Drawing from the theoretical foundations of the “critical theory” of the Frankfurt School and the media ethnographic “cultural studies” approach of the british Birmingham School, this study attempts to sketch out a media theoretical overview of the contemporary state of media culture. Using the term convergence culture as the foundation, this study offers a theoretical background to the two contemporary streams that are the significant and distinct tendencies of convergence culture: intermedial convergence, its contemporary state and historical tendencies that can be traced back using the past media theoretical approach of the Frankfurt School, and cultural convergence, its contemporary state and historical tendencies, which lineage in a media theoretical context can be traced back to the british ethographic “cultural studies” field. Using contemporary drama serials to identify and pinpoint these two stream, this study shows how intermedial convergence expresses itself today through media conglomeration in terms of branding, product placement and marketing as the result of the “completed” convergence between screen culture and popular music as the current defining state of commodity culture. Using the contemporary british drama serial Doctor Who I examine the processes of meaning making among members of the television series fan culture on the popular video content page youtube.com as expressions of cultural convergence. This study argues how the skills and talents developed in the interaction with popular culture and in a process of interaction between fans and participants (collective intelligence and participatory culture), will have an impact on the institutionalized knowledge “from above” and in a collective process will seep over to other fields of expertise. The study also argues, as a consequence of convergence culture, that in the contemporary state of online practices, social networking and in our interactions with digital media content, a mandatory “presence” has been created where we today are defined more through our online selves and these practices, than the ones that used to define us in our “physical” lives: “The medium is no longer just the message, we are living in a state where there is only messages”.

Sociala medier har fått allt större betydelse när det gäller kommunikation mellan människor och för företag har explosionen av sociala medier inneburit både möjligheter och utmaningar. För att möta konsumenterna där de befinner sig har företag nu följt efter kunderna till de sociala medierna. I strävan efter att öka sin lönsamhet har företag tagit tillvara på sociala medier som en ny och effektiv e-handelskanal, en verksamhet som fått namnet social commerce. Social commerce är ett nytt fenomen i Sverige och handlar om försäljning av varor och tjänster via sociala medier. Vårt mål med denna studie är att undersöka anledningarna till varför några svenska företag har valt att använda sociala medier som en plattform för sin e-handel samt klargöra vad det är som gör att sociala medier är en lämplig plattform för e-handel. Studien har genomförts med hjälp av kvalitativa intervjuer med företag som på olika sätt bedriver social commerce. Undersökningen baseras på intervjuer med respondenter från totalt fem svenska företag där tre av dessa står i fokus för undersökningen. Dessa tre företag är; Comviq, Pocket Shop och Lagerhaus, som alla bedriver social commerce. Ytterligare två intervjuer har utförts med företagen Askås och Cloud Nine som utvecklar e-handelstjänster till den sociala medieplattformen. Resultatet av vår undersökning visar att de kommunikativa aspekter som sociala medier innehar underlättar spridning av information vilket är en viktig anledning till varför de undersökta företagen anser att sociala medier passar för e-handel. Den virala spridningen av online word-of-mouth har en enorm effekt tack vare att informationen kan spridas snabbt, effektivt och till många via människor i det sociala nätverket. Denna förmåga är ett viktigt skäl till varför de tre undersökta företagen använder sociala medier som en plattform för sin e-handel. I vår slutsats noterar vi att konvergensen mellan e-handel och sociala medier och konsumenternas behov av att delta är tecken på hur vårt förändrade sätt att kommunicera påverkar vårt sätt att konsumera. / Title: Social commerce - A study of how our changing way of communicating affects the way we consume Number of pages: 39 (43 including enclosures) Author: Linda Bogren Ericsson, Sara Eklöf Tutor: Ann-Marie Morhed Course: Media and Communication Studies C Period: HT 2011 University: Division of Media and Communication, Department of Information Science, Uppsala University. Purpose/Aim: The purpose with this thesis is to study the phenomenon social commerce in Sweden and investigate the reasons why Comviq, Pocket Shop and Lagerhaus have chosen to use social media as a platform for their e-commerce. Furthermore, we want to clarify what it is that makes social media a suitable platform for e-commerce and how e-commerce can take advantage of the unique features that social media possesses. Material/Method: The study was conducted through qualitative interviews with companies who are in contact with social commerce in different ways. The study was based on interviews with respondents from five Swedish companies. Three of these companies, Comviq, Pocket Shop and Lagerhaus are all engaged in social commerce, and the other two, Askås and Cloud Nine are developers of e- commerce services for the social media platform. Main Results: The result of our study showed that Comviq, Pocket Shop and Lagerhaus chose to use social media as a platform for e-commerce in order to increase their sales. Furthermore, social media holds important communicative features that facilitate the dissemination of information. The viral spread of online word-of-mouth can quickly and effectively reach many people through the connected network within social media. This ability is an important reason for why the three companies use social media as a platform for e-commerce. It also emphasizes how e-commerce can benefit from a presence on social media. In our conclusion, we note that the convergence of e-commerce and social media, and the consumer’s need for participation are signs of how our changing way of communicating affects the way we consume.

The aim of this study was to investigate how selected municipalities’ use social media, with a focus on how they are working to increase the dialogue between municipalities’ and residents. To answer the purpose of the study three questions has been formulated: how do the communicators use social media in their daily work? What opportunities and challenges are the municipalities’ experiencing with Facebook? How do they work with Facebook to increase dialogue with citizens? The theories that has been used in this study is Cutlip’s and Grunig’s public relations theories, Shannon and weavers communication model, Cutlip’s and Heath’s theory of issue management and Jenkins theory of convergence culture. The method that has been used in this study is qualitative semi-structured interviews and the analysis is done with a thematic text analysis. The material of this study contained interviews of four communicator officers that are responsible for social media in the municipalities’.    The results of the semi-structured interviews showed that the communicator officers used social media to quickly, easily and cheaply connect many citizens in comparison with the traditional media. The biggest opportunity with Facebook for municipalities’ was to improve issue management by spreading the information faster and have an improved dialog with the citizens. The biggest challenge was to think more strategically how to enhance the use of Facebook. The communicator officers try to invite citizens to dialogue by presenting information that citizens want comment and debate about. Municipalities’ also will have meetings with PR agencies to improve the dialog with the citizens in Facebook.

