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I came, I saw, I squeed.

Jenkins is, of course, a man after my own fangirl heart (Squee!). As a fan himself, however, I think he sometimes forgets that the participatory culture he's cataloguing has not yet permeated the culture at large. To the world at large, fans are still "fanatics" in the perjorative sense of the word: People with no Real Life (In fan talk, RL).
Jenkins also says that he cannot yet talk about the significance of what he has found (13). I wonder at what point we will be able to make such claims. While Jenkins seems to imagine a coming convergence that will create sophisticated viewers across the spectrum of the US population, I'm not so sure. I disagree that in this new convergence, "No one group can set the terms. No one group can control access and participation" (23). Despite this egalitarian view, he reminds us that there is no Black Box, no single StarTrek computer system that will run everything for everybody. Convergence culture will take a long time, I think, to reach the general population. So when do we start studying it? Conquering it?

Submitted by Amylea on Tue, 2007-03-06 10:56.
Amylea's blog

What about American Idol?
rhetoricat's picture
Submitted by rhetoricat on Thu, 2007-03-08 10:57.

Do you really think that fandom is still a fringe phenomenon?  I wonder about this given the number of people who vote on American Idol.  I do realize that these aren't fanfic kinds of fans but I feel certain that they are "water-cooler fans."  Perhaps they don't post to discussion boards and engage a wider fan base, but does that exclude them from Jenkins' defintion.  I do agree that people regard "fanfic fans" as fanatics but I'm wondering how much participation is required to warrant the label "fan"? Or is the ability to contribute too limited by the structured interactivity of the voting process?  (As Jenkins discusses it on p.133)~Cat


People with no life
Ryan's picture
Submitted by Ryan on Tue, 2007-03-06 11:29.

I agree, Amy, that people who chronicle fan activities often exagerrate the impact of fanboy/girl participation by assuming that the activities of a small group of people apply to the culture at large. I think this happened with Snakes on a Plane. A few people latched on to this and made it into an inside joke, and the studio assumed that this meant that Snakes on a Plane would be a cultural explosion. However, they overestimated the phenomena and the film performed rather poorly in the box office. (also, I think it's just as fun to joke about seeing Snakes on a Plane as it is to actually see it.) The studio and media assumed that some internet buzz represented the sentiments of the public. They were wrong.