Online doco progress

I was very lucky over the weekend, I found 2 great connections for my Transient Spaces online doco. First of all, I remembered that my boyfriend went to school with Julian Hill, who was the head of Melbourne 2030 and now works for the State Government Department of Planning, so I'll be giving him a call to get a government perspective on development in outer Melbourne (especially Melton).

Secondly, I was talking to my lovely friend Liz, who said that her partner is an urban planner who is currently working on a development at Melton!

So I will have the Sudanese family as a case study of Melton residents, alongside the official government view and the opinions of an urban planner who has to deal with the problems of developing housing and retail spaces in the outer suburbs. A nice, balanced approach I think.

Snack TV - pt 2

Another aspect of short-form drama that I have been musing on since reading the article in The Age is how strongly online/digital drama formats have been pushed by the "money people", ie: film funding bodies such as Film Victoria, AFC and also the ABC. I find that their focus on new media is out of proportion in relation to the number of new media practitioners in Australia and also the audience for new media content.

Digital platforms have created a great new resource for filmmakers and other artists to express themselves and connect with an audience at relatively little cost. The push and drive to be exploring these new technologies should be coming from the artists themselves, as well as from the audience/consumers. However, in our current system, bodies like Film Victoria are using these technologies from the outside in, placing a huge emphasis on new media projects at the expense of more traditional media projects. I see this as having two negative side-effects. One is that the digital media created is actually a traditional drama form forced into a new media cross-platform technology, as opposed to a drama that organically uses the digital form. Secondly, throwing money at new media may make funding bodies look hip and cool, but part of the joy of digital technologies is how cost-effective they can be, which opens up opportunities to new artists and should need less money.

Of course there should be funding for these new media projects, but I think that decisions about how much to fund should come from how many media practitioners out there are using this form and how much they actually need to do it well (and make a living). There's a joke going around the filmmaking community at the moment that any application for film funding or for the ABC needs to use the words "new media" or it is doomed to fail!

Frankly, I think funding of new media projects would be better coming from commercial sources, such as Telstra, Optus or Foxtel. The commerical/business world is much better at being up-to-date and is also aware of what their audience wants. Business is about providing for the consumer, and government funding bodies should be about providing opportunities to artists. If each focused on their particular task, in relation to all areas, not just new media, we could probably get the balance right.

"Snack TV" - the rise of short form digital drama

There is an interesting article in The Age I came across today about the increasing number of short form dramas being made in Australia and around the world for consumption/viewing on mobile phones and onine platforms. The article, The Rise of Snack Drama, focuses especially on two Victorian-made series, Forget the Rules and Girl Friday, as well as looking at the international phenomenon of Lonelygirl15 (YouTube) and quarterlife.

After watching a few episodes of Forget the Rules and Girl Friday, I have bee struck by how traditional they are in terms of story content. The former especially, which comes across as a 3-min version of Secret Life of Us but set in Fitzroy instead of St Kilda. The creator of Forget the Rules is quoted in The Age as saying that free-to-air TV networks are too "conservative" to produce drama for young people anymore, but I have to say that the content of his online show doesn't seem to stray too far from the conservative anyway. The problem we are left with is that TV executives don't want youth drama because young people don't watch TV much anymore, however in transforming these shows into a short format I think that a great deal is lost. Forget the Rules and Girl Friday both have a very sketch-like quality to them, because it is very difficult (some would say impossible) to engage with an audience emotionally in only 2-3 minutes. Compared with Secret Life, This Life or Love My Way, we do not have the opportunity to get drawn into the characters' lives and therefore be moved as well as entertained (Love My Way, end of season one. Gut-wrenching).

Girl Friday is a more successful example of using short-form drama in a digital context because it plays up the comedy element (over-the-top performances, fantasy sequences etc) and also it uses the technology as part of the story. The first episode is about finding a mobile phone on a tram and trying to track down its owner. It also has many layers of potential interactivity for the audience, so the viewer can choose how much to engage with the program.

However, the most successful use of these new technologies, in my opinion, is the LonelyGirl15 series which screened on YouTube. The Age referred to this program as "controversial" because it didn't tell its audience that it was a scripted drama, viewers thought they were watching a teenage girl's video diary, but this is exactly why it is so clever. It plays on the idea of voyeurism and uses a new technology and entertainment in order to make a point. People use the internet and YouTube to, for want of a better word, spy on other people around the world. In finding out that LonelyGirl15 was actually an actor reading a script, perhaps it made people contemplate the morality and potentially exploitative nature of watching people's personal lives.

