Book Chapters by Stephanie Janes
In Besides the Screen: Moving Images through Distribution, Promotion and Curation eds. Virginia C... more In Besides the Screen: Moving Images through Distribution, Promotion and Curation eds. Virginia Crisp & Gabriel Menotti Gonring, Palgrave Macmillan (2015)
The definition of viral marketing is notoriously tricky to pin down, since it tends to overlap with related concepts such as ‘buzz marketing’ or ‘word-of-mouth’. However, the strategies I will discuss in this paper are based entirely online and encourage not only referral (e.g. ‘dude you have to see this YouTube video), but immersion in and interaction with the world of the film before, during and after viewing, allowing the viewer to shape, or at least appear to shape, their cinematographic experience.
Viral marketing, I argue, marks a shift away from what Justin Wyatt (1994) calls ‘high concept’ filmmaking and marketing.1 Campaigns for films such as The Blair Witch Project (1999), Cloverfield (2008), A.I. (2001) and The Dark Knight (2008), demonstrate a change in the relationship between producer and consumer to a stage where producers are encouraging consumers to be active, rather than passive, withholding information on forthcoming releases, and daring them to follow trails of online clues to get at it. This move to encourage agency or the appearance of agency, in the cinematographic experience is often discouraged in other areas of the industry, e.g. distribution. This paper questions the motives behind such elaborate online campaigns, arguing that the deliberate positioning of the viewer as investigator is accompanied by an extension of the filmic world (as opposed to simply an extension of narrative online) to produce a seemingly immersive experience that can be, but is not always, reflected in the aesthetics of the film itself, and that can transform a piece of marketing material into an entertainment experience in its own right.
In The Politics of Ephemeral Digital Media: Permanence and Obsolescence in Paratexts eds. Sara Pe... more In The Politics of Ephemeral Digital Media: Permanence and Obsolescence in Paratexts eds. Sara Pesce and Paolo Noto, Routledge (Forthcoming 2015)
This chapter intends to explore the varied and complex temporalities which can be seen to co-exist within one particular promotional paratext: Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) and their potential implications for both media producers and consumers when they are utilised within contemporary media marketing campaigns.
Often placed in the category of ‘viral’ marketing strategies, ARGs have been used since around 2001 to promote a number of films including A.I: Artificial Intelligence (USA, Steven Spielberg, 2001). and The Dark Knight (USA, Christopher Nolan, 2008). They create a narrative mystery set in the world of the film which is then broken down and scattered across the internet. Players work collaboratively in online communities to reconstruct that narrative using everyday media channels such as email, websites, phone calls, voicemails, and larger scale live events, like scavenger hunts.
Current literature often discusses ARGS in terms of narrative extension or their role as paratext in relation to a primary text (Gray, 2010; Ornebring, 2007). In less text-focused analyses they are discussed as sites for participatory culture and consumer empowerment (Jenkins, 2006). Some have even gone as far as to suggest that the strategies and techniques of such collaborative play can prompt players to attempt real-world problem solving, and the implications of such collective intelligence for various aspects of social life (McGonigal, 2008). Rarely does the focus turn to the temporal dimensions of this rather unique piece of promotional material, despite that fact that real-time gameplay is one of the genre’s defining elements and a fundamental part of the gameplay experience.
Grainge notes a tension in many ephemeral media texts, arguing for ‘a dual movement towards speed and storage, immediacy and archiving’ (Grainge, 2011:3), which is exemplified in YouTube. Grainge also points out that, whilst some scholars such as Schneider and Foot, have identified this as a tension inherent in the web itself, Mary Ann Doane traces this even further back in her work on cinema and temporality in late modernity, describing a ‘tension between a desire for instaneity and an archival aspiration.’ (Doane, 2002: 29) This relationship between media technology, the ephemeral and the impulse to archive and record the present is therefore not entirely new.
Elizabeth Evans locates a similar tension in web-dramas, describing them as involving ‘modes of engagement that are both anti- ephemeral and hyper ephemeral’. (Evans, 2011:156). This essay proposes to use this as a framework when discussing elements of ARGs, most of which can also be seen to fit into either of these two categories. However, rather than there being a tension between them, the two seem to co-exist comfortably, each offering different advantages for media producers and marketers trying to survive in a perceived ‘attention economy’ (Lanham, 2006).
A number of elements of ARGs appear to lean more towards the ‘hyper ephemeral’. The real-time nature of the games means that they are fundamentally based on a present-ness of experience, particularly in their incorporation of live events such as scavenger hunts or flashmobs. Due to this experiential nature they cannot be re-rerun or replayed – you literally had to be there at the time in order to have the game experience. Even in-game websites are rarely accessible in their original formats due to consistent in-game updating.
Their status as marketing also restricts the lifespan of the text and therefore the duration of the gameplay experience. As far as the marketing team are concerned, the ARG exists primarily to promote another media text and ends with the release of that primary text. In effect, the ARG comes out of circulation, and therefore existence, as soon as the film comes into circulation.
Yet, despite having an apparently commercially determined life-span, ARGs tend to linger in some forms beyond the built-in recommended use-by date. Remnants of complete puzzles and websites will continue to float around the web. Even more persistent are the community forums which allow us to trace back through a game via player discussion. These communities will linger and perhaps even reconvene at a later date to follow another game.
