Handout

Denise Mann, The Labor of the Lost ARG

Abstract

The article follows the events leading up to and following the Writer’s Guild of America (WGA) strike (2007-2008), particularly in relation to Lost showrunners Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof’s considerable leverage in negotiating a deal between the WGA and the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers (AMPTP) and the consequences of this deal. It also touches on the influence of the Lost ARG in TV, film, & game industries.

Thesis

"The now completed Lost franchise (2004 – 2010) provides a useful means of examining the state of the post-network television industry in the digital age, given its creators’  groundbreaking use of the web to craft digital expansions of its  storylines as well as their use of blogs, alternate reality games (ARGs), and mobisodes to promote the series" (Mann 118)

Keywords

> Zeitgeist

> Digital age

> ARG (alternate reality game)

WGA Strike (2007-2008)

WGA wanted “higher DVD residuals, union jurisdiction over animation and reality program writers, and compensation for new media” (121)

WGA concerned with payment for streamed content via services like Netflix and payment for content reuse via digital download

Lost showrunners Carlton Cruse and Damon Lindelof instrumental in the negotiating process

Networks gain profit via pre-paid subscriptions to Netflix and also through ads on sites like Hulu.com (NBC-Universal/Fox/ABC-Disney owned)

Writers were still expected to work for almost nothing (11 cents per million downloads) (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6hqP0c0_gw)

Despite victory, “since 2008, more and more studios and networks have created digital marketing divisions and have employed low-cost labor to generate content-promotional hybrids in house.” (122)

The Lost ARG

Rachel Blake, fictitious character in “The Lost Experience” ARG, sets out to “take down the man” (aka the Hanso Foundation)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6Ag0LvxfHE

People in real life can help find clues, can discuss it in blogs, forums, on social media, etc.

Marketers saw the ARG as “grassroots promotion that used social media to appeal to a younger audience where they lived—online” (123). Indirect promotional value: Spreadable media (Jenkins)

Cuse and Lindelof assigned Jordan Rosenberg and Javier Grillo-Marxuach to write and oversee the ARG material but they too quickly found themselves overwhelmed

Ivan Askwith: Three goals of the ARG:

> a promotional campaign to engage fans and generate viral speculation

> a narrative extension, designed to provide fans with additional content…to deepen the immersive pleasure of the show

> an advertising space for sponsoring partners to reach the engaged participants of the campaign with brand messages

Breaking the Fourth Wall

Fans had begun to imagine that the game was real, that Rachel Blake and the Hanso Foundation were real. In order to facilitate this, Rosenberg and Grillo-Marxuach became “puppet masters,” working “behind the scenes as the writers, programmers and stage managers of live pervasive gameplay” (125).

Advertisements of sponsors were to be included in the game, or clues for the game were to be hidden in advertisements

“From the marketers’ perspective, any contest, casual game, or ARG that momentarily distracts a potential consumer is assumed to forge a bond between that grateful individual and the brand” (126)

Too many sponsors = chaos that only the most experienced fans could get through

Previous method of advertising was in a 30-second TV ad

Ads “encourage [viewers] to unearth hidden-in-plain-sight sponsor messages, scrutinize them for game clues, then digitally download and share them virally with their friends” (127). Millennials encouraged to “steal” and share.

Blair Witch Project fictitious reality: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWiz6reVupA

Sublymonal Messaging

A play on Sprite’s lemon and lime flavors

An attempt to converge Sprite ads and the Lost ARG via Crispin, Porter & Bogusky advertising firm

“the rule used to be to never confuse the viewers with obtuse messages…But yet, more and more people (Gen Y and younger in particular) enjoy ‘filling in the blanks’ and take great pride in the feeling that they themselves have discovered something hidden” (Williams, Junky in Mann 131)

The challenge: advertisers wanted to break the fourth wall by hinting at subliminal messages from sponsors but the writers of the ARG wanted the fourth wall to remain intact

Were different than 30-sencond ads (lost Gen X) but were unrelated to Lost (lost Gen Y)

Consequences of the WGA strike

2011: Movement of big networks back to the basics (reality shows, sit-coms, episodic dramas) designed for mass audiences

Expansion of network power and control over licensed property (products associated with their shows)

Expansion of marketing and advertising

“all, it seems, in an effort to maintain stricter controls over their industry” (120).

“Unwilligness to collaborate with creative partners…[and] outsiders” (136)

“A giant step backward toward their analog past” (136)

WGA offered support for writers who wished to work outside of networks and studios and pursue more entrepreneurial ventures (Netflix originals?)

Criticisms: Hard to follow, no precise timeline given, no abstract.

Discussion Questions

What are your thoughts of the WGA strike? Do you think the networks only agreed to demands based on Lost and Cuse and Lindelof's popularity?

How did the "alternate reality" of The Lost Experience influence TV and film? Can you think of examples?

Consider the clip. Does this represent a similar idea of "alternate reality? Is it possible to experience some of the same difficulties in sponsorship and upkeep that the writers of The Lost Experience did?