Main Points

* Capitalises on proliferation (of technology)
* Uses the consumers to promote so that it is peer-to-peer marketing that is, to some extent, invisible to the consumer.
* Can capitalise on references to or themes within a movie as appetisers that ‘prepare a market’ for the content
* Can adopt slogans that are spread around and create curiosity before delivering the final source e.g. The Dark Knight
* Original viral videos contained some small reference to the product even though the video itself was ‘just a cool vid’ e.g. ‘My dad’s got restless legs’
* This phenomenon is related to ‘word-of-mouth’ advertising, ‘buzz marketing’ and ‘stealth marketing’ and can be used to create a perfect storm (see Obama’s campaign ad)
* Popular phrases that are ‘user-generated’ by the consumers are popularised by marketing forces and used to sell e.g. Dancing Baby’s “All you base are belong to us”.
* They often violate copyright laws through their very nature as they use trademarks, symbols, characters, ideas and put them into new contexts whether as mash-ups or in some other form.
* ‘Hyper-real’ cinematic styles capitalise on the success of viral videos by making themselves appear amateurish (and therefore genuine) to some degree.
* Can be used in positive ways to raise awareness about issues e.g. District 9’s ‘humans only’ phone-boxes’ called to mind the racism of old South Africa in segregating 'the whites and the blacks'.

realism

realism is an ascetic construct (a created 'look') put together by conventions that are agreed upon at any one time.

Key terms: photorealism, actuality and realistic violence.

• Actuality: can be put together through real life photographed by they can also be staged.

• Realistic violence can be enhanced through phonographic technology.

• Realism can be faked and we should not mistake it for authenticity.

They style of realism, which are often the result of technology.

indepence and relationships

Test the statement: We express independence but we value relationships.

Consider whether online relationships flourish and in what form, how online relationships compare to RL (real-life) ones, whether youtube and the internet is a ‘hotbed’ of cultism, whether ‘youchoose’ your friends on ‘youtube’ and how all of this affects how we interact. Are we closer or more distant?

Consider the emo kid phenomenon where an online, real-time romance began but was later discovered to be faked. However, Facebook may be a better example of this aspect of cultural inversion: http://www.jordoncooper.com/2008/09/08/the-social-impact-of-facebook-and-twitter/

& examine such articles as “I’m so totally, digitally close to you”: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/07/magazine/07awareness-t.html?ex=1378440000&en=b87f67f56fa2fbe2&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink & the social impact http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/the_impact_of_facebooks_platform.php

The social impact of facebook UK

idea that your condensing the most important information that's in your head at any time.
technical term is ambient awareness.

digital intimancy some people feel that they can only be intermite through the web with things like facebook but its all simulated. But there are varying degrees of intimacy for example you can get a more in depth view of someone the more you talk to them if they have videos bot just pictures, the more you learn about them and interact and become involved.

the fact that we have social media makes us feel that relationships are more important. but are these relationships real do people just care about ascetics and want people to see how many friends they have and how many people they know where as others want to have their voice heard or cultivate real relationships with others. In some ways it brings people together but in others drive that apart people feel like they are part of a community where as others feel as thought they loose individuality by subscribing for something that everyone else is on and people become ruled by this.

we express commercialization but we value authenticity:
You get all this amazing presentation and someone goes so what, they are still not impressed.

Testing cultural inversion

express:

1. individualism
2. Independence
3. commercialization
   

value:

1. community
2. relationships
3. authenticity

Individualism and community

When someone says the word community to me the first thoughts that spring to mind are people that share something in common and due to that shared interest or value or location they come together. It can be a physical and mental bond.

community becomes more individual as it is something someone becomes a part of.

1. Name any ‘online communities’ that either you or another is a part of: facebook
2. Try to find out the similarities and differences between the two and any other ideas about ‘individualism’ and‘community’.
3. Consider the most subscribed channels on youtubeand the youtube celebrities you have researched. Do they do what they do because they want to express themselves (their individuality) and get involved in a community?

Reflections on ‘ An anthropological introduction to YouTube’ – Michael Wesch

Key Terms: interaction, immersion, ‘partipatory culture’, blogoshere, ‘mash-up’, narrowcasting, machinima, aspirational TV, web 3.0, hyper-reality, self-reflexive, ‘context collapse’.

1. There are various types of videos on YouTube such as parodies, diaries, adverts, home videos, performance clips, documentaries, scenes from films.

2. Videos can be mixed and remixed across the whole globe, leading to what Wesch describes as ‘context collapse’. Here is one of the most common videos

Bushwhacked

3. There are a number of pros and cons of ‘context collapse’:

4. Aspirational TV is something that appeals to the audience is connects with them as they aspire to be it or own it.

5. One of the top ranking videos on YouTube is

David Gauntlett's you tube site

David Gauntlett (born 1971) is a British sociologist and media theorist. He specialises in the study of contemporary media audiences, the everyday making and sharing of digital media, and the role of such media in self-identity and self-expression.
He is now a professor of media and communications at the university of Westminster.
Some his most famous pieces of work is the online article about web 2.0.The article argues that the traditional form of media studies teaching and research fails to recognise the changing media landscape in which the categories of 'audiences' and 'producers' blur together, and in which new research methods and approaches are needed.

What is media in the online age?

We will be studying for this type of the course media in the online age.
With emphasise on convergence and also looking into global media. We will debate on the direction our technology is traverling in good? What is the effect on industries and is it posative or negative? And also will it change how we profit from the media?

I believe that media in the online age is all about developing and utilising the web. It originated from web 1.0 and has now become 2.0 and somewhere in the near future we will all be using web 3.0.
Web 2.0 is vastly more interactive it has brought social media with it such as facebook, myspace and youtube. Anyone can consumer media when and where they please they can also contribute to it. This is partially due to how compact technology has also become. At one time most technology and electrical media instruments were on a giant scale now some things such as the mobile phone can fit into the palm of your hand.
Media consumption used to have a set time, death of the schedual as now the consummer can acsess everything on demand.
Family would once gather around the Television in the evenings to watch one of the five channels avaliable to them. But now progrmas can be viewd whenever suit you with sky pluse and online channels e.g. BBC iplayer.

Also the days of files of paper stacks of reports and masses of files clutering up our space is long gone with computer providing a new way to store and sort infomation. Digital text is far more flexiable. Some researchers tell su that there is a blog born every 30seconds, the web is a way for people to collaberate it links us together in buisness and in leasuire.