Whilst these varying temporalities have a number of potential advantages for film marketers, they also highlight a number of broader issues facing consumers of digital media. There is a strong archival tendency in ARG communities, who are aware of the fleeting nature of the games they are so passionately committed to, and who are driven in an attempt to make permanent that which is ephemeral. Such a drive also reflects a tension which is often considered symptomatic of the internet as a digital medium itself, at once a space of ‘archival promise’ and yet possessing a shifting temporality which is ‘emergent and continuous’, a ‘continuous networked present’ (Hoskins, 2012: 100). As communities collectively reconstruct their experiences of the games they participate in the production of what Hoskins might describe as ‘digital network memory’, wherein data is highly transferable and accessible, but also eminently erasable.
In contrast to the, arguably less stable, digital content produced by both players and producers of ARGs, Many games also involve the distribution of material objects and promotional materials, or ‘swag’ as they are known on the forums. This can range from posters and window stickers to replica props or collectibles associated with the film or the game. It is possible that, as Hoskins also suggests, the ephemerality of the digital side of the games affords the ‘material objects… of cultural memory… greater significance’ (Hoskins, 2012: 103). Possession of swag becomes not only a more permanent reminder of the games, free from the prospect of digital deletion, but also a form of cultural capital amongst players. ARGs therefore can therefore be seen as a site where this tension between temporalities is actively negotiated by media consumers, and some of Hoskins’ predictions for the implications of the ‘digital network memory’ can potentially be seen playing out.
Playing an ARG involves experiencing various temporalities, often on a very personal level. By outlining these differing and apparently contradictory temporalities, this article hopes to shed more light on the experience of a complex, under-discussed and strongly temporally defined media paratext. Whilst the hyper ephemeral and the anti-ephemeral seem to co-exist productively for media marketers, the combination may prove more problematic for media consumers looking to preserve what can be an intensely emotional and affective media experience.
Talks by Stephanie Janes
In 2001, Steven Spielberg’s A.I.: Artificial Intelligence became the first Hollywood film to util... more In 2001, Steven Spielberg’s A.I.: Artificial Intelligence became the first Hollywood film to utilise a fully-fledged alternate reality game as part of its marketing campaign. Conceived and executed by a small team at Microsoft Games Studios, The Beast was a highly interactive murder-mystery narrative set in the world of the film.
Since then, films including Cloverfield, The Dark Knight, and Tron: Legacy have all launched ARGs of varying complexity.
However, ARGs are not used solely for promotional purposes. One of the most concrete definitions focuses on them as a genre of multiplatform storytelling and collaborative gaming:
‘a cohesive narrative revealed through a series of websites, emails, phone calls, IM, live and in-person events. Players often earn new information to further the plot by cracking puzzles... the players of these games typically organise themselves into communities to share information and speculate on what it all means and where it’s all going’.
As a result, not only do promotional ARGs work earnestly to suggest that ‘This Is Not A Game’ there is also a desire to prove that ‘This Is Not A Piece of Marketing’. Much academic work around them avoids discussing their commercial function and favours either reading them as narrative-extending paratexts (Jonathan Gray) or examples of the power of collective intelligence (Henry Jenkins, Jane McGonigal).Using a number of examples, including The Beast, Why So Serious and Super 8, this paper intends to discuss the potential conflicts that might occur when a medium so deeply involved in storytelling takes on the responsibilities of movie-selling.
Power relations between fans communities and media companies have always been key to debates with... more Power relations between fans communities and media companies have always been key to debates within Fan Studies. The extent to which fan communities ‘resist’ or remain in thrall to the power of media producers has moved from a resistant/incorporated dichotomy to the suggestion that fandom has become a normative mode of mainstream media consumption. Either way, the relationship has always been a delicate and complex one.
As fan communities moved online, notions of digital convergence and collective intelligence were mobilised to argue for fans as empowered consumer collectives, increasing their ability to control decisions around their favoured media products.
This paper uses promotional alternate reality games to problematise notions of consumer/producer power in the age of digital convergence. ARGs have been used to promote films such as A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (2001), The Dark Knight (2008) and Super 8 (2010). Although difficult to define, ARGs may be described as:
‘A cohesive narrative revealed through a series of websites, e-mails, phone calls, IM, live and in-person events. Players often earn new information to further the plot by cracking puzzles... players... typically organize themselves into communities to share information and speculate on what it all means and where it’s all going.
ARGs are unique in that they are explicitly commercial entities, but encourage, and arguably require a mode of engagement which replicates that of a ‘grassroots’ fan community. Feelings of player agency are created via interactivity, but are arguably illusory since puppetmasters always control of the strings of the games they have designed. In this almost paradoxical situation, where an apparently organic fan community can be created by a corporation, who really holds the power? Furthermore, how relevant is the issue of power to such media consumers, if they are willing to collude with producers for the illusion of inclusion?
Mainlining Fandom: Hollywood’s Use of Alternate Reality Gaming as a Marketing Strategy
Hollywood... more Mainlining Fandom: Hollywood’s Use of Alternate Reality Gaming as a Marketing Strategy
Hollywood has always approached the internet with caution, often viewing it as a battleground for IP rights rather than a communicative link between the industry and its audiences.
