Rhiannon Bury – författare

Cyberspaces of Their Own interrogates the social and spatial relations of the rapidly expanding virtual terrain of media fandom. For the first time, issues of identity, community and space are brought together in this in-depth ethnographic study of two female internet communities. Members are fans of the American television series The X-Files and the Canadian series Due South. Forging links between media, cultural and internet studies, this book examines negotiations of gender, class, sexuality and nationality in making meaning out of a television show, producing fiction based on television characters, creating and maintaining online communal relations, and organizing cyberspace in a way that marks it out as alternative to that which surrounds it.

Television 2.0 sets out to document and interrogate shifting patterns of engagement with digital television. Television content has not only been decoupled from the broadcast schedule through the use of digital video recorders (DVRs) but from broadcasting itself through streaming platforms such as Netflix, Vimeo and YouTube as well as downloading platforms such as iTunes and The Pirate Bay. Moreover, television content has been decoupled from the television screen itself as a result of digital convergence and divergence, leading to the proliferation of computer and mobile screens. Television 2.0 is the first book to provide an in-depth empirical investigation into these technological affordances and the implications for viewing and fan participation. It provides a historical overview of television’s central role as a broadcast medium in the household as well as its linkages to participatory culture. Drawing on survey and interview data, Television 2.0 offers critical insights into the ways in which the meanings and uses of contemporary television are shaped not just by digitalization but by domestic relations as well as one’s affective relationship to particular television texts. Finally it rethinks what it means to be a participatory fan, and examines the ways in which established practices such as information seeking and community making are altered and new practices are created through the use of social media. Television 2.0 will be of interest to anyone teaching or studying media and communications.