harnessing the twitter olympics: from #van2010 to #london2012 jennifer m. jones

www.jennifermjones.net #media2012 #van2010 #ldn2012

So why the Olympics?

Sport

The Olympics is not a sporting event...

olympism, symbols & ideology governed by the IOC

sacred symbols brand identity

ritual & spectacle

disruptive, locally interpreted but globally understood.

sponsorship: the corporatisation of an institutionalised ideology

transformative infrastructures - the invasion and the privatisation of public space

CODE (cultural olympiad 2010)cultural programming

media visibility - one of the most watched events in the world

the games do not exist in a vacuum

everything is political

security & surveillance

budget cuts

...and funds that will not renew once the games are over.

destruction of existing communities

• displacement and gentrification of areas- artificially inflating housing prices to price out existing residents.

local resistance DTES Olympic Tent Village

olympic resistance network photo credit: @kk

protest, resistance and the games go hand in hand since the first games in athens, 1896.

The olympic games is not a sporting event...

...it is a stand-alone, complex (and often conflicting) multi-narrative phenomena...

...that produces globally shared histories and memories of a nation’s collective identity...

...that we share together through the media.

athens 1896 the first modern games

how do we remember?

the first olympic media was a citizen journalist

the IOC shaped their recent history on the images and archives provided by audience members

but now...

accredited media

media corporations that have paid the most for the exclusive rights and access to the games

one representative from each country

full rights to the sport and olympic brand

access to sport

non-accredited media

visiting journalists who may or may not have accreditation for the ‘official’ media centres.

facilities provided from the host city government to support media production

media access to people people get access to media

but what about everybody else?

access to technology: faster, smaller, cheaper

samsung athens 2004 leading the way in innovation

this presentation is breaking copyright law!

IOC congress, oct 2009 Martin Sorrell

‘audience as co-conspirators’

launched half-way through vancouver 2010 flickr.com/olympics

the olympic review acknowledged after the games

but what about the rest of us?

amplifying alternative narratives

truenorthmediahouse.comself-accredited media

what does it mean to be media?

www.creativetechnology.org

w2 arts and media house

media space for independent journalists

workspace & facilities

produced their own media content

TNMH had no physical space, social media only.

W2 was a community space, transforming when required.

how can this change the games experience towards london 2012?

london as a ‘national games’ 13 regions of the UK

social media already part of games experience

resistance to the games

national unease

#media2012 - national citizen media network for london 2012

reclaiming the olympic games

from media event to media festival

http://www.media2012.org.ukhttp://www.jennifermjones.net#media2012

see you in london!see you in london!see you in london!see you in london!see you in london!