Comics

https://www.pixton.com/my-comics/posted

Username: Libcat21  Password: Welcome*21

This project was both fun and exhausting. I wanted to do more comics, but I never made a comic before and over estimated how much I could physically do. I originally wanted to do these by hand, but I was afraid my style was to “bare” for this project (plus, my scanner/printer isn’t working). I used Pixton instead, it was something I was shown in another class that I was eager to try out.

The site was easy to use and offerd an array of options that i could use, change, and make myself. There were a few things they didn’t have, like house elves and brass eagle knockers, but they had enough that I could make do. I’m actually glad I used an online source for the comic. I’t helps for those who aren’t good at drawing but still have ideas. The site helps bring ideas to life for those who can’t draw.

I’m also glad I used headcanons from other fans. It adds to the unity of fandoms and shows that not every idea about a house is correct.

Digitalit: THE GAME

For my final, I created a game. But this is not just a game: it is a Real-Person fanfiction-style game that features Plymouth State and everyone from the Digitalit class!

I use many theoretical concepts we learned in class to frame the world and plot of the game. For example, the controllable character in the game is called Interactor, which is a nod to Katherine Hayles’ essay on electronic literature. Hayles’ essay uses the term “interactor” to refer to the “user” engaging in a work of interactive fiction.

Perhaps the most explicit use of theoretical concepts from class, however, comes from the books that are read by the Interactor in the game. In order to acquire the means to destroy the Copyright Creature, the game’s villain, the Interactor must read about several elements of participatory culture that were discussed in our Digitalit course.  The Interactor reads excerpts from What is a remix, exactly? by Elisa Kreisinger, Grey Area: How Fifty Shades Dominated the Market by Emily Eakin, Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture by Henry Jenkins, and Legal issues with fanfiction from Wikipedia. These four articles gave the best examples of what participatory culture is, how it’s used, and what the issues are surrounding it.

The Copyright Creature itself is also a nod to concepts we went over in class, particularly relating to fanfiction and remixes. Fanfiction and remixes, being forms of participatory culture, are unique in the way they rely on being a “transformative work” in order to be protected under Fair Use. If something is not protected under Fair Use, it is considered copyright. The grey areas surrounding Fair Use is what fuels the Copyright Creature’s rage.

The Copyright Creature, while demonic, actually does serve an important purpose: to protect the rights and works of authors. The Interactor can decide the best course of action for dealing with the Copyright Creature at the end of the game, whether it’s killing the creature or sparing its life, ultimately deciding their view on the matter. Copyright does serve an important purpose, which the Interactor may learn depending on their choice.

Outside theory, but still relating to the (real life) Digitalit class, is the use of Twine-like elements in the game. Twine creates branches of choices for the Interactor to explore. Although there are choices, the game is still linear in the way that it follows a distinct beginning, middle, and end that can’t be skipped through or reconfigured. The game does have different endings, though, and the two “big” endings have a significant difference that reflects they type of person the Interactor becomes while playing the game.

It’s important to note that Digitalit: The Game is a GAME, not interactive fiction. There are a few distinctions that solidify this point.

For example, there is an avatar to explore the world with. The avatar becomes the recognizable vehicle that NPC’s (non-playable characters) interact with. By interacting with NPC’s, the player can find out more about the world and more about the story behind the game.

The person behind the avatar (the player) is supposed to suspend themselves in the world that the avatar is engaging with. This “suspension” is helped by another defining characteristic of the game-genre: world building. Digitalit: The Game utilizes world building to create not just the setting of the game, but the “reality” the game is set in.

Players see the visual elements to the world: the brick pathways, the trees, the clock tower. Those who go to Plymouth State University have the extra edge of knowing where the game is set in real life: the school. In addition to the visuals, however, are the objects that the player can click on to get a further look at the world.