Video

Here is a video my dad (and I) made about the Sudanese Australian Integrated Learning Program, which is a tutoring service in Melbourne. Sadly, he has had a number of racist comments added to the YouTube site. Why do people feel the need to add such hate to the world?

Ethics

All the ethics approval for our Hons project sounds quite complicated! I'm worried about issues around using an existing script that is based on true stories from asylum seekers and refugees (as AFR does). Will I have to get ethics approval to use the stories, even though I didn't do the interview? Will AFR's permissions be sufficient? Is the fact that they are anonymous enough?

I will have to arrange with Christine to ensure she has access to a counsellor in case the actors get distressed by the material they are using.

One of AFR's key methods to humanise asylum seekers is to have actors telling the stories of refugees in their own accent/voice. So that the vocabulary is that of someone for whom English is a second language, but the accent doesn't necessarily match the use of language. This encourages the audience to listen to the stories rather than put the storyteller in a racial or cultural box. I think that any awareness campaign for AFRUK should use a similar method somehow. More thought needed.

Other academic references - quantitative research

Problems with quantitative research, references:

"Clinical research with sheep is often constrained to use small samples. This places additional strains on traditional Frequentist statistical analyses: the results tend to lack statistical power, so there is a high likelihood that they will not be statistically significant. In addition, it is difficult to combine the results of more than one study."

P. J. Cripps; “Statistical and epidemiological methodology for sheep research: The needs, the problems, the solutions”
Small Ruminant Research
Volume 76, Issues 1-2, April 2008, Pages 26-30


Quantitative research best in order to back up other research. If a theory or problem is not already well understood then qualitative research is needed before a quantitative study is conducted.

John W. Creswell
Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Method Approaches
p.22

Transient Spaces - Online Doco

I have been thinking of ideas for my "online" doco as part of Transient Spaces. The concept is quite new to me, although I can imagine how it will work and I have heard of online docos, I had just never considered how one would go about making one before.

A number of potential topics spring to mind based around the theme of "community". The first thought that came to my head when presented with the topic was a Sudanese family who are friends of my family. I think I associate them with "community" because their community is so strong and the ties that bind the Sudanese in Australia come, not only from shared cultural and racial/family links, but also from the shared experience of being a migrant community in a new country and the trauma of escaping from a warzone and all the emotional/psychological baggage that comes with that.

My thoughts then moved on to a more literal, physical community, which is actually where this Sudanese family live, and that is in Melton. Melton is literally the end of Melbourne, the last sub/urban landscape before rural Victoria begins. There are a number of new developments in the area and the land is cheap relative to other Melbourne suburbs. Some of these developments are pitched as "communities", which begs the question in my mind, can you create a community? Does building houses together, isolated from other housing estates, force the residents to become a community? I think this could make an interesting study.

Finally, I have been thinking of online communities, especially massive multi-player online gaming communities. My boyfriend plays World of Warcraft a couple of times a week, and I have played it too (but not as regularly) and he is adamant that playing games in this way creates new communities, rather than necessarily isolates people, as is often suggested. He argues that the way that WOW is setup, in order for a player to get the most out of the game and move up the levels they have to co-operate with other players, show generosity and share ideas and tactics. Some "quests" require more than one player to complete them, and at the top end they can require up to 25 players who must all communicate and co-operate in order to complete the quest. My boyfriend says that he has had intimate conversations with people from all over the world, and people he would not ordinarily meet in daily life, and that can only be a positive thing because it creates understanding and respect for others. Even though they look like elves!

So three potentially fertile subjects. Any comments or ideas are welcome.

Other academic references - quantitative research

Problems with quantitative research, references:

"Clinical research with sheep is often constrained to use small samples. This places additional strains on traditional Frequentist statistical analyses: the results tend to lack statistical power, so there is a high likelihood that they will not be statistically significant. In addition, it is difficult to combine the results of more than one study."

P.J. Cripps; “Statistical and epidemiological methodology for sheep research: The needs, the problems, the solutions”; Small Ruminant Research;  Volume 76, Issues 1-2, April 2008, Pages 26-30; Weblink


Quantitative research is best used in order to back up other research. If a theory or problem is not already well understood then qualitative research is needed before a quantitative study is conducted.