Esta dissertação tem como objetivo investigar como características que são inerentes à cultura da convergência podem fomentar a leitura literária. Destarte, tencionamos observar como o uso da tecnologia pode complementar e enriquecer a leitura, através de práticas que possibilitem a junção das mídias tradicionais e as mídias atuais, para assim ressignificar os hábitos de leitura dos alunos. Propomos atividades de leitura participativa e intersemiótica com o uso de dispositivos tecnológicos, que favoreçam o gosto pela leitura e o desenvolvimento de competência de compreensão e de produção de textos narrativos. Utilizamos em momentos diferentes da pesquisa, dois questionários para obtermos dados qualitativos em relação às propostas realizadas. Concluímos que as mudanças nas práticas de leitura em sala de aula são vitais, uma vez que as conversões culturais não podem ser dissociadas das transformações educacionais. / The aim of this thesis is to investigate how characteristics which are inherent to the convergence culture can promote literary reading. Thus, we intend to observe how the use of technology can complement and enrich the reading through practices that enable the joining of traditional and current media, reframing the reading habits among students. We propose participatory and intersemiotic reading activities using technological devices in order to encourage the taste for reading and the development of the competence skills of reading comprehension and narrative text production. In different moments of the research, we used two questionnaires to obtain qualitative data on the proposals made. In summary, we conclude that changes in reading practices in the classroom are vital, since cultural conversions cannot be dissociated from the educational transformation.

This paper explores the social aspects of a new kind of mobile games where players interact with each other in a shared physical space as well as in-game. As technology spreads throughout layers of culture and everyday life, and gaming becomes increasingly widespread, we see a future in social digital games through the use of smartphones, because of their prevalence and their technical versatility. This poses new challenges for designers. By using the context of music selection in semi-public to public situations and with the help of prototypes, we explore the problems of making selections and connections in large groups as well as delivering feedback. As a result of this project we arrive at elements such as participation, competition, scalability and the importance of social interactions between participants which can be used when designing systems in similar contexts.

This essay focuses on the digitalization of art canonisation in the game Animal Crossing: New Horizons (Nintendo/Nintendo EPD, 2020). Furthermore, the purpose of this essay is to understand which artworks the game incorporates in its museum, as well as how the player can interact with the artworks in question. Bolter and Grusin's remediation theory are thoroughly explored through the material, as well as the maintaining of norms through representation. The conclusion is that the game allows the player to interact restrictedly with the art in the museum, but is allowed more freedom outside of it. However, the restricted interaction is strongly incorporating known norms of how to behave and interact with the museum as an institution. These norms are also applicable in situ – outside of the museum's pixelated world. The aura of the artworks is compromised through the notion that the player can obtain any number of original artworks. Still, the originality and aura of the artworks are secured through the institutionalised environment in the museum. / Uppsatsen behandlar digitaliserad konsts kanonisering i spelet Animal Crossing: New Horizons (Nintendo/Nintendo EPD, 2020). Uppsatsens syften är att analysera vilka konstverk som spelet integrerar i sitt museum och hur dessa verk kategoriseras, samt hur spelaren kan interagera med konstverken. Bolter och Grusins remedieringsteorier behandlas utifrån denna frågeställning med fokus på digitalisering och konstrepresentation. Slutsatsen är att spelarens interaktion med konstverken på det digitala museet är begränsad, men att spelaren får mer frihet i spelets andra miljöer. Således följs etablerade konventioner kring hur besökaren på ett museum ska bete sig. Konstverkens aura förändras då spelaren kan inneha hur många originalverk som helst. Trots denna omdefinierade aura stärks däremot verkens originalitet av museets institutionaliserade och auktoritära presentation.

The overall purpose of this essay, “‘I really hope you guys are enjoying this. Thank you so much for watching!’ - a qualitative and quantitative study of the interaction between YouTubers and their audience", is to study how YouTubers that play and comment video games interact with their audience, what kind of response these YouTubers receive and the interaction between viewers and fans in these YouTubers comment sections. This essay also studies if there is a difference between the response female and male YouTubers receive. The study is based on theories about fan culture, participation culture, collective intelligence, feminism and gender. A quantitative content analysis has been used to analyze 600 comments on six YouTube videos uploaded by six different YouTubers. The purpose of the quantitative analysis was to see what content of the comments most often occur as well as if the comment showed a positive, negative or neutral view of the YouTuber. The result of the quantitative analysis was used as a base for a qualitative critical discourse analysis, which also studied how the YouTubers behaved in the videos. The results of this study showed that the YouTubers mostly received positive comments about their personalities and their YouTube channel. They mostly received negative comments about the way they play the game. The female YouTubers received more negative comments than the male YouTubers, who in turn received more positive comments. The study also showed that YouTubers interact by talking directly to the audience and looking into the camera, by using the word “we” when talking about how they play the game as if they are playing with the audience, by asking the audience questions and by answering comments that the YouTubers have received. The YouTubers engage their audience by using strong expressions and by playing the game during a livestream. The YouTubers’ fans engage and interact by showing appreciation of the YouTubers and defend the YouTubers when they receive negative comments in the comment section of their videos. These ways which YouTubers interact with and engage their audience can be seen as part of a discourse about interaction and engagement online.