By examining these “extra” things, the player gets a sense of the world they are in. The mood behind the world changes depending on where the player is in the game. For example, the hellish looking Ellen Reed is very different from the serene campus. Inside are statues that stare, and guts that line the walls. Clicking these things allows the player to know that the mood of the game has changed, and that there are sinister elements in the world. I’d say world building is the most distinctive quality of the game that makes it a game rather than just interactive fiction.

Another highlight in my game is that most of the dialogue comes directly from the blogposts created by my Digitalit class, which can be viewed on this very WordPress site.

I felt that it was important to do this for two reasons. This game, in a sense, is a form of Real-Person fanfiction. The characters in the game are taken directly from people in real life. Even the game’s environmental layout is based directly on Plymouth State University. Making sure that the game’s characters were true to their real life counterparts both in their visual representations and their dialogue was important to me, because that’s what a Real-Person fanfic is about: taking real people and throwing them into a fictional situation.

In addition to staying true to the Real-Person fanfic genre was my goal to be “meta”. This game is meta in the sense that it is a game created in a Digitalit class by a Digitalit student about a Digitalit class and Digitalit students. The students in my class have learned what the characters in the game learn, and the students in real life have, in a sense, experienced what the Interactor in the game experiences (minus the demonic creature).

In conclusion, this game ties together the most important elements my Digitalit class studied over the course of the semester. More importantly, however, is that the game also ties in the individual students, and preserves their reactions to our course through the medium of the game.

That’s about it!. Click the link below to get the file! Here are directions on how to play:

• First, click the Google Drive link below.
• From there, you need to download the ENTIRE Digitalitfinal file.
  That should download a file named Digitalitfinal onto your computer.
• Open it, and find the file named Game.exe.
• When you try to open that file, it should prompt you to either EXTRACT ALL or RUN.
  You want to EXTRACT ALL.
• That should give you another file named Digitalit.
• Open that one, then run THAT folder’s Game.exe file, and you should be golden.

Google Drive Link – WINDOWS ONLY

BONUS CONTENT:

I really feel like playing the game doesn’t show how many things I had to learn to make this run correctly, so I’m including some screenshots to show off my work 🙂

All of the dark squares are “events” that can be interacted with

Twelve mapped areas make up the game. They all have to be individually connected through events.

How the “Twine-like” quizzes from the Quizzing Crystals were made.

The Copyright Creature had four pages worth of events, each one helping to lead to the two different endings in the game (well, technically three).

“Not Afraid of the Dark: Hypertext Memoir and Musings in Verse, Prose, and Media” (Final Project Rationale)

For my final project in our class on digital literature, I chose to create a hodge-podge collection of verse and prose, illustrating my thoughts on the world, my personal experiences, and things that I am passionate about (e.g. film, music, etc.). Using the software from Twinery, I crafted a combination of memoir and personal musings, with an interactive twist. When reading through each lexia, there is always a choice of more than one word to click on. This word brings the reader to another lexia, which correlates to the previously-clicked-on word somehow. For instance, if the word “ivory” was in a lexia, and you clicked on it, the lexia you’d be transported to would have to do with elephants. I’m aware that this is a wild example, but the entire work is a but complex, in an artsy, odd, free-form kind of way.

I chose to use Twinery as my platform because I wanted the reading experience within my piece to be extraordinarily interactive. I loved how the hypertext novel The Unknown  by Scott Rettberg, William Gillespie, Dirk Stratton, and Frank Marquardt told a story, or series of stories, in a completely non-linear, yet coherent fashion. Along with wanting to implement a high level of interactivity via hypertext, I wanted my project to have a potently artistic style to it. Often, technology and creativity/art are seen as binary opposites. I’m guilty of thinking with this very mindset, that technology is cold and lifeless, and you can’t breathe a human vibe into it. But, when we studied GIF novels, like Zac’s Haunted House by Dennis Cooper (which I LOVED, as our class knows), I was reminded that technology can be immensely artistic and intentionally ambiguous, allowing for projection of meaning and strong artistic expression.

