Fan Culture @ Swarthmore

In my pre-sleep browsing, I ran across this interesting link: http://www.fantasymoguls.com/

Below is a description from IMDB (on whose home page I found the link):

“Think you can do a better job of picking hit movies than the studios? Then prove it at Fantasy Moguls.com, the fantasy game for Hollywood movies, now with a new look and easy new gameplay for all seasons. Create your own studio with a budget of $100, which you’ll use to select up to eight movies to fill out your studio slate. You’ll rack up points for your studio based on things like box office, review score, “legs” (the term for longevity in the theaters after the initial release) and per-theater average. You can play in a league with your friends or join a public league and make new ones. Perhaps best of all, it’s 100% FREE to play. The ultra-competitive summer season is now underway, so sign up and join Fantasy Moguls, sponsored by the 2008 Honda CR-V.”

While there are obviously many levels to unpack here (commodification of the process of commodification, for instance, or the “revelation” of “insider” knowledge via the industry term “legs”), I am hitting the sack, and just wanted to get this up here before I forgot about it.

Other possible discussion points include this in-depth strategy article that, at first glance, I took for a film review, or Honda’s large advertising presence in this venture.

Perhaps I will edit this to include a more thorough reading tomorrow, but please don’t let that stop you from commenting.