiple products come together to form one product with the advantages of all of them. Mobile phones are a good example, in that they increasingly incorporate digital cameras, MP3 players, camcorders, voice recorders, and other devices.

The Nokia 7373 is not only a fashionable, portable gadget from which you can make phone calls and send text messages, but has a large, dazzling 262k colour screen and a 2 mega-pixel digital camera with 8x zoom and video capture. Furthermore, you can listen to your favourite music on the integrated stereo MP3 player and FM radio. It’s Bluetooth enabled for hassle-free, wireless connectivity and has 10 MB of built-in internal memory, expandable to 2 GB with the microSD slot.

This NMT therefore has converged with:

The digital camera
The video camcorder
The internet (or home PC)

Radio
Music (CDs, MP3 players)

Benficial for the audiences: For the consumer it means more features in less space, through a portable, convenient medium.
Benficial for the industries: It means remaining competitive in the struggle for market dominance. The announcement of a new cell phone that incorporates iTunes music songs is an example of media convergence in consumer electronics.

HOWEVER there is still a downside to convergeed media; converged devices are frequently less functional and reliable than their component parts (e.g. a video will be of much better quality on a camcorder than on your mobile phone). “Further, as single devices address a wide spectrum of consumer needs, breakdowns and problems become more likely, and more disruptive to the consumer. The greater the degree of convergence in a device, the more vulnerable consumers are to the failure of that device and face more complex user-interfaces.” (from wikipedia)

Other converged media devices concerning phones:

• Phone companies integrating 3G on their phones.
• Television is now being converged with the mobile phone industry.
• Phone calls are also being made with the use of personal computers.

Case study 11 – Fansite

Mcfly maniacs

‘Mcfly maniacs’ is an unofficial website for the awesome foursome pop band (with guitars) Mcfly. The site has been created by fans for fans, to discuss their passion (Mcfly) and find out more about the band.

The site states:

“Welcome to McFly Maniacs, the number 1 resource for everything McFly! We opened on 6th December 2003 and have suported McFly from the very begining! We have had alot of suport from everyone who visits and its been great running it over the past years, we will keep going as long as you keep visiting!We would just like to thank you all for the suport on the site over the years. Its been great running the site and we enjoy your company!If you wish to contact us, then click on 'Site' then 'Contact'.Hope you enjoy your stay! :)Amy and Emma”

The site is targeting all fans of McFly, and is using the website to:

• Promote the band
• Give the fans more information
• Make the fans feel involved with the band, ‘in the know’
• Create an online community
• Give this niche audience a form of media which is solely targeting them
• Personalised, narrowcasting.
  

The website contains:

• Menu bar: Home, band, gallery, music, fans, fun, tours, site, web
  
• ‘Video of the moment’ where Mcfly’s current video is posted via a YouTube link.


• A chat board


• News bulletin board, almost like a blog, where the site runners leave messages and updated information on the boys.


• Gallery: loads of photos of the band, from TV and Video stills, to scanned in magazine images, official tour photos or photos taken from live events. These are fan photos, not those you’d see on the official band website.


• Music: Find out all the details and statistics concerning their singles and albums (chart positions, sales, release dates etc), the lyrics and chords to all their songs.


• Fans: send in your pictures or autographs if you’ve met Mcfly, see photos of other fans bedrooms covered in Mcfly posters, send in artwork you’ve done of the band. Register with the site to leave comments on the forum or join in the chats.


• Fun: get Mcfly ringtones or wallpapers, play games, caption photos, read Mcfly cartoons, read funny Mcfly quotes, send photos of Mcfly look-alikes.


• Band: band members biographies.

Media texts involved are the internet, photography and video. The site is kept quite like a blog as it is an amateur site.

Narrowcasting, online community, niche audiences.

Video of the moment: Mcfly, Transylvania



For the industry: free market research; they can see the audience's interests, and what they like/dislike about Mcfly from this site. Free promotion - they are getting the promotion of the band and of their songs through a medium they have nothing to do with. In some ways this is scary - what's published is democratic, and therefore out of their control - but in other ways it is beneficial, they don't have to be reach audiences, the audiences find out more off their own backs.

