Revenge of the fanboy: convergence culture and the politics of incorporation

Abstract

?Revenge of the Fanboy: Convergence Culture and the Politics of Incorporation,? examines the demographic, representational, and academic ?revenge? of the fanboy within convergence culture. Specifically, this project exposes the gendered tensions underpinning the media industry?s ?collaborationist? embrace of fans through a series of test cases. The first addresses Twilight anti- fandom through a discussion of the Twihate protests at San Diego Comic-Con 2009, Comic-Con?s shifting industrial significance as a promotional space, and fanboys privileged positioning within that space. Moving from localized efforts to contain fangirls at San Diego Comic-Con 2009 to systemic attempts to channel and regulate fan participation, the second test case examines the television industry?s construction of digital ancillary content models through an analysis of the SyFy series Battlestar Galactica (2003-2009). This analysis interrogates how the textual ?work? ancillary content performs replicates fans? tendency to play in the textual gaps and margins, how this ancillary content reinscribes textual authority, and how fans? labor is ultimately ?regifted? back to them as promotional material. The final test case addresses emergent forms of socially networked fan production that attempt to strike a balance between fandom?s ?feminine? gift economy and the ?masculine? commercial drives of amateur production within convergence culture. Examining the fan practice of filking, or folk songs written and performed by fans, alongside the emergence of Harry Potter wizard rock bands, this test case points towards fangirls? complicity in professionalizing their male counterparts, and questions the viability of a model of fan production that fuses commerce with charity.

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