“Prosumer” as Second Nature

In class last week we talked about how the linear conception of sending and receiving information is evolving. In his essay entitled “Convergence Culture in the Creative Industries”, Mark Deuze discusses the “convergence of the cultures of production and consumption of media” within creative industries. He states that the distinction between producers and consumers of media content are blurring, creating a “prosumer”. He remarks that these “collaborations” have always existed in the past, but are much more visible and ubiquitous within the age of the Internet. This is certainly true as well outside the world of creative industries he focused on in journalism, games, marketing and advertising.

With social media platforms, and the rise of participatory and interactive media, “prosumers” can exercise an increased amount of control over what they see, hear, watch, etc. It seems like being a prosumer has become second nature to us. We like to share information through blogging, status updates, sharing links to articles, posting videos and photos, liking, commenting, tweeting, re-tweeting, following, etc., without really thinking twice about it. For example, the virtual responses to the presidential debate last week manifested themselves in the form of websites, Tumblr pages, memes, to name a few, which became news headlines the following day.

We also discussed the participatory nature of platforms such as social media through the lens of the ritual view of communication, first proposed by James Carey in “A Cultural Approach to Communication”. These platforms are a way of shaping the way we belong, reinforcing our sense of community within the virtual world. There is a strong sense of individual agency being fostered, where we are now potentially more inclined to determine where, when, and how we consume media.