However, over the past decade, web presence has increasingly become part of everyday life for many consumers. Companies have responded by increasing their marketing activities online, some investigating more immersive viral strategies, such as the promotional alternate reality game (ARG). Since the launch of the ARG known as The Beast to promote Artificial Intelligence (2001), much has been made of this highly participatory mode of marketing. Although difficult to define, the following is a good description of an ARG:
‘A cohesive narrative revealed through a series of websites, e-mails, phone calls, IM, live and in-person events. Players often earn new information to further the plot by cracking puzzles... players... typically organize themselves into communities to share information and speculate on what it all means and where it’s all going.
Whilst this might sound like an attempt to communicate with a niche fan audience, this paper uses the ARG for Super 8 (2011) as a case study to argue that Hollywood is using this strategy to harness fan creativity and gamer sensibilities and ‘mainstream’ these modes of media consumption. I suggest that ARGs can be used to secure brand awareness and ultimately the loyalty ascribed to fan communities, from a wider audience who are less responsive to traditional advertising channels. ARGs allow marketers to create and to an extent control what were once considered ‘grassroots’ communities around a property before its release and encourage the average internet browser to pursue a highly interactive mode of participation with the text that would once have been considered the remit of hardcore fans.
FULL PAPER AVAILABLE IN:
Besides the Screen: Moving Images through Distribution, Promotion and... more FULL PAPER AVAILABLE IN:
Besides the Screen: Moving Images through Distribution, Promotion and Curation eds. Virginia Crisp & Gabriel Menotti Gonring, Palgrave Macmillan (2015)
The definition of viral marketing is notoriously tricky to pin down, since it tends to overlap with related concepts such as ‘buzz marketing’ or ‘word-of-mouth’. However, the strategies I will discuss in this paper are based entirely online and encourage not only referral (e.g. ‘dude you have to see this YouTube video), but immersion in and interaction with the world of the film before, during and after viewing, allowing the viewer to shape, or at least appear to shape, their cinematographic experience.
Viral marketing, I argue, marks a shift away from what Justin Wyatt (1994) calls ‘high concept’ filmmaking and marketing. Campaigns for films such as The Blair Witch Project (1999), Cloverfield (2008), A.I. (2001) and The Dark Knight (2008), demonstrate a change in the relationship between producer and consumer to a stage where producers are encouraging consumers to be active, rather than passive, withholding information on forthcoming releases, and daring them to follow trails of online clues to get at it. This move to encourage agency or the appearance of agency, in the cinematographic experience is often discouraged in other areas of the industry, e.g. distribution. This paper questions the motives behind such elaborate online campaigns, arguing that the deliberate positioning of the viewer as investigator is accompanied by an extension of the filmic world (as opposed to simply an extension of narrative online) to produce a seemingly immersive experience that can be, but is not always, reflected in the aesthetics of the film itself, and that can transform a piece of marketing material into an entertainment experience in its own right.
Papers by Stephanie Janes
Routledge eBooks, Nov 22, 2022
Journal of Marketing Management
C&T '21: Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Communities & Technologies - Wicked Problems in the Age of Tech, 2021
What does it mean to invite vulnerable communities to the table in times of crisis not just as su... more What does it mean to invite vulnerable communities to the table in times of crisis not just as subjects, but as co-designers, in ways that facilitate nourishing and care-full relations? In this paper, we present the case of an online design sprint involving two groups of diverse participants in London and Tokyo as the Covid-19 pandemic unfolded. This modified design sprint model, which we describe as a ’care-full design stroll’, integrated co-design approaches with ethics of care to offer remote cultural experiences aimed at addressing inequalities of access and inclusion faced by the arts and cultural sectors in Japan and the UK. We analyse data from ethnographic observations, interviews and surveys in both nations to illustrate the challenges and opportunities of facilitating design sprints online. Our findings show how care-full co-design, underpinned by concepts of thinking-with and working-alongside, can be facilitated in online-only and/or limited terrains, in ways that nourish cultural organisations and their publics in times of great uncertainty. We conclude with a set of six design principles which provide practical recommendations for the effective facilitation of future care-full co-design sprints for groups working in a variety of settings.
Alternate Reality Games, 2019
Alternate Reality Games, 2019
Alternate Reality Games, 2019
Networking Knowledge: Journal of the MeCCSA Postgraduate Network, 2014
This article uses data gathered from interviews with game designers and a survey of a core group ... more This article uses data gathered from interviews with game designers and a survey of a core group of 30 players to suggest that Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) allow media producers to develop a close relationship with consumers, prompting us to rethink previous notions of power in contemporary producer/consumer relationships. Discourse has moved from a resistant/incorporated dichotomy (Abercrombie and Longhurst 1998; Hills 2002) to the suggestion that fandom has become a normative mode of mainstream media consumption (Jenkins 2007). Theories of digital convergence and collective intelligence are often mobilised to argue for fans as empowered consumer collectives, increasing their ability to control decisions around their favoured media products (Jenkins 2006). Promotional ARGs are unique sites for studying this complex relationship. ARGs have been used since around 2001 to promote a number of films including A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (Steven Spielberg, 2001) and The Dark Knight (...
Alternate Reality Games, 2019
CINEJ Cinema Journal, 2017
Sarah Atkinson, Beyond the Screen: Emerging Cinema and Engaging Audiences. London: Bloomsbury, 20... more Sarah Atkinson, Beyond the Screen: Emerging Cinema and Engaging Audiences. London: Bloomsbury, 2013. 2014. xiii + 293 pp. ISBN 978-1-6235-6637-1
The concept of textual poaching positions fans as active audiences who borrow from, embellish and... more The concept of textual poaching positions fans as active audiences who borrow from, embellish and remix textual materials as part of their consumption. However, this potentially invasive behaviour is often at odds with the rights and demands of intellectual property holders. Through case studies of alternate reality games, filesharing networks, Twitter hashtags, and football (soccer) fandom, this forum article brings together four scholars to discuss the inherent tension between brands and fannish consumer practices. In particular, the authors focus on the interplay of power and control between the two parties, debating the extent to which fandom might be considered a negotiated form of brand ownership.
Arts and the Market, 2015
Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to investigate the ways in which players and producers of p... more Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to investigate the ways in which players and producers of promotional alternate reality games (ARGs) negotiate their commercial status, similar to the way in which Matt Hills (2002) argues fan communities negotiate their position within a commercial media industry.Design/methodology/approach– In-depth interviews with game designers is combined with the results of an online player survey and qualitative analysis of discussion on player forums. This provides a strong platform from which to discuss player and producer attitudes towards the status of promotional ARGs as marketing materials.Findings– Both players and producers use various strategies which allow them to negotiate their relationship to the commercial nature of promotional ARGs. These include a focus on the immersive nature of the games (also known as the “This Is Not a Game” philosophy), defining their creative interests strongly against the perceived commercial interests of corporate ...
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Book Chapters by Stephanie Janes
The definition of viral marketing is notoriously tricky to pin down, since it tends to overlap with related concepts such as ‘buzz marketing’ or ‘word-of-mouth’. However, the strategies I will discuss in this paper are based entirely online and encourage not only referral (e.g. ‘dude you have to see this YouTube video), but immersion in and interaction with the world of the film before, during and after viewing, allowing the viewer to shape, or at least appear to shape, their cinematographic experience.
Viral marketing, I argue, marks a shift away from what Justin Wyatt (1994) calls ‘high concept’ filmmaking and marketing.1 Campaigns for films such as The Blair Witch Project (1999), Cloverfield (2008), A.I. (2001) and The Dark Knight (2008), demonstrate a change in the relationship between producer and consumer to a stage where producers are encouraging consumers to be active, rather than passive, withholding information on forthcoming releases, and daring them to follow trails of online clues to get at it. This move to encourage agency or the appearance of agency, in the cinematographic experience is often discouraged in other areas of the industry, e.g. distribution. This paper questions the motives behind such elaborate online campaigns, arguing that the deliberate positioning of the viewer as investigator is accompanied by an extension of the filmic world (as opposed to simply an extension of narrative online) to produce a seemingly immersive experience that can be, but is not always, reflected in the aesthetics of the film itself, and that can transform a piece of marketing material into an entertainment experience in its own right.
This chapter intends to explore the varied and complex temporalities which can be seen to co-exist within one particular promotional paratext: Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) and their potential implications for both media producers and consumers when they are utilised within contemporary media marketing campaigns.
Often placed in the category of ‘viral’ marketing strategies, ARGs have been used since around 2001 to promote a number of films including A.I: Artificial Intelligence (USA, Steven Spielberg, 2001). and The Dark Knight (USA, Christopher Nolan, 2008). They create a narrative mystery set in the world of the film which is then broken down and scattered across the internet. Players work collaboratively in online communities to reconstruct that narrative using everyday media channels such as email, websites, phone calls, voicemails, and larger scale live events, like scavenger hunts.
Current literature often discusses ARGS in terms of narrative extension or their role as paratext in relation to a primary text (Gray, 2010; Ornebring, 2007). In less text-focused analyses they are discussed as sites for participatory culture and consumer empowerment (Jenkins, 2006). Some have even gone as far as to suggest that the strategies and techniques of such collaborative play can prompt players to attempt real-world problem solving, and the implications of such collective intelligence for various aspects of social life (McGonigal, 2008). Rarely does the focus turn to the temporal dimensions of this rather unique piece of promotional material, despite that fact that real-time gameplay is one of the genre’s defining elements and a fundamental part of the gameplay experience.
Grainge notes a tension in many ephemeral media texts, arguing for ‘a dual movement towards speed and storage, immediacy and archiving’ (Grainge, 2011:3), which is exemplified in YouTube. Grainge also points out that, whilst some scholars such as Schneider and Foot, have identified this as a tension inherent in the web itself, Mary Ann Doane traces this even further back in her work on cinema and temporality in late modernity, describing a ‘tension between a desire for instaneity and an archival aspiration.’ (Doane, 2002: 29) This relationship between media technology, the ephemeral and the impulse to archive and record the present is therefore not entirely new.
Elizabeth Evans locates a similar tension in web-dramas, describing them as involving ‘modes of engagement that are both anti- ephemeral and hyper ephemeral’. (Evans, 2011:156). This essay proposes to use this as a framework when discussing elements of ARGs, most of which can also be seen to fit into either of these two categories. However, rather than there being a tension between them, the two seem to co-exist comfortably, each offering different advantages for media producers and marketers trying to survive in a perceived ‘attention economy’ (Lanham, 2006).
A number of elements of ARGs appear to lean more towards the ‘hyper ephemeral’. The real-time nature of the games means that they are fundamentally based on a present-ness of experience, particularly in their incorporation of live events such as scavenger hunts or flashmobs. Due to this experiential nature they cannot be re-rerun or replayed – you literally had to be there at the time in order to have the game experience. Even in-game websites are rarely accessible in their original formats due to consistent in-game updating.
