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COMM 3P18 Blog Post #3B

In my final blog post of the year, I will discuss my experience at a recent Toronto Maple Leafs game. I have been to a handful of professional hockey games in my life, but I primarily watch the games at home. Occasionally, I will watch a game at a bar with some friends as well. While watching this last game live and in person, I really reflected on my audience experience. Since I do not have the opportunity to attend professional hockey games very often, I really noticed the difference between watching the game in person as opposed to watching it at home or at a bar with friends. I personally found that watching the game in person was far more suspenseful and I enjoyed the overall experience much more. I think that because I was surrounded by hundreds of other Leafs fans, who were also highly invested in the game, I was far more intrigued and devoted to watching the game and paying complete attention. When the game was tied 1-1, I felt a great amount of suspense. As is mentioned in Kim, Cheong, and Kim (2016), “suspense produces emotional arousal, which carries over and intensifies the audience’s response to the event, producing a rewarding enjoyable emotional experience” (p. 395). Suspense was greatly felt throughout the entire arena as the fans were cheering and encouraging the players when they came close to taking the lead. I definitely do not feel the same amount of suspense while watching games both at home and at a bar. This is why I thought this audience experience would be interesting to talk about. This experience demonstrates how the environment in which you watch a hockey game for example, can alter the way that you interact with the experience.

           Watching the Leafs game at home versus in person offers two distinct experiences. While watching at home, I noticed that I was far calmer and did not express much emotion and feelings. I was in the comfort of my own home, lounged on a couch and I must admit, I’m on my phone much more when watching a game at home. At home, I am usually watching the game with my family members, but like me, they do not say much throughout the game and the experience is far different from physically being present at the game. The experiences, in my opinion are so different and as Kim, Cheong and Kim (2016) explain, “people watching the game on TV at home are there with- at most- several people, usually their family members. In addition, they are often interrupted by various factors at home, for example, living rooms’ bright interior lighting, and people moving about in the living room” (p. 391). Although when I watch the game at home, my family and I do not talk much, there are always various distractions that make me lose focus on the game.

           I am a fan of the Toronto Maple Leafs, and although I do not watch every game, I still enjoy watching hockey by both attending games and watching them on TV. Although both options provide me with different experiences, I will still continue to watch the Leafs, but will continue to try to go to as many games as I possibly can. I bought the tickets to the last game I went to on Ticketmaster. I am not even kidding when I say that ten minutes after I purchased the tickets, I was beginning to see advertisements about Leaf’s paraphernalia and tickets on several of my social media timelines. As Sullivan (2013) mentions, “as more and more audiences turn to online media for information, entertainment, and creative participation, marketers and advertisers have attempted to follow audiences into these new, networked spaces” (p.231). I personally think that it is very scary that immediately after I purchase tickets to a hockey game, related information is revealed to me by advertisers and marketers on my social media timeline. This idea encompasses the fact that we are always audiences no matter what. I bought tickets to be an audience member at a hockey game and in return, I also became a target audience to advertisers of Toronto Maple Leaf merchandise and paraphernalia.

           Overall, recently going to a Toronto Maple Leaf’s game, made me realize how much more of an active fan and audience member I am when I attend the games in person. Although I still continue to watch the games at home, I definitely prefer watching the games in person as being surrounded by thousands of other fans really adds to the overall atmosphere of the game. I was also fascinated with the speed of advertisers who were instantly able to track that I purchased Leaf’s tickets and therefore, advertised their products that they thought I would be interested in purchasing.

Kim, K., Cheong, Y., & Kim, H. (2016). The influences of sports viewing conditions on enjoyment from watching televised sports: An analysis of the FIFA World Cup audiences in theater vs. home. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 60(3), 389–409.

Sullivan, J. L. (2013). Media Audiences: effects, users, institutions, and power.

