Attitude and Zoella: exam question

EXAM QUESTION : Attitude and Zoella

Clay Shirky argues that audiences in today’s online age are no longer passive consumers of media content. Evaluate this ‘end of audience’ theory.
Refer to Zoella and  the Attitude website to support your answer. [30]

You need to :

• Explain the key points of the  theory including how modern online audiences are described as active,interactive and individual "prosumers".
• Use specific and relevant examples from the key texts to explain how audiences can be seen as active (website features , content of articles and pages, specific  links to social media, range and type of opportunities for feedback and interaction )
• Do both texts encourage their different audiences to be equally genuinely  active or interactive and to "talk back" to the producer ? Are more traditional methods and media used ?  How does this relate to their different target audiences ?
• Evaluate how far you agree with the theory and whether it fully explains how the texts relate to their audiences .  Are all modern and young audiences active ? What is the main purpose of the texts?  Is there a single clear target audience for both texts?  Is social or online media different from traditional media in how it treats its audience  You can use other theories and concepts such as parasocial interaction to support your points .

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Sherky's end of audience theory explains that we are more likely to respond to texts using social media as it has become a very common and crucial factor in modern society. This could mean audiences respond to Zoella and Attitude's content by creating their own content on a fanbase, online and in real life, like posters or drawings.

Zoella's audiences are considered active as they respond to her through social media, whether it is Twitter, Facebook or Instagram. They respond in both negative and positive ways, for example on her Q&A videos they express their feelings or opinions towards the things she says. This shows her Q&A videos are a successful way to ensure her audience engages with her and creates a parasocial interaction. Attitude, on the other hand, doesn't expect audiences to interact on social media as they are older and do not use many social media platforms but only the basic ones, for example Facebook and Twitter which are linked on their website. Attitude audiences are considered more "socially modern" even though they are older, as they have views that are more modernly accepted in society, for example homosexuality.

Zoella's audience can be seen as more traditional in their attitudes as they are are mainly younger females and may follow the more tradition stereotype that young girls are into hair, beauty and pink. 

Zoella's audience tend to be active and individual "prosumers" in the way they follow in the steps of Zoella and create their own YouTube account, whether it is to watch Zoella's videos and be subscribed or to create their own content in the style of Zoella. This shows a big portion of her audience are responding to her content and making sure their opinions or feelings are expressed and being a parasocial audience. However, Attitude tends to be more formal with their audience reposing through letters, newspaper, email or the more older forms of social media, which many younger people no longer use. 

Statement Of Aims: music video

Statement of aims

STATEMENT OF AIMS : BAND 5

An excellent, highly detailed, statement of consistently relevant aims and
intentions that clearly responds to the brief, targets the intended audience and
reflects the specified industry context such as specified record label/tv channel
through a coherent concept for interrelated products

 The aims and intentions demonstrate a plan for thorough and sustained use of
appropriate codes and conventions for both products

 Excellent evidence of application of knowledge and understanding of the
theoretical framework of media through sustained use of highly appropriate
subject-specific terminology

colours, tones, moods, what they reflect 

meaning/message

song, talk about it

shots

angles

transitions

Music Video

My music video is going to appeal to a wide range of audiences of all ages as anyone can relate to having fun and reminiscing on old memories. I inspire to aim it at even 30 to 49 year olds which could be considered as 'exporters' or 'reformers'. 

I have mainly targeted the video at females, however, as I want them to align with the female singer and feel as if they are her when listening to the music. 

The song I have chosen is quite emotional and sings about love and heartbreak in Italian. I feel my music video fits in well with the song as it gives a touching atmosphere. 

In the music video I have included multiple shots in different locations where my artist can be seen with friends, at parties, in beautiful locations, doing amazing things and it overall gives the effect that the viewer is watching the life of the artist as they watch the video and feel a connection them. 

There are a lot of bright colours in the music video but also much darker shots as the song has sad but also more uplifting parts to it. It includes shots of the night sky and ocean to add to the effect of spiritualness and nostalgia.

I want the viewers to align with the artist and understand their feelings as they watch the video and feel it on an emotional level. The song is supposed to bring out past feelings or memories as the shots could remind the viewer of a certain event that happened in their life which is similar. 

