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Robert Andrews ALevel Media Studies A3 AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION AND THE EVOLUTION OF BROADCAST MODELS IN THE BRAVE NEW MEDIA At the end of the twentieth century, the world is witnessing an extraordinary convergence of communications media. Essentially driven by the expansion of broadcasting, falling prices in the computing industry and the demand for sophisticated forms of news and recreation, digital media is set to revolutionise die ways in which we receive our information and entertainment, how we buy and sell, and the manner in which we communicate with one another. Yet it is still far more an important issue how we approach this oncoming age. It will be about from where we get our information, how much we get, how we process it, and how we use it to our collective or individual advantage. These, and more questions have begun to be asked, and the answers will have implications for each and every one of us. This essay will attempt to explore die issues relating to me ways in which the media in a conternjwrat'y society will develop. It will examine the pressure that established media inslilLitions may find themselves under, the desire on die part of receivers for something more than passive communication, and how the nature of me relationship between these two parties is set to evolve over the coming years, as digital media expands. The nature of the way in which the media is used is changing rapidly, and postmodern culture is me centre of a fascinating debate over who has the ability to communicate effectively, and whether we simply lake possession of the information we receive, or interact with it. The outcome could shake established media institutions to their roots, forcing a cultural revolution of ideas, or it may prove that old dogs do not need to be taught new tricks. To examine how me media will change, we must look to the structures of me established media forms of today, to times when they were fresh and exciting, m each situation, we find that the birth of the medium has been the product of both technological and sociological advances. The issue is whedier technology forces change in society for technology's sake, or whether society will demand a change that technology will seek to bring about. The feeling that led to Gutenburg's printing of the Bible in 1456, and Caxton's printing of the first English book twenty years later, was die desire to communicate, the need to transmit information far and wide. Further down the line, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the deiiianu for more current facts gave rise to the newspaper, which would provide more reliability to the news needed by city professionals than the gossip they would find in their cosmopolitan coffee shops. If receiving this much hard information was seen as beneficial, then the development of [lie radio should have been truly innovative. It was another development which owed its existence to advances in technology creating new opportunities for a new medium (o thrive. All new media places a heavy refiance on overcoming expense and a reluctance for change before their acceptance as essential goods, and the radio was perhaps the first mass communication product to see whole families and streets crowd together to hear sounds from some mystical, faroff studio, despite the radio's use, in reality, as a secondary medium; which only commands one sense and can be used while some other task is attended to. The same trends were obvious in the introduction of the television Groups of people would sit around the box as pictures flickered onto the tube This was a fundamental pointer as to how television would be used even to mis date. It is in the notion that each broadcast is seen as an

Audience Participation and the Evolution of Broadcast Models in the Brave New Media

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This is a very important essay to me, written by me. This is an A-Level Media Studies coursework piece written in 1997.I was a student of the media who cared deeply to understand how our media worked, and one who noted incongruities in the representations of my culture in our media. Aged 16, I had also held a long interest in using technology.During A-Levels, I had begun reading Wired magazine, which suddenly united all these subjects (politics, culture, art, technology and media) and more in a riotous clash of monthly ideas. I felt as though my pent-up frustration at the media-economic systems, about which I was learning, was about to burst forth in to grand possibility. Suddenly, it was clear to me - the power to communicate would no longer rest with he who owned a printing press or broadcast transmitter. The one-to-many communications model could yield to a glorious many-to-many future in which everyone had the ability to publish for themselves, to each other and to be communicated back with in a bursting that would secure authentic, balanced representation of culture. I had, indeed, drunk John Perry Barlow's Kool Aid.These were ideas I was writing about as early as 1995 and 1996. They were ideas that have come to pass in today's internet - I'm proud, to be frank, that I was one of the few people at that time identifying the possibilities, advocating how our new media might change societies for the better. They have. In a sense, we prophesied "social media".But today, I'm sometimes chagrined that the vulgar "social media" crowd acknowledges this revolution as its own, as only a recent phenomenon. No, this was a cultural shift others amongst us identified and helped bring in to being 15 years earlier.This A-Level essay was the first major essay in a series of works that took me through university writings and focused on the media society that was about to change. Back then, it felt like no-one knew it and I was one of the few crazy soothsayers spewing words from the future on the street corner.

