The Alter of Capitalism: It Must Burn

In Convergence Culture Jenkins discusses this concept in fan engagement of the multimodal production of the Matrix matrix. Some only partook in one or two facets of the entire field of its media array while others exhausted the totality of the project and beyond. Then, in reference of The Beast he discussed the issues in maintaining the narrative integrity of that ARG to a very small number of participants (around 7500 “readers”) while a much larger population was totally unaware that the ARG even existed.

In reading this from chapter 3, the matrix chapter, a question that came to mind is: what is too much and too little? Looking at the concept of there being too much and too little to occupy the casual consumer and the rabid fan, where do we find this line. Do we find it? Do we develop it? This is a really important question for me in my overall project and in the upcoming course project.

As I have talked to people about my ideas over the last few years I am frequently faced with two extreme responses. One response is that users do not want more freedom. They actually want more strict prescripted story. They would rather follow a tight but engaging narrative. This response is most confusing because what these people are saying is that they essentially want a single player forced narrative game in a massive participant format (MMORPG). The other response is that users do not want any guided narrative at all. They want the landscape, the world, the setting to tell them where they are, not how they are. They want to developed the story of the world within the community that partakes in the virtual world laid out before them.

Upon reading Convergence Culture I have come to realize my over all project is very much my attempt to localize the idea of consumer as willing producer-participant as discussed in this work. I have known for a while that my ideas are very much like those mention as Raph Koster’s in chapter 4. It is about putting the narrative in the hands of the user/player and mixing that identity with “author”. Convergence conception of media is participatory media, not interactive media.

In the time since the authoring of this text a producer, JJ Abrams, has effectively deployed methods similar to those used in creating the Matrix array, most notably the TV series LOST. JJ has used these methods in other works to greater and lesser degrees (Star Trek, Fringe, and Cloverfield). Another example of a producer harnessing ARG like methods is Joss Whedon who is primarily known for Buffy The Vampire Slayer but is responsible for Firefly/Serenity and Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog (both of which relied on multimodal presentation to sustain its narrative in between dominant projects and as advertising).

Though these higher profile producers have support from large media companies their methods are very much like that of fan methods of participating in the extension of fiction deployed by large entertainment conglomerates. In thinking about how the above producers work I cannot help but conclude that they have been informed by grassroots works that developed a static IP into a multidimensional array of active and interactive processes of creation and consumption.

Looking at nearly pure grassroots production there are a few examples that come to mind.  Star Wars, as discussed in Convergence Culture. Ghostbusters with two fan made films; one 45 min movie and a full length film. To a greater extent than those, Star Trek with its 43 year history of fan production which includes feature length fan-made movies, fan-made miniseries (both of which star some of the actors from the actual franchise), as well as a variety of other fan fiction ranging from slash to full length novels distributed via the Web and by hand.

The question I ultimately have, like Jenkins’ question, is how ready are people to undertake such activities? A further question I have is how real is convergence culture with out total input from global populations? Jenkins discusses the Matrix array and fan consumption as being composed of that scale of casual participants to ferociously hungry fans. There is another scale that must be considered. That which spans the problematic concept of the digital divide. This extends us, conceptually, into the realm of participation in local and global culture, of government and the governed, the economic elite and the economically oppressed, even the range of affluence of education.

Though Jenkins discusses convergence in terms of the control and development of intellectual property there is a subtext of liberty in his ideas, liberty far beyond who can write Harry Potter stories and who cannot. I often talk about self determinism in digital virtual environments but my questions are actually broader that that. how can the concept of convergence help us in the “real world”? how can we use Jenkins’ ideas to activate liberty and determinism for every person every where?