I have recorded the shots in many different angles to insure the artist can be seen in different ways and different locations can be depicted. I wanted to add as much going on as possible in the shots to ensure the viewers enjoy the music video with the story unveiling as they watch. 
I created a fading transition between the different locations and changing of shots to add to the nostalgic, slow feel the video gives. I want the transitions to symbolise someone recalling the memories in their mind or replaying them like a film in their head. I am going for a dream-like appearance in the shots, a bit faded and short moving on ti the next memory. 
The pace of the music is quite slow and calm so I didn't want my shots to be too chaotic, so I made sure they fit in well with each part of the song and align with it. 


Magazine Front Cover

In the front cover of the magazine I will use a lot of gold tones to add to the beach-like and dreamy effect I am going for. I will use myself as the artist so I am going to get a picture of myself posing in a magazine-like style with gold lighting on my body. 
I aim to make the cover look like a lifestyle magazine so I will add information about fashion or dieting on the cover to refer to other pages inside the magazine. I will add an imagine of a bag or item of clothes to advertise another page on the inside. 
In the left centre of the cover I will talk about my artist and ensure it is quite catchy so people will want to turn the page and read all about her. 
I am going to put the barcode and the price in the bottom right corner of the magazine as most magazines have it there and I don't want it to cover any of the image as it just has to be small. I prefer people focus on the magazine itself rather than the price. 
The title of my magazine is in Italian and means "The Voices" which fits in well as my artist is Italian and it is an Italian song. I like the fact that it combines Italian and English as it could reach a wider audience from other places worldwide.
I want the text to be orange or yellow as I think black or white would be quite bland and that is not the effect I'm looking for. I am targeting older audiences however I am sure it is still quite classic and formal in the yellow tones and will interest women of ages 30 to 49.
I will put the date of the magazine right under the title in the style of other magazines and I think will be in the same colour as the title as I don't want too many colours going on. 
I am looking for a natural, life-like effect as I don't want the cover to appear edited. I prefer it looks like it is in the great outdoors and beautiful nature as older audiences would prefer that rather than a brightly lit photo in a studio room. 
I feel the clothes I am wearing in the photo make me look older or appeal to an older audience.

Double Page Spread

In the double page spread I want to use a few colours but of the same tones. I think pink will fit nicely as it will attract females that are my target audience. 
I am going to put the title in quite large, bold font with the subheading right below it in a slightly lighter colour. I think I will put the subheading in lowercase, but I shall play around with it and see what fits better. 
I want to put my stand-first in the left top corner right under the title and subheading as it will grasp the viewer's attention immediately, especially being in bolt black font. I am going to ensure my stand-first is interesting and use exclamation marks to create a cheerful or excited tone. This is quite an important part of the spread as it will make the viewer decide if they want to read further or not. 
I want my columns to be neat and tidy and separated into paragraphs with different topics or questions being answered in each one. 
Each paragraph will have a different subheading, whether it is a question or just the title of what I am going to talk about. I am thinking of putting the question as a subheading and going straight in with a quote so it gets straight to the point. 
I will use quotation marks to indicate exactly what my artist has said in her interview pulling out the most important or interesting things that may make people laugh. I will also add information from the interviewer's point of view to interest the reader.
I want my pull-quote to stand out but be at the bottom of the double age spread. I will make the font big but I'm still debating if it should be bigger than the subheading as it is just as important.  
I want to add a lot of different fonts to ensure it looks interesting and stands out. I would like each subheading to have a different font style to divide the different paragraphs and topics. 
I am going to add a large image of my artist and two other smaller ones, all in natural settings. The larger image I am planning on cutting out and removing the background so it looks more magazine-like and then I want to write around it so it looks more professional. 

ANALYSIS: Attitude website

ANALYSIS : Attitude website

Homepage  Attitude website
Powerpoint     Essential analysis and summary
Explain the following about Attitude analysing the technical codes and elements of the website to  help you.  

• Identify Target Audience :  Sexuality, gender, age, ethnicity, nationality , class ?
• Look at the range of content, technical codes such as colour, font and images, possibilities of audience feedback, representations, links to any social or traditional media etc.
• presentation :   How is masculinity and sexuality represented in the website  ? Are certain stereotypes or elements  foregrounded or given higher priority and focused upon more than others for the benefit of the target audience ? If so, why ?
• How closely linked is the website to the Attitude magazine in terms of ownership, content and style ?