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COMM 3P18 Blog Post #3A

Throughout the last few weeks in class, we focused a lot of attention on fans, and fandom. I therefore, thought it would be fitting to write a blog about myself and my personal experiences of being a fan of the television series This is Us. This is Us is a television show that has really become popular over the past year. The show was aired on NBC, but it is also available on Netflix. I have noticed more and more people talking about the show to one another, as well as seeing show content on several social media platforms. Although I do not create This is Us content, I do actively follow several pages and websites in order to be able to stay connected to, and listen to and watch content that fellow fans have created and posted for others to see. YouTube is one of the main platforms from which I find interesting content about the show on. YouTube allows content creators to upload their work onto the platform under their channel name, and from there, fans such as myself are able to search videos that interest them through the search bar. Athique (2018) mentions that YouTube consist solely of user-generated content and “it relies upon its users to supply the value of the service, and to do so freely and without payment” (p. 60). As a fan of This is Us, I am very appreciative of all the content creators who create parodies and reaction videos to their favourite episodes and scenes because the content that upload helps me develop other perspectives and ideas about the show, and storylines within the show.  

           My mom is aware of my fascination with This is Us, as I have made her sit down and watch a few episodes with me on several different occasions. Although she liked the show, she admitted that she was not one to get hooked on shows and consistently watch them. What she does not understand is how I occasionally take time out of my day to go on YouTube and watch all kinds of videos about the show. She cannot wrap her head around the idea that I am such a huge fan of one particular show that I will spend hours of my day searching for videos that will interest me about particular characters and scenes. She continuously also mentions how times have changed drastically in terms of technology, social media and the internet from when she was my age. When I asked her what her favourite show was when she was my age, she had to think about it for a second. After a few moments, she revealed that she thinks it was Golden Girls. Following that statement, she then explained how although she watched Golden Girls often, she was never as obsessed with Golden Girls as I am with This is Us. She mentioned that she believes she was not able to be ass emotionally and mentally connected to Golden Girls due to limited to the internet and social media. As Sullivan (2013) mentions, “something profound has changed about our media landscape. The relatively low cost of microprocessing technology has made computers ubiquitous in industrialized societies. Simultaneously, the dramatic expansion of the Internet beginning in the 1990s meant that individuals could access and process information faster and more efficiently than ever before” (p. 214-215). I then thought about how right my mom was. Social media platforms such as YouTube allow me to easily and efficiently locate videos created by fellow fans that I know I will find interesting, thus further permitting me to identify with and established an even greater fandom for the show.

           As I mentioned before, I personally do not create content, but other user-generated content has been very helpful to me and I think because of the videos that I watch on YouTube constantly, I have been able to resonate with the show even more. There is a countless number of videos on YouTube that I have watched that have aided me in understanding some of the little details about the show that I did not even catch on to. As an example, I recently watched a video titled, “What Big Fans Don’t Even Know About This is Us” created by Nicki Swift. The video provides fans with all sorts of behind the scene details about the show. There is a part of the video that talks about Chrissy Metz’s character Kate and her struggles with her weight. Nicki Swift’s video reveals that Kate’s character actually resonates with Chrissy personally as she feels that all the characters that she plays in TV shows struggle with similar issues (What Big Fans Don’t Know About This Is Us, January 30, 2018). This detail really helped me resonate with Kate’s character and it improved my initial thoughts about her character. I must admit, at first, I found Kate annoying as her character was constantly complaining about her weight, but she really was not doing much about it at first. Then, I watched Nicky’s video and learned that almost all the characters that Chrissy has played deal with the same issue. This fact not only made me like the character (Kate) more, but I grew a great appreciation for Chrissy Metz for being so strong and for learning to ignore all the negativity she receives from society. I think that Chrissy’s characters and her struggle with her weight resonates with many people and as Navar-Gill (2018) mentions, “while audiences have obviously always been important to the success of media texts, the work of production now places vastly greater emphasis on the ongoing interaction and involvement with the fan audience through venues including the entertainment press, in-person events like Comic-con, and, perhaps most significantly, the constant feedback loop of social media” (p. 211-212). Small details such as the significance of Chrissy’s struggle with her weight are aspects of the show that resonate with fans and encourage continuous feedback throughout social media.

