Task 2 - Understand how Media Producers create Products for Specific Audiences

Ways Companies affect Customers

Language

Euphemism
Euphemisms are spins on things considered aggressive, brash or distasteful, they re-word and twist a quote into a more mild variant, they are used in advertising to create the illusion of politeness or friendliness.

Dysphemism

Dysphemisms are an aggressive and repulsive take on a topic, they are used to present something in a bad light. Companies will sometimes use dysphemisms when referring to their competition, in an attempt to bring them down.

Why its Used
Used by companies to present their products in a positive light, turning their imperfections into something that’s intended and acceptable, while presenting their rivals as unstable or faulty.

Active & Inactive Verb

Active verbs use the present tense, if something is going on right now, people would feel pressured to be included, if something happened people would not feel as panicked. “The game industry is growing.” is considered better than “The game industry grew.” Present is used for positives. “The game sales dropped.” is considered better than “The game sales are dropping.” Inactive verb is used to present a topic as being in the past, this is useful for disasters or errors that don't go according to plan.

Language My Example - “Most of our games have lots of bugs.”
As an example of Euphemism and Dysphemism, I've reworded the sentence “Most of our games have lots of bugs.” into something that may be written by a corporation trying to soften its losses.

We pride ourselves with a diverse family of developers and creators, our executives at Game Shark believe every-single-one should have freedom to create their dream game! Every one of our projects comes from the heart, sometimes that means coming from one person only; and unlike our competitor AAA studios we have a zero tolerance policy for crunch time. When you sit down and play our hand-crafted love notes to the video game community, keep in mind the amount of effort it took to bring them to you.

Language Real-Life Example - "Genesis does what Nintendon't"
Companies are always looking for new ways to make their advertisements and products stick in the minds of their target demographic, one of the best ways to do this is to manipulate them into feeling threatened. Back when SEGA was a first-party company and was producing its own consoles there was high competition between them and Nintendo, both companies were creating counter-advertising, solidifying hostility between their fans. This led to publicity and sales increases for both companies, the obviously blinded fans, more than ready to pledge their wallets to their company of choice all because of the scuffles of Mario and Sonic, a fake and empty battle only acting as a front for company greed. "Genesis does what Nintendon't", this a solid example of Dysphemism, it is a quote repeated several times throughout SEGA's advertising. This along with the "Blast Processing" Euphemism used when describing the Genesis/Megadrive work together to bask SEGA in the spotlight while shunning Nintendo for its inferiority.

Typography

Leading
Leading is the distance between two lines, it helps take up more space on the page without needing to write more, it also makes it more clear and easier to read. This can be seen on many gossip magazines or entertainment news feeds.

Tracking
Tracking is the distance between two words, similarly to leading it is used to make text larger without needing to write more, it is useful for some fonts that overlap and are harder to read form far away.

Doki Doki Literature Club uses large, cute fonts to give off an innocent front, its use of advanced typography allows it to trick players into a false sense of relaxation and giddiness, perfect for the plot twist after Act 1.


Imagery

An example of using imagery to affect a customer can be seen in the way fears and phobias are used to affect the emotions and feelings, this effect is commonly used in video games to present a specific mood or emotion.

The fear of insanity is called Agateophobia, its described as the fear of losing one’s sanity, overly-worrying over the effects of stress and isolating one’s self away from society. Darkmantles are creatures from DnD, they have many eyes, all surrounding their body, this makes it hard to tell if it’s a predator or prey. It’s skin is rough and calloused, it obviously doesn’t survive in the sea despite its appearance, it hovers above the heads of people judging by its long, webbed tentacles. Every single part of its design is made to be unnatural and not fit into people's expectations, thus unnerving the viewer.

The fear of the undead/corpses is called Necrophobia, it is described as a incessant fear when near or around locations of the dead, this includes crypts, graveyards and abandoned locales among others. This creature is named the “Power Lich” and is from the game “Heroes of Might and Magic III”, its creators have used many different themes and ideas to bring fear into the minds of its viewers. The long, thin arms and legs that sprout from its armour are only just holding together with stray skin and muscle. The skull, with its broken jaw stares deep into your eyes with its own soulless pair. The deep crimson glow emanating from its hand bleeds into the ground, the staff glowing bleakly as well.