You can look at some of the following elements to help you

1. Masthead
2. Website layout and design
3. Image/text ratio
4. Colour palette
5. Website features
6. Mode of address ( formal/informal )
7. Content and ideology of articles and pages

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

The target audience of the Attitude website is gay men, particularly in their 30's or older. It wouldn't necessarily appeal to a young gay audience as the themes are much more mature and more formal than a typical website for teenagers. There is a fair mix of ethnicities on the website, however a lot of the men that appear in the topless shots are white males.  The content is mainly targeted at a wealthier  working class or upper class audience. We can see that lower class audiences wouldn't be targeted as theatre plays are advertised on the website, and it is well known that wealthier and older audiences tend to go to them.
It is a stereotype that gay males like theatre so Attitude didn't miss the chance to include it and ensure it can reach maximum interest.
The website includes a "boys" section which is much less formal than the other sections of the website. The fact that they decided to name it "boys" instead of lads, men or males shows that it is trying to create another stereotype.
The title of the website is written in very bold and plain font. There is a wide range of black and white and not much colour in the layout, adding to the fact that it is for an older audience as younger audiences would prefer a pop of colour to give it more life.

The content includes pin-up males that may not actually be gay, like Shawn Mendes or David Beckham. This is an effective way of Attitude to get a wider audience. The males may not be gay but however they are attractive and would grasp the attention of multiple gay males. The website adds links to nude shoots to insure more people would be interested, sometimes even grasping the attention of females. The website finds a good link in simliarity between the LGBT community and straight members of the public who would be interested in the same topics, for example the Shawn Mendes article.



There is a lot of articles about news on attacks or abuse on gay people carried out by straight people to raise attention that still many members in society do not accept gay people. There are also articles about shows and pride events with drag queens or famous people so more people can join or get involved.
In very small font there are links to the Facebook, Twitter and Instagram of the Attitude website so that more information can be found on other social media platforms.
The website doesn't necessarily focus on just gay people it tries to receive liberal society views and doesn't separate the genders or sexualities. It does this well by adding straight celebrities and females who have a positive attitude towards LGBT.

On the other hand, the website includes sections where the public are asked on their views about LGBT to allow other people to feel involved in the website and have a say, even if they may not agree or share the same views as the target audience of the website. Many of the people that appear in this section are of different ethnicities but mainly older.
 There is a "style" section where the hottest clothes are advertised which adds to the stereotype that gay males like fashion more than straight men as it wouldn't normally be advertised in a straight men's magazine as they would focus more on cars or women.

Online Media: ZOELLA

PAPER 2 : Online Media 1 : ZOELLA

SOCIAL MEDIA IN THE ONLINE AGE

You will look at the role played by blogs and websites in the media today, exploring the way in which these convergent media platforms increasingly overlap, as well as investigating the potential that they offer for self-representation.
The changing relationship between media producers and audiences will be considered, as the idea that media consumers have now become producers who regularly and actively participate in the creation and dissemination of media content online.
The impact of digitally convergent media platforms on media production, distribution and circulation will also be explored.

  Text 1  : " Zoella "  : GENERAL ANALYSIS 

You should be mainly analysing her blog ( new version and archive) as well as her other outlets on youtube,twitter etc.
Analyse and summarise the  content and purpose  of her blog/ youtube channel and insta

• What areas of life does she focus on ?
• Who is her main target audience ?
• Does she simply entertain her audience or support, give advice and educate ?
• What is her mode of address ?

1. Are there any differences between the  content and purpose of her various blogs and online channels ?
2. How does Zoella produce  income ? This link  will help and here's an article about youtube and its income channels
3. How can her audience interact with  or give feedback to Zoella/Zoe ?

Define parasocial interaction in your own words
Summarise the representation of gender as well as other representations  such as age , class or ethnicity that are most dominant in her blogs. You can also explain any use of stereotypes and  gender performativity along with relevant technical codes such as body language, use of colour, props and formatting.
What are the main differences between Zoella and Zoe Sugg as representations ?

