Month: October 2011

MACT Project Update

/ sunilagni / Leave a comment

Source: Wikimedia Commons

The process of getting my research project approved by the University of Alberta is underway. A quick update on what exactly I’ll be doing:

My research study will be exploring this new breed of hockey fans that’s doing more than just consuming information. Instead, fans are creating, developing, sharing and maintaining information as a collective group.

I’ve selected a fan blog dedicated to the Edmonton Oilers as my sample. Using Bruns’ four principles of produsage as categories, I’ll explore different features of the fan site. It’ll be a content analysis, but with a qualitative approach rather than quantitative. What this means is, instead of counting frequencies or randomly selecting data, I’ll be sorting what I observe into themes and then analyzing the collected data.

What I hope to uncover is that hockey fans who blog are more than prosumers, or individuals who are really good at consuming and being what the NHL wants them to be. Instead, these fans can be considered produsers, who continuously extend the content they consume by working with others and various technological tools.

Bruns, A. (2009). Blogs, Wikipedia, Second Life and Beyond. New York: Peter Lang Publishing.

Zhang, Y. & Wildemuth, B.M. (2009). Qualitative analysis of content. In B. Wildemuth (Ed.), Applications of Social Research Methods to Questions in Information and Library. Retrieved October 18, 2011 from http://ils.unc.edu/~yanz/Content_analysis.pdf

Hockey Fans and the Leviathan

/ sunilagni / 2 Comments

While reading through Yochai Benkler’s “The Penguin and the Leviathan”, this crops up.

Blogger Tyler Dellow over at mc79hockey.com is looking for volunteers to track statistics from Oilers games. Instead of the standard goals and assists which are already offered by the league, Dellow proposes some advanced statistics tracking:

I divided the rink into 24 zones and recorded where each event started and ended. I did, I think, come up with some interesting stuff, even in only ten minutes. I was recording what happened with the puck when a player touched it and where he touched it.  

The collaborative effort of fans to collect and analyze data will be something to see if it can get off the ground. If there’s anyone interested in helping, you can contact Tyler (mc79hockey@gmail.com). The challenge will be to breakup the work so that it can be manageable and provide a high enough degree of satisfaction that participants come back to do more.

Once my research proposal is approved by the University of Alberta, I’ll start examining the online behavior of hockey fans. One thing I hope to uncover is how this level of fan participation isn’t surprising, considering how committed fans are to the game of hockey, the participatory culture that exists and the technology available. As I mentioned in my post NHL Needs to Provide More Data, the NHL can either start helping fans out and be part of the movement, or just watch the collective creativity take flight.

Benkler (2011) put it best:

For the commons has finally come into its own. Because in today’s knowledge economy, the most valuable resources – information and knowledge – are themselves a public good, and the best way to develop and maximize this good is through millions of networked people pooling that knowledge and working together to create new products, ideas, and solutions (pg. 153).

Benkler, Y. (2011). The Penguin and the Leviathan: The Triumph of Co-operation over Self-Interest. New York: Crown Business.