Well it's that time of year again, countless celebs in glamorous gowns and tuxes graced the red carpet on Sunday night in eager anticipation of the 82rd annual Academy Awards and all the excitement it brings. Thousands of people flock to the television set on this night every year to first see the red carpet arrivals, then anticipate who will win what award, and of course the typical Oscar upsets. However, this year was slightly different as people flocked to their TV AND COMPUTERS.
This year, broadcasting the Oscars to Canadians, CTV hosted an 'live chat' on their website during the Oscars. CTV.ca boasted that as of 6:30pm on Sunday night, Canadians could chat live "with Canada's pre-eminent celebrity gossip maven, Lainey, direct from carpet and press room; etalk’s resident fashionista Susie Wall; and MuchMusic’s Trevor Boris, comedian, producer, and juror on the MuchOriginal series, Video on Trial." I found this to be an interesting idea, so as my friends and I were watching the awards ceremony, we would periodically check in with the online forum to see what people were talking about. We got many laughs as people would say ridiculous things about dresses, hair styles or adding in their own commentary to the evening's events. We found the whole live Oscar chat to be quite entertaining, but ultimately came to the conclusion that there was no rhyme nor reason for the live chat. There were no brilliant ideas or reflections brought forth in the forum, it was simply a shared space where like-minded Oscar enthusiasts could gather to share their opinions on celebrities, movies, and whether or not people deserved the award they had won. It was an interesting chat to browse during the awards ceremony, but in reality it only mediated and interfered with my own Oscar experience with my friends. Instead of discussing it as a group as the night's events unfolded on the TV, we had added a third party to the mix...our laptops (and with it came hundreds of other online personalities). Perhaps other people felt differently, and appreciated the interaction with practical strangers online, but that was my conclusion of the experience.
However, an online chat was not the only means of online interaction offered during the Academy Awards. CTV also promoted, through online and televised ads, an interactive contest taking place in real time during the awards. The sponsor, Quaker Crispy Minis ran a contest called "Red Carpet Party Picks" consisting of several different polls that asked various questions about the Oscars, allowing participants to answer, and if correct they would gain points to hopefully win the grand prize of a trip to Los Angeles. I didn't have any grand plans of winning the prize to LA, but my friends and I tried out the game as a fun way to test our "Oscar IQ". The polls mostly asked for predictions of who would win each category. The poll would start as the presenter started talking, and the poll would close as the winner was about to be announced. Due to the quick nature of each poll, as a group we would get easily side-tracked by talking or debating the likelihood of each candidate and would not get our vote in on time resulting in not earning a lot of points. But the contest/game was highly entertaining, and was a better way to facilitate a 'party' (as the name "Red Carpet Party Picks" would suggest) or interactions between a group of people than that of the CTV live chat.
These two online Oscar initiatives that CTV promoted this year were quite interesting, particularly seeing the ways that users played with an online sense of community during an event such as the Oscars which is typically viewed in groups in front of the TV. I wonder if other people felt as if the live chat or real-time contest negotiated their experiences at all, or perhaps enhanced it? It will be interesting to see if this type of 'live' community during 'live' events will continue in the future, and to what degree.
I agree, the live chat didn't seem to be of crucial importance to the Oscars ceremony, but perhaps this is more of a gradual step in the direction of instant and global media. The Oscars is a sacred event for many people so any major changes that may seem to infringe upon this time honored tradition may be received with resentment,
ReplyDeleteThe live chat aspect certainly does open the doors to create an entirely different community of viewers, the more contributory the channel, the less passive. Just another step in web 2.0's re negotiation of social media.
This is true, and it would largely depend on the person and their relationship with the media. I'm sure there are a number of people that watch the Oscars by themselves, and in that case perhaps a social space in which people can discuss the events of The Oscars in real time with other people is very beneficial and enjoyable. As with any technology, it depends on the user. But as you suggested, perhaps it is a gradual step towards an increasing presence of instant and global media.
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