______________________________________________________________________________________________________

Zoella mainly focuses on lifestyle videos where she talks about hair, make-up and fashion that would appeal to teenage girls, but mainly females aged from 12 to their mid twenties. She started off with Primark hauls which is a typical, affordable high street store that many young females shop at, making it accessible to the viewers. She tends to make videos about Primark hauls even in her most recent videos which shows that it still is an interest among her viewers even after 10 years. Primark is cheap but has many different items which makes its products widely bought across the UK. Zoella creates make-up videos advertising different products from different brands and boosting her fame and income. In each video she talks about a certain item and sponsors it, receiving many from the companies ho pay her to mention the product.
In her videos Zoella is seen to have very "girly" hairstyles, which may girls may want to try as they see it looks stylish on her. She tends to change her hair colour and haircuts often, while doing hairstyle tip videos that receive many views.The theme in her videos is bedroom settings with pink and pastel backgrounds with cute lights of fluffy cushions. With time as her videos progress the background looks nicer and the quality of the videos improves majorly. It is clear that as she gets more viewers she starts to put more effort into her videos and uses better quality cameras to insure she makes the videos as appealing as possible. Her main target audience is teenage girls who would want to follow her path and be like her, being like an influencer for them. She isn't an influencer in a healthy way but more in a fun way where she does videos about eating junk food or playing games or doing Q&As with her friends and family. However, in her most recent videos she mentions being Vegan and going to gym. The main focus in her videos is entertaining and keeping a cheerful atmosphere for her viewers, rather than educating them. She starts to talk a lot about her private life once she gets comfortable with her viewers and fills them in on her anxiety or panic attacks, creating a parasocial interaction and more familiar connection with her viewers.Zoella uses a very direct mode of address when talking to her audience. She looks directly at the camera and talks about her life in a friendly, talkative way to involve the audience more and insure they like her personality. On her blog she includes links to all her social media platforms, books, stock and things she is interested in. By putting all her important details in one place she makes it much easier for people to access her products and buy them or receive more fame. By adding products she likes to her blog she is receiving income from different companies who ask her to sponsor them.
She adds a link to her two instagrams where the different themes can be evidently seen. In the "Zoella" one there is more pink and girly themes, whilst the "Zoe Sugg" one is much more formal and elegant with lighter and darker tones to show a more serious approach as she is getting older and may not attract the same young audiences. 

As Zoella is now 29 it may seem that she is too old to continue doing videos for teenage girls as she cannot relate to that lifestyle anymore, so in her recent videos she can be seen acting in a more formal and more educated way. 

ZOELLA Paper 2: Analysing audience and theory

PAPER 2 ZOELLA : Analysing Audience and theory

You may get a question in the Online Media section which explicitly asks you to apply a specific theory to your online texts and you will definitely need to know about key audience/representation  theories for at least one section of paper 2
Explain how the main audience theories we have studied can be applied to Zoella/Zoe Sugg and her audience

• Cultivation
• End of Audience
• Fandom
• Identity

Plan the key points you would make in the exam question below:

How far can aspects of identity be seen to affect the way in which audiences use online media?Discuss, with reference to Zoella. You should refer to relevant academic theories in your response. 

____________________________________________________________________

        

     Gerbner's Cultivation theory basically tells us in respects to Zoella's youtube channel that the more we see representations of the stereotype that  young, teenage girls love pink things, make-up and hair, the more we believe it is true. We often see this in Zoella's videos as she always follows this stereotype, making her viewers follow her and try to be like her increasing the stereotype. However, her "Zoe Sugg" page is more formal and grown up where she talks about much more serious and relatable topics that may interest larger audiences. If people keep seeing young girls like Zoe Sugg doing similar videos with pink and cute backgrounds they further get the idea that most young girls behave in that way, when really there is a lot of girls who enjoy playing football or like cars. 

        Gauntletts' theory of Identity tells us that we follow the social media or internet to create our own identities. For example, young girls could be influenced by "Zoella" to behave in a certain way because of how social media tells them, for example the fact that they have to wear make-up, have pretty hair or take perfect selfies. This in a way could make people have a fake identity as they just want to copy others and be "normal" in society. With "Zoe Sugg" as another Youtube account and page, we can see that the person is physically the same one who  does the "Zoella" videos, however the attributes and character she plays are very different. This shows Zoe Sugg is torn between her two identities and is unsure if she should continue them both or stop one of her Youtube accounts. This is because her "Zoella" one is much more stereotypical and might not interest as many audiences now as it has been going on for a long time and people have grown up with her and changed interests. Both of her pages, however, are different identities and may not actually be who she really is behind the camera, she is just trying to appear interesting for her viewers. 

