Core Post #4

While many of my classmates obviously hate the Andrejevic piece, I find it somewhat useful in terms of thinking through the multiple effects of fan activities. First thing to clarify is that the article is not simply an accusation of the “exploitation” of online fan labors; rather, its attempts are to “understand and elucidate the ways in which creative activity and exploitation coexist and interpenetrate one another within the context of the emerging online economy.” (25) In other words, Andrejevic does not deny the empowerment brought by fan participation, nor does he understand the exploitation as a coercive power that leaves no choice for fans; rather, he just (perhaps tediously) reminds us that the relationship between passive viewing and participation is more complex than the binary opposition it may appear.

In this sense, the article is not contradictory to what Jenkins claims in his article— “fans are not empowered by mass culture; fans are empowered over mass culture” (491) and this is achieved through the practices of text poaching. For both Jenkins and Andrejevic, subversion and oppression are not inherent characteristics embedded in the medium itself, but rather effects produced through fan activities. If Jenkins’ article increases the audience’s awareness to use their autonomy as the base for consumer activism, Andrejevic’s piece, in contrast, warns audience of online forums’ tendency to exploit their labors, thus helps to prevent this practice go into its extreme form. In this sense, Andrejevic’s article may not be the most favorable for many readers, but it needs to exist. 

I did not expect the word “exploitation” causes so much indignation. Although I’m not very familiar with Marx, I speculate the word has something to do with an asymmetry in power relationships. As Andrejevic points out, participation is different from shared control (37). Although online forums increase the interactivity between the show and the audience, the interactivity is still “mediated” by someone (in most cases, the producer) who claims the right to regulate their texts. Twisting McLuhan’s metaphor about hot and cold media, if the totally passive viewership is a lecture, then the interactive viewership is analogous to a seminar—but with a discussion leader that decides when and how you can speak. It is not so much a question, then, about whether online users really enjoy the posting, or whether they can receive other kinds of (for example, mental) rewards through writing in the forum, than a question about the positions they stand in relation to the producers. It curdles into a question of ethics: who benefits from it, and is it rightly so?