A Look at Convergence

Academic Analysis

Today media companies are encouraging user production, what this means is enabling users to impact the company’s new products. An example of this is the Xbox Kinect while you are playing your Kinect you are sending data to Microsoft, this data tells them all kinds of information but what they want out of it is how can they make their product better. This article examines convergence as a way of explaining user production.

Convergence has become a large part of communication technology today. Hamilton and Heflin say that “As the growing tide of websites, online forums and blogs began to challenge the author­ity and dominance of corporate-owned media, some scholars celebrated what they saw as an increase in unregulated platforms for expression free from corporate control” (Hamilton & Heflin, 2011, p. 1052). This shows you that anyone can get online and have a voice that can be as powerful as any in the country. Convergence goes against the normal corporate ways of doing things because audiences are allowed to create their own content. You are seeing it more and more now because you are enabled to get your voice out of the internet through blogs, forums, and websites. And now you can “modify existing television and video game content” (Hamilton & Heflin, 2011, p. 1052)

The roles of the producer and consumer have almost been completely reversed. Now consumers have the power to change a product as they see fit. Hamilton and Heflin sum it up like this “This increased participation and audience agency contribute to a transformation of producer and consumer roles that consequently challenge the power of large media corporations” (Hamilton & Heflin, 2011, p. 1053) User feedback has boosted many companies sales. A growing trend we have began to see is that companies are now getting involved in social networking like Facebook and Twitter to boost brand loyalty and hit a target audience. “User production as possibly turning the means of capitalism to progressive aims” (Hamilton & Heflin, 2011, p. 1054) this seems to be the reason that many companies are adopting these new ways of letting the consumer influence them in order to increase their productivity.

 

A place where user production is used a lot is in today’s television by the form of contests. These contests are mainly used in order to manage user production. In October 2007, Current  TV launched Current.com. What this did was “In a cultural-populist vein, Current TV regards itself as part of a groundswell change in the ‘evolution of media’ that makes possible an ‘active, collaborative community” (Hamilton & Heflin, 2011, p. 1058). Users can now add their own pieces to news items but they must meet certain guidelines. Current TV is just one example of how media organizations are always trying to incorporate user production. I think that we will continue to see an increase in user production as time goes on because in time it will only become more accessible to everyone.

Hamilton, J., & Heflin, K. (2011). User production reconsidered: From convergence, to autonomia and cultural materialism . New Media & Technology, 13(7), 1050-1066. doi: 10.1177/1461444810393908 http://nms.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.ohio-state.edu/content/13/7/1050.full.pdf+html