        Shirky's End Of Audience theory states that people may now be more influenced to respond to texts on Twitter, Instagram or Snapchat as they have become very popular in society and it is almost seen very peculiar if someone doesn't use social media. This could link to the way that fans of "Zoella" recreate make-up videos in her style and post them, trying to get noticed by her or accepted. A lot of people created Youtube accounts after seeing Zoe Sugg's success and find a lot of pleasure seeing their followers or likes going up as it makes them feel satisfied and content. The majority of people in this day and age believe that if they do not have enough likes or comments they are not good enough, which shows what internet and technologies or idols do to people's minds. Fans of "Zoella" watch her videos and head to social media to express their feelings toward them. The majority of her fans are girls aged 13 to their late twenties who enjoy and have a parasocial interaction to her videos, whilst the older people may believe it is wrong and is feeding bad things into young girls' minds.

Life On Mars: audience and industry

Using linked resources, class notes  and own research please explain the following in relation to Life on Mars with specific factual information when relevant. Use the Full revision pack for some key information as well as the BBC press pack

AUDIENCE

Audience marketing
How did the marketing( trailers ,advertising etc.)  for 'Life on Mars' target, identify and maximise  its audience ? This could also be by targeting an existing  audience
official trailer
BBC press pack

Look at the following :

• Use of  specific genres and their conventions

• Use of stars such as John Simm

• Use of characters

• Any other methods used  to target audiences  (enigmas, merchandise, links to other products or genres)

Audience response
Fandom : Life on Mars had and still has a cult following among TV fans .
wiki fanpage 
Summarise how the resources created here links to Jenkins theory of fandom
What could be an oppositional reading of Life On Mars be, in particular in relation to how different types of  audience could  respond to the characters of Gene Hunt and Sam Tyler? Any other examples?

Critical response 
Give examples of fan,  newspaper and website reviews of the series and any awards . Were these generally positive and what were the main reasons ?

INDUSTRY

Summarise the following Production  and ownership  information (use the revision pack and your own research )
Summarise how  the programme was commissioned and produced  and details about who byBroadcast date, scheduling   and channel  of original broadcast, audience figures ,  spinoffs  and different versions, other ways of increasing profits How does Life on Mars fit into the BBC's remit of the  kind of programmes it should be producing ? Use key words from the BBC remit ( in the revision pack )
Regulation information
Which bodies were in charge of regulating the content of Life on Mars ? What possible legal or ethical issues could have been raised by the content of Series 1 episode 1 ?

_____________________________________________________________________________

Life On Mars uses crime and sci-fi combined to maximise audience interest. The audience it aims for is older, hence why the actors are famous from previous films or series that have an older audience. For example, the actor that plays Gene Hunt would normally be seen as a dad character in other movies. 

Crime interests many young viewers, however the time that the series is set in wouldn't normally interest younger viewers as they wouldn't now much about it or find it white boring and old-fashioned. 

The trailer is very short and catchy as there is so much going on that it instantly grasps the audience's attention and makes them intrigued to watch the series. The trailer also doesn't give away too many details so it doesn't spoil the show and leaves you guessing when you watch it. 

However, the trailer instantly shows the time change which can be seen in Sam's face where he immediately looks younger, making it self-explanatory that he has gone back in time without showing the little clips of the series. 

Gene Hunt and Sam are in the car together which isn't seen in the first episode, however the trailer jumps straight into it to not waste any time. 

The trailer could interest ages from 30 upwards, but for me being a teenager I wouldn't mind seeing it too as it appears exciting from the trailer. \

John Simm, who plays Sam, has been in many dramas and is a very famous English actor and director which many people would want to see, so making sure he is seen close and clearly in the trailer or advertisements would make viewers be drawn in to watch the series. 

The BBC Press Office describes the series multiple times as an "innovative, witty and action packed drama" in a description on their site in bold. 

