Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, 2004. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 84-87). / A close reading of two television shows, K-Street and Tanner '88, was performed to examine how one might become informed about real-life political news by viewing entertainment programs that combine fiction with actual current political events, issues, and figures. In his book The Good Citizen, Michael Schudson claims that mere factual recall does not necessarily indicate that one is "informed", but rather an "informed citizen" is one who actively reads the "information environment". According to Schudson, however, "the obligation of citizens to know enough to participate intelligently in governmental affairs [should] be understood as a monitorial obligation" where one scans rather than reads the "information environment". By indexing themselves as "hybrid", programs such as K-Street and Tanner '88 might encourage skepticism and therefore scanning of the "information environment", unlike "news programs" (i.e. "The News") that frame themselves as accurate and complete. In addition, fictional narrative has the power to foster viewers' personal investment in particular characters and, in this way, could provide additional incentive for active information gathering by creating narratives where characters stand to be directly affected by actual current political events and issues. Neither Tanner '88 nor K-Street appear to have harnessed this potential, however. / by Robert J. Bain, Jr. / S.M.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 85-89). / The design of information visualization, defined as the interactive, graphical presentation of data, is on the verge of a significant paradigm shift brought on by the continued maturation of the Information Age. Its traditional role as a scientific tool deployed by rigorous data analysts is in the process of expanding to include more mainstream uses and users, reflecting fundamental changes to the role of information and data in our increasingly digital society. However, visualization design theory remains rooted in earlier conceptions of its use, largely ignoring the needs of this new, non-expert audience. Accordingly, this thesis attempts to re-contextualize information visualization as a public-facing practice, and explores ways in which its design can shift from being described as "by experts, for experts" to a new characterization as "for the people." / by Michael Danziger. / S.M.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, 2010. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 83-91). / The emerging field of fan studies has, until recently, been defined only by the research that has taken place within it. Almost universally, this research focuses on self-identified fans. However, scholars are beginning to examine and debate what the limits of the field should be. This study argues that self-identified fans are not the only group that ought to be examined under the heading of fan studies. It also highlights the fact that humor is rarely discussed in fan studies, and argues that this is a major lacuna. In order to accomplish these goals, this study turns to three examples. The first example is an online discussion community for the Twilight novels, Twatlight, which does not define itself as a fan community but nevertheless exhibits all the characteristics of a fan community and is in conversation with self-identified fan communities. The second example is humorous images produced by the Twatlight community, which use jokes to make serious arguments about the Twilight books. The third example is humorous fan vids produced within the mainstream media fandom vidding community; fan vids have been traditionally treated by fan studies as purely melodramatic artworks. The study concludes that fan studies should define itself as the study of people who are affectively engaged with texts in the context of critical communities. / by Madeline LeNore "Flourish" Klink. / S.M.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, June 2003. / "May 2003." / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 101-103). / The Ars Electronica FutureLab is a thriving interdisciplinary research facility located in Linz, Austria. It is part of the Ars Electronica Center (AEC), a cultural institution which for over two decades has been a pioneer in exploring the interface between art, technology, and society and mediating public interaction with new technologies. As a nonprofit organization, the AEC is primarily supported by key public sector partners including local government and the state broadcast company, as well as corporations. This institutional framework, together with university affiliation, has facilitated the FutureLab's diverse activities from artistic to more commercially oriented projects exhibited in the AEC 'Museum of the Future' and at off-site venues. The FutureLab's team of artists and researchers has forged a unique hybrid research model focused on three core research areas (virtual reality environments, interactive installations, digital surfaces) which allows them to take prototypes developed from artistic projects and apply perfected solutions to industry projects, or vice versa. Increased demand especially from the private sector for the lab's cutting-edge technology developments and research expertise now threatens to upset the delicate balance of this model. Today, AEC management needs to address the issue of sustainability for both its FutureLab division, in face of heavy workloads, and the institution at large, given decreasing government funding for arts/culture. The AEC is devising a strategy for cultivating industry partnerships based on the FutureLab's experiments in corporate collaboration to date which have been successful namely because they are focused on mutually beneficial outcomes. Through this strategy, the AEC is eager to supplement corporate sponsorships with longer-term industry partnerships in order to ensure financial stability. FutureLab employees stand to gain additional resources and, therefore, the ability to sustain their current research model and continue doing cutting-edge work. With the AEC and the FutureLab, corporations have access to a dedicated arts community whose expert staff can help them develop and promote interesting projects as well as meet both their business needs and corporate affairs objectives. / by Stephanie Davenport. / S.M.