           After I watched the first episode of This is Us, I knew I would continue to be an active audience member of the series. There are so many aspects of the show that I am able to relate to on a personal level, and that is why I believe I am so deeply invested in the show. Not only am I a fan of the actors in the show, I have fallen in love with the entire plot of the series. The entire storyline is so relevant to my everyday life as it highlights the ideas of family, loss, hardship, friendship and love. As Sullivan (2013) mentions, “fans are emotionally invested in their favourite media by thinking deeply about the plots, characters, and messages of those texts” (p.191) and that is exactly what I did, and continue to do while watching the series. Although I have developed my own personal thoughts and feelings about characters and plot situations, audience created content such as the videos that I watch on YouTube have definitely also aided in guiding my thought process and beliefs about the show as well. I love that I am able to turn to social media platforms to learn and hear about other fans’ perspectives about a show that so many other people love as much as I do. I hope that one day am I able to gain the courage to create content ad express and share my opinions and thoughts about televisions series’ that I invest so much of my time and though into.

Athique, A. (2018). The dynamics and potentials of big data for audience research. Media, Culture and Society, 40(1), 59-74.

Navar-Gill, A. (2018). Fandom as symbolic patronage: Expanding understanding of fan relationships with industry through the Veronica Mars Kickstarter campaign. Popular Communication, 16(3), p211-224.

Nicki Swift. (January 30, 2018). What Big Fans Don’t Even Know About This Is Us. YouTube. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFkli0wD4-w

Sullivan, J. L. (2013). Media Audiences: effects, users, institutions, and power.

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COMM 3P18 Blog Post 2B: TLC

I am not a huge television watcher nowadays. Ever since I moved away from home, I have not had access to cable and therefore, I have not been able to watch television shows that I regularly watched when I lived at home. But, when I do go home for the reading weeks and the Christmas break, I try to sit down and watch as much TV as I possibly can. While I was in high school, I watched a lot of shows on TLC (The Learning Channel). Some of my favourite shows included Say Yes to the Dress, John and Kate Plus 8, My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding, Breaking Amish and 90 Day Fiancé. All of these shows were quite popular at the time and my mom and I would sit down together and watch new episodes that aired each week. I would say that 90% of the shows that are aired on TLC are based on real people or families and the shows document their day to day lives. My mom and I love these types of shows and prefer watching the TLC channel over any other network. In comparison, my brother and my dad will never sit down with my mom and I when we are watching TLC and will therefore, go downstairs and watch ESPN or TSN instead. This little example of how there is a major divide in what television programs my family watches highlights the importance of audience demographics.

Writing this blog post really got me thinking. Clearly, TLC is an extremely popular channel and all of its shows are very popular amongst people all over Canada and the United States. I, for example, follow many of the stars that appear on many TLC shows such as Kate Gosselin and Molly Hopkins on Instagram. Therefore, after reading chapters 4-6 and the corresponding articles, I really began to understand the importance of audience demographics. As I previously mentioned, my brother and dad had no interest in any of the shows on TLC, whereas my mom and I are completely hooked. Therefore, information like this is crucial for advertising companies.  As mentioned in Sullivan (2013), “advertiser look at the size of specific subgroups that are of particular interest, based upon certain basic social features of these audiences such as age, income, gender, geographic location, and race” (p.96).  After reading the section on audience demographics I really began to connect some dots regrading demographics and the advertisements shows on certain television channels. I noticed that on TLC, many of the commercials shown were targeted toward females. Examples include Dove and Playtex. In comparison, I asked my brother to name two commercials that he saw while watching a Leafs game one night and he stated he watched a Ford Commercial and a Bud Light commercial. This signified to me the importance of really understanding a program’s demographic. The Buzzard (2015) article highlights how the Nielsen family developed a piece of technology called the Audimeter which ultimately kept track of what television programs households were watching on a daily basis (p.514). Technologies such as this were installed in homes in order to develop information about what shows were being watched the most. This information was vital to advertising and marketing companies and as Buzzard states, “this currency determined what programs, what stations, and what networks were successful” (p. 514). Therefore, it became clear to me how advertising and marketing companies really need to conduct and collect information from audiences and consumers in order to accurately and effectively marketing and advertise their products.