Sources:
https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/euphemism
http://examples.yourdictionary.com/examples-of-euphemism.html
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/dysphemism
https://webdesign.tutsplus.com/articles/choosing-the-right-font-a-practical-guide-to-typography-on-the-web--webdesign-15
https://practicaltypography.com/line-spacing.html
https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758%2Fs13414-013-0463-8
https://massivephobia.com/agateophobia-fear-of-insanity/
http://common-phobias.com/necro/phobia.htm
https://soft-h.deviantart.com/art/power-lich-homm-III-559613444
https://blog.pond5.com/7776-lighting-for-a-mood-making-the-most-of-key-color-and-contrast/

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/24/light-emotions_n_4831224.html

Ways Customers affect Companies

Beta Testing

Beta Testing is an important part of game development, "it's cited as crucial for the success of virtually every successful game ever made." A developer can use the feedback given by beta testers to improve their game before release.

Closed Beta
Closed Betas are a beta of a product given to a select number of people, they are not allowed to disclose any of the things they see publicly, a closed beta tester is normally payed for their work. They are required to test out the game, detail their opinions of the game, share any problems they encountered and aid the development team in improving the issues and shortcomings of the product.

Open Beta
Open Betas are publically available versions of a game that allows those interested in the product to test it out and give their opinions on the product. In video games, open betas are a common way to spark discussion  and hype about an upcoming game. This also means any glitches and errors found by the large number of open beta testers can be fixed before being shipped and released.

Telemetry
Telemetry is the act of automatically collecting data from a computer and sending it someone else, this is done by many developers (especially those who work on MMOs) in order to easily tell what player spend the most time on, what type of characters they build and all sorts of important information that may come in handy for DLC, updates or sequels.


Negative Press & Public Outcry

Public outcry is a powerful tool, in the right hands and with the right targeting it can topple organisations, the internet and social media has given people a voice and a way to unite on the issues they find unfair. There are many ways to protest on the internet, and with journalism always on the plow for the latest scoop, its not that difficult to get your voice heard.

Twitter Trends
Twitter is a social media that relies on quick, short messages and trends, it lets people quickly communicate their opinions, feelings and thoughts to thousands. Hashtags are a popular way to categorise tweets, they are also used by movements and rallies that want to raise an awareness for a specific topic.

Twitter Trends Example - #FixFIFA
An example of Twitter in action can be seen with the #FixFIFA trend, where people worldwide have reported their horrible experiences with the newest FIFA18 patch and its negative effects on the framerate of the game, horrible internet connectivity problems and several other problems rendering the game unplayable.

Forums
Forums are a great place to share just about anything, chances are if you can think of a topic there's a forum for it, Reddit is a popular place to talk about whatever you want, with thousands of forums available. Forums are a perfect place to organise events and protests, they are easy to use, free and can reach many.


Example - EA Microtransactions
Lets get to the crème de la crème of this topic, the recent news conserving EA, Battlefront 2 and its microtransactions. This topic can go on forever, talking about the predatory nature of Loot Boxes, EAs abuse of licenses, companies and staff along with the many other problems and allegations. To keep this short and sweet, I'm going to discuss the backlash on reddit, its spread towards Imgur and Twitter and the consequences of EAs actions.

This whole deal started with the Battlefront 2 Open Beta, players quickly noticed the "Pay to Win" elements present in the (80$) game, a reddit post titled "Seriously? I paid 80$ to have Vader locked?" rose through the "StarWarsBattlefront" subreddit and was promptly addressed by the EA Community Team.

This reply ended up being Reddits most disliked comment, with a -674k rating. This was them screenshotted and shared on Imgur, Twitter and many other social media websites where it grabbed the eye of journalist websites and youtubers.

As of the 23/11/2017, there has been an outcry to ban Loot Boxes as they promote gambling to children and tempt those with gambling addictions; Hawaii and several other countries rushing to ban and/or enforce strict regulations onto Loot Boxes.

Crowd Funding
Crowdfunding is a way fans can directly fund a game or project they want to see more of, there are many crowdfunding websites with differing rules and regulations.

Kickstarter
Kickstarter is a crowdfunding website, a user can set the amount of money they need, the date the crowdfunder campaign will end and any tier rewards. Kickstarter has been used in a number of famous (Shovel Knight) and infamous (Mighty Number 9) games, the platform allows for a lot of freedom between the user and the funders; The freedom given by Kickstarter given has been exploited before and has left users skeptical. The great thing about Kickstarter is the lack of publishers, no longer do developers have to edit or censor their products because of publishers, they are free to present their products as they were intended, for better or for worse.

Patreon
Patreon is similar to Kickstarter, it allows for anyone with a dream and a project in mind to be funded by interested consumers. Unlike Kickstarter, Patreon is like a subscription, you pay for each amount of time/amount of posts and are given exclusive access to development documents, closed betas and voting polls. Unlike Kickstarter, if you feel unhappy with the direction a project is heading, you are free to unsubscribe, this means you are no longer paying and will stop supporting a project.

Example - Shenmue 3
Shenmue 3 is an upcoming game scheduled for a Holiday 2017 release, the Shenmue series is a classic among SEGA fans, it has a large and thriving fandom, despite this SEGA was hesitant to create Shenmue 3 in fear of a commercial flop. Deep Sea, a publishing company interested in creating the third game in the series purchased the rights to create Shenmue 3 and published a crowdfunding campaign on the website Kickstarter, the goal of 2 million being reached and surpassed in only a couple of days. The Crowdfunding campaign went onto receive 6 and a half million, without the input of the customers and fans, this game would not have been developed.

Sources:
https://games.gamepressure.com/beta-tests.asp?ID=4_1
https://www.gamespot.com/articles/pcs-monster-hunter-like-rpg-dauntless-closed-beta-/1100-6453067/
http://www.pcgamer.com/belgium-says-loot-boxes-are-gambling-wants-them-banned-in-europe/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2017/11/22/from-belgium-to-hawaii-potential-battlefront-2-loot-box-legislation-would-be-complicated/#69a6ee187cbc
https://www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsBattlefront/comments/7cff0b/seriously_i_paid_80_to_have_vader_locked/dppum98/
https://www.trendsmap.com/
https://patreon.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/204606315-What-is-Patreon-
https://www.kickstarter.com/about
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ysnet/shenmue-3
https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/266377/The_imposters_guide_to_taking_feedback.php
http://www.springer.com/gb/book/9781447147688
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=-guHadEPrFcC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

Task 1 - Understand how Media Producers Define Audiences for their Products

TWO METHODS OF DATA COLLECTION

Quantitative Questions -
Quantitative questions focus on the statistics, for example “rate this item 1-10” or “tell us the number of times you’ve used this product”. They are used by companies to find out which of their products is more liked or what part of their product is not used as much as expected. It means that consumers get the products made the way they want and the company gets more sales. It is also used in game testing, it shows game developers what parts of the game players enjoyed and what parts were too difficult or boring. Survey sites like Survey Money or Qualtrics exist where you can easily set up a Quantitative quiz that people can fill in.

Qualitative Questions -
Qualitative Questions focus on the person’s opinions and critiques. Questions like “What do you like best about the product” and “If you could change one thing about the product what would it be?” are considered Qualitative Questions because they have nothing to do with statistics. There are websites for products that list information and data about them, these websites have a comment section where anyone can give their opinion and if they recommend it or not. This gives companies a more detailed description of what their consumers want but this it requires people to spend their time writing reviews and the company spends their time reading through them.

DATA COLLECTION COMPANIES

BARB -
BARB (Broadcasters’ Audience Research Board) is a UK based audience research business that focuses on tracking television usage. By installing a special box to a subscribed household they can track the things the household watches and by who, they then sell this information to broadcasting companies like the BBC who then use it to focus their broadcasts towards what people like to watch. The tracking box comes with its own special remote, when a certain member of the house sits down to watch, they press the button on the remote to signify that they are watching, each member has their own button, even unexpected guests.

When a household signs up with BARB, they have the aforementioned "box" hooked up to their television, this device tracks which person is watching, the shows/movies they watch, at what hour the do so, the device they use (television, tablet, computer etc.) and the type of service they are watching through (internet, mobile data, satellite etc). Each day's data is recorded and via calculations and grafting, BARB studies the changes in behaviour and activities over time, providing results to improve the overall broadcasting experience for both the consumer and the provider.

