The Internet is, as we know, maturing into a medium which has both media and participatory elements. Needing to put a label on what was emerging, for chapters for the PhD Thesis and to feed the research back into the Corporation (as agreed), I began to use the term ‘Participatory Media’. A paper titled ‘Overview of the implications for the BBC of Participatory Media – management, awareness, literacy and safety on interactive media platforms’ was produced for review by senior BBC managers in August, 2005.
My own definition of Participatory Media would be ‘iterative content published in hosted space, that is a shared space, facilitated by a media organisation on behalf of the public’. The title of the Thesis is ‘Hosted Space: the mediation of interactive public service content’. The term ‘Participatory Journalism’ has been widely used as described in the excellent report (later book) ‘We Media’ by Shayne Bowman and Chris Willis.
Findings from my doctoral research will begin to be released from October 2006 onwards, but the main themes are:
Facilitation: The importance of having trained facilitators in participatory media environments, whether they be members of staff or members of the public seems clear.
Presenting, hosting and moderation: There are differences between the three roles, but they are highly complementary. Audiences want to be acknowledged for their contributions and to engage with the facilitators instead of merely viewing presenters from a distance.
Changes in time and space: Unlike linear media, participatory media offers the opportunity to both watch and engage, even at the same time. The important thing is that the participant or consumer can organise the way they want to consume, as they wish, when they wish, where they wish.
Membership culture: The relationship between the producers and the audience changes in participatory media environments. It ceases to be an ‘episodic’ one to become something which is much more ongoing.
Proximity: Participants like to feel a sense of proximity to the presenters and hosts or the organisation, and to know that someone will drop in from time to time to chat or to help organise the shared spaces.
Fear: Many presenters, producers and hosts do not feel comfortable ‘interacting back’ to the audience/members (we need a better term!). They may need to learn how to engage with the participants and it is a particular skill.
Control: Participatory media environments mean that there is more of a sharing of control between the producers and the participants. Sometimes the producers will editorialise, and it may be the participants do the editorialising at other times; there may also be a sharing of production. Without the presence of skilled facilitators, the changes in control will be difficult to manage.
Hosted Space: There is a new sense of the existence of a place which sometimes is closer to the domain of the producer and sometimes closer to the place where the participants ‘inhabit’. Mostly the space is probably somewhere in between.
Presence: I spoke to many of the Celebdaq traders and asked them whether they felt the presence of others when they were buying and selling shares and chatting to other traders online – many said yes, they definitely had a sense of others being present. They also said the other traders who they knew well had the ability to stir up much stronger emotions than their purely ‘real life’ friends.
How can presenters and hosts manage to be ‘present’ on an ongoing basis as well as being able to facilitate the episodic content of any live events or transmissions (be they televisual, textual or aural)? I have some thoughts which I will put forward tomorrow, in the last part of my guest blog.
~ Lizzie Jackson
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