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 147-156). / This thesis challenges the common social construction of game development, which perceives the activity only within its commercial, corporate realm. As an exemplar of the many thriving amateur development communities, the self-identified "homebrew" Nintendo Game Boy Advance (GBA) development community is analyzed in-depth. This unique community is brought to the attention of scholars as an important intersection of game studies and amateur media studies, challenging the focus of game studies on commercial production. The GBA homebrew community is studied from the personal motivational level to the social dynamics of the group. The analysis considers the blend of technological and cultural motivations brought to bear on the production and the content of the amateur games, and how amateur development facilitates skill acquisition outside of canonical academic structure, and opens access to professional mobility. The case study advances both historical and contemporary comparisons to other independent media communities. The thesis also examines discussions in the community around peer-judged competitions as a form of vernacular theory. The content of homebrew GBA games released into the community are further analyzed, with the construction of useful categories spanning genre, fan games, remakes, remixes, and tech demos. Nostalgia and parody in relation to game history are especially considered, as are demonstrations of technical skill ("tech demos") as a uniquely amateur practice. The legal context of amateur GBA development is also examined. Nintendo maintains the GBA as a closed, proprietary system, and thus for homebrew developers access to information and legitimacy is blocked. / (cont.) Comparisons are advanced to historical examples of intellectual property enforcement in the emergence of corporate media in the 20th century. Amateur practice is found to be tangential to corporate interests, ignored both by the disinterest of corporations, and in blanket policies targeting piracy. Historical cases that legitimate reverse engineering of software are discussed for context. Thesis concludes that one cannot cleanly construct categories of amateur and professional as separate practices, and remarks upon the constant renewal and shifts in amateur development communities as new game platforms are released in the commercial market. / by Brett Bennett Camper. / S.M.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, 2006. / I explore two core concepts in today's youth entertainment culture that will increasingly become central in future attempts to design affordable foreign language learning materials that hope to bridge the chasm between education and foreign popular culture. In the process, I outline a series of example applications that apply these concepts to developing rich foreign language materials -- starting with more experimental/long-term approaches such as using video game modding techniques to make language learning friendly video games and ending with more concrete, ready-to-go, applications like extending open source content management applications. The first concept I look at is that of "Remix culture." In short, Remix culture describes the way in which youth culture today more visibly orients itself around creating media by extracting component pieces from other people's media creations, then connecting them together to form something new. In the video game world this phenomena is more specifically termed 'modding.' In this process, amateur fans take a professional commercial game title and then modify it in creative ways that the original designers may not have considered. / (cont.) Outside of video games, we see terms like "web 2.0" used to describe technologies that allow website viewers to play a role in authoring additions to the sites they are reading, or "mashups" where users use programming interfaces to rapidly create web content by mashing together pieces from different sources. The second emerging concept critical for curricular designers to follow is that of transmedia storytelling. Traditionally, one might assume a model in which distinct media forms are used to serve distinct cultural practices: television or novels tell stories, video games are for play, blogs for socializing and textbooks for learning. While initially this may have been the case, as each of the media forms above have evolved, they have expanded to cover multiple other cultural practices, often by extending across other media forms. By following the evolution of the interactions between these various media forms and activities within entertainment industries, we can find valuable insight when forecasting their possible interactions in the education industry. / by Ravi Purushotma. / S.M.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, 2009. / "February 2009." / Includes bibliographical references (p. 94-101). / This thesis probes into current American makeover culture, thorough three detailed case studies that represent an increasing confluence of commerce, entertainment, and, at times, spirituality. Each of the chapters is devoted to a niche media property, or genre, dedicated to the domestic sphere. The first chapter focuses on the genre of home decorating TV shows and practices of their consumption. The second centers on a single television program - TLC's What Not to Wear, and the interpretative activities it provokes among viewers. The third chapter examines the FlyLady - a transmedia property with a strong internet base, described by its founder as a "behavior modification system" that coaches its subscribers in getting their houses in order. This study was driven, among other things, by the following questions: as the 'commodity frontier' gets increasingly intermingled with our daily lives, with the help of increasingly pervasive media, how do certain communities respond, and with what methods of meaning-making? What draws audiences to engage with media properties so intermingled with commerce in the first place? And, what constitutes these properties' entertainment value as well as the other values audiences find in them? The answers vary with each case study, yet, there are many commonalities pertaining to meanings associated with consumer goods in late capitalism. The media properties described here capitalize on the movement of meaning from culture through consumer goods to individuals. At the same time these three chapters exemplify many cases of redirecting, filtering, and damming up the flow of meaning on the part of viewers and subscribers. / by Orit Kuritsky. / S.M.