Case Study 10 - Podcasts

Podcasting, describes the way technology can push audio content from websites down to consumers of that content, who typically listen to it on their iPod or other MP3 audio players. Podcasting is similar to the PVR – people can watch what they want and when they want by recording and storing; this time it is used for audio not video, and is currently free of charge. Note, however, that this technology can be used to push any kind of file, including software updates, pictures, and videos.
What makes podcasting special is that it allows individuals to publish (podcast) radioshows, that interested listeners can subscribe to. Before podcasting you could of course record a radio show and put it on your website, but now people can automatically receive new shows, without having to go to a specific site and download it from there. Podcasting is democratic; anyone with a microphone, a computor and a space on the internet can publish one.

For industries this 'democracy' could be a threat; now radio can be made by anyone, without the need for broadcasting licences and specialist equipment. However, it also a way for them to reach their audiences more effectively. Virgin Radio and the BBC have been experimenting and have found it popular and likely to be accepted. The process of downloading means institutions can be accurately informed of the consumption of their content. With the rapid growth of podcasting, it is somethinhg industries are bound to exploit in the future. (especially the mobile phone industry; big storage + 3g high-speed connectivity, downloading and storing podcasts could become the norm). Copyright is a consistent problem for podcasters.

Recently, with the emmergence of video i-pods, podcasting has become a lot more video-based, and you can dowload video podcasts (for example, behind the scenes of extras, you can watch as Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant try to find a replacement for Jude Law in their programme). This means that podcasting is fitting into the pattern of other NMTs; personalisation, on-demand content and portability. There is no predetermined schedule for podcasts. Podcasts can cover a huge range of topics, and are increasingly targetting specialist or niche interests (narrowcasting). This is good for those with unheard of interests, but also a concern - how will audiences know what to consume with this much choice? and does quantity necessarily mean quality?

My example has been taken from the Times Online podcasts (downloaded from the i-tunes store) and is from Dom Joly’s series of ‘Dom Joly takes on the world’. This is a comedy piece where people get to choose what activity he takes on, and then has to talk about. Here he is going ‘Canyoning’ in Scotland which consists of jumping down rocks and waterfalls. The piece is quite funny, and part of a series which you can subscribe to.

Key theories:

convenience, personalisation, narrowcasting, regulation, online surveillance, democratisatoin, reach, non-linear, portability.

Case Study 9: VLog

YouTube: Fettes boys

(You must watch their videos, they are very very funny)

A Vlog is a blog for videos. Sites such as YouTube allow people to set up their own vlog accounts, where they upload various videos of themselves or other clips which they find funny or important to them. Again an online community can be made through sites like these, other people can comment your videos and you can make friends with people within your network.

Youtube is free and easy to access. Millions have a youtube account, and thousands of new videos are uploaded everyday.

Youtube is mainly used by amateurs. People posting their home made videos or just uploading short clips from films or television programmes. They upload their videos to make their friends laugh, or so they can link them onto other personal webpages. In many cases, people want to be noticed for their video-making talents; for example, some people post their fanfilms on sites like youtube, so directors will notice them, or they can be entered into short film awards.

My example of a vlog is by a group of boys from Fettes private school in Scotland. Their profile name is GL2786, and they have posted 8 videos. They have 22 subscribers to their space, 218 bulletins, 9 comments, and have also posted 16 of their favourite videos (which they haven’t made). All of their video posts have been made by them at school in their spare time, most of which are lip-syncing to funny songs. There are many options of how to contact the boys, such as send message, send a link, add comment, add as friend etc.



Personalisation: people can do what they want and when to their own web pages.
Democratisation: VLogging is encouraging people to get hands on with media, and make their own videos with their own cameras and equipment.
Regulation: People can in effect upload whatever they want. Whole television shows and movies can be uploaded, but this hasn't yet breached the copyright laws.