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BLOGOGRAPHY
Blog watching with a purpose
By: Alicia Dudek & Kate Saunderson
We are looking into how people use, abuse, and reuse new media through consump@on and produc@on of content.
Mapping the idea space and focusing the scope
Understanding the blogosphere’s role in rela@onships
People
Blogosphere /
Internet Technology
• People – Who are the people in the seats? • Online – reading blogs – wriDng blogs – commenDng – replying ‐ parDcipaDng
– Involvement in the blogosphere • Who, what, when, where
• With who – the groups, the organizaDon of groups, the organizaDon, hierarchies
• How much Dme is dedicated to this form of new media entertainment?
What are you DOING?
• Blogosphere – A form of new media – An umbrella term for online log wriDng, journal wriDng, criDcism, reviewing, chronicling, the commentary mechanism, social system, subculture, and the literacy of the parDcipants
– The collecDve works of the bloggers and commentators
– The physicality of blogs as well as the ethos or ether of the blogosphere
– Meta‐blogging ; blogging about blogging; “I blog therefore I am”
What are you DOING?
• Technology – The stuff you use to make it happen (meaning the blogosphere)
– The behavior of people with regards to technology – How people use, abuse, and reuse technology meaning new media?
– Tailoring technologies – How oTen and how long are the interacDons with technology?
What are you DOING?
WHY are you doing it?
WHY are you doing it?
WHY are you doing it?
WHY are you doing it?
THE INTERNET BARRIER IS SOMETHING FLUID THAT EBBS AND FLOWS CREATED BY USERS
BLOGGER AS THEY ARE ONLINE
VERSUS
BLOGGER AS PEOPLE IN THE REAL WORLD
What PEOPLE and why?
People Reading • Reading blog posts • CommenDng on blog posts • Replying to comments, etc. • AXending events planned online
through blogs, or implemenDng the advice or knowledge from the blogs.
• Returning to regular blogs. • Blogs they you look at to be
entertained, just for fun? – Blogs that merge fun and funcDon?
• How do you find other blogs? – Google, search – Blog subscripDon, RSS feeds, links – Reading blogs on blog
agglomerator sites – Through websites
People Wri@ng
• WriDng blog posts • CommenDng on blog posts • Replying to comments, etc. • Blogging replies to other
online content • ReacDng and responding to
real world or virtual world events, you tube videos, retweeDng, etc.
• Linking of blogs and whys and hows, eDqueXe/ literacy
• Networking • Organizing events
THE INTERN
ET BARR
IER
OK… but I sDll don’t get it
Can you explain more about what “internet (didacDc) barrier” means?
Exactly the quesDon we would have asked ourselves. We have been thinking about this a lot and its a difficult thing to pinpoint because this barrier is very fluid and takes many forms. I can answer this ques@on best with a story about the video game Metal Gear Solid. Metal Gear Solid was released on the PlaystaDon 2 console back in the day. It was one of the culminaDng games of its Dme and came to represent what a high quality game should look like, but it also contained elements that broke the rules of video games. In one of the later stages of the game the main character, a gunslinger named Snake, is baXling one of the final bosses. Psycho ManDs, the boss, has telepathic and telekineDc powers. Throughout the fight, Psycho ManDs begins to ask the player if they enjoyed playing other video games and making comments on how oTen they saved or how other games were played. By reading the memory cards contents and breaking the 4th wall Psycho ManDs, is illustraDng how a video game can breakout of the game atmosphere and truly unseXle the user. This is further deepened when during the baXle Psycho ManDs disables the users controller leaving them helpless. In order to defeat Psycho ManDs the player must move the controller from port 1 to port 2 in order to regain control. By demanding this physical acDon in order to interact and reading the memory card with the players personal informaDon, Metal Gear Solid was revoluDonary. Here is a video of the part of the game we are discussing Metal Gear Solid Psycho ManDs Boss Fight.
Screenshot: Metal Gear
Solid
The internet barrier What does this mean? • The internet barrier menDoned in our video can be viewed as an interacDon barrier. It is constantly changing due to technology and the acDons of users. It is like the surface of a giant bubble in a state of fluxus. The player of Metal Gear Solid is like our blogosphere parDcipant. The game console is our technology. Psycho ManDs is a representaDon of the blogosphere. The blogger puts themselves out there by creaDng representaDons of themselves online. By creaDng these representaDons and interacDng in the community the blogger is "filling up the memory card" which can then be read and uDlized by the blogosphere community in order to interact directly with the blogger. The commentary and reply mechanism which is fundamental to blogosphere literacy acts as a way of breaking the 4th wall between bloggers and the online world. That's what it means at the moment in our context.
Crossover Connec@on Ar@fact
BLOGPOST FROM: WWW.VIDEOGAMEY.COM
Sidenote:
HOW TO BEAT THE METAL GEAR SOLID BOSS PSYCHO MANTIS
As the story about Metal Gear Solid illustrates its really creepy when the 4th wall is not only broken but a person's private, public, personal, professional, virtual, and physical world's begin to collide. Blogger's are ac3vely seeking this collision and forming it in their own hands by shaping their interac3ons with this fluctua3ng barrier. This is what we really want to explore. How the people shaping the barriers are changing the way that the blogosphere reads people and how interac@ons are created.
