Spreadable Media: Creating Value and Meaning in a Networked Culture

3 The Value of Media Engagement

113 In January 2010, the SyFy Channel site Blastr posted an article with the provocative headline “Heroes Is a Hit—as the Most Pirated TV Show, That Is” (Huddleston 2010). As the article reported, TorrentFreak.com tracked how often the average episode of particular series had been downloaded illegally in 2009. Many cult shows—Heroes and Dexter among them—attracted as many or more illegal downloads as television viewers, at least as counted by Nielsen. If all these viewers were counted equally, some canceled or soon-to-be-canceled series would become television-network hits. Heroes, for example, had 6,580,000 illegal downloads for a single episode, as compared to 5,900,000 legal viewers (the Nielsen number the show was hovering around at that time). Meanwhile, a hit such as Lost had 6,310,000 illegal views per episode, in addition to its 11,050,000 legal viewers. Torrents represent only one of several possible mechanisms by which someone might illegally access television content, so even these expanded numbers underestimate the full range of viewers. Strikingly, almost all these torrent “hits” were “cult shows” that rely on dedicated niche audiences and serial structures to attract “engaged” audiences. Most were serial programs that depended on regular viewership in order to be comprehensible. These shows are also among the most heavily viewed on alternative legal platforms (such as video on demand and commercially available online platforms) and are top sellers on DVD. Many illegal viewers come from countries where a series is shown on a delayed schedule. These fans want to sync their viewing schedule with international online discussions about shows, but they can’t easily THE VALUE OF MEDIA ENGAGEMENT THE VALUE OF MEDIA ENGAGEMENT 3 3 The Value of Media Engagement 114 join the conversation if they have to wait until programs become locally available. Meanwhile, some come from countries where a series is not available on any schedule, delayed or otherwise; illegal downloads are their only chance of accessing the content. Many other viewers want to skip advertisements, view shows on their own schedules, watch video on their preferred platform, and/or avoid policies of legal streaming television sites they find frustrating. These “pirates” are not taking content because they refuse to pay for it (especially since they could watch it free when it is originally aired); they are seeking to change the conditions under which they view it (De Kosnik 2010). Such viewers don’t count within the current logics of audience measurement. They are watching the series but not in ways television channels can value. The industry seeks audience members who fit into particular markets, defined by age and gender demographics desirable to advertisers, which are most easily constructed around a common, “sticky” advertising time slot. Heroes executive producer Tim Kring responded to Blastr’s revelation by saying, “The general attitude of the networks towards this massive audience that’s out there has been to stand on the sideline and heckle these people when, in fact, these are people who actively sought these shows out. They went some place and actively pirated the show. These are fans that should be embraced, and, somehow, figured out how to monetize” (quoted in Jenkins 2010b). The Middleman’s Javier Grillo-Marxuach saw these illegal viewers as part of the mechanism for generating awareness of, and interest in, his cult property: The more people talk about the show, the more other people will end up buying the DVD. Eventually, anybody who looks at a pirated copy will tell somebody to buy the T-shirt or the DVD or the keychain, and the money will come back to us. [. . .] I’d rather have the show I work on be seen, and, frankly, given the way that the studios have dealt with the royalty compensation for writers on alternative platforms . . . I’m so sorry about your pirating problem, really! (Quoted in Jenkins 2010b) Heroes was then in ratings peril and was eventually canceled, while The Middleman was already canceled and recovering its production The Value of Media Engagement 115 costs through DVD sales. However, the perspectives of both Kring and Grillo-Marxuach reflect the potential value that rights owners might ultimately find in these alternative views. These fringe audiences are often highly engaged at a time when the media industries are concerned about disengaged audiences and declining viewer loyalty . Yet these illegal downloads are most often routed to the...