Tag Archives: Readings

Audience Research Thoughts

Alan McKee raised some interesting points in this week’s reading, ‘A beginner’s guide to textual analysis’ about audience research. Interviewing audiences regarding their interpretations of texts can produce interesting and unexpected insights. However, McKee also focuses on its drawbacks; it can be cumbersome and expensive, as often research is not as simple as asking audiences to tick a box.

McKee notes: ‘audience research does not find out ‘reality’: it analyses and produces more texts’. He argues that there is a difference between what a person thinks about a text, and what they say they think about a text, to the person who is interviewing them. People may change their answers to appear more sophisticated, emphasizing programming that they think is perceived as better quality.

This prompted me to think about how often people change their behaviour and what they say in order to influence people’s perception about them. For instance, if for whatever reason a person is asked to list their favourite TV shows, or hobbies, they may curate that list according to the impression of themselves they wish to create. An obvious example would be online dating profiles, where almost every person lists ‘travel’ as a hobby.

It is relevant to the way we curate a social media presence, using selection and omission, to highlight parts of ourselves that we think will appeal to others, especially a broader audience.

Week Three Readings

David Gauntlett suggests that making should be front and centre of contemporary media studies. Media is indeed more than just a subject; it is a method; it is broad. The media landscape has changed significantly since its conception. It is no longer just institutions who create media texts, as everybody now has the resources and the ability to do, be it through mobile phones, computers, social media, etc.

Further, Gauntlett proposes that there are two ‘peaks’ in media studies: creativity (positive) and surveillance and exploitation (negative). This is the idea that with media technologies developed, our ability to be creative media makers was increased, but on the flip side also the institutions’ ability to monitor and exploit us. For instance, Facebook allows consumers to create their own content and connect with others, but it also provides a platform for businesses to create targeted and personalised advertising. As the saying goes, if you are not paying for it, you are the product.

Gauntlett takes a more positive view of media studies, however. He sees media as a set of networks, filled with ‘sparks’ that can triggers experiences and transformations, as well as provide places of exchange and inspiration.

Moreover, as media practitioners we need certain knowledge. In order, Gauntlett lists 3 points of knowledge that he believes are necessary:

  1. How things work (technical and economic knowledge)
  2. How things feel (emotional knowledge)
  3. How to make a difference (creative and political knowledge)

These points are in order of importance because one can not know how to make a difference without knowing how things work. These readings were interesting because Gauntlett’s proposals are things that I hope will be (and so far have been) included in the Media course.