John W. Creswell; Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Method Approaches
p.22; Weblink

One step closer

I checked with Christine about whether she's happy for me to take on a project to create a viral awareness campaign for her and she is... phew! That could have been awkward!

New abstract

Very few Britons understand their government's policy and obligations towards asylum seekers or why asylum seekers are coming to their country to seek refuge in the first place. This is leading to more vocal expressions of anti-refugee sentiments (as distinct from anti-immigration views) from far-right groups, politicians, the media and members of the public. Actors for Refugees UK aims to tell the stories of refugees and asylum seekers, to humanise them in the eyes of the general population, who may never have met a refugee in person. How can AFRUK use a viral marketing campaign to further spread its message of compassion and reach a larger audience?

A decision has been made

I've been thinking things over for a week now, asking my friends and family for their opinions, and I think that I am going to change my final project from the thesis on marketing religion to creating a viral public awareness campaign for AFHR UK.

Doing the exercise about "Is it worth asking the question?" started to push me towards the awareness campaign idea more, because it has much stronger answers to the question of "who" it is for and also its relevance to my future career. Ultimately I am considering two career paths (and in this day and age it's likely I'll get to do both!) Plan A is to work as a film director, of features and television drama. And in acknowledgment of the fact that Plan A will be difficult and might never happen, Plan B is to work in communications for the not-for-profit sector, particularly an advocacy group. A project where I create a campaign for a worthwhile cause, and research the effectiveness of such campaigns and how they have succeeded in the past, will benefit both Plan A and B!

Another factor that has contributed to my decision is that the marketing Christianity idea was supposed to be for a doco, and I think it would make a better doco than it would thesis. However, to make the documentary to the standard that I would want requires some kind of funding. The plan was to shoot some observational footage, so that it's not just talking heads, and that means shooting hours and hours of tape and hiring a decent cinematographer and sound recordist so that you don't miss any crucial event and/or line. We would also have to spend a week in Sydney observing World Youth Day and to make the interviews look decent we need to hire lights and ideally also have a crew that knows what they're doing (I'm not a DOP!) We have pitched the film to the ABC (twice! Don't ask...), SBS and the FFC. There are no more funding options (because Film Vic and AFC require a free-to-air broadcaster attached).

Also in relation to the above point, because I've been working on the idea for 18 months I'm not confident that I will still be passionate and excited about it by the end of this year. Frankly, I could write a thesis about it tomorrow, but I want this year to involve me going on a journey and discovering new ideas. I already know what I think the answer to my thesis question is, so what's the point of asking it?

I'll write my new abstract tomorrow.

Problems with Quantitative Research

“a research finding is less likely to be true when the studies conducted in a field are smaller; when effect sizes are smaller; when there is a greater number and lesser preselection of tested relationships; where there is greater flexibility in designs, definitions, outcomes, and analytical modes; when there is greater financial and other interest and prejudice; and when more teams are involved in a scientific field in chase of statistical significance.”

John P. A. Ioannidis
“Why Most Published Research Findings Are False”
Public Library of Science (PLOS) Medical Journal, Vol 2, #8, August 2005
medicine.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get-document&doi=10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.0020124

In summary, problems can arise with:

- Small sample size
- No other studies/stats to build on
- Different methods of gathering stats
- Prejudice on part of researchers/funding
- Competition from other researchers

Is it worth asking the question? Pt 2

What sort of media campaign could/should be employed in order to raise awareness of human rights abuses in the UK by a group such as Actors for Human Rights?

Who is it for? - Actors for Human Rights UK, but also other human rights organisations that are struggling to attract attention to their cause and raise public awareness of their issue.

Why ask? - Because it could do some good in the world.

Is it viable? - Could be a lot of work, but I would have all the resources I need access to.

Am I passionate? - Definitely. There is almost nothing I am more passionate about. And finding the best ways to spread the word about what human rights abuses are going on around the world (I would probably focus on just one, in consultation with Christine from AFHR UK). People are really good at removing themselves from an issues and the idea behind any kind of media/new media campaign would be to engage the public emotionally and give them hope that they can do something about it.

Is it relevant?  - It's more relevant directly to my career, because Christine might have some work for me in London at the end of the year. So this would no doubt help!

Is it worth asking the question?