Their status as marketing also restricts the lifespan of the text and therefore the duration of the gameplay experience. As far as the marketing team are concerned, the ARG exists primarily to promote another media text and ends with the release of that primary text. In effect, the ARG comes out of circulation, and therefore existence, as soon as the film comes into circulation.
Yet, despite having an apparently commercially determined life-span, ARGs tend to linger in some forms beyond the built-in recommended use-by date. Remnants of complete puzzles and websites will continue to float around the web. Even more persistent are the community forums which allow us to trace back through a game via player discussion. These communities will linger and perhaps even reconvene at a later date to follow another game.
Whilst these varying temporalities have a number of potential advantages for film marketers, they also highlight a number of broader issues facing consumers of digital media. There is a strong archival tendency in ARG communities, who are aware of the fleeting nature of the games they are so passionately committed to, and who are driven in an attempt to make permanent that which is ephemeral. Such a drive also reflects a tension which is often considered symptomatic of the internet as a digital medium itself, at once a space of ‘archival promise’ and yet possessing a shifting temporality which is ‘emergent and continuous’, a ‘continuous networked present’ (Hoskins, 2012: 100). As communities collectively reconstruct their experiences of the games they participate in the production of what Hoskins might describe as ‘digital network memory’, wherein data is highly transferable and accessible, but also eminently erasable.
In contrast to the, arguably less stable, digital content produced by both players and producers of ARGs, Many games also involve the distribution of material objects and promotional materials, or ‘swag’ as they are known on the forums. This can range from posters and window stickers to replica props or collectibles associated with the film or the game. It is possible that, as Hoskins also suggests, the ephemerality of the digital side of the games affords the ‘material objects… of cultural memory… greater significance’ (Hoskins, 2012: 103). Possession of swag becomes not only a more permanent reminder of the games, free from the prospect of digital deletion, but also a form of cultural capital amongst players. ARGs therefore can therefore be seen as a site where this tension between temporalities is actively negotiated by media consumers, and some of Hoskins’ predictions for the implications of the ‘digital network memory’ can potentially be seen playing out.
Playing an ARG involves experiencing various temporalities, often on a very personal level. By outlining these differing and apparently contradictory temporalities, this article hopes to shed more light on the experience of a complex, under-discussed and strongly temporally defined media paratext. Whilst the hyper ephemeral and the anti-ephemeral seem to co-exist productively for media marketers, the combination may prove more problematic for media consumers looking to preserve what can be an intensely emotional and affective media experience.
Talks by Stephanie Janes
Since then, films including Cloverfield, The Dark Knight, and Tron: Legacy have all launched ARGs of varying complexity.
However, ARGs are not used solely for promotional purposes. One of the most concrete definitions focuses on them as a genre of multiplatform storytelling and collaborative gaming:
‘a cohesive narrative revealed through a series of websites, emails, phone calls, IM, live and in-person events. Players often earn new information to further the plot by cracking puzzles... the players of these games typically organise themselves into communities to share information and speculate on what it all means and where it’s all going’.
As a result, not only do promotional ARGs work earnestly to suggest that ‘This Is Not A Game’ there is also a desire to prove that ‘This Is Not A Piece of Marketing’. Much academic work around them avoids discussing their commercial function and favours either reading them as narrative-extending paratexts (Jonathan Gray) or examples of the power of collective intelligence (Henry Jenkins, Jane McGonigal).Using a number of examples, including The Beast, Why So Serious and Super 8, this paper intends to discuss the potential conflicts that might occur when a medium so deeply involved in storytelling takes on the responsibilities of movie-selling.
As fan communities moved online, notions of digital convergence and collective intelligence were mobilised to argue for fans as empowered consumer collectives, increasing their ability to control decisions around their favoured media products.
This paper uses promotional alternate reality games to problematise notions of consumer/producer power in the age of digital convergence. ARGs have been used to promote films such as A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (2001), The Dark Knight (2008) and Super 8 (2010). Although difficult to define, ARGs may be described as:
‘A cohesive narrative revealed through a series of websites, e-mails, phone calls, IM, live and in-person events. Players often earn new information to further the plot by cracking puzzles... players... typically organize themselves into communities to share information and speculate on what it all means and where it’s all going.
ARGs are unique in that they are explicitly commercial entities, but encourage, and arguably require a mode of engagement which replicates that of a ‘grassroots’ fan community. Feelings of player agency are created via interactivity, but are arguably illusory since puppetmasters always control of the strings of the games they have designed. In this almost paradoxical situation, where an apparently organic fan community can be created by a corporation, who really holds the power? Furthermore, how relevant is the issue of power to such media consumers, if they are willing to collude with producers for the illusion of inclusion?
Hollywood has always approached the internet with caution, often viewing it as a battleground for IP rights rather than a communicative link between the industry and its audiences.
However, over the past decade, web presence has increasingly become part of everyday life for many consumers. Companies have responded by increasing their marketing activities online, some investigating more immersive viral strategies, such as the promotional alternate reality game (ARG). Since the launch of the ARG known as The Beast to promote Artificial Intelligence (2001), much has been made of this highly participatory mode of marketing. Although difficult to define, the following is a good description of an ARG:
‘A cohesive narrative revealed through a series of websites, e-mails, phone calls, IM, live and in-person events. Players often earn new information to further the plot by cracking puzzles... players... typically organize themselves into communities to share information and speculate on what it all means and where it’s all going.