Secondly, I became really intrigued with the idea of how two people could be watching the same show, yet interpret what they are watching differently. As an example, although both my mom and I love the show 90 Day Fiancé, we interpret the show differently. We have both decoded the meaning of the show in two totally different ways. As Sullivan (2013) states, “decoding is therefore both a creative and a social practice; creative because the message receiver brings to bear his or her own cognitive and associative resources to the deconstruction of a message and social because the receiver is also informed by larger meaning structures such as language, community norms, and cultural conventions” (p.141).  I have decoded 90 Day Fiancé in a way that my mom does not agree with. I used my own personal cultural conventions and norms in order to decode the show and have decoded a meaning far different from what my mom has decoded. While decoding he show throughout many episodes, I have come to the conclusion that many of the couples are not actually in love. I have come to this conclusion based on my own cultural norms and practices. With creativity and my own opinions, I have begun to develop an understanding that any of the people in the relationships are probably using their spouses for American citizenship and/or money. Therefore, the producers of this show have given us the encoded meaning; two people from different parts of the world are in love and have 90 days to get married, but I have decoded a much truer realty in my mind. As a side note to all of this denotative and connotative meanings of a diamond ring in this show are different to me than it would be if my best friend got engaged. As Sullivan mentions, “in decoding specific messages, audiences react to both the denotative level of meaning- the literal, ‘near universal’, or common sense meaning of the sign- and the connotative level of meaning- or contextualized understanding of signs” (p. 141). Therefore, the denotative meaning of a diamond ring would be love and marriage, but in the case of 90 Day Fiancé, to me, the connotative meaning of a diamond ring is often associated with access to money and getting American citizenship for example.

Lastly, I view shows on TLC as a way to engage with others in the world. As an example, Granelli and Zenor (2016) talk about the different modes of audience engagement. I believe that while watching shows such as Say Yes to the Dress, I would personally engage in the second mode of engagement which is referential. Granelli and Zenor state that, “in assessing the meaning of the text, the individual moves outside of the text itself and compares it to his or her own real life for interpretation” (p. 5058). While watching Say Yes to the Dress, I compare the emotions the bride is going through and the style of dresses she likes to my own personal preferences and thoughts. Lastly, Granelli and Zenor also talk about how audiences engage in morality in texts. A great example of a show on TLC that correlated to this is Breaking Amish. While watching this show, I believe that I engage in Bandura’s theory of moral disengagement which states that ��viewers use rationality to either excuse immoral behaviour or redefine it as moral” (5059). The show is about Amish people who try to break Amish traditions and sometimes even run away from their culture as a whole. Therefore, I excuse immoral behaviour such as a son in an Amish community aggressively pushing his mom and swearing at her because she has not allowed him to be his own person and express his own identity and self his entire life.

In conclusion, television, and more specifically, the TLC channel has allowed me to really get a better understanding of how we engage and identify ourselves and situations in our lives with things that we are watching on television while also decoding them and developing connotative meanings. I have also learned that advertisers and marketers are extremely strategic with the ways in which they gather information in order to assure their products and services are being marketed toward the right audiences.

References 

Buzzard, K. (2015). The rise of market information regimes and the historical development of audience ratings.Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television,35(3), 511-517.

Granelli, S., & Zenor, J. (2016). Decoding “The Code”: Reception theory and moral judgement of Dexter. International Journal of Communication,10, 5056-5078.

