This week’s (and year’s) first Integrated Media readings look into the concept of I-Docs or Interactive Documentaries. The authors list four different modes of existing I-Docs, each one affording the user a different construction of reality.
These are: Conversational, between the user and creator, Hypertext, which leads the user to different pages with a single click, Participative, or “collab-docs” that stage a conversation between the producer and the user community, and Experiential content depending on the location of the participant, allowing them to interact with physical space.
If one is to return to Bill Nichol’s three part definition of documentary as “involving a community of practitioners within a particular institutional context, familiar modes of documentary representation and a set of assumptions and expectations of audiences”, it is to be concluded that the technology of the 21st century allow “digital documentaries” to garner direct (if not even democratic) participation from then passive audiences. However, this must not be confused as a mere “digital revolution”, rather as a remediation (Bolter and Grusin) of old and new media.
As of current, it is also mentioned that there are two broad dynamics at play. Firstly, the integration and transformation of digital technology in documentary as a cultural form precedes. There is also a convergence of documentary’s discourse and aesthetics into participatory contexts such as online cultures. However, the overall concept in I-Docs are transformed (for the better) in its distribution, accessibility for users, and proliferation of user-generated content.