Collective Intelligence
March 8th, 2008 by abreche1In Jenkins’ article about convergence culture, he brings up a lot of interesting ideas about industry and regulation that most of the class (including myself) seemed to find especially relevant to discussions of vidding. I was interested though in the point that he makes about collective intelligence and the idea of a knowledge community and its applications to a study of fan communities in general.
It is certainly true that a lot of popular fan texts have wikis devoted to them (My favorite is this Battlestar Galactica wiki), and Textual Poachers describes chatting about the narrative of shows as being an integral part of much of the fan activity Jenkins observes. But with many fan sites including episode guides and collections of fan fiction, I was wondering if the idea of pooling knowledge about a program intersects cleanly with negotiating fan interpretations, particularly in light of our discussions of reading strategies.
Basically, I want to know if any of you have encountered areas on fan sites that purport to be only summaries but instead include personal notes and commentary either about UST in a heteronormative pairing or homosocial undertones. The idea of internet fan communities as massive, international, and largely anonymous water-coolers is fascinating to me; at the same time a fan may want information about the explicit narrative of an episode he or she missed, what he or she may receive is a barrage of responses from fan-critics not just describing the episode, but also preparing the person inquiring (especially if a knowledgable fan) for certain themes that will emerge. I know that people sharing information with me about my favorite shows has included thinly veiled commentary that ultimately affected the way in which I watched the episode, especially if it brought up elements that I focus on in my own readings.
Posted in Convergence Culture | 1 Comment »
There was an Alias fan site I used sparsely that provided space for both summaries of episodes as well as discussions and predictions about the plot development. I personally did not participate in the online forums and generally actively avoided them as I prefered to predict the show’s twists and turns myself (along with my friend who watched the show as religiously as I did). On the devastating occassion I missed an episode without recording it I resorted to the site, but only to be influenced by others views on the plot and character developments. (Hense my avoidance.) While I can’t give you too many details about the site, I know that it did have cater to both summerizing and foreshadowing, critiquing, and analysis of the episodes. (If that helps answer your questions at all)
Either way, I think it might be difficult for a successful summary to be given without being tainted by a personal view of what is important. The summarizer must decide what to include, and this will undoubtably effect how the reader digests the episode. Perhaps the best way around being influenced too much by one point of view would be to read multiple summaries of the same episode to get a broader feeling of the events.