The viewers instantly see from the trailer some sort of connection between Sam and Annie which could be a potential romance. Romances are quite popular in the 21st century and could possibly attract many female viewers.

The T-shirt above is merchandise for Life On Mars which is humorous and appeals to older audiences, like middle-aged men which would find it funny to wear if they enjoy the series. 

If the shirt becomes popular in high-street stores or online it could attract many more viewers to watch the series as it would become more well known and spoken about, giving it higher ratings. 

Life On Mars won the audience award from the British Academy for Film and Television Arts in 2007. It received 7 nominations including Best Actor, Best Director, Best Drama, Best Writer, Best
Production Design, Best Sound, Best Editing. At the 

International Emmy Awards it won
Best Drama for 2006 and 2008.

One of the keys to the continued success of Life On Mars was how the audience
was made to feel part of the central storyline from the opening episode onwards.
The audience becomes ‘active’ within the narrative as they are working alongside Sam Tyler to work out for themselves if this is fantasy or reality.
The series works upon classic narrative lines of mystery, intrigue and enigma.
Enigmas are puzzles, mysteries, questions which are built in to the narrative
regarding characters, situations and events. These help to move the narrative
along, create tension, and involve the audience by seeing if they can work out
the answers. I think Life On Mars creates multiple enigmas in the way it constantly makes us wonder if Sam has really gone back in time or if it is just all in his mind and he is actually sitting in a hospital bed in his own time just dreaming while he is in a coma.

Henry Jenkins' theory is about how dedicated fans respond to popular media in their social and cultural identities, in ways that aren't authorised by the media. Jenkins refers to this as "textual poaching".

Late Night Woman's Hour

Based on the overview and specific content from two episodes ( the episode 'Home' and one other), explain the following about Late Night Woman's Hour with examples from the program supporting your points.

• History and background of  LNWH
• Summary of content and audience of Radio 4 Themes and subjects covered in LNWH

• Structure and content of typical episodes ( interviews, feature pieces, discussion , phone-in , etc.)
• Presenter ( age, gender, background, broadcasting history, comparison with previous presenters )
• Use of spoken language ( mode of address, formal/informal, emotional language)
• Use of audio codes ( music, sting , theme  )
• Opportunities for audience feedback
• Any marketing /advertising  of  own program and other  BBC content
• Target audience of LNWH ( age, gender, class, interests, use of media etc.)

Lauren Laverne and guests discuss home is the episode 'home'. They ask what home mean to the spectators and if it is domesticity a joy or a drudgery? This is a much more formal episode where the people speak much differently to the modern episodes which include swearing and a quite comical approach. 

The target audience is generally women from 35-50 years old. The show is also shown at 11pm on Thursdays and Fridays which is a time that middle-aged women would normally be at home resting, instead of going out, for example, on a Friday night like younger people would do. This would give them a chance to watch the show while their husband or children are sleeping, as they wouldn't want them to hear some of the explicit contents, for example cheating, vaginas and masturbation. 

The presenters for this show on the first run were Lauren Laverne and Jane Garvey who led panels of five guests in discussion of a particular topic such as fan fiction or lust, which would normally interest younger audiences, hence making it an interesting topic for older women to discuss. Some of the topics also discussed in the first run were lying, datings apps and Tinder. These were broadcasted after the watershed as the conversations were quite frank and adult. 

The show is presented on BBC Radio 4, which is a radio station owned and operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It was founded in 1967. 

BBC Radio 4 is also available through Freeview, Sky, Virgin Media and on the Internet, which allows it to be accessed very easily if a show is missed or if preferred to watch later. However this has its negative aspects as it means that anyone can access it, especially on the internet, allowing even young audiences to hear it. Younger audiences shouldn't have access to it because of the explicit nature of the topics which may disturb them. 

Lauren Laverne, an English radio DJ, model, television presenter, author, singer and comedian, was the permanent host of Late Night Woman's Hour until autumn 2018. She was born in 1978 in Sunderland, England and is now 41 years old. 
In autumn 2018, live broadcaster and journalist Emma Barnett took over. She is 34 years old and was born in Surrey.  
Late Night Woman's Hour became available in a weekly podcast format in 2018, which listeners can access via BBC Sounds as well as other podcast apps.