What other relaDonships are you going to explore?
What is the relaDonship between blogs and technology?
We see that there is a relaDonship between the availability of technology, the form of blogs, the ways that they are used to interact and get updated. This rela@onship has an effect on how people connect, learn, and share informa@on. If people have more access than others there will be differences in how people get "caught up" in the virtual world or construct their virtual world. The barriers that each user puts in place, shielding parts of private life from the online world and vice versa, are crucial in understanding the entertainment landscape. Technology and its availability is fundamental to any shiVs in online behavior. It can either enable or prohibit certain ac@ons, even going so far as to create en@rely new paWerns of behavior. Looking at how those paXerns are formed and influenced, during the development of the blogosphere, cannot have been mutually exclusive to the development of technology.
Our research would venture into the relaDonship between original blogs, their tradiDonal format of long wriXen posts, to that of the new forms of blogs, their predecessors, such as twiXer, vlogging, Flickr, photo blogs – the morphing of this area alongside new mobile technology, increased internet access, digital literacy/aXenDon span.
did that help clarify?
What QUESTIONS and WHY?
Things we can learn by blogsurfing • Define community in blogosphere: blogging community
mapping, TwiXer feed study • Iden@fy groups + communi@es of blogs: observe and record.
Examples: 'Fail blog'/ 'Itmademyday'/ 'Post Secret ' • Document behavior of commen@ng: Observe blog’s and zoom
in on comment behavior and literacy • What tech made it happen: Trackback what technology was
used • How do people design the frames (camera angle): What tools
do they use? • Framing bloggers: Digital observaDon/ select quesDonnaires • Frequency of blog posts: Observe blog replies and comment • Blog success – public blogs, popular blogs • How people began: look at early blog posts, interviews
What QUESTIONS and why?
What QUESTIONS and WHY?
Ques@ons we want to answer • Where people blog: physically and virtually
• Blog history • Validity of blog output • Blog stats acDve/passive – No. of dead blogs • Blogosphere demographics • People moDvaDons in digital spaces
• Scale of blog writer: create scale/find scale • Scale of tech literacy: create scale/find scale • Stakeholders • Sites frequently used
What QUESTIONS andWHY?
Ques@ons to ask people • Q. Did any technology help or hinder your move to blogging?
• Q. Where do you blog? Physically & Virtually
• Q. How you got into blogging? • Q. Why do you blog now?
• Q. Time spent on blogs?
• Q. Do you see yourself as a blogger? • Q. How people began their blogs? • Q. How do you find blogs?
What QUESTIONS and why?
But…
how are you going to ask quesDons?
• Digital and real ethnography methods will be mixed in order to see the whole picture. This illustrates the spectrum of real or virtual involvement during the course of the method.
INNOVATIONS: • Catch a “viral” blog wave or comment wave and ride it • Blog tour – a blogger takes you along on a physical or virtual tour of their blog
• Focus group on blog avatar creaDon – Using whiteboard blocks in order to have people role play through the creaDon of a blog community
– Individual idenDty avatar creaDon, post it note tags on 3 dimensional shapes in order to provide a physical anchor i.e. acDon figure
What METHODS and why?
What METHODS and why? Method Type Examples
Spectrum
of invasivene
ss
HIGH Monitoring over Dme
Looking at comments / Dme increments
Geong feedback form blogger being monitored
Monitoring Passively Watching blogs and noDng post frequency
Watching Public blogs versus individual blogs
Direct ObservaDon Watching people blog & parDcipatory observaDon
Videos, vlogging – check associaDons – blog twiXer facebook
Full Interview In person, online Blog tours, blogger directs
Dialogue Have a chat & email exchanges
ContacDng commenter & asking them / watching their comment paXerns
1 OFF – single instance of interacDon or exchange
Comment and ask, Things of note, behaviors seen on the fly, note down related blurbs / or interesDng
Instances of seeing something in a blog during desk research LOW
What METHODS and WHEN?
What OUTPUT and why? • Make your last output match your next input • Design of a focus group on blogs: Blog avatar creaDon role‐playing
• QuanDtaDve StaDsDcs – CounDng of the instances that certain similar events occurred – Supplemented by desk research into overall blogosphere populaDon and staDsDcs
• Stories – Specific illustraDve examples of stories – Persona creaDon – a form of storytelling
• ReflecDon on the methods and processes used – DocumentaDon of all methods and processes used
• FINAL DELIVERABLE – In a format that easily and clearly communicates the findings – Form, kind, analysis, visualizaDon, presentaDon
What OUTPUT and WHY?
Must be saDsfy demands:
• INTEGRITY • INTERESTINGNESS • FORM
• FUNCTION
QuesDons & Comments?
• Please email us: • Alicia Dudek – [email protected]
• Kate Saunderson – [email protected]
Image Sources
• hXp://www.bubbleinc.co.uk/pages/images/thought_bubble.jpg
• hXp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayZG‐RJCUYs&feature=related
• www.informaDonisbeauDful.net