Sullivan, J. L. (2013). Media Audiences: effects, users, institutions, and power.

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COMM 3P18 Blog Post 2A: YouTube Engagement

I have no shame in admitting that I spend way too much time on YouTube. From a young age, I always had a fascination with watching vloggers go about their day to day lives. When I was younger, I enjoyed watching vloggers that made me laugh and performed all sorts of pranks on strangers in malls, parks etc. As an example, I remember coming home from school, grabbing a snack and sitting in front of the computer for an hour watching Charles Ross before I was forced to start my homework. But, when I turned 14, I became extremely interested in beauty and fashion. Therefore, I started to watch and subscribe to different types of beauty vloggers on YouTube. I then began coming home from school, turning on an “everyday makeup” tutorial and would sit in front of my mirror trying to replicate and perfect the look for hours. As the years went by, I began to resonate with some of the vloggers I would watch daily.  As an example, I began to follow a YouTube vlogger named Isabella Fiori around the age of 19. To this day, I watch her videos on a weekly basis. Therefore, I guess you can call me an instrumental audience. Sullivan (2013) states, “instrumental audiences would search for specific kinds of message content, often seeking out and selecting informational material in a purposive way, selecting greater care and selectivity over media as well as increased involvement with the programming itself” (p.117). Although I have never met Isabella; and probably never will as she lives in Australia, I feel as though her and I have a lot in common. As I became older I really took an interest in fashion and makeup as it became a part of my own identity.

I can apply the uses and gratifications approach and the notion of needs to my personal example. As I became an active audience member to many vloggers on YouTube, I was actually fulfilling some personal needs without even realizing it. The most obvious type of need that I believe I was fulfilling by continuously watching these types of vloggers was affective needs. As mentioned in Sullivan, affective needs are “needs related to strengthening aesthetic, pleasurable, and emotional experience” (p. 114). Hence, it is quite obvious that I was watching Isabella’s videos to help develop and strengthen my makeup skills in order to “look better” which ultimately helps enhance aesthetic appeal and pleasure within myself. But besides this, the uses and gratifications approach helped me realize that not only are Isabella’s videos helping fulfill my affective needs, they are also helping enhance cognitive, integrative and escape needs. As I mentioned before, I feel as though I have formed a personal connection with Isabella since subscribing to her channel. Her videos have been a tool that I have used to escape from reality as a way to relax on day where I was feeling down. On the other hand, I have also watched many of her videos at times in my life where I needed a confidence boost alongside learning a new technique on how to hide my acne scars (Sullivan, 2013, p. 114). Similarly, as shown in the Sundar and Limperos (2013) reading, YouTube gratifications include things such as social interaction, conventional information seeking, and interpersonal utility (p. 508), all of which are gratifications that I believe I have obtained throughout my years of watching beauty and fashion vloggers.

The Sundar and Limperos (2013) reading also explains how agency-based gratifications are demonstrated on platforms such as YouTube (p.514).  Agency-based gratifications reveal a sense of community as audience members are able to communicate with one another by posting comments on other people’s videos as well as collaborating with others in the YouTube community (Sundar and Limperos, p.514). The agency-based gratification is one that I can actually relate to in relation to YouTube. Jeffree Star is a makeup guru that established his persona on YouTube. He currently has 11 million subscribers on the platform. Just like Isabella Fiori, I have been subscribed to Jeffree star for many years. He has an extremely successful makeup line but, before I went out and purchased some of his products, I turned to YouTube to watch reviews and tutorials on some of the products I was interested in. This short example goes to show how agency-based gratifications are constantly being used on platforms such as YouTube. Many users turn to YouTube to display their opinions and thoughts on products and services. I for one, am constantly turning to YouTube as a means of developing a new understanding of a product or service. I know that when I go to search reviews of Jeffree Star’s makeup line, over 50 videos will appear and will be available for me to watch and use to develop an opinion on whether or not I should hop onto the Jeffree Star makeup bandwagon. Agency-based gratifications are an amazing way to learn about new products and services that are circulating throughout society as user-generated content on these products are constantly being made available on the internet. Although I personally do not generate content, I heavily rely on beauty and fashion gurus and their content.

