[arg_discuss] is ARG just a marketing technique to the press?

[Ian Millington]

Great discussion.

I guess like many other readers I read Brian's mail and thought - yeah
how unfair, isn't it obvious that  this is the start of something
significant?.

But is it unfair? Can you think of another creative discipline that:

a) Is appreciated widely (including by the media) in its own right.
b) has no proven business model for direct monetization.

Nearest I came up with was graphic design, but even then I wouldn't
say it was widely appreciated in its own right (and certainly wasn't
appreciated in its own right for half a century, despite considerably
greater ubiquity than ARGs).

For ARGs (b) is still the 800lb gorilla in the corner of the living
room. As someone who is not interested in advergaming, but has
(unsuccessfully) tried to get commercial ARG material funded, I know
from bitter experience that ARGs are perceived as marketing gimmicks
by the mainstream games industry as well as the media. The chalk
outline of Majestic is till tiptoed around with an air of disdain.

I have a depressing sense that unless we crack b - work out how to
reliably monetise our effort successfully for its own sake - that ARGs
might be destined to languish in the 'marketing gimmick and academic
curiosity' for a long time.

Ian.



On 27/12/2007, Brian Clark <bclark at gmdstudios.com> wrote:

> >1) The no-longer appropriate bundling of marketing and non-art.

>

> I'm working on a piece regarding this, but sadly the answer I offer up isn't

> a simple one as it requires providing an alternate framework for creating

> sets from this work. In many ways, the complete misreading of "Blair Witch"

> cause-and-effect lead marketers to mistake one (fan building) for the other

> (marketing) -- even though those were two different phases, even for "Blair

> Witch". There are other historical examples in play, but since Mike is here

> and the BW case study is well (mis)known it is as good of a shortcut of that

> bigger idea as I can offer up yet.

>

> Fan building and marketing can co-exist, but don't necessarily share the

> same value structures. Fandom, though, can't be "faked" -- its appearance by

> definition implies success in forming a connection between a creator and an

> experiential participant. The disconnect between the implied goals of fan

> creation and "mere marketing" are what we're seeing and what we're thinking.

>

>

> People want some kind of taxonomy to feel safe with the world though, and

> none of the taxonomies put forward articulate the question of intent.

> Fortunately, it shouldn't have to; it only has to show a diversity of

> intent, like any media or artform needs to. What craft it is applied to

> (entertainment, news, advertising) is almost beside the point.

>

>

>

>

>

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