RAJAR -
RAJAR (Radio Joint Audience Research Limited) established in 1992 is similar to BARB, it tracks what radio stations people listen to and passes on that data to the BBC and RadioCentre who co-own the company. It keeps track of how long a station is listened to, the platform its listened on and location it's listened in, after the BBC and RadioCentre receive this information they adjust important news and advertisements to be played when most people are listening.

OFCOM -
OFCOM are government-approved regulators of TV, radio and all broadcasted forms of media, they ensure that scams and shady practices while also promoting competition between broadcasting companies, they ensure citizen interests are met while also protecting them by enforcing regulatory rules and laws. They were originally unveiled during the 2001 Queen's speech to parliament, it was presented as a "super-regulator", there to oversee the rapidly growing media broadcasting business.

ABC -
The ABC (Audit Bureau of Circulations) are divided into many sectors, one of these sectors is the BBC marketing and advertising sector, they mainly specialise in doing small-scale studies and using the research from BARB to decide how to market their broadcasts. Due to how much of the researching they outsource this division doesn't do much of its own, they mainly handle the data they receive from others.

EEDAR -
EEDAR (Electronic Entertainment Design and Research) is a research firm started in 2006, it focuses on studying and collecting data on video game players and the gaming industry and selling it to companies like SEGA and BLIZZARD and many others. Its one of the largest video game data companies, even receiving a Guinness World Record. As of february 2010 it has "15,414,725 objectively quantifiable data points". The data it collects ranges from sale numbers, advertising all the way to briefs.

VALVE -
Valve has done its own private research to ensure its games are the most immersive and well built of the industry, they've researched the things a player keeps track of with eye movement detection, they track the heartbeat of a player to detect when to spawn enemies, ensuring the is never a safe spot. A Lot of the research they do in incorporated into their games, not only do they track it, they also make sure to note how intrusive each approach to tracking is, this helps them figure out how players react at home playing games to a strikingly accurate degree.


AUDIENCE PROFILING

FOCUS GROUPS -
A focus group is a group of people that all share a specific trait (this could be things like, being a specific gender, playing video games, enjoying a specific genre of video games and other such) their input is commonly used to adjust entertainment media to be more accessible to that specific audience. Focus testing is nefariously abused in the AAA video game industry, with faked results and bad decisions turning interesting games into bland generic mush. An interview with an assassin's creed game designer describes how focus testing dumbed down the game by removing features deemed "too hard" due to focus testing, these edits ripped holes in the game's balancing and created easily exploitable glitches.

QUESTIONNAIRES -
Questionnaires are a simple concept, they are a type of survey used to better understand the wants and needs of a person/group, the questions on them vary depending on topic but are worded and written in a way that gives insight into the mind of its target audience. Questionnaires are used by many companies due to their simplicity and user-friendly design, some companies offer free nicknacks for answering a survey as an incentive to get more people's opinions.

FACE-TO-FACE INTERVIEWS -
Face-to-Face interviews are exactly what the sound like, two people sit down and have a discussion where one person is interviewing them, commonly with prewritten questions and noting down any useful information. While these types of interviews offer a much larger amount of information, the fact that it requires people to talk and answer in real time can be both intrusive and the anti-anonymity of the matter may make people lie or tell half a truth.

EVALUATION OF AUDIENCE PROFILING USEFULNESS

Socio-Economic Status
A person's socioeconomic status is their knowledge, experiences, economic status and social standing all wrapped up into one rating, it is basically a way to rank those with little experience and money compared to someone more well known and knowledgeable. This data type is integral as someone's life experience may make them view the world in a different light, someone of high socioeconomic standing might appreciate brands over quality, while a person of a lower standing may value their money more, doing more research and considering branded goods as a waste of money.

Psychographics
This breaks down people into groups based on their values, political stance and personality among other things, while this does not relate as much to the entertainment media it is easy to see how journalism and news networks profit from this information.

Geodemographics
By breaking down people into groups of where they live, you can see patterns in the type of media consumed, one city may have a larger that average interest in video games due to historical or current events, its a no-brainer that a larger than standard amount of money should be pumped into billboard (and other types of) advertisements there than anywhere else.

Age
The age of a person can tell you a lot not only the type of media they are exposed to but their interests and abilities, for example- you wouldn't advertise medication and cars on a children's website because of obvious reasons. By studying the age range of your customers you can better advertise your products.

