Key Concepts [3/4] Audience (AS Media Studies)
Welcome back to the next tutorial video based
on the OCR AS Media Studies course.
In this tutorial, we are going to be looking
at the concept of Audiences.
The concept of audience is paramount to the
study of the media because all media is produced
for an audience.
Without the audience, the media product is
essentially worthless.
The understanding of this concept or idea
will be assessed in Section B of the exam,
in conjunction with Institutions.
In the past, various theories that tried to
explain the importance or the relevant role
of the Media Audience tended to dwell on the
idea of separating the audience into different
types of people to whom the media products
could be more easily targeted by marketers.
So males, between the ages 16-24, are seen
to like, in today’s market, is for quite
brutal horror films and gross-out comedies.
The marketing for such products will inevitably
attempt to capitalize on the interest of that
section of the audience.
We will come back to this when we talk about
distributing media products because that’s
where marketing becomes even more relevant.
Whatever question comes up in Section B of
the exam is likely to require some understanding
or analysis of Marketing.
For now, we are going to look at an early
audience theory, the hypodermic model.
This tended to be the audiences, essentially
passive receptors into which the all-powerful
media was able to inject its ideas.
The audience was seen as a kind of like an
amorphous mass, not a collection of individuals;
they would take what they were given and they
wouldn’t complaint about it.
This is how things progressed for some time.
However, it is not too far-fetched to suggest
that this model does have some related in
the contemporary world.
All of you have to do is look at what is shown
at the multiplexes on any given week.
It is this and that of blockbusters, family
animations, horror movies, rom-coms.
You make a deal with thriller, an action movie
thrown in there; that will probably be your
blockbuster.
Likewise on TV, we are bombarded with the
endless talent shows or programs or property
shows.
However, it is with the advent of digital
technology, affordable high quality digital
technology at that, for the home and the person,
which kind of heralded in, perhaps, the Golden
Age of the consumer as producer.
There is a blurring of boundaries that is
increasingly of interest for A Level Study.
To call it a Golden Age is perhaps an overstatement
somewhat.
We haven’t yet seen the next Spielberg emerge
having shot a feature film on his phone or
her phone for that matter.
But there are developments in technology,
how consumers view and share media that is
meant that the study of the audience as part
of the AS course has a different slant to
it than they made it done, say five years
ago.
They can no longer be considered passive receivers,
but will have the power to produce, distribute,
exhibit and exchange their own media.
So many young people particularly doing this
on a daily basis.
The Active Audience model is now considered
a more realistic way to talk about audience.
In simple terms, though you may not realize
it, young audiences, particularly, influence
the success or failure of records, films and
TV shows, simply by virtue of the fact that
they can broadcast their opinions live on
Twitter, FaceBook, SMS messenger and all of
these various platforms.
Naturally, marketers are keen to harness this
power and influence to promote their own products.
Indeed, the institutions have produced, distribute
and exhibit or exchanged media, have been
working frantically to protect the monopoly
on how and what we, the audience, get to see.
This leads us on, rather neutrally, to the
concept of Institutions which we will look
at more closely in the next tutorial.
Thanks for listening.
[End of audio – 04:41]
Key Concepts [3/4] Audience (AS Media Studies)
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