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Page 1: Audience Participation and the Evolution of Broadcast Models in the Brave New Media

Robert Andrews A!Level Media Studies A3

AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION AND THE EVOLUTION OF BROADCAST MODELSIN THE BRAVE NEW MEDIA

At the end of the twentieth century, the world is witnessing an extraordinary convergence ofcommunications media. Essentially driven by the expansion of broadcasting, falling prices inthe computing industry and the demand for sophisticated forms of news and recreation, digitalmedia is set to revolutionise die ways in which we receive our information and entertainment,how we buy and sell, and the manner in which we communicate with one another.

Yet it is still far more an important issue how we approach this on!coming age. It will be aboutfrom where we get our information, how much we get, how we process it, and how we use itto our collective or individual advantage. These, and more! questions have begun to be asked,and the answers will have implications for each and every one of us.

This essay will attempt to explore die issues relating to me ways in which the media in aconternjwrat'y society will develop. It will examine the pressure that established mediainslilLitions may find themselves under, the desire on die part of receivers for something morethan passive communication, and how the nature of me relationship between these two partiesis set to evolve over the coming years, as digital media expands.

The nature of the way in which the media is used is changing rapidly, and postmodern cultureis me centre of a fascinating debate over who has the ability to communicate effectively, andwhether we simply lake possession of the information we receive, or interact with it. Theoutcome could shake established media institutions to their roots, forcing a cultural revolutionof ideas, or it may prove that old dogs do not need to be taught new tricks.

To examine how me media will change, we must look to the structures of me establishedmedia forms of today, to times when they were fresh and exciting, m each situation, we findthat the birth of the medium has been the product of both technological and sociologicaladvances. The issue is whedier technology forces change in society for technology's sake, orwhether society will demand a change that technology will seek to bring about.

The feeling that led to Gutenburg's printing of the Bible in 1456, and Caxton's printing of thefirst English book twenty years later, was die desire to communicate, the need to transmitinformation far and wide. Further down the line, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries,the deiiianu for more current facts gave rise to the newspaper, which would provide morereliability to the news needed by city professionals than the gossip they would find in theircosmopolitan coffee shops.

If receiving this much hard information was seen as beneficial, then the development of [lieradio should have been truly innovative. It was another development which owed its existenceto advances in technology creating new opportunities for a new medium (o thrive. All newmedia places a heavy refiance on overcoming expense and a reluctance for change before theiracceptance as essential goods, and the radio was perhaps the first mass communicationproduct to see whole families and streets crowd together to hear sounds from some mystical,far!off studio, despite the radio's use, in reality, as a secondary medium; which onlycommands one sense and can be used while some other task is attended to.

The same trends were obvious in the introduction of the television Groups of people would sitaround the box as pictures flickered onto the tube! This was a fundamental pointer as to howtelevision would be used even to mis date. It is in the notion that each broadcast is seen as an

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event that the viewer loses control over what they watch; when each programme is aired at acertain time; meaning the viewer having to fit in with the schedules of a group of people atbroadcasting house through tlie medium of a square box. The very existence of programmeguides tells us that the nature of old broadcasting is inflexible, commanding our attention atspecified times of the day as we use our eyes and ears to receive dictated messages. This callsinto question the nature of the relationship between the content and the user ! in the situationshighlighted thus far, the content has dictated the attention of the user, though if tlie userwanted that content to be useful, they should be able to tell the medium which informationthey receive, when and where.

The excitement with which the first viewers greeted television had superseded the knowledgethat they were being dictated to, but me television phenomenon of the twentieth century is onewhich has bred laziness and apathy. The overriding message here is that the model adopted bymedia up to the end of tills century has been one!to!many, offering little more than a one!wayroute of communication from a powerful producer to a passive audience; despite thesignificant number in which the latter outweigh the former ! the very nature of masscommunication is, therefore, unbalanced.

A system in which the few control the information received by the many can be seen asbeneficial by those who distribute this information; unfair by those who receive it, andunhealthily divisive by commentators. It is a very powerful situation, and one which isfavourable to advertisers, who seek to reach as many people as possible through as manychannels.