Gender
While the differences between male and female lifestyles have started to blur as of late, with more and more gender-exclusive activities becoming unisex, it's still important info to know the percentages of people who are male vs female. Considering the shifts in politically acceptable behaviour, its always a good idea to be on top of your game when tracking the people using your products, if you notice more and more men buying something targeted towards women you should encourage that by altering your marketing and target audience into something more neutral to increase profits.

Sexual Orientation
While not as frequently visited, sexual orientation has its uses, there are many movies, tv shows and video games that have people of varying sexualities, these types of media may earn a second look from someone more "liberal". There is also the matter of more 'adult' forms of entertainment that may need to research their audiences preferences for a better experience.

Regional Identity
This is the place someone originates from and the way that place has shaped the person's decisions personality. These tend to fall under stereotyping, the best example of this would be America's obsession with patriotism and food, most easily observed in the advertisement named Carl’s Jr. “Most American Thing Ever”. An advertisement of a model in an American flag bikini, surrounded by american-themed objects next to the statue of liberty. (Last link in source list.)

Mainstream
Trends come and go, it's important to keep track of what's "hip and happening" so you and your product arent seen as transparent and desperate for attention. Keeping an eye on potential new trends is integral for businesses, one lucky investment and all of a sudden all the spotlights are on you. When something is "Mainstream" it is considered popular enough that even people with little interest would buy it just to fit in, it can be a large gamble, you either win big (Portable Gaming) or end up broke (Ouya).

Alternative
This can best be described as a Niche group growing into Mainstream and the changes that come along with such a transition. Video games were once considered children's entertainment only, as more older folk were drawn into gaming and as kids grew into adults and continued playing games the market slowly incorporated more mainstream appeal as can be seen with the motion era of consoles, the Wii, Xbox Kinect and Playstation Move all going for a more "Family-Friendly" experience.

Niche
Not everyone is drawn into the mainstream 'hype', some people just prefer the activities not normally considered socially acceptable, these types of Niches are the opposites of the mainstream gamble, they are more methodical investments than the "Go big or go home" approaches of mainstream-targeting companies.

Sources:
https://www.bl.uk/business-and-ip-centre/articles/what-are-typical-quantitative-research-questions
http://dissertation.laerd.com/types-of-quantitative-research-question.php
http://dissertation.laerd.com/how-to-structure-quantitative-research-questions.php
https://www.surveymonkey.com/blog/2013/04/10/qualitative-vs-quantitative/
https://masscommtheory.com/2011/05/05/writing-good-qualitative-research-questions/
http://www.gamerankings.com/browse.html?site=p
http://www.barb.co.uk/
http://www.barb.co.uk/about-us/barb-for-students/
http://www.barb.co.uk/about-us/how-we-do-what-we-do/
http://www.barb.co.uk/about-us/frequently-asked-questions/
http://www.rajar.co.uk/
http://www.rajar.co.uk/content.php?page=about_organisation
https://www.ofcom.org.uk/
https://www.ofcom.org.uk/about-ofcom/what-is-ofcom
https://www.ofcom.org.uk/about-ofcom
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ofcom
http://abc.go.com/
https://www.abc.org.uk/
http://about.abc.net.au/
http://www.eedar.com/
http://www.eedar.com/about
http://www.eedar.com/gamepulse
http://www.eedar.com/eedar-insights-analytics
http://www.eedar.com/data-services
http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/largest-database-of-video-game-features
http://sru.soc.surrey.ac.uk/SRU19.html
https://www.thebalance.com/what-is-a-market-research-focus-group-2296907
http://www.experienceux.co.uk/faqs/what-are-focus-groups/
https://www.focus4people.com/system/projectsAll.asp
http://www.spinter.lt/site/en/vidinis/vidmenu/face-to-face-interview
https://www.snapsurveys.com/blog/advantages-disadvantages-facetoface-data-collection/
http://www.valvesoftware.com/company/Valve_Handbook_LowRes.pdf
http://www.valvesoftware.com/publications/2009/GDC2009_ValvesApproachToPlaytesting.pdf

http://www.trustedreviews.com/no-man-s-sky-review#

http://www.eedar.com/reports/EEDAR_Deconstructing_the_PC_Free_to_Play_Market_2015.pdf
https://vimeo.com/129692446