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, 2009. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 85-88). / The music industry, along with the world of media as a whole, is in a state of transition. What is being sold is not so clear anymore, nor is it obvious what parts of the traditional business will survive. Audiences play a crucial role in these shifts; they've become empowered and increased their participation within media industries. Working towards the premise that audiences can add value to media businesses beyond the act of consumption, this thesis argues that for media industries to benefit from their contributions it is first necessary to locate these audiences as active participants and producers of value. This thesis studies the dynamics of participatory audiences through the case of Brazil's Tecnobrega scene (literally 'cheesy techno'), expanding on a 10-day ethnographic field trip to the capital of Tecnobrega, Belem. This music industry has circumvented mainstream conventions by forgoing copyright and collaborating with 'pirates'. Tecnobrega's audiences not only assist in the circulation of content, but through their socializing and fan production, they create and trade symbolic capital that directly affects the popularity, and consequently the perception of value, of various parts of the industry. The competencies acquired through these types of participation have the potential to overflow into other domains; they can help shift the conceptualization of the public sphere and can, likewise, become paths for the exploration of cultural citizenship and agency within globalization processes. / by Ana Elena Domb Krauskopf. / S.M.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 105-107). / This thesis explores the intersection of the television image with the presentation of self-identity. I examine two TV series in the spy genre -- Alias (2001 - 2006) and The Prisoner (1967 - 1968) -- discussing how each employs strategies of visual representation to present its protagonist as decentered or unfixed; in so doing, these programs complicate and problematize within their narratives the terms by which "subject" and "agency" have been traditionally understood and represented to popular TV audiences. This problematizing in turn opens up possibilities for detecting new modes of subject formation. This paper argues that television, communication tool and historical and cultural artifact, must be regarded equally as a visual medium. In fact, the TV image brings the enacted identity theorized by Judith Butler into direct contact with Henri Bergson's formulations of memory and image, creating characters and spaces within TV stories that vividly illustrate the limitations to and potentials for creativity within the domains of action and identity. In addition to Butler and Bergson, this paper turns additionally to Gilles Deleuze for an understanding of cinematic image and time, and to the concept of masquerade developed within feminist theory. In The Prisoner, a modern hero must make sense of a landscape of discontinuities and repetitions that challenge his ability to act, react, move, and escape. In Alias, a postmodern heroine must master the art of changing selves in order to move across spaces that, like her own identity, are conditional and are never what they initially appear. / (cont.) In both series, the television image, freed from an obligation to represent only one thing while ruling out others and made multiple by the TV episode format, assumes a resonance over its duration that creates the conditions for the depiction of fluid and changeable spaces and characters. In both cases, the TV image repeated enables a paradigm shift where the depiction of a decentered protagonist, once exceptional, now becomes a normative subject on television. KEYWORDS: Alias -- Bergson -- Butler -- decentered subject -- Deleuze -- feminism identity -- image -- Jennifer Garner -- Patrick McGoohan -- The Prisoner -- spy shows -- television -- visual theory / by Lisa Marie Bidlingmeyer. / S.M.

Filmography: leaves 85-86. / Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Comparative Media Studies, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 86-95). / Film dances, or filmed dance sequences accompanying film songs, are an important part of popular Indian cinema. Over the years, Hindi film dance has evolved from a cinematically simplistic, filmed documentation of performance traditions, to a recognized and increasingly respected dance category emulated in staged performances in India and abroad. Despite their significance, dances in Indian popular films have not been systematically analyzed, and their movement, history, cultural influence and migration remain largely unexplored. The ubiquitous presence and under-theorization of film dances raises many questions about why these dances emerged as key ingredients of film, how their production, dance and cinematic content has evolved over time and, finally, how these dances are received and reinterpreted by audiences outside India. The objective of my investigation here is to set the foundation for an analytical framework for understanding dances in popular Hindi films. Using the relationship between dance sequences in films and their re-staging as Bollywood dances at South Asian cultural shows as a point of departure, I explore the analytical challenges of exploring dances in Hindi films as a first step towards a larger study of the cyclical migration of these dances to be conducted at a later date. My rather formalist approach to Hindi film dances provides a foundation for investigating these dances in way that will allow me to expand on this research in the future. Most importantly, however, I believe my approach to Hindi film dances enables me to explore "Bollywood dance" as a site of reception of Hindi film dances as they move from films to stage. / by Sangita Shresthova. / S.M.