Abstract
ABSTRACT This essay examines domestic and international marketing campaigns for the Australian prison drama, Wentworth (Foxtel, 2013–Present), as an intervention into the relationship between (digital) marketing strategies and fan engagement with televisual ideologies. We comment on how three manifestations of marketing (via two campaigns) connect back to automatization, capitalism, incarceration, and media using both technological automation and fan labor—and argue that the campaigns’ use of automation and participatory culture exploited fan communication and fetishized incarceration for capitalistic gain. Extending previous scholarship around participatory culture’s reliance on audience labor and applying a critical cultural studies lens, we elucidate how the show utilized cross-cultural marketing approaches that stood at ideological odds with the show’s content. The first campaign, Australia’s Foxtel promotion of Season Five, employed full automatization to alter the fan viewing experience and maximize profits. The second campaign by Spain’s Calle 13 promoted the series’ Spanish debut. The backdrop for Calle 13’s campaign was drastically different, including only partial automation. It reduced fan interaction and used participatory culture to collect audience information. Both campaigns commercialized fan culture and utilized varying levels of automation to more firmly position prison as an entertainment landscape, simultaneously de-humanizing the experiences of women inmates offscreen.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.