Cross-Media Parody

A sign of an area maturing is the presence of parodies. I don’t have any cross-media parodies, but I’m sure there are plenty parodies of franchises. Take this one from the webcomic Penny Arcade (thanks Jeremy): Tycho, the in-comic character, has been hired to write 13 fantasy novellas based on a game franchise. He explains in the news section of the site:

So, as you can see, I’ve supposedly been “granted a contract” to write several novellas based on Epic Legends of the Hierarchs: The Elemenstor Saga. This is a “popular franchise” that began life as a CCG but now has a boardgame, a pen and paper variant, a Saturday morning cartoon, a series of limited edition busts, a CG animated direct to video feature, and upcoming MMO and a line of “totally street” hip-hop fashions – all of which strive to remain canonical.

This week I’ll be populating an extremely sparse wiki with a few of the basic touchstones of the franchise and its timeline. It begins with the birth of the first Magic Sword King, Ronard – and it culminates in the betrayal of Princess Crystalcrown at Mount Wor. There are other items in the middle there – like the discovery of High Elemenstation by the wizened Harbinger Portent – but there is also the execrable (some might even say blasphemous) Wizbits, an ill-advised foray into tween programming where four young wizards and their collectible familiars introduce no less than fourteen retail products per episode.

Well, in a recent post, ‘Tycho’ informs us that he has competition, but you can check out the wiki of his dastardly cross-media creation: The Elemenstor Saga. Very, very funny.

And then there is the bloody funny Young Guns versus Old Ones: a game where young marketers use new media tactics against the old media approaches. Very funny too.

Does anyone out there know of any other franchise or cross-media parodies? I’d love to hear about them.

On-Demand and Play

Scheduled viewing—watching a television show or film at a particular time, tuning in to listen to a radio show, attending a theatre performance—has been the dominant mode of accessing entertainment since early (Roman?) theatre. Sure, we’ve had street-player performances, but they are not scheduled or on-demand for the audiences. Such entertainment is impromptu (for the audience), extra entertainment not intended to be experienced but decided at the moment to be so or not. It could be seen as “push” with an “opt-in”.

With the introduction of recording technologies, such as a the wax phonograph, cassette tapes, game cartridges, floppy discs, CD-Roms, DVDs and so on, audiences could “time-shift” their viewing: experience it beyond the scheduled viewing time. More recently, with the Internet, audiences can access the entertainment streamed through a website or download a digital file that they can then access anytime on their computer or mobile device. As an aside, the notion of “time-shifting” is relational: the viewing time can only be shifted if it was at some time fixed. The notion, therefore, is not technically appropriate when talking about content that never was delivered at a fixed time.

Another impact of the Internet has been the globalisation of content (bare with me, I’m getting to a point soon). The majority of websites are available to all users, regardless of what country or time theyÂ’re viewing from. Audiences are aware, therefore, of programs (tv shows etc) that are available OS and so try to access them immediately rather than waiting for their own countries release. They also form communities of interest around content they appreciate and so feel left out if some members of their community have access before them. People don’t congregate according to country, they congregate according to interest! There is an increasing trend, therefore, towards simultaneous global releases; region by region releases that are at least close to each other in time; and global internet “pre-releases”. The latter notion of a “Internet pre-release” is another example of old media snobbery/hang-over. A worldwide accessible Internet release has a potentionally greater reach than a television release. What is “pre” about that? Perhaps then a pre-release is in the context of broadcast or cinema being considered a primary/preferred medium/technology?

In the pivotal/first work on “play” Italian philosopher Johan Huizinga put forward that the first main characteristic of play is “freedom” (Huizinga, 1955 [1938], p.8). He elaborates:

Play is superfluous. The need for it is only urgent to the extent that the enjoyment of it makes it a need. Play can be deferred or suspended at any time. It is never imposed by physical necessity or moral duty. It is never a task. It is done at leisure, during “freetime”. Only when play is a recognized cultural function—a rite, a ceremony—is it bound up with notions of obligation and duty. (ibid.)

Juxtaposing this notion with the entertainment distribution trend of on-demand viewing, I was struck by how much of our entertainment has not existed within the domain of play. Until the last decade or so entertainment has not been something we could access as we needed it (unless you pick up a book), it has not been something we could defer or suspend at any time. It has a times been a task. Our “freetime” has been defined by others. Obviously this context is changing, but gee, I was quite surprised when I considered this notion. Have we been missing out on a whole lotta fun? How has this impacted the design of entertainment, our experience and expectations of it? I think this may be one of the reasons why we’re seeing a whole lot more UGC: entertainment is fun again. It is something we can call on whenever we want, it answers us, it is disposable, it can be shared. Engaging with it is a lot less serious business.

Quick Stats: Top 10 Social Networking Sites

On May 11 Nielsen//NetRatings released their press release on the top social networking sites for the US [pdf].

“Social networking sites are the reality television of the Internet,” said Jon Gibs, senior director of media, Nielsen//NetRatings.

Top 10 Social Networking Sites for April 2006 (U.S., Home and Work)
1. MySpace
2. Blogger
3. Classmates Online
4. YouTube
5. MSN Groups
6. AOL Hometown
7. Yahoo! Groups
8. MSN Spaces
9. Six Apart TypePad
10. Xanga.com

In summary, 45% of of web users are reached through these sites. Good summary of some relevant sites, but I wouldn’t call them all “social networking” sites. What isn’t social on the web? They’re a mix of sites that try to encourage socialising, sites that facilitate self-publication, sites that facilitate finding each other, sites that facilitate grouping according to interests…a big mix which I think is silly to bunch together. I guess the list is more for advertisers to reach consumers, it is about sites that have the greatest reach, sites that people gravitate too. Anyway, quick stat and quick rant over.