Throughout many years, I have been able to use YouTube as a way to fulfill many needs in my life that are able to be revealed through media. Using YouTube has allowed me to connect with others in the YouTube community. I look up to many beauty and fashion vloggers and use them as a means to keep me updated on the newest trends in relation to fashion and makeup techniques and colours/styles. Being an audience member of many YouTube vloggers has open my eyes to how watching media content is not only a way to waste time, it also serves as a gateway to a vast array of information that ultimately fulfills needs that I did not even know were being fulfilled.

References 

Sullivan, J. L. (2013). Media Audiences: effects, users, institutions, and power.

Sundar, S., & Limperos, A. (2013). Uses and grats 2.0: New gratifications for new media. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 57(4), 504-25.

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BLOG POST #1B: How Instagram has Influenced me as an Audience

     I am a huge fan of Instagram. In fact, it is absolutely my favourite application that I have downloaded on my cellphone. Instagram is a social media platform that has played an integral part of my life for the past 6 years now. It has allowed me to participate as an audience member in the world of digitalization and communication. Alongside this, Instagram has also allowed me to gain an audience in the form of followers. If for some reason you are not familiar with Instagram, let me explain. Instagram is a social media platform in which you are able to post pictures and stories on your profile for all your followers to see. You also have the choice to privatize your account or to keep it open so that users who do not follow you are also able to see your posts. I activated my first Instagram account when I was in grade 11. It was 2014 and absolutely everybody in my high school was active on Instagram. It was the app that everybody would pay the most attention to and other social media platforms such as Facebook become less and less popular as the days went by.

    Using Instagram has become a daily routine of mine and it has been incorporated into my daily life. I use Instagram as a means of connecting with people near and far. I also use Instagram as a way to showcase and advertise my pictures that highlight where I am, what I am doing and who I am with. I believe that I am an audience to all the people I follow on Instagram and all the people that follow me are my audiences. As mentioned in Sullivan (2013),  communication involves both a sender and receiver. Therefore, for example, when I post a photo of myself with my roommates on Clifton Hill in Niagara Falls, I am the sender and all my followers who see and like my photo are the receivers of the message I have sent out onto my feed (p. 3). Since I have over 1,000 followers on Instagram, my message, aka my posts are being sent out to a mass audience.

     Although I have admitted that social media has played a very large part in my life for many years now, I went through a phase in the past 6 years where I deactivated Instagram for a short period of time. This is because I felt extreme pressure within the word of social media. What I mean by this is that while I do believe that social media is a great tool for communication and expressing yourself, it also acts as a tool for enabling competitiveness and jealousy among others. Instagram has also opened my eyes to the reinforcement of stereotypes in our society today. For example, many girls turn to Instagram to post about how their boyfriends took them on a helicopter tour, bought them 24 roses and paid for an elegant dinner for their first anniversary together. Although this is just a general and elaborated example, instances like these are ones that reinforce stereotypes “which prescribe the predominant method through which all individuals perceived the world” (Sullivan, p. 36).

     Connecting this example to my own life may help you get a clearer understanding of why I personally chose to deactivate Instagram in my first year of university. I was dating a guy for several years, but we kept our relationship very private. We both agreed that we did not need to use Instagram as a means of expressing our relationship and feelings toward one another. We were also a very laid-back couple and truthfully enjoyed just hanging out and not doing anything together. As the year went on, many people whom I followed at the time were posting pictures and captions about how great their relationships were and happy they were together. Seeing other couples post about all the elaborate things they did together had me thinking that my relationship was not good enough and that my boyfriend and I were not doing enough for each other. This entire thought process was influenced by what the people I follow were posting and the stereotypes that were being produced on social media through these posts. This also contributed to my fear of being isolated. I felt as though if I did not post about my relationship, I would be isolated as I had a different view and opinion on the matter. I also thought that this would result in me loosing followers (my audience) and as mentioned in Neubaum and Kramer (2018) not conforming to what others were doing would result in “fear of being judged or negatively evaluated by others and therefore losing one’s standing in a group or even in society” (p. 142). I ultimately decided to deactivate my account for just over a month in order to work on my relationship with my boyfriend and to mitigate the feelings I was sensing every time I scrolled through my feed.

