Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Gaming lifestyle and brand parasites

Parteco (Participatory Economy and Beyond: Developing tools and processes for open and participatory knowledge creation and content production) project ended with a Picnic session on 11 June 2008 at Gardenia (Helsinki).

The picnic idea was brilliant - props to Katri Lietsala! Even though the discussion ended up being a bit lame on our blanket the "picnic discussion" was a great format. When I grew tired of the discussion on our blanket, I could easily join other groups or just hang around and enjoy the company.

Katri Lietsala and Esa Sirkkunen published a book on the topic:
Social Media: Introduction to the tools and processes of participatory economy.

Even though I wasn't part of Parteco project I was happy albeit a bit surprised to be invited to give a short presentation on brand parasites at the picnic. The slide set below is not the one I gave at the picnic. Instead I though of collecting "stories" how associations and other actors have utilized the net and understood digital and/or gaming lifestyle of the youth. In this sense brand parasites is just one alternative to meet the crowd and operate online. At Parteco picnic I used Life Tastes Better Without Drugs (EOPH) associations' Hubu project (at Habbo) as an example of brand parasite. The others examples were Anshe Chung (Second Life) and Zipipop (Facebook). I would like to highlight that those were just three randomly chosen examples with an attempt to present different manifestations of "brand parasites".


3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Warm thanks Sonja that you participated. I think people need to collaborate more and be ready to present their thoughts across the organization borders which unfortunately (even in such a small country as Finland) seem to hinder co-operation sometimes.

It was a nice surprise to notice that we have similar thoughts about the ongoing web trend. That made it even easier to invite you to speak ;) I have also referred to parasitism (page 27 book, page 28 pdf).

Perhaps we should check if there is something to write together? I just have to find some spare time - if there is any left because of Gemilo Ltd.

Anyhow, have a nice summer and thanks again.

Sonja Kangas said...

Good to know :) I already have a few ideas for articles... :)

Sonja Kangas said...

Good to know :) I already have a few ideas for articles... :)