#weekly topic

Do you have uncertainties about your identities? How do you deal with them?

It’s been 11 weeks since I first posted blog about social media. It’s amazing how the time passes by so fast that you don’t even realise it. As for now, the topic of this blog will be Fandom and Fan Activism. There are different types of fans behaviour which include this:

And this:

Or maybe this:

Basically, everyone is a fan of something, it’s just a matter of how much love you have for it. Even if you hate something, you are also a fan of hating that thing. Last year, Lifewire came up with a list of 10 Entertainment Fandoms that are HUGE on Tumblr. And yes, Cumberbitches is one of the fandoms mentioned! Not to forget about Whovians, and the Potterheads. (Please excuse me if I get the fandom name wrongly) Usually fans are being depicted as being childish, obsessed and are duped customers. Henry Jenkins had stated that there are 5 levels of activity which the fandoms involve, and these are contradicting the image that people think of fans.

Image from : FMT

#GE14 Malaysia

We all know the result of recent general election 14 in Malaysia: Barisan Nasional has lost the first time in 61 years of Malaysian history with Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohammad being the Prime Minister, beating the world record of oldest Prime Minister! Social media has certainly plays a huge role at here, as it affords the rakyat to stay up-to-date with GE14 results live. Even though the media content from media stations such as television channels are being controlled before releasing the latest GE14 result into the public, people are able to check what is happening around them, with the latest news from all over Malaysia. This part here is what Henry Jenkins called the participatory culture. Why people participate? They are FANS of what they are supporting! (If you still don’t get it, it means the people are fans of a political cause, a political party, hence, the votings and supports)

Tay Tay  ♥

Linking it back to a previous topic that I have talked about, which is the activism and political engagement online, everything is interconnected here. Activism and political engagement can be seen as fans of a political cause fighting for their what they believe in. It does not mean the people who marched in rallies and protested are “just some obsessive fans which will get over it after some time”. It’s not! Most of the time, fans, including anti-fans, are very clear with what they like or dislike. They are not duped consumers most of the time, unless they are forced to. Now that leads us to Taylor Swift Tix. It’s a system that allows fans to buy concert tickets. In order to get better seats and get verified as true fans, they have to show proof of purchases on her merchandises and albums. The system is claimed to be there to eliminate those 2nd Hand ticket sellers that exploits the Swifties. In this case, the fans are “forced duped consumers”, knowing that the ticketing system is being monetized but there are quite a huge number of them still purchasing her concert tickets with merchandises to support her. The point here is they are willing to spend the money after knowing what they have done to the system instead of blindly being tricked to purchase merchandises, albums and tickets. The proof to that, you ask? Taylor’s Reputation tour ticket sales plummeted, with empty seats available despite the tour is kicking off in few days. Taylor’s team claimed it is a sign of their tactic to successfully stop 2nd hand ticket sellers from exploiting the ticketing system. Can the decrease in ticket sales link to fan activism? It may be yes, but in a smaller scale and less “violent” way if we were to compare it to EVE. (Don’t attack me, I’m just a Swiftie that can’t afford any of her albums *cries*)

Fandom Kingdom: Celebrities App

The idea of fandom has paved the new way for celebrities to spread their kingdom: celebrities app, which fans are busy “diving” into. Here are a few examples of celebrities’ applications that exist in market: The Swift Life, Kim Kardashian: Hollywood, Kimoji, Demi Lovato: Path to Fame and many more. These applications are either games or social application that get fans to connect with each other in a platform specially for them. They are separated. The fandoms are separated and grouped together, just like a few kingdoms. Some of the “citizens” have multiple “citizenships”. Some of these applications requires monthly subscriptions and some of these are free with premium contents that needs to be bought. Then again, let’s link it back to what I have talked about before: Fans still have the option to choose whether to pay for the items and services in these applications or to allow access to their data. This also links back to the previous topic: Crowdsourcing and crowdfunding. The fans’ data are being crowdsourced when they agree to the T&C to use the applications. The application also crowdsource funds (a.k.a crowdfunding) from the fans. In my eyes, these are similar to “farms” with “self-volunteered workers” that produce data and money for the “farm” owners. From my perspective, this is actually moving the communities away from the societies online. Why? People just do not share other forms of information that is unrelated to the celebrities in the application anymore, the contents the fans got are all related to the celebrities, the owners of the application.

Obsession, no?

How do you deal with people accidentally misgendering you (in person or online)? Do you always correct them, only sometimes or never?

This Week’s Theme: Puerto Rico

Happy Easter to my followers that celebrate Easter. Happy Sunday to everyone else! I hope y’all are having a good weekend! I have because Jeremy and I got to relax and just hang out this weekend. This week has been crazy for both of us. Now we have to begin preparing this coming week. Part of that is getting ready my birthday! One week until my birthday!  Thank you so much for letting me have a…

This Week’s Theme: Illinois

I guess with how late in the day this post is going up, you can kind of tell how this weekend has been going. I am so sorry for the lateness of this post. Yesterday was a no spoon day and yet I tried to spend spoons I didn’t have. I needed to take this weekend to take a break and recharge a bit. I will have a video up tomorrow talking about the investigation tomorrow afternoon. I will let y’all…

This week’s theme: Washington

This week’s them is the great state of Washington. When I think of Washington, I think of Starbucks, Grey’s Anatomy, and grunge rock bands. I haven’t had the chance to visit there yet but maybe I will get the chance in the next two years. I’m really excited to dive into the haunted locations of Washington because that is one of the states we haven’t discussed yet on this blog. I found a couple…

This Week’s Theme: Texas

Now that things are getting back into a routine I can work with, lets get back to the paranormal posts y’all know and love. While I haven’t really spent much time in Texas, I love the places I have visited briefly while driving through the state. This week’s posts will be about haunted locations and urban legends in Texas. I have picked some pretty interesting topics that I think y’all will…