None of me established media mentioned can be said to offer worthwhile interaction of aeither viewer!producer, viewer!content or viewer!viewer nature. But television can be thoughtof as fostering a particularly insular reaction to content, where the end!user can offer nofeedback on the issues raised in the programme. When we consider Eco's 1981 statement,"The unity of a text lies in its destination, not its origin," we see that broadcasters cannotpossibly know what viewers have thought of their programme unless some form of reaction isprovided," and that the preferred meaning may even have been misinterpreted. In 1964,Marshall McLuhan identified that, because of the one!way nature of mass communications,senders are not in a direct relationship with receivers, and that because this relationship isimpersonal and reaches a large audience, it can be packaged and sold as a commodity, unlikeinter!personal communication, which costs nothing. It is only inter!personal communication,via two!step flow, which enables post!broadcast dissection of preferred meanings, though thisis limited.

If this discussion took place on a wider scale, via one of the three reaction models proposedabove which draw together the sender and receiver; then it would create a real forum forthought, where viewers would become participants, creating a community around the contentin which the received meanings are deliberated over, whether the concurrent dominanthegemonic position, negotiated position, or oppositional. This would provide the broadcasterwith a valuable insight into the reaction amongst the viewers/users of content; and wouldfurther stimulate the shared experience of those who receive and produce it.

The result of the same old broadcasting model is an industry which is afraid to experiment forfear of anything that breaks out of hegemonic genericism being a commercial flop. But morecrucial to the broadcasters is the notion of power. I have mentioned that being a contentproducer, disseminating information en masse, is a commercially strong position. Yet it alsomeans that the broadcaster controls the information received by the viewer, and has thediscretion to edit or manipulate that information. Cynics would talk about this in terms of theMarxist ideology, where content is distributed by the state for the state's benefit. In fact; this isa situation which begins to look decidedly like George Orwell's 1984 totalitarian nightmare.

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Robert Andrews A!Leve) Media Studies A3

Indeed, it is unhealthy for the public to receive information from only a handful of newssources. In order to arrive at a balanced opinion, multiple ideas should be assimilated.Broadcasters are intent on maintaining the old model for reasons of market dominance, but theexplosion of plurality, recently and in the next few years, threatens to destroy their hegemony,resulting in hundreds of channels of ideas.

This will provide ordinary people with the opportunity to air their own opinions, as hasalready happened in much of the new media sector and the underground old media.Particularly on the worldwide web, the possibility of setting up sites quickly and easily hasgranted users the ability to become content producers of their very own. This has led to therapid expansion of free thought circulating on the Internet where people create communitiesaround their own ideas where they would have been impossible with old media.

The key sentiment is that the opportunity to become a creator is extremely empowering,providing one with a potentially huge stage to air one's views. But moreso; it will overturn therelationship between' broadcaster and viewer, bringing the two closer together, as masscommunication technology becomes cheaper and easier to use. A new punk ethic is set toprevail, where kids raised on Nintendo and the net, in a society increasingly hostile to politicsand big!business domination, will see no reason why they cannot make their views heard Infact; where interactive media gives rise to active users, there are positive implications fordemocracy. In recent decades, there has grown an apathy toward politics, and this maypartially be blamed on the media ! viewers see politicians bickering amongst themselves ontelevision; or read their comments in the newspaper, and they do not have access to them forquestioning because they are beyond the closed doors of the one!way model. The lack ofcommunication from voter to voted is not conducive to a democratic society.

•The British general election of 1997 saw an apparent concerted effort from broadcasters toinvolve the public in the debate. A range of television shows offered viewers the oppoi [unityto get involved by offering their opinions to the masses and, more importantly, to put theirconcerns to the politicians vying for rule of the state. They were able to talk back, as well asget talked to.

The broadcasters allowed this because they recognised that the next government would beelected not by a handful of corporation executives, but by the people outside the studio; infront of the box. The decision to transform these viewers into participants recognised thepower of the consumer and attempted to draw them into the show; where they would be seenas a cross!section of the public, in order to gauge the mood of the nation. Some programmes'content was entirely based on viewer interaction, others used studio audiences to put thequestions that 'you; the viewer wanted to ask.

In most cases, the broadcaster still has ultimate control over the direction of the show, throughthe nomination of questioners, the interruption of the interrogated; and the casting of votes,This creates a framework in which the broadcaster retains authority; where the newly!converted participants can be cut off.