In addition, I liked the idea of generative poetry, like “Along the Briny Beach” by J.R. Carpenter, but didn’t want my poetry “talking at” the audience like that poem and its poetic peers. I wanted the audience to be able to have a say in where the “story” went, like in the Twine Quing’s Quest. At first, I wanted the entire piece to be verse, but then I realized that some prose would probably be needed to elaborate on certain key elements, like why certain things (music, for example) mean so much to me, as well as my past with them, and why I’m taking the time to write about them. Though my piece would probably make the most sense to a niche audience (with interests and thoughts/perspectives like mine), I kept the fact that readers might not know what I’m talking about in mind. For this reason, I tried to make it apparent that I was writing about a band, or an author, or a film, etc. I tried to give some background info here and there. However, the scope is still limited, after all, everything in this work is entirely from my perspective.

When I wrote about certain films or musicians, etc., I included videos. Not only does this give a reader an example to understand what I’m talking about, it adds a multimedia layer. For example (and this is a real example), I mention the film Black Swan in one of my poems. The reader can, then, click on the film’s title (which is a hyperlink), and be transported to a trailer for the movie. I did the same thing for music, and even a Charles Bukowski poem. I think this adds a helpful layer of background information and context for someone reading what I’ve written and not sharing my passions/interests. In addition, this use of someone else’s creation within my own creation is a bit of a throwback to participatory culture and Henry Jenkins’ thoughts on it, from early in the course.

Overall, this piece is rather dark and emo, hence the name Not Afraid of the Dark. Themes that run through the entire piece, and help connect it between different lexias, are existential musings, chaos within the universe, thoughts on a possible higher power, music, film, and writers that I love, etc. I hope readers enjoy this.

Final Project: Hannibalpalooza

For my final project, I chose to do an anthology which analyzed the fanfictions in the Hannibal fandom, focusing on those written for the relationship between Hannibal and Will. It is posted on pressbooks, so take a look at it if you feel inclined!

https://halflives.pressbooks.com/

So, What’s Reading?

Children have always been referred to as “future leaders”, groomed by schooling for years and years to become versed and adaptive to cultural changes in almost any facet of society. Whether in the business, academia, or technology world, the youth are trained to not only stay current with changes but to anticipate them and spearhead their development. When it comes to technology, however, the implications for that spearheading could be much more complex than straightening out an economic crisis or researching a new theory. Advances in technology and different digital media platforms have started to challenge and change what it means to do something as fundamental as read. This has caused a shift in young children learning to read- from linear thinking to non-linear, something with great potential upside for society.

There are certain advances in technology that have taken charge of this whole ‘rethinking the reading process’ idea. Hypertext is one of the earlier developments. After that, in the early 2000’s, came social media sites like Myspace and Facebook, followed closely by Twitter, Instagram, and many more. Transmedia storytelling is another aspect of digital literature that will be used to explore children’s ability to comprehend complex, non-linear thinking. All three of these components of digital literature require a different set of skills than traditional print. The ability to create or read a story that isn’t in a “normal” order requires a high level of patience and commitment that most young children aren’t at.

Hypertext has become a staple of online interactivity. From games and visual texts to emails and internet browsing, hypertext is everywhere. It’s the foundation of this papers format and content. Hypertext isn’t even exclusive to computer technology, as choose-your-own-adventure stories have been around long before and most often were written for children. However, the introduction of hypertext regarding computers sparked a much more immersive way for people, including children, to consume and process information.

Hypertext dates back to Poststructuralism, with the works of Derrida and Foucault laying the ideological framework for digital hypertext before it was even close to being a reality. According to George Landow’s Hypertext, “hypertext allows readers to choose their own paths and move easily among any number of linked documents, the single, authoritative center to a discourse becomes destabilized” (Landow). The idea of a discourse becoming destabilized is exactly what pulls people into a hypertext, the fact that there is no linear plot so the reader is allowed to piece it together themselves.

