A fan of Blade Runner

I have always been a person who dislikes being a fan and being labeled as a fan of something. On one hand it has been dislike of fanatism in general, on the other hand I don't like that others simplify my personality through tags that label me as fan of something, or even see me as a sterewotype of something. As a teenager I couldn't understand worship of bands and celebrities, and regarded mass following in general stupid even to a degree that I tended to ignore things that were popular back then, even though later I've grown very fond of some bands that were popular during my teens, such as CMX and Smashing Pumpkins. And even if I have had really keen interest in something, I've lost interest in it quite fast and focused my attention to other things. That being said, there is one science fiction movie that has always been one of my favorites, which keeps its marvel after several watchings and that still has atmospheric visuals even when compared to today's special effects and computer generated backgrounds.

Blade Runner is a science fiction film that borrows a lot from Film Noir, but is still in my opinion a good example of soft science fiction where science is used to portray questions essential to society and humanity. The futuristic LA is not just a backdrop of events but reflection of developments of society in time to come. The setting is bleak, dark and rainy, but details and atmosphere makes the setting beliavable and hauntinly beautiful. Themes of the movie touch pollution, genetic engineering, technological determinism, globalization, corporate power and fear of death, but the most important question in the movie is about humanity - what makes us human? Human-like replicants are identified through testing and hunted by assumed human, Rick Deckard. The viewers may first identify with Deckard, but gradually, as the movie progresses, replicants start to seem more and more human. Deckard, hunting and killing replicants because of his job starts to question himself, and the difference between the humans and replicants.

The movie has influenced a lot of later films and video games. It has also somewhat big cult following, and has stood the test of time well, eventhough it wasn't a big hit when it was released. I have also participated in online discussions and interested in the fan community surrounding Blade Runner. The visual style and music still inspire me a lot, and the films and games that carry some sort of resemblance to Blade Runner always interest me, even though I am often disappointed with them. The movie is for me a some sort of standard that I compare science fiction movies to, and I haven't yet came across anything that comes close to it. In truth, perhaps I don't even want to.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083658/

The Convergence Culture

The first impression of the book was that it's much easier to read than I thought thanks to it's writing style. The most of the examples chosen were very familiar to me, but the phenomenas surrounding them were not that well known yet, and Jenkings has done a huge job in collecting and analyzing phenomena surrounding the media products of nowaday. The main examples are very diverse: reality-tv series, transmediated world of matrix, the consumer participation in Star Wars, consumer rights over Harry Potter and political spoofs in US politics. The examples are in my opinion so varied that the book can cater all kinds of readers but hardly anyone is already familiar with the phenomena reflected by examples in every chapter. Personally I found the chapter 4 about the grassroots creativity most familiar and interesting, especially it's latter part.

In chapter 4, Jenkins presents Star Wars is a franchise which both encourages grassroots participation and which is at the same time an example how copyright holders try to keep franchise the way they indended. Star Wars has been a subject of huge fan following for decades, and also a target for fan made movies of various filmmaking technologies. The copyright holders in media industry have divided into two stances, which Jenkings calls the prohibitionists and the collaborationists. Former have taken very strict stance to regulate and restrict fan made content, the latter see fans as important promoters and collaborators of franchise. In the new media(mmo games in the example of Star Wars) latter seems to be the way of the future, and in case of Star Wars MMO, fans were allowed to influence the creation of the Star Wars galaxies universe.

In case of MMO games, and perhaps in case of new media in general, the collaboration with customers seems to be the more beneficial stance in my opinion. In MMO game the franchise must be expanded by a huge amount of content, and in order to keep subscriptions running, players must feel the world as their own. Even though the Star Wars lore had been much larger than is visible in the movies, the alive, interactive world demands creation of new lore, and in that fan activity can be very useful. Tools for player interaction and activity creation are required in a modern MMO game, and licence holders cannot possibly regulate all this new content that users are creating.

Jenkins doesn't want to predict which of the stances will reign in the future even though he hopes that the collaborative stance will gain more foothold in the media industry. When games are considered, I tend to be more hopeful than Jenkins. In case of MMO games the media companies don't really have a choise to regulate content of a franchise because the player created content is essential in order to keep MMO world interesting. In the chapter, there is also discussion of modding games and how community created mods can prolong the life of a game and help to find out what kind of features players want from a game. Even though modding tools have been available for a quite long time at least in some games, I'd say that the modding tools and level editing is becoming more and more popular, and even a selling point for games for consoles as well. Another possible trends in gaming, online distribution and expansion pack releasing are not yet very well connected to user created content in my opinion, but approving and distributing high quality user created content as a part of official lore and game expansions could be highly profitable for game companies, even if they paid royalties to users that create content.

Media diary summary

Sorry I posted my assignments late because my invitation to this blog was expired already. Hope you have time to comment.

I wrote my media diary from 5th to 9th of December 2009 because I spent that weekend mostly at home and therefore used more time following media than usual weekend. At some weekends when I'm not home I hardly follow any media intentionally.

5.12.2009 Saturday
I powered on my computer somewhere around 12, checked emails and news. Also visited internet forums and browsed internet, read wikipedia etc. for interesting but probably useless information. On the evening I listened to music I played Dragon Age on PC for some time. I couldn't really concentrate on playing so I decided to watch a horror movie Pandorum on late evening. I didn't feel sleepy, perhaps because of the movie, and started reading discussion about the movie on IMDB.com, rather usual habit of mine when the movie is good or thought provoking. Later, around 03 at night I used skype to chat with my girlfriend. Rather unusual day for the lack of phone usage, especially on saturday.
6.12.2009 Sunday
Woke up late, powered on computer to check out mail & news from internet forums. Had a few phone calls and text messages, chatted a bit on facebook which I rarely use. On evening I read local newspaper along with other mail that was left on my mailbox. Had TV on for a while and watched Independence Day celebration for a while. Did some schoolwork on computer on the later evening and chatted via messenger and skype.
7.12.2009 Monday
Woke up bit before school so I didn't have time to spend on computer in the morning. Picked up mail when I got from school. On the evening I checked internet forums & youtube while eating(a habit) and checked bus&train schedules for wednesday. Used IRC, messenger and skype later on evening. Used phone for calling as well.
8.12.2009 Tuesday
I had time before the school so I checked mail and browsed internet while having a breakfast. On evening I did some schoolwork on pc, logged on to irc/msn/skype but didn't use much. I played Dragon age for around 5 hours on late evening. I don't usually have that much opportunities to concentrate on playing, because for me it takes a while before I can focus on game properly.
9.12.2009 Wednesday
Woke up relatively early, powered on PC and checked mail & browsed net and checked facebook. Got Christmas commercials via SMS. Checked train schedules online and prepared some reading & tv-series episodes for my laptop to have something to do while traveling. Left home for groupwork meeting, used phone to tell I'll be late :D. Read a bit of Ilta-Sanomat tabloid that was left on train, also had more phone calls. Used MP3 player as well.

Because of the weekend at home I used lot of computer, and because my travelling plans had delayed a bit I had Tuesday evening to concentrate on playing. I have some habits in my media use, but the time I spend on each media can vary greatly. One habit is checking emails and rarely facebook when I wake up and turn on the computer, continued by somewhat pointless internet browsing when I have time. Browsing forums and other sites on my main PC has become some sort of replacement for TV, I often do other things at the same time, like chat online with my laptop or eat, quite often I even browse some nonrelated sites amidst reading school related articles and books. I almost always search information and read discussions about media products that have gained my interest, spending even more time searching information than using the media product itself. That is the case with most movies, games and books I'm interested in.