Whilst this might sound like an attempt to communicate with a niche fan audience, this paper uses the ARG for Super 8 (2011) as a case study to argue that Hollywood is using this strategy to harness fan creativity and gamer sensibilities and ‘mainstream’ these modes of media consumption. I suggest that ARGs can be used to secure brand awareness and ultimately the loyalty ascribed to fan communities, from a wider audience who are less responsive to traditional advertising channels. ARGs allow marketers to create and to an extent control what were once considered ‘grassroots’ communities around a property before its release and encourage the average internet browser to pursue a highly interactive mode of participation with the text that would once have been considered the remit of hardcore fans.
Besides the Screen: Moving Images through Distribution, Promotion and Curation eds. Virginia Crisp & Gabriel Menotti Gonring, Palgrave Macmillan (2015)
The definition of viral marketing is notoriously tricky to pin down, since it tends to overlap with related concepts such as ‘buzz marketing’ or ‘word-of-mouth’. However, the strategies I will discuss in this paper are based entirely online and encourage not only referral (e.g. ‘dude you have to see this YouTube video), but immersion in and interaction with the world of the film before, during and after viewing, allowing the viewer to shape, or at least appear to shape, their cinematographic experience.
Viral marketing, I argue, marks a shift away from what Justin Wyatt (1994) calls ‘high concept’ filmmaking and marketing. Campaigns for films such as The Blair Witch Project (1999), Cloverfield (2008), A.I. (2001) and The Dark Knight (2008), demonstrate a change in the relationship between producer and consumer to a stage where producers are encouraging consumers to be active, rather than passive, withholding information on forthcoming releases, and daring them to follow trails of online clues to get at it. This move to encourage agency or the appearance of agency, in the cinematographic experience is often discouraged in other areas of the industry, e.g. distribution. This paper questions the motives behind such elaborate online campaigns, arguing that the deliberate positioning of the viewer as investigator is accompanied by an extension of the filmic world (as opposed to simply an extension of narrative online) to produce a seemingly immersive experience that can be, but is not always, reflected in the aesthetics of the film itself, and that can transform a piece of marketing material into an entertainment experience in its own right.
Papers by Stephanie Janes
The definition of viral marketing is notoriously tricky to pin down, since it tends to overlap with related concepts such as ‘buzz marketing’ or ‘word-of-mouth’. However, the strategies I will discuss in this paper are based entirely online and encourage not only referral (e.g. ‘dude you have to see this YouTube video), but immersion in and interaction with the world of the film before, during and after viewing, allowing the viewer to shape, or at least appear to shape, their cinematographic experience.
Viral marketing, I argue, marks a shift away from what Justin Wyatt (1994) calls ‘high concept’ filmmaking and marketing.1 Campaigns for films such as The Blair Witch Project (1999), Cloverfield (2008), A.I. (2001) and The Dark Knight (2008), demonstrate a change in the relationship between producer and consumer to a stage where producers are encouraging consumers to be active, rather than passive, withholding information on forthcoming releases, and daring them to follow trails of online clues to get at it. This move to encourage agency or the appearance of agency, in the cinematographic experience is often discouraged in other areas of the industry, e.g. distribution. This paper questions the motives behind such elaborate online campaigns, arguing that the deliberate positioning of the viewer as investigator is accompanied by an extension of the filmic world (as opposed to simply an extension of narrative online) to produce a seemingly immersive experience that can be, but is not always, reflected in the aesthetics of the film itself, and that can transform a piece of marketing material into an entertainment experience in its own right.
This chapter intends to explore the varied and complex temporalities which can be seen to co-exist within one particular promotional paratext: Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) and their potential implications for both media producers and consumers when they are utilised within contemporary media marketing campaigns.
Often placed in the category of ‘viral’ marketing strategies, ARGs have been used since around 2001 to promote a number of films including A.I: Artificial Intelligence (USA, Steven Spielberg, 2001). and The Dark Knight (USA, Christopher Nolan, 2008). They create a narrative mystery set in the world of the film which is then broken down and scattered across the internet. Players work collaboratively in online communities to reconstruct that narrative using everyday media channels such as email, websites, phone calls, voicemails, and larger scale live events, like scavenger hunts.
Current literature often discusses ARGS in terms of narrative extension or their role as paratext in relation to a primary text (Gray, 2010; Ornebring, 2007). In less text-focused analyses they are discussed as sites for participatory culture and consumer empowerment (Jenkins, 2006). Some have even gone as far as to suggest that the strategies and techniques of such collaborative play can prompt players to attempt real-world problem solving, and the implications of such collective intelligence for various aspects of social life (McGonigal, 2008). Rarely does the focus turn to the temporal dimensions of this rather unique piece of promotional material, despite that fact that real-time gameplay is one of the genre’s defining elements and a fundamental part of the gameplay experience.
Grainge notes a tension in many ephemeral media texts, arguing for ‘a dual movement towards speed and storage, immediacy and archiving’ (Grainge, 2011:3), which is exemplified in YouTube. Grainge also points out that, whilst some scholars such as Schneider and Foot, have identified this as a tension inherent in the web itself, Mary Ann Doane traces this even further back in her work on cinema and temporality in late modernity, describing a ‘tension between a desire for instaneity and an archival aspiration.’ (Doane, 2002: 29) This relationship between media technology, the ephemeral and the impulse to archive and record the present is therefore not entirely new.