So, how does hypertext technology challenge the way that children learn how to read, and ultimately, think? Well, a study at the University of Valencia “provides initial evidence that hypertext navigation overviews are particularly useful for students with low sustained-attention skills” (Salmeron, Garcia). Hypertext, in general, is much more immersive than traditional print, as it gives children the opportunity to design their own learning experience, following only hyperlinks that they are interested in.

A separate study was done on whether children prefer linear or non-linear, hypertext, storytelling techniques. Two separate classes of third graders spent eight weeks on a collaborative learning project, in which, the first group each wrote their own linear stories for four weeks and then spent the next four working with one another to improve and edit their work. The second group did the same exact thing, but experimenting with non-linear storytelling instead. It was found in the linear group that the “children deeply relied on evaluating the relationship, continuality and coherence of story path before sequentially participating in building up the story” (Lui). A limitation is seen here with the linear approach to learning. Children get very caught up with making sure they stay consistent in their stories instead optimizing their creativity to tell it in a different way. It was discovered through an end-of-the-study survey that “children in the nonlinear group performed superior to those of linear group in all four factors [derivation, remix, ownership, and positive independence]”.

Once it was discovered how accessible hypertext technology was, social media platforms that were just starting out started taking advantage. Facebook and Myspace were the earlier ones, paving the way for all of the ones out there today. Twitter is one of the most popular social media platforms today. A site that allows users to post short “tweets”, usually including a link to another site or article for the world to see. It’s also interesting that children today are the most active on social media than ever before. For the next section of the paper on Twitter, follow this.

An extremely crucial part of the reason why children in the past few decades have been pushed to think in non-linear ways is due to the rapid expansion of transmedia storytelling. Henry Jenkins, one of the leading scholars in the field, said in Transmedia 101 that it is “a process where integral elements of a fiction get dispersed systematically across multiple delivery channels for the purpose of creating a unified and coordinated entertainment experience”. For example, a fan of Harry Potter may read all of the books but still not be experiencing the “unified and coordinated” experience that is the sum of all of the Harry Potter movies, shows, games, toys, etc. It sounds like a lot to ask of the average fan to dedicate so much time to unraveling the entirety of the world, but Jenkins believes the opposite. He says, “we are drawn to master what can be known about a world which always expands beyond our grasp. This is a very different pleasure than we associate with the closure found in most classically constructed narratives” (Jenkins). Humans are naturally curious beings, with a desire to know things that are unknown, so it’s understandable that reading things with a clear, linear end might be less appealing to a child with a shorter attention span.

Now, of course, the transmedia stories that exist today are different than the ones that were around just ten to twenty years ago. Most of them were expansions of Disney or Pixar movies like Toy Story and Lion King. Today, however, there are many more options for media platforms to take on a transmedia story. Technology that is mainstream now, that wasn’t then, includes smartphone and computer apps. These have transformed the way that people get information- from whenever possible to whenever convenient.

For example, a recently popular installment of a famous transmedia story, Pokemon, is a perfect example of how smartphone technology is changing the way children learn to read. Pokemon Go is a smartphone game designed to continue on the story of Pokemon and capitalize on the strong fan-base that it has acquired and maintained over twenty years. It’s not surprising that Pokemon Go became one of the most successful video games ever, as fans of the story are already used to reading it non-linearly, across television shows, movies, books, video games, and the playing cards that started it all.

From the same study that found that youth spend the most time daily on different types of media, it was concluded that “transmedia formats for children may even enrich educational concepts… High engagement and media enjoyment result in children’s more elaboratively processing information and thus encourage self-regulated learning” (Pietschmann). The process of non-linear learning is more stimulating for a lot of people, including children, and can get them interested in doing more learning outside of school, perhaps even for pleasure.

Through all of these different aspects of digital literature, it’s clear that what most people read on a daily basis is non-linear, as opposed to older, slowly expiring methods of texts like books, newspapers, and magazines. As a result, children are becoming subconsciously wired to read and think in more abstract ways than before. While there are many drawbacks to constant technology use, the idea that it could teach kids how to keep an open mind and get them more interested in reading has massive implications for society. As “future leaders”, children who have gained the patience and creativity to read in non-linear ways have the opportunity to free themselves of the limitations of linearity and be true innovators.

