Corporate Fandom: Re-creating Media Fans as a Public - Bay
Abstract
Michael Warner's (2002) conception of publics and counterpublics is used to analyze fandom.
Historically, fandom was a counterpublic, opposing mainstream media consumption.
Corporations now court media fans of popular franchises, integrating them into the mainstream.
Corporations are shifting fans into a public position, changing the definition of a media fan.
Bringing 'desirable' and 'affirmational' media fans into the mainstream reorganizes them as publics.
Keywords
consumption
counterpublic
public
paratext
media industries
marketing
Introduction
Marketing promotions now center on Western media fans, leveraging their engagement.
This shifts fans from a counterpublic to a public, driven by corporate interest in their buying power.
Corporations aim to increase engagement with Hollywood franchises by mainstreaming fan practices.
Mel Stanfill (2019) discusses the mainstreaming of fandom and the toxicity that comes with it.
The toxicity of fandom has been discussed by Benjamin Woo (2018) and Anastasia Salter and Bridget Blodgett (2017) in the wake of Gamergate in 2014.
The re-conception of the ‘fan’ as a public and possible corporate product is interrogated
The Public vs. the Counterpublic
Michael Warner defines a public as an entity embracing all users of a text.
Users actively place themselves in a public through attention and activity.
Categories defining fandom are based on consumption and engagement levels.
Engagement is a defining characteristic of fandom.
Warner describes counterpublics as finite groups sharing characteristics beyond a text.
Counterpublics define themselves through distinct performances, risking exposure when assimilated into general circulation.
Early media fandoms (e.g., Star Trek fans) existed on the outskirts of society.
Saturday Night Live's 'Get a Life' skit (1986) exemplified the perception of fans as 'not normal'.
Lynn Zubernis and Katherine Larsen (2012) discuss fandom shame as a gatekeeper.
Fandom shame is linked to the pathologization of fandom in public and academic studies.
The 'fandom as counterpublic' model succeeds among niche fandoms or when fan objects are deemed unacceptable.
Bringing Fans into the Public
Corporations rebrand media fans, moving them from the outskirts to the center.
This refocuses marketing campaigns on engaged consumers, turning the public into fans.
Marketing campaigns explicitly reference fans.
Creatives and producers directly address fans on social media.
Creators equate 'the audience' with the fandom, normalizing fan-like behavior.
Success depends on trending on social media, intensifying fan engagement.
Lines between counterpublic and public blur as corporations encourage attachment and consumption.
Fandoms have moved past subordinate status, gaining power and recognition.
The subtext of a television show is now something that is actively encouraged on the part of the producers, rather than simply on the part of the fans
Fans are defined by practices and activity rather than common interest.
Fandom as a public is defined by active self-selection, engagement, and practices.
Not all scholars agree that fans were ever deemed outsiders.
Popular conception of the fan was not the public with which the ‘dominant public’ chose to identify.
Corporate rebranding has moved identification into a more recognizable concept of the ‘regular’ public in the form of the mass (buying) audience.
Transformative Creation
One defining feature of fans is their transformative creation that often exists entirely in opposition to the interests and goals of the corporation
The industry is most interested in fans who will be engaged on their terms and use their approved content.
Fan and critic obsession.inc named these fans ‘affirmational fans’ on Dreamwidth (obsession.inc 2009).
Affirmational fans reinforce the franchise’s brand through familiar yet new content.
A public is defined by its relation to text.
. Nor can a single voice, a single genre, or even a single medium.
Fandom lends itself to identification as a public, encompassing canon, fanon, community, and paratext.
Abigail Derecho's 'archontic literature' concept applies.
Fandom, as a public, requires ongoing engagement and archival expansion.
The Hunger Games Paratext as Case Study
Corporations refocus fans through paratextual content, mostly digital and transmedia marketing.
Jonathan Gray's film paratext includes traditional advertising and material from stakeholders, fans, and creators.
Lionsgate used paratextual content to attract an engaged audience for The Hunger Games series (2012–15).
In 2011, a fan site allowed interaction within the story as a member of Panem.
Lionsgate launched The Capitol.pn, competing with the fan site, eventually forcing it to shut down.
The Panem October site started as a potential profit-driven space.
This public push for recognition and economic standing indicates that some fans have moved out of the place of the other or counterpublic in their roles as ‘affirmational fans’.
Lionsgate developed websites, YouTube channels, apps, and experiential sites like the Hunger Games Experience.
Capitol Couture, a magazine-style website, blurred reality and fiction, offering fans new content focused on fashion and makeup.
As the story progressed, Capitol Couture evolved to include covert interviews with leaders of the revolution.
Transmedia storytelling expands the storyworld, especially for active fans.
Blurring fiction and reality rewards engaged fans with cultural capital.
The Hunger Games-related websites can be seen as a form of alternate reality game (ARG).
Christy Dena describes ARGs as a form of transmedia storytelling.
ARGs are differentiated from most games by their realism aesthetic
In the early days of the Capitol.pn site, users actively participated by sign[ing] up and receiv[ing] a District Identification Pass and District assignment, and thereafter they act as a Citizen of Panem, following instructions from the Capitol as they are passed down from on high.
The Revolution.pn site responded to the Capitol.pn site.
Content was updated on a timeline matching the film releases, playing out 'in real life'.
Corporate interest in transmedia marketing stems from free fan labor.
Abigail De Kosnik points out that fans’ profuse contributions to the Internet can be regarded […] as labor. Online fan productions constitute unauthorised marketing for a wide variety of commodities
Fans also work in the area of immaterial labour described by Mark Coté and Jennifer Pybus (2011) whereby sharing material and providing their data to the corporation
With the Revolution.pn site, fans were given a very visually enticing spectacle, but even fewer story elements
Fewer opportunities to engage with content and other fans suggests that Lionsgate was more interested in metrics and control of fans than in fostering organic growth of the fandom and its traditional practices.
It is important to point out here that, as De Kosnik says, this is ‘not necessarily exploited labor’ (2013: 106)
Affirmational fans participate in industry-led competitions and hashtag campaigns.
This engagement is a corporatization of the fan gifting economy.
Fan Control vs. Fan Activism
Creators and corporations manipulate the mass labor force of fans.
Fans are aware of indulging in marketing and positionality.
Marketing campaigns place audiences in the position of antagonists, sometimes with undesired responses.
Smartphone apps and Subway campaigns have faced criticism.
CoverGirl's makeup line faced criticism for a Capitol perspective.
Fans criticized the studio and licensing partner in the created spaces.
Fans are not easily controlled, engaging in critical digital media scholarship (Paul Booth, 2010).
Conclusion
Corporations incorporate fans into the public to encourage consumption and control practices.
Corporations hire community managers and instigate fan art campaigns to manage content.
Reconfiguration of fans has financial benefits for corporations.
Fans continue to apply activity and engagement to their interests.
American corporations promote popular entertainment franchises and work to grow the group that self-identifies as an active media fan.
This change has impacted what it means to be a fan and will continue to impact fandom and fan studies.