Elizabeth Evans locates a similar tension in web-dramas, describing them as involving ‘modes of engagement that are both anti- ephemeral and hyper ephemeral’. (Evans, 2011:156). This essay proposes to use this as a framework when discussing elements of ARGs, most of which can also be seen to fit into either of these two categories. However, rather than there being a tension between them, the two seem to co-exist comfortably, each offering different advantages for media producers and marketers trying to survive in a perceived ‘attention economy’ (Lanham, 2006).
A number of elements of ARGs appear to lean more towards the ‘hyper ephemeral’. The real-time nature of the games means that they are fundamentally based on a present-ness of experience, particularly in their incorporation of live events such as scavenger hunts or flashmobs. Due to this experiential nature they cannot be re-rerun or replayed – you literally had to be there at the time in order to have the game experience. Even in-game websites are rarely accessible in their original formats due to consistent in-game updating.
Their status as marketing also restricts the lifespan of the text and therefore the duration of the gameplay experience. As far as the marketing team are concerned, the ARG exists primarily to promote another media text and ends with the release of that primary text. In effect, the ARG comes out of circulation, and therefore existence, as soon as the film comes into circulation.
Yet, despite having an apparently commercially determined life-span, ARGs tend to linger in some forms beyond the built-in recommended use-by date. Remnants of complete puzzles and websites will continue to float around the web. Even more persistent are the community forums which allow us to trace back through a game via player discussion. These communities will linger and perhaps even reconvene at a later date to follow another game.
Whilst these varying temporalities have a number of potential advantages for film marketers, they also highlight a number of broader issues facing consumers of digital media. There is a strong archival tendency in ARG communities, who are aware of the fleeting nature of the games they are so passionately committed to, and who are driven in an attempt to make permanent that which is ephemeral. Such a drive also reflects a tension which is often considered symptomatic of the internet as a digital medium itself, at once a space of ‘archival promise’ and yet possessing a shifting temporality which is ‘emergent and continuous’, a ‘continuous networked present’ (Hoskins, 2012: 100). As communities collectively reconstruct their experiences of the games they participate in the production of what Hoskins might describe as ‘digital network memory’, wherein data is highly transferable and accessible, but also eminently erasable.
In contrast to the, arguably less stable, digital content produced by both players and producers of ARGs, Many games also involve the distribution of material objects and promotional materials, or ‘swag’ as they are known on the forums. This can range from posters and window stickers to replica props or collectibles associated with the film or the game. It is possible that, as Hoskins also suggests, the ephemerality of the digital side of the games affords the ‘material objects… of cultural memory… greater significance’ (Hoskins, 2012: 103). Possession of swag becomes not only a more permanent reminder of the games, free from the prospect of digital deletion, but also a form of cultural capital amongst players. ARGs therefore can therefore be seen as a site where this tension between temporalities is actively negotiated by media consumers, and some of Hoskins’ predictions for the implications of the ‘digital network memory’ can potentially be seen playing out.
Playing an ARG involves experiencing various temporalities, often on a very personal level. By outlining these differing and apparently contradictory temporalities, this article hopes to shed more light on the experience of a complex, under-discussed and strongly temporally defined media paratext. Whilst the hyper ephemeral and the anti-ephemeral seem to co-exist productively for media marketers, the combination may prove more problematic for media consumers looking to preserve what can be an intensely emotional and affective media experience.
Since then, films including Cloverfield, The Dark Knight, and Tron: Legacy have all launched ARGs of varying complexity.
However, ARGs are not used solely for promotional purposes. One of the most concrete definitions focuses on them as a genre of multiplatform storytelling and collaborative gaming:
‘a cohesive narrative revealed through a series of websites, emails, phone calls, IM, live and in-person events. Players often earn new information to further the plot by cracking puzzles... the players of these games typically organise themselves into communities to share information and speculate on what it all means and where it’s all going’.
As a result, not only do promotional ARGs work earnestly to suggest that ‘This Is Not A Game’ there is also a desire to prove that ‘This Is Not A Piece of Marketing’. Much academic work around them avoids discussing their commercial function and favours either reading them as narrative-extending paratexts (Jonathan Gray) or examples of the power of collective intelligence (Henry Jenkins, Jane McGonigal).Using a number of examples, including The Beast, Why So Serious and Super 8, this paper intends to discuss the potential conflicts that might occur when a medium so deeply involved in storytelling takes on the responsibilities of movie-selling.
As fan communities moved online, notions of digital convergence and collective intelligence were mobilised to argue for fans as empowered consumer collectives, increasing their ability to control decisions around their favoured media products.
This paper uses promotional alternate reality games to problematise notions of consumer/producer power in the age of digital convergence. ARGs have been used to promote films such as A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (2001), The Dark Knight (2008) and Super 8 (2010). Although difficult to define, ARGs may be described as:
‘A cohesive narrative revealed through a series of websites, e-mails, phone calls, IM, live and in-person events. Players often earn new information to further the plot by cracking puzzles... players... typically organize themselves into communities to share information and speculate on what it all means and where it’s all going.
