Jersey Shore and the Fan Club

The Jersey Shore Reality TV show has taken the television waves and blogosphere by storm. Facebook and all sorts of other media outlets have all been talking about the new show.  Whether its people who love the show, or absolutely despise it, one thing is for sure; viewers are hooked to this MTV stroke of genius. I got curious and logged into my Facebook account to search “Jersey Shore.” I found that this show has a devoted Fan club on Facebook with 4,362,542 “Likes” on their page!  As our textbook states in Henry Jenkins essay, “One becomes a ‘fan’ not by being a regular viewer of a particular program but by translating that viewing into some kind of cultural activity, but sharing feelings and thoughts about the program content with friends, by joining ‘community’ of other fans who share common interests. For fans, consumption naturally sparks production, reading generates writing, until the terms seem logically inseparable.” I couldn't agree to any sort of "poaching" as de Certeau characterized a certain type of reading for Jersey Shore.  After looking through some fan discussion forums for Jersey Shore, I discovered that people find a connection with these greased up, too tanned Italian-Americans. Some are finding interest in dressing and putting the Snooki “poof” on their heads to resemble their favorite Jersey character. Just like how Trekkies imitated and still imitate their favorite character on that show, this new reality TV show seems to be meaningless, yet still attracting young adults. Could it be because it’s just popular to do that? Or is there something about this group of people their fans relate to? There are many discussion forums I Googled to see how popular this show is, and there seems to be countless number is pages for their millions of fans to discuss.  The problem I’m having is that it’s not something intellectual they’re talking about, but it’s simple and something they feel they can relate to, such as relationships between the characters, the meaning of friendship, or just simply getting the pleasure of hating someone on TV who’s not acting, but portraying their REAL personality.  Here are some discussions and comments posted by fans of “Jersey Shore” that I came across. This is what people are really saying and thinking about this show:

• We watched it last night. I am from the Jersey Shore, and I, nor anyone I know, acts, dresses, or thinks like that. I thought being a "guido" was a bad thing - these people are proud of it??

• My favorite line last night was from one of the girls. She felt like she was "above" selling t-shirts, because "I'm a bartender, I do great things." Yeah like giving people Cirrhosis of the liver!!!! What a MORON!!

• That Snooki girl was so pathetic it was sad. She just sat there waiting for someone to pay attention to her, and when they didn't, she threatened to go home. I KNEW she wouldn't leave, it was just a last attempt to get some attention. Then she brought that guy home from the club and he pukes all over the place - that was disgusting! Then she tells everyone "He’s my friend, leave him alone" OMG - you just met this guy 30 seconds ago!

• And the nickname thing - I haven't had a nickname since 8th grade, but when each one of them walked in, they all asked what their nickname was, like everyone has one....

• I heard that the Italian American council (or something like that) was trying to get the show off the air because it shows Italians in such a bad way. Though I think they are 100% right, I REALLY hope they don't get it off the air - its my new favorite show!!! LOL

Work Cited for Comments: http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2345152

Merchants of Cool and "Jersey Shore"

After viewing the documentary “Merchants of Cool,” I must say that I’m impressed with the research that has been done, and I would have to agree that pretty much the same concept of targeting teens has been going on for years. It may be unethical, but I think it was a brilliant idea for the advertising industry. The video basically explains how marketing and advertising industries target teens, the largest market available with the most expendable income. Some of the methods are a bit odd, and it seems that the trendsetters are being targeted and exploited. The documentary focuses mostly on MTV and Sprite, two partners in one of the largest marketing campaigns in the world. MTV has maintained a very important role on the influence of yesterday and today’s generations. When it came to advertising, MTV went to great lengths to grasp the attention of teenagers, who in turn, had the attention of their parents. By grasping these teenagers attention, MTV has been able to grow and introduce new trends throughout the years by incorporating advertising into everything they do , including music videos, sponsoring concerts and events, and most importantly to me, their reality TV. Targeting teens through such a large campaign has its consequences, though. As the video pointed out, there is a certain amount of “feedback” occurring with media and teens, where researchers find the small trends, make them big, convince bands to sell out, then let the trends die. Jersey Shore is one of many reality TV shows that have gotten teenagers hooked because apparently some want to be like them. Teenagers like to party, granted. But on the hit reality show “Jersey Shore” these groups of Italian-Americans are paid to do nothing but party and create drama. With partying comes drinking, mistakes, and confusion. Its bad enough Jersey Shore gives the illusion to young girls that drinking and dancing on bars is the way to go. I think that pop culture has come a long way now, however, I feel it’s always been consistent. The point is that teens are the generation who are somewhat coming out of their innocence, discovering their identity, wanting to party hard, and have every possible experience they can. With “Jersey Shore” I think that MTV has teens watching this show telling them that hey, you’re wanna know what partying hard is? Watch this! MTV is telling teenage girls out there with this show that you’re not the only ones with complex relationship issues, these guys on Jersey Shore have complications in their love life too! All in all, I think that selling to teens through the media has become pretty easy. You see it on TV, you wanna buy it and be it..