The BBC has got into the realms of online interactive fiction with Jamie Kane. The eponymous popstar – supposedly killed in a helicopter crash – is a fictional creation aimed at the same demographic as empty-headed pop fanzines: 14 to 18 year old girls. And while I think it’s a crime for the brains of 14 to 18 year old girls to be washed in this way, that’s a rant for another time.
No, what’s triggered today’s rant is that I think that the BBC has overstepped the mark in creating the world of this fictitious popstar. Don’t get me wrong, I think these online interactive fictions can be a lot of fun – I remember the first time I came across the viral marketing for Speilberg’s A.I., which, from a seemingly innocuous web page for Dr. Jeanine Salla, turned into a hunt for the killers of Evan Chan via clues on web pages, emails, and even real locations.
So what has the BBC done? Well, in setting up the game story, they, or a company working on the game, have apparently created a page on Jamie Kane in Wikipedia. And that, I think, is going too far. As Boing-Boing reader Chris says:
I’m a big fan of the BBC and public broadcasting in general, but I think they’ve crossed a line here. This is a Wikipedia entry for a made-up pop star that’s being used as part of some kind of viral marketing for one of their "new media opportunities". It pisses me off that an organisation paid for by the British public and supposedly working to a charter to provide quality entertainment feels justified in spamming up a genuinely useful internet resource in the name of PR.
To which I can only say: "Hear, hear". What really sticks in my craw is the response to Chris apparently from a marketing droid freely admitting to using Wikipedia in this way:
I can’t say who I am, but I do work at a company that uses Wikipedia as a key part of online marketing strategies. That includes planting of viral information in entries, modification of entries to point to new promotional sites or "leaks" embedded in entries to test diffusion of information. Wikipedia is just a more transparent version of Myspace as far as some companies are concerned. We love it (evil laugh).On the other side, I love it from an academia/sociological standpoint, and I don’t necessarily have a problem with it used as a viral marketing tool. After all, marketing is a form of information, with just a different end point in mind (consuming rather than learning).
If that is indeed a genuine comment, then all I can say is: you utter bastard – I hope that you’re first up against the wall, come the revolution.
Funny, really, the furore over the Beeb broadcasting Jerry Springer – The Opera left me cold – I viewed it as a rant by religionists who lacked the wit to understand what the show was about. But this abuse of the principles of Wikipedia for me is something else entirely. It’s like spitting in the face of knowledge and learning, and that really gets to me.
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