     As time went on, I decided to reactivate my account and have not looked back since. I now focus on using Instagram as a way to connect with people and things I am interested in. I focus my attention on celebrities and following food, fitness and fashion accounts. I also lean toward posting photos of myself that feature me living my everyday life. I really try to present myself to my audience as truthfully as I can. I post pictures that I do not look the greatest in, I post pictures of myself without makeup on and I post pictures of myself taking a huge bite out of a burger. The main purpose of my Instagram account now is for my followers to be able to identify with the real me. This is also why I am a follower of so many fitness, food, and fashion accounts as those are the things that I identify with personally. I can truly say that there are many accounts that I follow on Instagram that I feel resonate with who I am as a social and human being. As an example, Kayla Itsines is a personal trainer and is a huge social media icon today. She is someone I identify with as her workout guide is what influenced me to start living a healthier life and working out. Therefore, as Brown (2015) states, “Kelman’s (1958) concept of identification is especially applicable to studying involvement with media personae, since most people who identify with media personae are influenced by them without ever having face-to-face interaction” (264). I also have many followers that I have not personally met, but they communicate with me to ask about a meal that I posted a picture of and how to make it.

     In conclusion, I have a great love for Instagram. It is a social media platform that was allowed me to realize what aspects of my life are important to me and worth stressing and worrying about. With age, I learned not to be influenced by certain things that others post online and that is why I have chosen to be very particular about who and what I am an audience to. I have completely redesigned my Instagram game in a way that works for me and have gained a large audience posting things that encompass who I am as a person. Instagram has allowed me to connect with people from all over the globe and I hope to continue using Instagram as a means to communicate myself and what I love and am interested in, with people with similar interests.

Brown, W. (2015). Examining four processes of audience involvement with media personae: Transportation,parasocial interaction, identification, and worship. Communication Theory, 25, 259-283.

Neubaum, G., & Kramer, N. (2018). What do we fear? Expected sanctions for expressing minority opinions in offline and online communication. Communication Research, 45(2), 139-164. 

Sullivan, J. L. (2013). Media Audiences: effects, users, institutions, and power. Thousand Oaks, California. SAGE Publications Inc.

https://www.instagram.com/kayla_itsines/

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BLOG POST #1A: My First Ever Live Professional Soccer Game

     On March 23, 2018, I had the opportunity to attend a Croatia versus Peru soccer game in Miami Florida. I come from a Croatian family and I am also a huge soccer fan. Therefore, I found this opportunity to be one that I could not pass up. Tailgating at the Hard Rock Stadium began 4 hours before the game began. We brought our coolers full of drinks and food and spent the few hours before the game mingling, singing, drinking and believe it or not, taking pictures and exchanging jerseys and other paraphernalia with Peruvian fans. The atmosphere before the game was so incredibly amazing that I could not imagine how loud, exciting and intense the experience in the stadium was going to be like. There were Croatian and Peruvian fans from all around the word. In fact, I ran into many family friends from both Canada and America that I did not expect to see. This goes to show how loyal Croatian fans are and how much love we have for our soccer team that we are willing to take off work, school etc. to support them. I have watched countless soccer games on television but, this was going to be the first time I was able to watch my favourite team play and see my favourite players in real life. What was waiting for me when I walked into the stadium was the say the least, unimaginable.