 

 Works Cited

Jenkins, Henry. “Transmedia Storytelling 101.” Henry Jenkins, Mar. 2007,                                            henryjenkins.org/2007/03/transmedia_storytelling_101.html.

Landow, George P. “Hypertext: The Convergence of Contemporary Critical Theory and             Technology.” Criticism , vol. 4, 2000,                                                                                                  file:///C:/Users/Tucker/Downloads/Landow%20Hypertext%20(1).pdf.

Lui, Chen-Chung, et al. “Children’s Collaborative Storytelling with Linear and Nonlinear             Approaches.” Social and Behavioral Sciences, Procedia, 6 May 2010,                                          http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877042810008116.

Pietschmann, Daniel. “Limitations of Transmedia Storytelling for Children: A Cognitive             Developmental Analysis.” International Journal of Communications, vol. 8, 2014,             ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/viewFile/2612/1205.

Salmeron, Ladislao, and Victoria Garcia. “Children’s reading of printed text and                              hypertext with navigation overviews: The role of comprehension, sustained                        attention, and visio-spatial abilities.” J Educational Computing Research , vol. 47,                  no. 1, 2012, journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.2190/EC.47.1.b.

An Anthology of A Song of Ice and Fire fanfic – Final Project

For my final project, I decided to do an anthology of fanfiction because I am fascinated by the way fans respond to the movies/books/television shows they love. Since my latest obsession is A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones, I thought it perfect to combine what I love with my final project for Digitalit.

I had originally thought to make my anthology into a pressbook, but as I planned the anthology out, I decided that I wanted to make this project more fully incorporated within the digital world, instead of mirroring traditional books. Instead the anthology is a blog with different pages dedicated to different genres. There is an incredible amount of room for me to grow into if I decide to continue this project after the semester ends.

Check it out here, and feel free to leave comments!

https://asoiafanthology.wordpress.com/

Transmedia 202 and The Lizzie Bennet Diaries

Henry Jenkins has defined a lot of my current, limited, knowledge of digital literature. First with participatory culture, then Transmedia Storytelling 101, and now Transmedia Storytelling 202. 202 addresses some questions about his theory of transmedia storytelling and also adds some new “rules”, if you will, for it.

Some new elements to add to my understanding of transmedia storytelling after reading include the fact that the number of media used in a project isn’t as important as the relationship between them, and that it’s important not “to prioritize digital media extensions over other kinds of media practices”. The example used in the reading was with regards to games somehow being a more important piece of transmedia storytelling.

The Lizzie Bennet Diaries is a good example of this idea of quality over quantity that Henry Jenkins seemed to be getting at. There isn’t a whole transmedia world dedicated to Pride and Prejudice, I believe there are couple games but other than that not much.

Pride and Prejudice has been made into movies and whatnot (let’s not talk about that zombie version… some things are better left undiscussed), but this web-series is the closest thing, in my opinion, to creating a “world” for the story.

One thing that Henry Jenkins talked about in the new reading was the difference between an adaptation of a story and an extension of a story. In it, he says that “an adaptation takes the same story from one medium and retells it in another. An extension seeks to add something to the existing story as it moves from one medium to another” (Jenkins). This web series is definitely an adaptation, as it is just a more modern take on the story rather than any sort of new contributor to the plot.

After reading Transmedia Storytelling 202, I’m not too sure how much The Lizzie Bennet Diaries qualifies as transmedia. I think it does, just maybe not as much as The Matrix or Sherlock. Jenkins said that “Most transmedia content serves one or more of the following functions:

• Offers backstory
• Maps the World
• Offers us other character’s perspectives on the action
• Deepens audience engagement”

I think the web series does only a little bit of each of these, except for map the world. I haven’t read the original book, but I can’t see a world that was built for this story.