But the conversion of viewers to participants is now a trend. A number of televisionprogrammes over recent years have sought to incorporate phone!in participation in order toincrease the reality of experience.

Viewer participation is particularly effective in matters of national importance. A televisionlandmark occurred in January of 1997 when ITV ran a live public debate on the Britishmonarchy. Despite pulling in the world's largest television response of 2.6 million; the debatewas heavily criticised for a confrontational style which encouraged people to take sides. In

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defence, director of programmes at Carlton, Andy Alien, said: "In the eighties, people werecowed and they didn't speak out. Now they are finding a voice again, and as soon as theyspeak, members of the elite call it mob rule." Entirely consistent with the idea that viewers inthe digital media era want to engage in dialogue rather than listen to monologue, he added:"Television is changing. In the age of the Internet, people want communication to be two!waytraffic." \

The interactionist standpoint, that the viewer is an active participant, is something of a fallacyif that viewer cannot respond. They may decode the received information and arrive at anopinion which may or may not be consistent with the preferred encoded meaning. But this isworthless if there is no forum of discussion outside of personal company.

So, what is the response from broadcasters to the challenges of the new public demand forinteraction and participation? In May 1996, the BBC published Extending Choice In theDigital Age, a document which would 'set out the corporation's ambitions for public servicedigital services; funded by the licence fee.' The main commitments made were to provideBBC 1 and 2 in widescreen, a 24!hour news channel and an electronic programme guide. Theideas fanned the more general proposal of more choice, hardly the boon to democraticinteractionism or community building that will be necessary in the future.

Indeed, Extending Choice was harshly criticised by many in the industry; particularly JohnWyver of independent producer. Illuminations: "The BBC reckons that interaction consists ofchoosing from a range of pre!determined options offered by the provider," he wrote, in Wired2.10. "All variants of this future still assume the primacy of traditional broadcasting."

Wyver, who produced The Net for BBC2, proposed that conventional broadcasting be toppledin order make the worldwide web the organising force for shows, instead of an adjunct.

In his own proposal for the way television can work five years down the road, Wyversuggested the primary location for a show would be a web site, where a community built from'viewers' offer their own comments and tips on the topic of the show. From there; a half!hourweekly programme is drawn by professional TV producers from the material collected fromthe web site ! ideas in text, pictures and video. He recognised that "to convert audience intocommunity, this scenario depends crucially on finding non!television people who cancontribute meaningfully to good television." In this sense, the viewer is truly the creative, andthe model would require a rethink of the role of the producer, who would become responsiblefor discerning between healthy debate and a libellous slanging match, creative advice anddangerous nonsense,

New media represent a fundamental shift in power from the broadcasters to the public whomthey allegedly serve. It slips through the restraints on which public service broadcasting wasfounded ! limited access to the spectrum, subordination to government authority, restrictiveOperating licences; inadequate access to production technology ! yet new media also givesbroadcasters new opportunities to develop relationships with producers and audiences, ratherthan simply extending choice. It could create a new type of public service broadcasting thatincludes, rather than edifies, the public.

' "It is built around the traditional broadcast model with multimedia tacked on as anafterthought," commented an anonymous BBC employee in Wired 3.02. "What it fails toaddress is the need to redefine the traditional model. Ignoring this is like shuffling the chairson the Titanic."

That traditional model is based around Reithian ideals which are an age apart from today'sworld. The legacy to educate, entertain and inform was borne out of a war!time era which

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Robert Andrews , A!Level Media Studies A3

assumed the public had little choice in what to consume, that the nation wanted to be a wholeand that broadcasters have a right to cultural high!ground. Postmodern culture is one whichprovides us with more choice, more plurality of opinion and no reliance on close!knit war!time communities. Instead, new communities are being forged on!line, in cyberspace,

New media re!builds the uses!and!gratification model of analysis ! it requires endeavour toactively seek out the content which is of interest, rather than tossing information at the viewerat time!tabled intervals. The user has full control over the time and place of informationretrieval, therefore living up to the proposal that users are active in seeking ftut and processingthe content they handle.