     Stepping foot into the stadium was such an overwhelming feeling. Watching a game on television as an audience member will never compare to the ambiance and extravagance of physically being a part of the game. When I was standing at my seat, I felt completely different than when I watch a game on television with my friends. The rush and energy I sensed as the national anthems played and tens of thousands of fans sang alone to their countries anthem left me with goosebumps. The release of fireworks to symbolize the commencement of the game was not only beautiful, but it signified the importance of the game for both countries while also getting the audience; the fans pumped and ready to cheer on their teams for the next 90 minutes. Audience involvement during the entirety of the game was so salient that it was impossible to not feel and be involved in the game. As Brown (2015) states, “involvement is a dynamic process that incorporates both consuming media and coproducing media through mediated interactions” (p. 260). As an audience member, I was consuming the game. But, besides physically being present at the game, I was also featured on television and was filmed cheering and celebrating during the game. This was the absolute highlight of my audience experience. Being filmed cheering on my favourite team is an example of how I was able to coproduce media. The short few seconds of fame that I got, resembled the pure enjoyment and excitement that not only I was feeling, but the stadium and its fans were feeling as a whole. Being filmed and featured on television exemplifies how easy and simple it is for audiences to be transported into an experience as “a highly transported individual is cognitively and emotionally involved in the story” (Brown, p. 262). I was so emotionally and cognitively involved during the game that absolutely nothing else was on my mind. I disconnected myself from social media and all other aspects of communication in order to gain the most out of this once in a lifetime experience.

     Being present at a live soccer game is an experience I will never forget as it has been something I have always dreamed about. As I mentioned before, I attended the game with some of my closest friends. This last-minute trip definitely came with a price, that’s for sure. Interestingly enough, while I was tailgating outside of the stadium, I learned that Miami has the biggest Peruvian population outside of Peru. This got me thinking. I began to think about all the money that this experience was costing me. My flight ticket costed me around $350 dollars, my ticket to the game costed me $270 dollars plus my stay, food and other costs that I acquired in the 5 days I was in Florida. I spent a large sum of money in order to be a part of an experience that I definitely do not regret spending my money on. But the 5 days I spent in Florida also got me thinking about how audiences are in a sense, commodities. What I mean by this is that I, as a university student bought into all the advertisements and game previews that I would come across on television and social media. The more I watched previews and commercials, the more I was being convinced that the more I would be spending was a good idea and worth it. I also began to watch other commercials and previews in order to gain more knowledge about the event, where it was being held, how much tickets were etc. the more people like myself began researching the event, the more attention it was getting. As Smyth suggests in (Sullivan, 2013), “audiences continue to generate economic value to the system of commercial broadcasting by internalizing advertising messages and turning them into a demand for consumer goods and services” (p. 81).  People like myself and my friends are what made the game such a great success. For people from all over Canada and America to take time off work and school and spend hundreds of dollars to watch their favourite team play is exactly how major organizations and companies earn revenue.

     Although the entire experience did costs me a lot of money, I would never regret my decision of attending. Although I must admit that I was influenced by advertisers, that is not solely the reason I decided to go to Miami. I have always been a follower of the Croatian national soccer team and have worshiped them from a very young age. With this in mind, I knew that I may never get the chance to be able to make a weekend out of a soccer game with some of the closest friends ever again. I would consider myself to participate in low-level worship as I do follow the entire Croatian soccer team on social media platforms and it is evident that I talk about the players and enjoy being around people who also have a great love for the entire team (Brown, 2015, p. 266). My experience at the Croatia versus Peru was definitely a pricey one, but one that will always be special and memorable. As a member of the audience, I was really able to see how extravagant a professional soccer game really is and now understand why so many people are willing to pay so much to attend these events.  

 Brown, W. (2015). Examining four processes of audience involvement with media personae: Transportation, par asocial interaction, identification, and worship. Communication Theory, 25, 259-283. 

Sullivan, J. L. (2013). Media Audiences: effects, users, institutions, and power.Thousand Oaks, California. SAGE Publications Inc.