Jenkins – Prosumer theory, 2006

2006 book - Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide

• Participatory culture is the idea that the public, are no longer just consumers, but also act as producers or contributors also called “prosumers”

• He suggests that the emergence of web 2.0 has allowed companies such as Facebook and Flickr to enter participatory components into their companies – such as for allowing feedback allowing audiences to produce and remix content they produce.

• This is an example of how online emida’s are working with consumers in collaboration rather than again them (idea of citizen journalism also applies here)

• convergence is a cultural, rather than technological, process; that networking computing encourages collective intelligence; that a new form of participatory culture is emerging; and that skills acquired through ‘leisure’ activities are increasingly being applied in more “serious” contexts.

• For example, people are using social networking sites and reporting their own news and this is beginning to be taken more serious than before.

suggesting that as consumers produce and circulate media, they are blurring the line between amateur and professional. “prosumerism” is also encouraged by big companies for their own purposes and aims.Some negatives of this movement is that fact that the former exclusive control by the media of their own content is no longer there (or is slowly going) this means that audiences in time, may gain more control over the media than mass media companies.