Book Review: Collaborative Media: Production, Consumption, and Design Interventions, by Jonas Lowgren and Bo Reimer

Abstract

Collaborative Media: Production, Consumption, and Design Interventions. Jonas Lowgren and Bo Reimer. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2013. 198 pp. $35 pbk.Jonas Lowgren and Bo Reimer, co-founders of Malmo University's School of Arts and Communication, came together again to write Collaborative Media: Production, Consumption, and Design Interventions. Acknowledging the changing media due to the emergence of new media, the authors created a new term-collaborative media. This contemporary phrase describes media driven, produced, and designed by consumers. Lowgren and Reimer recognize that a change has taken place in consumer behavior-increasingly, people not only consume media, they also produce media: blogs, music videos, and so on. And they organize their media practices in new, innovative ways. This book is an exploration of that new relationship and consumer developments.The authors refer to their book as a scholarly monograph based on teamwork between their two fields: interaction design (Lowgren) and media research (Reimer). This innovative field of collaborative media sits comfortably astride the gap between the two existing fields and leads to a new understanding of the relationships between production and consumption. Thus, the authors argue, through this collaboration, the two fields become less distinct. This is not meant to merely describe a new discipline in media studies, but rather it is indicative of a complete alteration of the current understanding in the field. In other words, it is not simply that consumers are now producers, but that our basic conception of what we mean by audience must change. Now, with collaborative media, we can see the fact that viewers increasingly becoming media producers is a game changer.Whether these changes are positive or negative is a subject the authors review throughout the text. This strategy is beneficial to the reader, in that they do not answer this question too early and permit one to reach some conclusions on one's own. Ultimately, collaborative media is discussed as a form of practice, calling for participation and action. Furthermore, this art form disrupts the historical notion of mass media. The topic is interesting, innovative, and certainly at the forefront of the mass media discipline. In this day and age, we cannot study mass communication without reference to new technology. Of course, along with new technology come consumers and questions about how they use and relate to media. To this end, Lowgren and Reimer have put together an easily accessible text that appeals to a wide audience.For students and faculty, the text is heavily cited with academic work and instruction. …