Changes in the New Media Audience

Web 2.0 sites have become the fastest growing category on the Internet (MediaPost Publications 2006). The increasing uptake of Web 2.0 has now also led to the blurring between the producer/consumer boundaries, leading to terms such as "viewsers, prosumers, DIY cultures, co-creators, user-generated content, participatory cultures, and produsers" (Bruns 2007). Users are now adding value to the network and many varied DIY communities are emerging. For example, online publishing via blogs, media sharing, information and knowledge management, and social networking are now important parts of Web 2.0 (Bruns 2007).

But do the changes that come with these new technologies lead to the emergence of an empowered, interactive audience? How is the relationship between this somewhat new audience and new media technologies, changing from the more traditional audience and their use of media?

I believe this new audience certainly envelopes a degree of empowerment that hasn’t ever been seen before. Today’s users are consuming media in a way that is completely unlike the behaviour of the more traditional audience decades ago. With new media, audiences have the ability to pretty much choose when and where they engage with media. This is vastly different to traditional broadcasting where TV shows are broadcast at a particular time, and the audience has to either be there to watch it, or they miss out. Now, audiences can download TV shows before they’re even broadcast, or use timeshifting programs, such as Foxtel IQ, which enables the audience to watch programs whenever they feel like it. I believe this has led to a new empowerment of the audience, i.e. they have more control and power over how they consume media.

This new audience also provides a challenge for marketers and seems to be slipping under the radar. New media viewing habits are being formed, i.e. it's not unusual to be involved with two or three media touchpoints at the one time. This provides a challenge for marketers as these new ways of interacting with media are not being adequately measured or tracked by the standard media measurements (theage.com.au, 2007).

Not only is this new audience elusive and hard to pin down, define, measure and manage, but DIY communities are also impacting on the traditional media. Blogging and open news sites that practice citizen journalism, for example ohmynews.com are undermining traditional news sources. Social networking sites such as MySpace and YouTube are becoming more popular for emerging musical artists, as they find more of a following online. These social network sites are now rivaling major record labels as artists can now build their fan bases online. Furthermore, audiences are turning to the Internet to download TV shows and movies well ahead of release dates, and this is also undermining traditional mainstream media.

All in all, I believe the changing new media environment is allowing for a more interactive, empowered audience.

References:

Bruns, A. (2007). Produsage: A Working Definition. Retrieved April 15, 2008, from http://produsage.org/produsage

MediaPost Publications. (2006). Web 2.0 Growing Faster than Online Video, News. Retrieved April 15, 2008, from http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles.san&s=50754&Nid=24887&p=380828

TheAge.com. (2007). Dude, Where's My Audience? Retrieved April 15, 2008, from http://www.theage.com.au/news/web/dude-wheres-my-audience/2007/07/24/1185043119701.html?page=fullpage