Perhaps by working through these questions, I'll be able to establish which of my potential topics is most worthwhile for me.

- Who is it for?

- Why ask the question?

- Is the project/thesis viable?

- Am I passionate about it?

- Is it relevant (to why I want to do Hons/my future)?

Is marketing Christianity like a product the only way the faith will survive?

- In some ways this is just for me, out of interest. Some churches might be interested in my results, but essentially the question in philosophical, so most church leaders and members will already know what they think. I would love to pitch the finished thesis to an academic journal, probably one that focuses on marketing issues or religion, but I'll wait and see if it's any good first!

- This question always raises so many other questions and peaks the interest of almost anyone I speak to. Obviously I don't expect to come up with a definitive answer, but I hope that asking the question will stir up some interest (and maybe some controversy) from the people who read the project and will encourage them to think about how our consumer-driven lives have changed the world, or whether Christianity has always marketed itself to potential converts (the Crusades??)

- This thesis is definitely viable.

- I'm passionate about it this topic, despite the fact that I'm not actually religious (or even "spiritual"). I am nonetheless interested in religion and the philosophical questions/conundrums that it poses (both within the religion and in religion's interaction with society at large)

- The topic is relevant to my aims with regards to Honours, because I'm keen to explore a topic that interests me in detail and challenge my written skills with regards to writing a thesis. However, I can't see it having an impact on my career in any more specific way. 

Other options

I came up with yet another idea after talking to Adrian about my thesis/project. Adrian suggested that, since I am interested in public advocacy and social justice that I would be better off doing a project around a social justice campaign.

This lead to me thinking about Actors for Refugees, with which I have been involved for about 7 years. AFR has even crossed the ocean, to the UK, and is about to expand to become Actors for Human Rights, run by a friend of mine, Christine Bacon. I could do a project for AFHR UK and create a viral marketing campaign for Christine to raise awareness of asylum seeker issues in the UK. I know she would be keen on something along those lines because awareness-raising is a big part of her charter/mission.

To check out the amazing stuff Christine does, have a look at www.iceandfire.co.uk/actorsforrefugees/

Or I could just stick to my original thesis idea.

Any thoughts or ideas from you would be appreciated! I'd like to have my decision finalised by the week after Easter so that I can get stuck in... to whatever it is...!

Doubts about my thesis topic - already!

With the news this week about PM Kevin Rudd focusing on binge drinking, including a "scare" campaign to discourage young binge drinkers, I'm considering a thesis that investigates the effect and/or usefulness of government education campaigns, including those that set out to shock and frighten people.

When did they start? Do they work? Why/why not?

Working at the Australian Drug Foundation I'll have access to lots of great resources and people to explore a topic like this.

Then again, I've already been working on the other topic for about a year! Hmmmm.

What is research?

To me research is essentially an exploration of other people's ideas, which you then use to form your own opinions.

It can also be seen as a search for the facts, the "who/what/why/where/when" information. But facts are slippery and, in many cases, impossible to pin down. Research invariably discovers differing and sometimes contradictory views about issues or events, which the researcher has to sort through and give weight to.

Why Honours?

Good question actually. I've been so busy the past few weeks that thought has occurred to me on numerous occasions.

But I am excited about it, so I suppose the answer lies in that gut feeling.

Last year, while researching a doco, I started to miss doing formal research and exploring new ideas. In some ways I missed something I'd never had, because during my undergrad Arts degree I didn't take most of the subjects seriously and was more interested in the extra-curricula possibilities that Melbourne Uni offered, especially theatre. However, the subjects that I did get excited about at the time still come to my mind years later.

Doing Honours for me will be mostly about the opportunity to write a thesis. To get really stuck into a subject and stretch myself intellectually. In Arts you skim over so many different areas and ideas that you never get the chance to explore anything properly. 

Secondary to that will be the chance to meet some new people and have some great conversation!

It could also open the door for more study later on in my life. Although I'm just concentrating on getting through this year first before I think about that!

Project abstract

The number of young Australians who identify themselves as members of a traditional Christian church is dropping, despite the fact that many consider themselves to be "spiritual". This is causing a crisis among the leading established churches, who risk becoming irrelevant in the future. However, the smaller churches that seem to be actually increasing their membership are using blatant marketing techniques in order to connect with the consumer-savvy Generation Y. The question for the big churches is, is this the way of the future: should faith be branded and marketed like any other product?