Old media may die hard, or not die at all. Despite the evangelism of interactive media moguls,there are reasons why the established media may be around for years to come! Firstly; thecapacity to be entertained must not be under!estimated! There will always be some distinctionbetween professional media producers and users, separated by the need to manipulate digitaltechnologies expertly, no matter how easy they are to use. Stories have been told for centuries,and it is a penchant that will not disappear simply because readers will also be able to tell theirown stories. And in a world which will be saturated by vast quantities of media content; therewill be a desire for news that is accurate and trustworthy. With the amount of other channels touse, the efforts of independent, amateur new media producers may turn out to be little morethan fifteen seconds of fame; swamped by big companies with an ever!expanding interest indigital media. Increasingly; technological determinism may play a part; where only those whoable to afford the devices for receiving content will be able to enjoy all the benefits describedearlier. At worst, this could mean restricted access to free speech, including a say in thedemocratic process, and certainly no possibility of producing one's own content,

Perhaps the most likely stumbling block to the liberation of the media will be one that is littletalked about. For interactive media to perform its role, some effort is required on the part ofthe user. This essay has talked about how television has produced a lazy society which canonly sit and digest messages. The transfer from a passive viewer to an active participant is afundamental one; and many will have to be convinced of the benefits of having to work to getinformation; whereas it used to be thrown at you. In contrast to McLuhan's belief that senderand receiver are not in direct communication; Golding, in 1974; found "the growth of masscommunications is a dual process. On the one hand, it describes the development of anindustry; and on the other the evolution of an audience. The relationship between the two isone of supply and demand for two basic social commodities; leisure facilities andinformation." In a society where anyone can become a producer of these commodities, thistheory holds no water up to the point where the producers require a kind of content which theycannot produce themselves. But as long as there are people to send information, there will bepeople who use it to their gratification.

It is perhaps ironic; or tragic, that the new bastion of many!to!many media, the Internet, maynow be ready to turn full circle and succumb to the commercial reality of broadcasting. 1996and 1997 saw news of the development of push technology', a model which defies the'traditional' Internet mode of deliverance. Inherently, to find information on the Net, a user isrequired to visit a site and actively choose the content they want.

'The push model is in direct opposition to this. Soon, information will be pushed to a user'sdesktop without the user specifying anything other than an initial categorisation of desiredcontent. Then, infon!nation will be pumped onto a continually!updated rolling ticker!tape,which will return the new medium to a one!to!many, television model, and will curtail theinteractive nature of the Internet before it has realistically took off. Push media is in thepipeline because advertisers have found it difficult to adapt to a new medium where anannouncement is heard only if a conscious decision is made to investigate. Precisely because

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the Internet is, or was, an anarchic, unpredictable; many!to!many system, which defiedtraditional media, the established content providers have found it difficult to do business there.Now, the centre of interactive media is moving into a post!hypermedia environment that willcomplete the Internet's transformation into a broadcast medium. This will have implicationsfor the way in which it is used, perhaps resulting in a society ignorant to the categories of newsnot specified.

In conclusion, twenty!first century media will have to be more intelligent than that of thetwentieth century. With so much pluralism, so many channels of information, it will have tocompete for our attention. Tt must, therefore, work hard in order to attract us, and offer aunique experience to ensure we use it again. It must also bear in mind that communities can becreated regardless of physical distance. The result may be a compromise between one!to!manyand many!to!many models, for the sake of plurality, which could mean receiving ourinformation in a one!way method, but discussing it in a more relevant and useful manner withthe aid of digital technologies.

In the past, television threw out information to viewers when it wanted to. In the future, itmust reel viewers into discussions the}' can join when they want. Welcome to the world ofbroadcatching,

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

A!Level Media Studies A3

Culture, Society and the MediaRoutledge, 1992Michael Gurrevitch, Tony Bennett, James Curran and Jane Woollacott

Mass Communication TheorySage, 1983Denis McQuaiI

Studying The MediaArnold, 1994Tim O'Sullivan, Brian Dutton, Philip Rayner

Extending Choice In The Digital AgeBBC.1996

The BBC's Digital Service Proposition; A Consultation DocumentBBC,1997

Wired UK 2.10Wired UK Ventures, 1996John Wwer

Wired UK 3.02Wired UK Ventures, 1997Meg Carter

Wired UK 3.03Wired UK Ventures. 1997•Kevin Keiiy, Gary Wolf

MediaGuardian, 13 Jan 1997^ Guardian News, 1997

Maggie Brown

Internet Magazine, May 1997Emap Business CommunicationsGarret Keogh

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