Transmedia Activism

This work aims to examine and portray how a gamified interactive documentary, extended across several media platforms, may engage people in the discussion of actual problems and stimulate social activism.

The theoretical part of this thesis examines the fairly new notion of gamification (Deterding, Khaled, Nacke, & Dixon, 2011; Deterding, Dixon, Khaled, & Nacke, 2011), which is a key concept to be explored throughout the thesis. This section is also intended to cover the actively evolving concepts of interactive documentary (Gaudenzi, 2013; Gifreu, 2012; Choi, 2009), transmedia storytelling (Jenkins, 2006; Pratten, 2015; Gambarato, 2013) and transmedia activism (Nanì, 2013; Hancox, 2014; Jenkins, 2016)—the field scrutinised by Lina Srivastava. The following empirical study analyses the unique case of Fort McMoney (2013), which is the first successful attempt to effectively combine documentary film and video game in order to achieve civic engagement in problem-solving and, potentially, lead to social change.

The qualitative method of research employs the transmedia project analytical model (Gambarato, 2013) to understand the nature of the project, identify a range of game design techniques and investigate the practical results. That makes the research valid for further explorations in this area, which could unravel essential factors of applying gamification to activism projects. The research findings demonstrate how the combination of interactive documentary and game logic works on catching people’s attention, resulting in deep understanding of a topic and provoking its discussion for social change.

Hashtags são largamente usadas em contextos de grande mobilização social para articular posicionamentos afins, configurando elos simbólicos que demarcam contextos coletivos de significação. Estabelecem, desse modo, narrativas fragmentadas e dispersas em conexões online e offline. Trata-se de uma forma significante que cresce em relevância à medida que seu uso social se expande e sua função mediadora se fortalece nas interações cotidianas. Com o propósito de compreender a função mediadora da hashtag e descrever sua dinâmica sociocomunicacional, acionamos o conceito de mediação derivado da semiótica peirceana. Com base nesse conceito, que é também um modelo de comunicação, descrevemos a dinâmica transmídia da hashtag #vemprarua, largamente utilizada em contextos de grande mobilização social no Brasil. A dinâmica transmídia é permeada por processos variados de mediação, normalmente provenientes da combinação entre ações institucionais, que se concretizam em distribuição multiplataforma, e a atividade produtiva da audiência em conexões de redes sociais online. No âmbito do que vem sendo caracterizado como transmídia ativismo, os processos de mediação são marcadamente políticos, comprometidos com causas sociais e voltados para gerar ação coletiva em busca de mudanças. Hashtags cumprem função mediadora destacada em dinâmicas transmídia, sendo especialmente relevantes em contextos de transmídia ativismo. Para investigar a ação mediadora da hashtag #vemprarua no contexto dos protestos brasileiros recentes, refizemos sua trajetória no Twitter e no Facebook por meio de coleta automática. A análise dos dados baseou-se nas relações sígnicas que conformam a semiose peirceana, ou mediação.
http://www.labcom-ifp.ubi.pt/ficheiros/201906241348-2019_prado_satuf_comunicacao_ambiente_digital.pdf?fbclid=IwAR3G7Ml4ibblBDhSEVRvjgelUpEVaMTNi8qjh52q_6TggRLDq3WB8zCJSLY

This essay aims to reflect on why and how the research on journalism and, specifically, research focused on the possible future innovations to be applied, may look at the concept and logic of transmedia as a way to refresh ideas, incorporate experimental methods and create/develop new forms, genres and models. In the current fluid media ecology, mobile and online environments play an outstanding role when identifying aspects, features and potentialities for interface design, interactivity, information architecture and its visuali-zation, localization and mobility, usability, etc., among others.

The spreading of fake news about the trial of former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on January, 2018 is analyzed here according to the pragmatic conception of truth proposed by Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914). Through collecting in online social networks, the collective effort to establish competing beliefs was observed, according to Peircean methods of tenacity and authority. The analyzed communicational process, characterized as transmedia activism, was driven by the mediation of hashtags that referred to political polarization and posts attributed to celebrities. It is concluded that the dispute for the semiotic value of truth fostered the transmedia expansion of fake content and, paradoxically, verified news.
Keywords: Transmedia, semiosis, fake news

Este estudio busca comprender hasta qué punto el periodismo multiplataforma
practicado por TV3, en asociación con su canal de noticias 3/24, acerca del tema de la
soberanía de Cataluña asume configuración transmedia o es caso típico de dinámica
intermedia. Los procedimientos metodológicos se basan en la observación sistemática
de las publicaciones de TV3 y 3/24 en Facebook acerca del 9-N, designación social de la
consulta popular hecha en Cataluña el 9 de noviembre de 2014. También fueron
analizados los comentarios y los enlaces relacionados con estas publicaciones, todas
pertenecientes al especial periodístico multiplataforma 9-N, la votació, producido por
TV3 y 3/24 en noviembre de 2014. Concluimos que la dinámica intermedia fue
predominante en el escenario multimediático investigado, aunque sea transmedia en
algunos casos, como las publicaciones bajo las etiquetas #9NTV3 y #9N.

Transmedia storytelling (TS) refers to media experiences expanded across multiple platforms. This article answers the research question about the specificity of Russian TS initiatives. The goal of the research is to emphasize the social and cultural contexts in which TS is inserted in Russia by reconstructing the panorama of the Russian transmedia landscape. The qualitative
research is methodologically supported by an analysis of documents and materials regarding transmedia projects in Russia and presents an interdisciplinary theoretical approach (1) to explore the concept of TS and the variability of terminology in different contexts; (2) to situate the discussion of TS in the contemporary Russian media landscape and above all (3) to investigate examples of transmedia projects in Russia. Since TS is just emerging in Russian media and culture, the article concentrates on mapping the Russian transmedia landscape.