Convergence Culture. Where old and new media collide
– Henry Jenkins
A good book, filled with examples of how our usage of media has changed –and is continuing to do so. The tone is friendly and on the positive side. This book is not about how the technology of media changes but how media-audiences are in constant flux.
Internet may have made everyone a possible mass-media producer, but the idea that we can take hold of created content and give it our own spin is not necessarily internet-driven or even internet-based. It is not even very new. What is new is the amount of people doing so and their interconnectedness and this is largely due to the production capabilities of new media. “Convergence does not depend on any specific delivery mechanism. Rather, convergence represents a paradigm shift – a move from medium-specific content toward content that flows across multiple media channels, towards the increased interdependence of communication systems, toward multiple ways of accessing media content, and toward ever more complex relations between top-down corporate media and bottom-up participatory culture. “
There is a lot in here about Survivor, Star Wars and Harry Potter; they do make for good examples. An alternative title for this book might also have been ’Fan-content’ or ‘What the audience does with media content’.
I would recommend ‘Convergence culture’ to anyone who is interested on how media usage influences us on a societal or cultural level and/or persons who are more specifically interested in fan-culture.