Content (The MIT Press Essential Knowledge series)

A concise introduction to content and the content industry, from the early internet to the Instagram egg. From the time we roll out of bed to check overnight updates to our last posts, likes, and views of the previous day, we're consuming and producing content. But what does the term “content” even mean? When did it become ubiquitous? And at what cost? In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, Kate Eichhorn offers a concise introduction to content and the content industry, examining the far-reaching effects content has on culture, politics, and labor in a digital age.Eichhorn traces the evolution of our current understanding of content from the early internet to the current social mediaverse. The quintessential example of content, she says, is the Instagram egg—an image that imparted no information or knowledge and circulated simply for the sake of circulation. Eichhorn explores what differentiates user-generated content from content produced by compensated (although often undercompensated) workers; examines how fields from art and literature to journalism and politics have weathered the rise of the content industry; and investigates the increasing importance of artists’ “content capital”—the ability of artists, writers, and performers to produce content not about their work but about their status as artists.---Kate Eichhorn is Associate Professor and Chair of Culture and Media Studies at The New School. She is the author of The End of Forgetting: Growing Up with Social Media, Adjusted Margin: Xerography, Art and Activism in the Late Twentieth Century (MIT Press), and The Archival Turn in Feminism. A concise introduction to content and the content industry, from the early internet to the Instagram egg. From the time we roll out of bed to check overnight updates to our last posts, likes, and views of the previous day, we're consuming and producing content. But what does the term “content” even mean? When did it become ubiquitous? And at what cost? In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, Kate Eichhorn offers a concise introduction to content and the content industry, examining the far-reaching effects content has on culture, politics, and labor in a digital age. Eichhorn traces the evolution of our current understanding of content from the early internet to the current social mediaverse. The quintessential example of content, she says, is the Instagram egg—an image that imparted no information or knowledge and circulated simply for the sake of circulation. Eichhorn explores what differentiates user-generated content from content produced by compensated (although often undercompensated) workers; examines how fields from art and literature to journalism and politics have weathered the rise of the content industry; and investigates the increasing importance of artists’ “content capital”—the ability of artists, writers, and performers to produce content not about their work but about their status as artists. From the time we roll out of bed to check overnight updates to our last posts, likes, and views of the previous day, we're consuming and producing content. But what does the term ?content? even mean? When did it become ubiquitous? And at what cost? In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, Kate Eichhorn offers a concise introduction to content and the content industry, examining the far-reaching effects content has on culture, politics, and labor in a digital age.00Eichhorn traces the evolution of our current understanding of content from the early internet to the current social mediaverse. The quintessential example of content, she says, is the Instagram egg?an image that imparted no information or knowledge and circulated simply for the sake of circulation. Eichhorn explores what differentiates user-generated content from content produced by compensated (although often undercompensated) workers; examines how fields from art and literature to journalism and politics have weathered the rise of the content industry; and investigates the increasing importance of artists? ?content capital??the ability of artists, writers, and performers to produce content not about their work but about their status as artists Contents Series Foreword Preface 1 A Brief History of Content in a Digital Era Defining Content in a Digital Era Predictions about the Rise of the Content Industry Types of Content 2 User-Generated Content The Long History of User-Generated Content The Promise of User-Generated Content When User-Generated Content Became an Asset The Classification of User-Generated Content 3 Content Farms Writing in the Age of Digital Incunabula Domain Building and the Birth of Clickbait Life Down on the Content Farms Factors that Contributed to the Rise of Content Farms 4 Content Capital The Field of Cultural Production before Content Content Capital Rise of the Instapoet (or How Rupi Kaur Outsold Homer) The Field of Cultural Production after Content 5 Journalism and Politics after Content Journalism in an Age of Content Fake News and the Content Industry 6 Content Automation The Evolution of Content Automation Content Automation as a Response to News Deserts Automated Entertainment Content The Future of Content Glossary Notes Preface Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Further Reading Index Eichhorn's Eks Book Will Unpack The Idea Of Content, Whose Emergence Reflects A Major Shift In The Way Cultural Products Are Produced And Consumed, With Far-reaching Implications For Society-- A concise introduction to the content industry and its ejecta, from the early internet to the Instagram egg.