Research Project - Artefact 6 Evaluation

Artefact six formed a research document that summed up the whole research and came to a conclusion to what the future on online content will be. It shows how content is being adjusted to keep up with the issue of online piracy and presents new strategies that are being used to tackle online piracy.

It argues a case that not enough is being done by big companies and associations to reduce piracy. Issues are raised about these organisations not successfully working together to beat online piracy and how this affects the industry as a whole.

The artefact looks into laws being enforced in countries to reduce online piracy by tracking and prosecuting individuals who frequently share files illegally. It highlights the dispute of anti-piracy technology being introduced to Freeview TV to stop illegal copying of TV shows for distribution on the internet.
It draws attention to the amount of illegal file sharing websites that have been fined or prosecuted and the vast crackdown countries are enforcing in their anti-piracy laws.

This document provides the new ways that are being used to help prevent online piracy and concludes how successful they may be with reference to previous artefacts.
It indicates measures that may be successful in helping, with what is an issue that affects every user of the World Wide Web.

Research Project - Artefact 6 Ideas

For my final artefact I want to sum up and bring together all my previous artefact's, and come to some sort of conclusion to how the issue of online piracy can be successfully tackled. I think the best way for me to do this is by producing a research document, that looks into strategies that were used previously and ones that are being used now, to ones that are newly being introduced and compare their success rates.

I think I can also look to where the future of online TV and content is leading to with its association with online piracy. I will need to look into new laws and legislations being introduced and how they affect it. I believe the new Digital Economy Act enforced in the UK last year (2010) will play a part in the argument for stopping pirates and prosecuting them for future decrease in piracy.

For this, I will need to do thorough research to come to a strong conclusion that justifies its findings.

Research Project - Artefact 5 Evaluation

Artefact 5 interviewed a famous Nottingham director called Chris Cooke, well known for his film ‘One for the Road’ (2004). It presented Chris Cooke with a series of questions about online piracy. The aim of this artefact was to understand his view on online piracy and how he is dealing with the change. This artefact focuses on a local person in Nottingham to get a more personal view.
This artefact provided me with essential information as it not only said why piracy is bad, but it also gave reasons why it was beneficial. I received unexpected answers, which in turn provided me with a different side to the issue of online piracy.
When asked about his view on online piracy, I received a strong view in favour of online piracy. The reasoning behind this was that he said a lot of films that were old or rare have been re-discovered by online piracy. He goes onto say that online piracy has been the main platform for films that would be lost, or films that haven’t been seen for centuries and it enables people to become fans of those films and learn from those films. It also gives an opportunity for those films to be re-released or re-mastered, and ‘piracy is what saved those films.’
The thing that struck me was when Chris mentioned being approached and being sold a pirated DVD of his own film, to which he gave a positive response. He said that he was happy that someone had even wanted to even copy his film and re-sell it and no one had really lost money. He mentions that he made it his priority to make the extras on his DVD have ‘real added value’. My next artefact will look into the future of online programming and piracy.

Research Project - Update - Chris Cooke Interview!

Okay, after a loooong time waiting I have managed to get myself an interview with Nottingham director Chris Cooke, known famously for his film One for the Road (2003) -

I will interview him next week and have written up a list of questions for this. I am hoping to get a very good response from this. I am glad I have managed to get this interview with a renowned director as it will make my artifact have good response and make it strong.

Research Project - Artefact 3

I have now completed my third artifact. I gave both users 90210 – Season 3 Episode 15 – Revenge with the Nerd to locate which was aired in the US on 14/02/2011 @ 9.00pm (1 hour run time).

The user who used online TV a lot managed to locate the programme in a mere 2 hours and 10 minutes. The user who did'nt use online TV located the file the following morning takinf only just 11 hours. I think these results show how quickly ans easily it is to find illegal content that can in effect change the viewing figures for shows in the UK dramatically.

Research Project - Problem

For my third artifact, I initially had the idea to look into how easy it is to download content from the internet. This followed up from the results gained from the diary in the previous artifact about time-shifting in TV in the UK and US. This artifact would include two users; one a regular online TV consumer and one that isn't and get both to download a video online after broadcast in the US to see ho quick they can get it.

However, after talking to my tutor Danny, I realised that I could not get my participants to do this as it would not comply with ethics for my research. Therefore, after several discussions I decided to continue the same experiment, but only having the users 'locate' the certain video file online rather than download. I think this will work well and I have got two people lined up to do this experiment.

Research Project - Evaluation 2

This is the evaluation for the 2-week diary of television viewing habits I collected for two students:


For my second artefact I collected a two-week television diary from two students; one was 20 years of age and the other 30. I have followed this up from results on my questionnaire that showed me that most television is consumed by students; therefore
I decided to get a wider age range to compare.

These results show that the younger student watched a huge amount of pirated/illegal content online whereas the more mature students didn’t consume any content online. I believe this may be due to young people, especially students, being more computer-active and having knowledge of software allowing them to download content for free.

The 20 year old student watched thirteen programmes online that were not yet aired in the UK, in the two-week period. These included American TV series, which were ahead of schedule by as much as 6 weeks. For example, the weekly show 90210 in the UK is currently on Series 3, Episode 9. However, the student had already watched up to Episode 15 online. I believe this shows a huge problem with the programme time-shift between the UK and US and the impact this could have on viewing figures.

The 30-year old student spent a lot less time watching programmes compared to the younger student. The 30-year old student also tied themselves to the main free channels which where BBC 1, BBC 2, BBC 3, and Channel 4. The times they watched their programmes were either afternoon or evening, whereas the younger student had a wider mix of timings for their viewing.

The schedule for the 20-year old student was more fixed as they watched the same programmes daily on the allocated times, both online and offline. For example, Eastenders was watched every day and if it was missed; online catch up services were used.

Research Project - Artefact 2

For my second artifact I have collected a two-week diary from two students, one ages 20 and the other 30 to get a wider student age range following from my questionnaire.

Here is an image of the tables showing the results:
(sorry about the quality, couldn't get a table into here - click image to view bigger)


Diary of the 20-year old student:
























Diary of the 30-year old student:

Research Project - Artefact 1 (re-done)

So, I have had my questionnaire checked over. A few minor mistakes, and one question was left out. I think it is important to get a questionnaire checked through by several people before distributing it as the results gained will reflect a lot better. The previous link to the questionnaire is now CLOSED, and the following is the link to my first questionnaire artefact.

Here it is:

Online questionnaire

Feel free to fill it out!

Artefact 1

Today, we filmed our first artefact for our practice experiments. We have been asked to complete a plan of 2 artefacts, with an abstract explaing them, and if we can, make at least 1 artefact.

We have chosen the subject of Online TV, and the question we experimented was 'How has Online TV affected the viewer's experience?'. Looking at research, we realised the main audience that watched online tv are `8-25 year olds.
Therefore, we went out today and filmed 30 young 18-25 ear olds and asked the the question, along with what method would they prefer to watch their TV progammes on?

Take a look: