Antoni Roig

‘The fruits of my own labor’: A case study on clashing models of co-creativity in the new media landscape

This article deals with the engagement of new media users in specific forms of participatory content production, focusing on productive and labour aspects in co-creative endeavours. We present a case analysis of a community-based filmmaking software, Moviestorm, focused on a specific set of practices – modding – and following the controversy that took place when a shift in the company’s business model altered the rules that tacitly constituted modders’ practices, particularly the notion of control over their own labour. We pay attention to motivations and expected rewards expressed by both modders and the company as a part of a negotiation process around the ownership and the affective and economic value of user-generated content. Our central argument is that through the analysis of practices, particularly in moments of conflict and change, we can acquire a more subtle understanding of an economy of affections in co-creative processes as well as observing the clashing models of co-creativity, with different approaches to peer production and hierarchy.

Reading Songs, Experiencing Music: Co-creation, Materiality and Expertise in Beck’s Song Reader

This chapter presents a detailed case study of the Song Reader project by Beck Hansen as a significant exponent of the changing relationship between musicians and their publics, in the framework of the continual attempts to reinvent the music industry. Song Reader was released in late 2012 in book format, containing music sheets of 20 new unrecorded songs, illustrations and some introductory notes inviting fans to perform and adapt them freely. Consequently, a wide range of creative outcomes of Song Reader appeared, from live performances to video material, graphic art or even recorded albums. Indeed, although it was not planned, different Beck-curated versions have been performed and released, thus constituting a valuable source for a cultural analysis in terms of participation, materiality, affection, authority and expertise.

Challenging prime time television Co-viewing practices in the Brazilian telenovela

Television (TV) has always been the focus of continuous debate around its shifting social practices, involving and challenging all established main agents, from content producers to brands, corporations, regulators and audiences (Boddy, 2002; Uricchio, 2002). At the same time, the remediations of TV are at the core of broader discussions on media change, particularly since the popularization of media consumption through the Internet. TV retains a position of centrality for understanding what it means to live in a connected environment. This article contributes to this debate through the analysis of the co-viewing practices within the specific context of Brazil’s most popular cultural product, the telenovela. After an overview of the key themes and scope of the research, we will situate the practices of co-viewing in the context of some of the key issues regarding connected viewing. We will deal with the particularities of the Brazilian telenovela as a cultural product and finally we will outline our empirical research on co-viewing practices in unofficial Facebook groups surrounding the controversial prime time telenovela ‘Babilônia’.