Mr Plinkett and New Media Ventures - How Do They Work?

To my left is Mr Plinkett. He is an aging serial killer who spends his time downing pizza rolls and reviewing movies. Some new, some old but all hilariously broken down between condescending rants and critical points. I'm introducing Mr Plinkett as an example of a New Media Venture. I'm not too sure on my terminology because the subject matter is so new. Seriously, I could only find one course about these Ventures.

New Media Ventures are a medium for story telling set apart by their formats. YouTube videos, blogs, and even hidden inside of other mediums. These ventures are usually interactive and are thus forth called games. These games are, in most cases, defined by two traits; interactivity and emergent properties. The interactivity comes in many forms whether in solving a puzzle to help out the characters or actually conversing with the characters themselves. This is where emergent properties come in. These properties are brought in unexpectedly by the players or audience. Depending on how much agency, ability to affect the story, the game masters give their audience. The game masters have to alter their story and push forward in response to what the players are talking about and where they are headed. Occasionally they entirely veer off course. New Media Ventures are smaller forms of a greater art, the ARG. Alternate Reality Game. For more information about ARGs follow this link to ARGnet. 

For now let's focus on the smaller and the more easily defined Ventures.

Take Mr Plinkett for example: On the surface these are movie reviews with quirky commentary. However, upon further examination of his Star Wars Prequel Trilogy Reviews one could see the emergence of a story. Between the jokes and critiques of the films we get to know Mr Plinkett as we would any character in literature or movies. We come to know and like him, despite his psychopathic tendencies.

 Later this week I'll add another post to expand on New Media Ventures and next week at my regular post time I'll go into ARGs. Starting with Marble Hornets.

Note: If you watch the Marble Hornet videos I'd advise to do so in chronological order while watching out for video responses. It's the best way to make sense of it.