 

Transmedia Storytelling: Teen Titans

“I am focusing on emergent forms of storytelling which tap into the flow of content across media and the networking of fan response” (Jenkins). I was trying to figure out what to write about and the one idea that my brain kept coming back to was how Doctor Who was kept alive through fan involvement, books, radio segments, and other pieces of media. Once I also read that “This focus on multiplicity leaves open a space for us to see fan-produced media as part of a larger transmedia process” (Jenkins), I knew what I wanted to talk about: Teen Titans.

Teen Titans was a very popular cartoon network show with great storylines and awesome fight scenes. It only ran from 2003 to 2006, but I loved it and always wanted it to come back. When I got to college, I got TV again and Teen Titans go had apparently been on air for about a year. The show was a much more cartoonized, silly and less action-packed version of the show that I expected to shy away from. Surprisingly, I watch it here and there and I don’t even hate it that much. It’s actually my “go to” if The Big Bang Theory, Rick and Morty, or something isn’t on. So, how does it work as transmedia?

Well, even though the new cartoon uses the same characters, all the stories seem to be original. Also, it adds stuff that could easily be additive. For example, there’s an episode where one of the villains informs the Teen Titans that they have been rebooted several times and that in their previous lives they were more serious and cooler looking. The show plays around with different ideas that make Teen Titans Go more of an extension than an alternative.

After further thought, it seems that Teen Titans Go may have done more for the show than another Teen Titans show more like the original probably would of. Teen Titans Go hit the younger crowd that Cartoon Network viewers now are (with kids having more and more media options earlier, making the really young kids the new audience). It has the qualities most CW shows now have: little action, more lessons, really, really kid-like graphics, and less actual violence.  Oh, and don’t forget really weird! What’s great about getting these youngins is they will eventually want to watch the old Teen Titans and may even want more of the universe. Now, while hitting a young audience and building new fans is a good move, there’s another layer that made TTG a good choice: the old fans.

I said earlier that CN fans are mostly young, and that’s true, but then you have people in my age bracket who grew up on CN and still watch adult swim for “the good shows.” We’ve seen Teen Titans and for some reason, at least for me, it’s hilarious to watch. Some parts are good, and that’s great, but most of the time I watch it to laugh at how outrageous the whole thing is. Robin is a psychopath, Raven and Beast boy have a weird Romance, and Robin might actually get to date starfire. It’s literally like a super cartoony, behind the scenes, reality tv version of Teen Titans. The greatest part is that for the most part all the voices are from the original show. So, you’ve got new fans watching, old fans watching, and despite the low ratings on IMDB, people are getting interested again.

Jenkins talks a lot about fan involvement, and earlier this year a fan made Teen Titans movie trailer came out. This shows that people want more Teen titans and I don’t believe it would be as interesting to fans if a piece of transmedia like Teen Titans Go, no, exactly Teen Titans Go, didn’t happen. Now that interest is building, and fans are getting involved, I think that the series will only continue to grow with more and more pieces for fans to absorb until it is like Justice League or The Avengers.

Now, as a final piece, think about this. The bad guy has already reset the Teen Titans, so how do we know that it won’t happen again and they won’t have their own show Marvel Avengers or the Defenders? This could all be a part of the slow process of DC becoming truly transmedia.

Vlogs are the culmination of everything we’ve learned this semester

No, for real. This isn’t some amateur 2008-era Shane Dawson stuff, this is a deep, deep transmedia experience. The Lizzie Bennett diaries combines a bunch of digital mediums that we’ve studied, and that’s super cool.

I would consider this to be remix culture, as even though it only remixes one work, it still changes it and warps the story to a different medium. The writers of this vlog take an established story with an established universe and change it to both bring it into the modern era and into a modern medium that is nothing like the original.

While a book has chapters and a vlog has posts, they don’t break up exactly the same way. A vlog usually has some kind of timed schedule but chapters, unless serialized, come out all at once.

