Author: christy

Marc Ruppel’s latest paper

christy

Marc Ruppel is a researcher into what he terms “cross-sited narratives”. He has put one of his talks online, a presentation that was part of his PhD Comprehensive Exam in Digital Studies, University of Maryland College Park. Marc terms:

cross-sited narratives “as multi-sensory stories told across two or more diverse media (film, print literature, web, video games, live performance, recorded music, etc.)”.

He also notes that these narratives “challenge the idea that convergence results in less media”. Yay! I am amazed at how many people think media has only one direction! Marc talks about CSNs as being complex systems with a “centrix”, “simplex” and “complex”. I’m still thinking about these, need some more information Marc. He says that there are two types of CSNs: Horizontal and Vertical.

Horizontally Cross-Sited Narratives: “similar to the horizontal integration of a market, HCSNs function in the expansion of a narrative across media”.

Marc gives examples from The Matrix and the ARG I Love Bees. The other, Verticals, are explained through Mark DanielewskiÂ’s House of Leaves (a book I still haven’t finished reading — is it possible to ever finish reading it?!).

Vertically Cross-Sited Narratives: “similar to a vertical market share, VCSNs traffic in emptied signifiers and sustained signifieds that are encoded with an awareness of the other media invoked by the narrative (not a metatext, but a metanetwork)”.

[Question Marc: how does VCSNs differ to collage?] Finally, Marc also discusses what he terms:

Migratory Cues: “any sign within one simplex that can be found in another simplex; a signal towards another medium—the means through which various narrative paths are marked by an author and located by a user through activation patterns”.

CTAs! Call-to-Actions! The referral system! Cool. I’ve got a post about such calls/referrals/cues coming up soon. Well done Marc. This would have to be one of the most thoughtful works on cross-media narratives I’ve read yet. Good stuff.

Ruppel, M. (2005) ‘Learning to Speak Braille:Convergence, Divergence and Cross-Sited Narratives’, Things as They Are?… [Online] Available at: http://things.wordherders.net/archives/005458.html

Worldwide Map of Cross-Media Researchers

christy

Cross-Media Researchers Map picInspired by a map created for botmasters, I’ve created a Frappr map for us! The map allows you do add a pin (like Google Earth, indeed, running with data supplied by Google). So, every cross-media researcher can add themselves to this map. We’ll see then just how many are in Europe! Add away!

http://www.frappr.com/crossmediaresearchers

Note: As soon as I figure it out too, I want to change the pins to indicate “industry” and “academic” rather than male and female. Also, the suburb locations (longitude & latitude) are not accurate, but the city, state and country are — which is all we need.

MIT has a dedicated Transmedia Storytelling Lab!

,
christy3 Comments

Henry Jenkins was one of the first media theorists to identify the subject of my research and and what he terms “transmedia storytelling”. He is co-heading a dedicated research lab at MIT now, called the Convergence Culture Consortium. The Consortium is geared towards, it seems, providing data to industry as well as contributing to scholarship. They are addressing the following:

Transmedia Entertainment describes the newfound flow of stories, images, characters, information, and sounds across various media channels, in a coordinated fashion, which facilitates a deepening expansion of the consumer’s experience.

Participatory Culture describes the way consumers interact with media content, media producers, and each other as they explore the resources available to them in the expanded media landscape. Consumers become active participants in shaping the creation, circulation, and interpretation of media content. Such experiences deepen the consumer’s emotional investment in the media property, and expands their awareness of both content and brand.

Experiential Marketing refers to the development of novel approaches to brand extension and marketing which play out across multiple media channels so that the consumer’s identification with the product is enhanced and deepened each time they re-encounter the brand in a new context.

Their ethnographic approach focuses on “three key, yet different, cultural groups”:

Fan Cultures
Brand Cultures
Style Cultures

These are the research questions the consortium will answer:

  • How has the intersection between old and new technologies shifted the ways that people consume entertainment and brand content?
  • What new media methods and models can sponsors and advertisers use to build a lasting emotional connection with their brands? (e.g. product placements, advergaming and viral marketing)
  • What happens as brand cultures (the most hardcore consumers of a particular consumer product) interact with fan cultures (the most hardcore enthusiasts of a particular entertainment franchise)?
  • What strategies do brand managers need to adapt to the instantaneous global circulation of entertainment content (such as Japanese anime, Korean soaps, and hip-hop)?
  • Does greater consumer participation in brand cultures result in stronger brand affiliations?
  • Where do companies “cross the line” in their efforts to attach themselves to particular entertainment franchises through product placements and tie-ins?

My heart nearly skipped a beat when I saw this group. But I was relieved to see they are concentrating on the audiences and not narrative design in particular. Initially, my research design included studying companies and the reception of their content. But, I found not many companies actually knew what they were doing! Times have changed though and this consortium will provide alot of valuable info, along with the busy researchers in Europe. [I’ll be doing a round-up of the cool stuff happening over there soon.] This is a huge area that has researchers & creators popping up everywhere across the globe. I had better hurry up and get my PhD out there (next year folkls!). They have a blog that seems very informative.