Costello & Moore (2007) Cultural Outlaws

124 - persistent debate in audience research - active or passive? (Morely, McQuail 1997)
-Frankfurt school = audiences as passive, easily influenced

125 - 1950s, 60s - Klapper, Lazarsfeld, Katz - argued for limited effects on audiences because effects were not consistent across all audiences.

Uses & Gratifications - furthered the active notion by saying viewers made decisions of viewing based on serving their owns needs (Katz, Blumler, Gurevitch, 1974).

S. Hall went beyond analyzing just the content to examining audience's interpretations (dominant, negotiated, oppositional)

Morely built on this going beyond Halls' three readings - introduced the product of shared codes among social classes (individual first, then reinforced by social class discussions)

Fiske (1987) furthered this - audience as highly active - interpreting messages all kinds of ways - but still within limitations because they could not produce the content they wanted.

126 - The relationship between the audience and the text should consider they impact social & cultural influences have on decoding

Within Audience Studies - emphasis is on viewer, meaning is determined by some extent by the viewer, research needs to look at context of viewing experience using qualitative methods, no consistency from viewer to viewer as social and cultural factors influence decoding

128 ** this study examines the use of the internet by TV fans to understand what role it can play in creating and maintaining an active audience (Remember, Seles argues that fans are just the first reference point  to audience studies and cannot be projected to the rest of the audience/viewers)

Method - online surveys that produced qualitative responses that were then coded.  Hermeneutics to look at online communities have some associated dangers: results are not generalizable, not predictive, and may not be the truth. 

139 - It has been suggested that audience activity occurs when fans move from the role of the consumer to that of the producer (McKee 2004)
"the powerless become powerful"

Study found fans to collectively and independently create interpretations of the texts outside the dominant modes of reception imposed by content creators
-activity stretched beyong this into the production of tangible goods (websites, fictions, reviews, etc)

Authors recognize that fan activity is mediated by the characteristics of the programs

Study found that participants active on some online activities were also absent from other related to a show (Attention economy proof!)
Therefore, audiences are variable rather than absolute

Question of power - is an active audience more powerful?
online fans at the lower end of the spectrum are indifferent about affecting the direction of a show
activity for them is more about enlightenment, information, insights and yield very little change in the external product

140 - at the other end of the spectrum, the most productive fans are exerting a form of power through productivity, but its impact is contained within the boundaries of the cultural byproducts of their interactivity

The authors question how fans might influence TV executives (Think Seles & Chuck example with Subway - by bypassing the ratings currency)

Fans can be outlaws in the sense they they do not use programming as intended
the potential is there for networked resistance, but that hasn't happened yet