The Lizzie Bennett diaries are also participatory, letting viewers interact with the characters on websites where they post content. It brings an old story into a new age.

This is in contrast to when we saw Pride and Prejudice on Project Gutenburg. It’s a perfect example of what I mean when I say digital literature must require a digital form. The Lizzie Bennett diaries are the same story as P&P, but they are both told in very different ways. That’s the cool part.

 

“Pride and Prejudice”…And A Transmedia Makeover

Until mere days ago, I saw transmedia storytelling as lucrative and brilliant, but I also (secretly) found it a bit overwhelming. I find this form of storytelling, which is telling a narrative over various platforms to create what go-to transmedia scholar Henry Jenkins calls a “coordinated and unified entertainment experience,” to be simultaneously fascinating and daunting. Last week, I wrote a blog post on the brilliance of the intricacy of the TV show LOST‘s transmedia franchise. And, I stand by that post. Still, the whole endeavor felt like “a lot.” I, personally, am not a fan of many transmedia franchise success stories, like LOST or Harry Potter.

I have friends who are avid fans of DC and Marvel, and I (being the quite selective superhero film fan that I am) was always shocked a how they seemed able to seamlessly go back and forth between mediums, consuming story lines from comics one minute, to a movie following the same plot the next. I feel like an elderly person in a 22-year-old’s body for saying this, but that didn’t seem like something I could do, or would even really want to do. I saw the benefits, and championed for them, but, to be honest, certain kinds of transmedia storytelling seemed a bit too intricate for me to seek out on my time, for simple enjoyment.

Then, I found myself watching “The Lizzie Bennet Diaries,” a modern day, transmedia recreation of the novel Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, composed of a YouTube vlog and Twitter updates by characters that coincided with what was going on with the show in each episode that was released. Henry Jenkins, I believe, would classify this web vlog/fake Twitter retelling as an “extension” (i.e. a retelling that adds something to the existing story as it moves from one medium to another). The reason that I classify “The Lizzie Bennet Diaries” as an extension, and not merely an adaptation (simply retelling a story in a different medium), is because the story of Pride and Prejudice (a novel) was not simply rehashed in a digital fashion with “The Lizzie Bennet Diaries”; it received an entire makeover.

 

From “The Lizzie Bennet Diaries”

First names remained (mostly) the same, as did the basic plot of the original Pride and Prejudice, in this revamped telling of the story. However, to not call “The Lizzie Bennet Diaries” a retelling, a transmedia extension, would be entirely wrong. Everything is given a modern twist with the use of YouTube vlogging and tweeting. That is low-hanging fruit on the list of what is new and different about this endeavor. But, also, think about what these modern elements actually do to the story. For one thing, Lizzie Bennet gets to tell her own story, as opposed to having it narrated in the third person narrative, like in Pride and Prejudice. In addition, characters are extremely self-aware of the storytelling in itself, as they are speaking directly to viewers of the YouTube videos. There is no fourth wall to be broken. In this revamped extension of a Jane Austen classic, characters are doing the storytelling themselves. This gives the story an entirely new way of connecting to the consumer (in this case, a viewer instead of a reader).

“The Lizzie Bennet Diaries” do not just speak directly to the viewer, these episodes allow for a serial, episodic experience. Each video is less than six minutes at a clip. In my experience, this allowed the plot to fly by. Each episode is entertaining and humorous, making for easy viewing. This allows for individuals who would never dream of picking up a novel to experience the same plot at their own leisure. And, to assuage my own anxieties regarding feeling overwhelmed, the tweets that match up with each episode, and are meant to (ideally) be read in between videos, are just as swiftly satisfying. Die-hard fans of the original Pride and Prejudice might be initially put off by this modern day extension of the classic, but this new format invites a new sort of consumption, and therefore, a new type of consumer, to enjoy the classic plot, as well. Once again, I give a sincere thumbs up to transmedia storytelling, and the abilities it has to extend the reach of stories.