The German football blogosphere: An evaluation and analysis of production, consumption and co-creation processes in interactive blogs.

Abstract

The research aim was the investigation of the German football blogosphere. Three aspects were considered as fundamental parts of this interactive online media sphere: The bloggers´ working processes and practices, the interaction behaviour between blog participants and the impact of the relationships on the blog content. Therefore a mixedmethod approach was used for the analysis combining the quantitative and qualitative blog content analysis as well as expert interviews with bloggers and a finalising blog reader survey. The results reflect the complexity of the working processes and interaction mechanisms in the media world of blogospheres. As a main finding, the German football blogosphere is an interactive communication and information sphere in which football blog participants can be divided into different groups who directly or indirectly have an impact on the produced blog content as a result of co-creation and way of content consumption, whereas the bloggers who work on a professional level decide on the presentation of information and the way of interactions as a last instance on and of their content platforms. Further findings show the high level of professional working methods among football bloggers whose working routines are comparable to those of other professional media producers (i.e. journalists and public relation communicators). Moreover, football blogs are equally used as an information platform but additionally as an interaction room by a small group of football blog users that is not offered in other professional content services (e.g. online news websites, newspapers). As a conclusion, the media culture of the German football blogosphere can be defined as an interactive, co-creatively producing and professional online media-related totality of an intellectual, creative and cultivated blog community within the football media world in Germany.