Convergence culture

In his book “Convergence Culture” Henry Jenkins shapes the outlines of what media are today and where the media industry is heading to. He looks at the field from a point of view that emphasises the relationship between content and user. The main idea he proposes is that we should start to look at media differently. Or, in fact realize that the way we look at media today is not entirely compatible with the parameters of modern media.

Instead of seeing the industry as a technologically driven machinery that produces products that are in turn consumed by the consumer it should be looked at as a whole where each part forms an almost autonomous unit thus taking a larger role in shaping the product. In fact, this is to say that contemporary media shouldn’t be looked at “merely” as an industry but a phenomena that is not bound to distinct linear components. Technology has provided the means to allow new meanings and connotations for media, but the field has changed so that relying on one device or a singular medium is no longer the standard. Similarly the role of the consumer has changed into a more active role regarding the end product.

Jenkins uses well known examples from the fields of film, television, gaming and internet to portray the flow of media today. The cases discussed are from popular culture and therefore the reader is most likely to be familiar with each subject if not a fan of the particular subculture represented as an individual case. Jenkins' text is pleasant to read and the way each chapter is constructed is easy to comprehend even for someone not familiar with the subject. However, I must say that I found the text to be unnecessarily repetitive at times.

Personally I was well acquainted with most of the examples but found the chapter discussing The Matrix most interesting. In this chapter Jenkins talks about transmedia storytelling and how narrative can be created using multiple platforms. I’dd seen the Matrix movies including the animations and found them interesting but had not thought about the consept beyond the surface, untill having read Jenkins. With the fact that the plot is told through various media and so that each medium gives something extra in to shaping the fictional universe, the case all in all does seem more appealing.

Another interesting fact to me is that most of the individual products were given average or below the average reviews. This is particularly true when looking at the games for instance “Enter the Matrix”. In this review by 1UP.com the game is described as being “...a better movie than it is a game.”. Here the rewiever also refers to the film “ The Matrix Reloaded” as bearing more similarities to a video game than to a film. On a side note, it should also be said that the issue here is with game reviews emphasizing namely the game and often not how it relates to its context.

The pruducers obviously wanted to create a vast fictional universe and to achieve this they used various different platforms, with each unit building on what the others had achieved. In doing this they might have created a whole that functions well, but individually the parts may have ended up lacking in some respects. Looking at this in the context of Jenkins’ book and particularly the title with emphasis on convergence, I began to think about how these issues relating to transmedia in the context of The Matrix would be solved today. Eleven years after the first release in the saga, how would The Matrix look and feel if it were released in 2010?