ARGs are unique in that they are explicitly commercial entities, but encourage, and arguably require a mode of engagement which replicates that of a ‘grassroots’ fan community. Feelings of player agency are created via interactivity, but are arguably illusory since puppetmasters always control of the strings of the games they have designed. In this almost paradoxical situation, where an apparently organic fan community can be created by a corporation, who really holds the power? Furthermore, how relevant is the issue of power to such media consumers, if they are willing to collude with producers for the illusion of inclusion?
Hollywood has always approached the internet with caution, often viewing it as a battleground for IP rights rather than a communicative link between the industry and its audiences.
However, over the past decade, web presence has increasingly become part of everyday life for many consumers. Companies have responded by increasing their marketing activities online, some investigating more immersive viral strategies, such as the promotional alternate reality game (ARG). Since the launch of the ARG known as The Beast to promote Artificial Intelligence (2001), much has been made of this highly participatory mode of marketing. Although difficult to define, the following is a good description of an ARG:
‘A cohesive narrative revealed through a series of websites, e-mails, phone calls, IM, live and in-person events. Players often earn new information to further the plot by cracking puzzles... players... typically organize themselves into communities to share information and speculate on what it all means and where it’s all going.
Whilst this might sound like an attempt to communicate with a niche fan audience, this paper uses the ARG for Super 8 (2011) as a case study to argue that Hollywood is using this strategy to harness fan creativity and gamer sensibilities and ‘mainstream’ these modes of media consumption. I suggest that ARGs can be used to secure brand awareness and ultimately the loyalty ascribed to fan communities, from a wider audience who are less responsive to traditional advertising channels. ARGs allow marketers to create and to an extent control what were once considered ‘grassroots’ communities around a property before its release and encourage the average internet browser to pursue a highly interactive mode of participation with the text that would once have been considered the remit of hardcore fans.
Besides the Screen: Moving Images through Distribution, Promotion and Curation eds. Virginia Crisp & Gabriel Menotti Gonring, Palgrave Macmillan (2015)
The definition of viral marketing is notoriously tricky to pin down, since it tends to overlap with related concepts such as ‘buzz marketing’ or ‘word-of-mouth’. However, the strategies I will discuss in this paper are based entirely online and encourage not only referral (e.g. ‘dude you have to see this YouTube video), but immersion in and interaction with the world of the film before, during and after viewing, allowing the viewer to shape, or at least appear to shape, their cinematographic experience.
Viral marketing, I argue, marks a shift away from what Justin Wyatt (1994) calls ‘high concept’ filmmaking and marketing. Campaigns for films such as The Blair Witch Project (1999), Cloverfield (2008), A.I. (2001) and The Dark Knight (2008), demonstrate a change in the relationship between producer and consumer to a stage where producers are encouraging consumers to be active, rather than passive, withholding information on forthcoming releases, and daring them to follow trails of online clues to get at it. This move to encourage agency or the appearance of agency, in the cinematographic experience is often discouraged in other areas of the industry, e.g. distribution. This paper questions the motives behind such elaborate online campaigns, arguing that the deliberate positioning of the viewer as investigator is accompanied by an extension of the filmic world (as opposed to simply an extension of narrative online) to produce a seemingly immersive experience that can be, but is not always, reflected in the aesthetics of the film itself, and that can transform a piece of marketing material into an entertainment experience in its own right.
This article uses data gathered from interviews with game designers and a survey of a core group of 30 players to suggest that Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) allow media producers to develop a close relationship with consumers, prompting us to rethink previous notions of power in contemporary producer/consumer relationships. Discourse has moved from a resistant/incorporated dichotomy (Abercrombie and Longhurst 1998; Hills 2002) to the suggestion that fandom has become a normative mode of mainstream media consumption (Jenkins 2007). Theories of digital convergence and collective intelligence are often mobilised to argue for fans as empowered consumer collectives, increasing their ability to control decisions around their favoured media products (Jenkins 2006). Promotional ARGs are unique sites for studying this complex relationship. ARGs have been used since around 2001 to promote a number of films including A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (Steven Spielberg, 2001) and The Dark Knight (Christopher Nolan, 2008). They create a narrative mystery set in the world of the film which is broken down and scattered across the internet. Players work collaboratively in online fan communities to reconstruct that narrative using everyday media channels such as email, websites, phone calls, voicemails, and larger scale live events, like scavenger hunts. Such games are sites of real-time interaction creating a give/take relationship between producers and consumers, which results in a more complex system of co- creation and negotiated ownership, as opposed to resistance, incorporation, or indeed cultural empowerment.
The concept of textual poaching positions fans as active audiences who borrow from,
embellish and remix textual materials as part of their consumption. However, this
potentially invasive behaviour is often at odds with the rights and demands of intellectual
property holders. Through case studies of alternate reality games, filesharing networks,
Twitter hashtags, and football (soccer) fandom, this forum article brings together four
scholars to discuss the inherent tension between brands and fannish consumer practices. In
particular, the authors focus on the interplay of power and control between the two parties,
debating the extent to which fandom might be considered a negotiated form of brand
ownership.
Through case studies of alternate reality games, filesharing networks, Twitter hashtags, and football (soccer) fandom, this forum article brings together four scholars to discuss the inherent tension between brands and fannish consumer practices. In particular, the authors focus on the interplay of power and control between the two parties, debating the extent to which fandom might be considered a negotiated form of brand ownership."