The Age of Prosumers: Reality TV and the Internet

Keyword(s):  
Author(s):  
Ravi Agrawal

In the year 2012, a generation ago in digital technology, the person who generated the most internet searches in India was not a cricketer or a Bollywood star. Nor was it a politician or a religious figure. None of them were close. The person most Indians were curious about that year—as measured by the total number of Google searches—was Canadian-Indian Karenjit Kaur Vohra, a.k.a. Sunny Leone, a former porn star and Penthouse Pet of the Year. It wasn’t the case only in 2012. As hundreds of millions of Indians continued to discover the internet through 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, and even 2017, Sunny Leone remained the most-searched-for person in India. People simply couldn’t get enough. (Prime Minister Narendra Modi made it to number two in 2014, the year he was elected, but Leone remained the clear favorite.) Prudish, conservative, family-values India . . . and a porn star? Leone was no longer even performing; she had stopped around 2010 and started her own production company with her husband and manager, Daniel Weber. In 2011, she came to India as a guest on the reality TV show Bigg Boss, a local version of the Big Brother franchise. Leone’s appearance was predictably controversial (by design, of course: it was good for the ratings). Although most Indians hadn’t heard of her, it didn’t take long for word to spread: “A porn star—from America—here in India?” At the time, parliamentarian Anurag Thakur complained to the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, arguing that Leone’s presence on a nationally telecast program would “have a negative impact on the mindset of children.” Thakur added: “When children see these porn stars on TV and then do a Google search, it shows a vulgar site. It will have a bad impact in the long run.” There were no laws, however, to stop Leone from appearing on TV. While the production of pornography was officially illegal in India, Leone could justifiably argue she was no longer involved in the industry. She was trying to pivot to general entertainment.


Author(s):  
Richard A. Voeltz `

Media critics of the war in Afghanistan and Prince Harry’s participation in it hoped that his imagined kidnapping by the Taliban portrayed in the British TV mockumentary The Taking of Prince Harry (2010) would prevent his return to Afghanistan. Prince Harry’s first deployment to Afghanistan in 2007-2008 was conducted under a media blackout to protect him from potential Taliban threats. He returned home after news of his service leaked out on the internet. However, his second deployment to Afghanistan after the mockumentary aired was radically different. The British media was now given almost unlimited access to Captain Wales in terms of interviews, television coverage, and video postings on YouTube. Prince Harry’s second 20 weeks serving in Afghanistan from 2012 to 2013 became an effective reality TV show and viral internet sensation, culminating in the propaganda documentary exercise of Prince Harry: Frontline Afghanistan (2013) that the British government and military hoped would erase the public relations disaster associated with his first deployment that prompted the making of The Taking of Prince Harry. But the successful packaging of Prince Harry proved difficult in the Internet Age. In fact, the perceived unfair treatment of Harry by the media prompted such a strong reaction in him that it can be seen as instrumental in the current attempts by Harry and Meghan to establish new identities separate from the monarchy through a newly refashioned celebrity.


Author(s):  
Nestor J. Zaluzec

The Information SuperHighway, Email, The Internet, FTP, BBS, Modems, : all buzz words which are becoming more and more routine in our daily life. Confusing terminology? Hopefully it won't be in a few minutes, all you need is to have a handle on a few basic concepts and terms and you will be on-line with the rest of the "telecommunication experts". These terms all refer to some type or aspect of tools associated with a range of computer-based communication software and hardware. They are in fact far less complex than the instruments we use on a day to day basis as microscopist's and microanalyst's. The key is for each of us to know what each is and how to make use of the wealth of information which they can make available to us for the asking. Basically all of these items relate to mechanisms and protocols by which we as scientists can easily exchange information rapidly and efficiently to colleagues in the office down the hall, or half-way around the world using computers and various communications media. The purpose of this tutorial/paper is to outline and demonstrate the basic ideas of some of the major information systems available to all of us today. For the sake of simplicity we will break this presentation down into two distinct (but as we shall see later connected) areas: telecommunications over conventional phone lines, and telecommunications by computer networks. Live tutorial/demonstrations of both procedures will be presented in the Computer Workshop/Software Exchange during the course of the meeting.


2001 ◽  
Vol 120 (5) ◽  
pp. A735-A735
Author(s):  
C STREETS ◽  
J PETERS ◽  
D BRUCE ◽  
P TSAI ◽  
N BALAJI ◽  
...  

1996 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 244-245 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. Smessaert
Keyword(s):  

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