Interactive Narrative in Digital Broadcasting A L FREW PhD 2020 2 Interactive Narrative in Digital Broadcasting Anna Louise Frew -- A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements of Manchester Metropolitan University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Art Postgraduate Arts and Humanities Centre 2020 3 4 Dedication I dedicate this work to the friends and family who sadly passed away in the course of writing this thesis. Nathan Wynn Harrison, who was just four years old in August 2016. Robert Wynn Harrison, my Grandfather, who passed away not long after Nathan. Charlotte Holt, a dear friend who passed away in September 2019. 5 6 Acknowledgements Firstly, I would like to thank my supervisory team. My Director of Studies Jim Aulich and supervisor Joe McCullagh who have been with me from the start, helping to keep the project on track and to the point. Gavin McDonald, who joined after the RD2 process and provided the theoretical knowledge in the team. A thank you to Clinton Cahill who saw me through six years of the course and was involved in the initial formulation of the project after teaching me at MA level too. Finally, David Jackson, the most recent addition to the team whose practice-based expertise meshes well with my own and brought some needed clarity at the end stages. A special thank you to Myna Trustram whose support has been invaluable along the way. I would like to thank the staff at the British Broadcasting Corporation’s Research and Development department for their generous contributions with their time and support throughout the project. In particular, Ian Forrester, who has been crucial in realising this project and always helpful with providing materials and his time for interviews. A thank you to Lianne Kerlin, Rhianne Jones, Andy Brown, Phil Stenton, Dan Tucker, and Tony Churnside who have all helped along the way with the project. A thank you to Julius Amedume the director of one of the case studies who was happy to make time in his busy day to be interviewed and for his permission to include the short’s script in the thesis. A final thanks to Oliver Spall, who no longer works at the BBC but took the time to talk to me in-depth about my findings. From my personal life, I’d like to thank my husband who completed his own PhD during this project. His practical support, taking more than his fair share of child care, advising me on the technical aspects of writing up, and his emotional support on this long journey has been brilliant. A thank you to both my own parents and my parents in law who have provided me with resources from a laptop when my old one broke down, through to a roof over my head when I’ve needed it. Your help has been essential. Finally, thank you to my cats Pangur Bán and Katten Jansson, who have made many valuable contributions to the accuracy of my grammar in the thesis. All errors and inaccuracies are theirs. 7 8 Abstract This thesis is focussed on an application of audience data in developing media form Implicitly Interactive Pervasive Narrative (IIPN). IIPN is a digital broadcast that uses data about the audience and/or their environment collected pervasively, in real-time, to tailor the narrative it is delivering. The audience has a sit back experience whilst an algorithm personalises their story. IIPN is currently produced by research and development departments. This thesis asks two research questions: To what extent is current narrative theory useful in examining IIPN? And, what are the key production benefits and drawbacks to working with IIPN? To answer these questions, it examines two prototypes made by the British Broadcasting Corporation’s Research and Development (BBC R&D) department. The project makes contributions to knowledge in three areas. One is in ascertaining to what extent current narrative theory is useful in examining IIPN. The next is a theoretical model proposal for studying IIPN based upon these findings. Finally, the project identifies key production benefits and drawbacks to working with IIPN. The theory-based contributions of the project are achieved through a literature review which revealed there is not a narrative theory dealing with IIPN specifically. The literature review goes on to inform a model proposal that is tested in the two case studies. The proposal is composed of three parts. The first is to consider the ‘pre-narrative’ elements of the IIPN, the second is to compare several outputs from the IIPN. Both these steps include the third element which is how audience data is affecting them. The production-based findings were gained through applying the model proposal in the case studies, aided with interviews with staff from BBC R&D. The findings are pulled together into a matrix which details the benefits and drawbacks to IIPN and includes a range of ways to mitigate the drawbacks. As IIPN is in its infancy as a technology, both the model proposal and the production findings help to define the field and act as a first step towards creating a toolkit for working with IIPN. 9 10 Table of Contents Dedication ............................................................................................................................... 5 Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................. 7 Abstract ................................................................................................................................... 9 Table of Contents .................................................................................................................. 11 List of illustrations ................................................................................................................. 18 List of Tables ......................................................................................................................... 23 Abbreviations ........................................................................................................................ 25 Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 26 Research questions and objectives ....................................................................................... 26 The basic principles of IIPN ................................................................................................... 27 The difference between implicit and explicitly interactive narrative ................................ 30 Types of data and objects in an IIPN ..................................................................................... 35 Structure of the thesis .......................................................................................................... 36 1 Definition of Pervasive Media, Implicit Interaction, and Related Terms .......................... 44 Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 44 Narrative ............................................................................................................................... 44 Implicit and explicit interactive digital narrative ................................................................... 45 Pervasive media .................................................................................................................... 46 Other terms related to pervasive media ............................................................................... 48 11 Personalised media ............................................................................................................ 48 Location-based narrative ................................................................................................... 48 Mixed reality storytelling ................................................................................................... 49 Perceptive media and the BBC Research and Development department ............................ 49 Use of the term perceptive media in a marketing context ................................................ 50 Other terms related to perceptive media at the BBC ........................................................... 52 Object-based ..................................................................................................................... 52 Responsive ......................................................................................................................... 54 Conclusion: Definition of an implicitly interactive pervasive narrative ................................. 55 2 Historical Context of IIPN .............................................................................................. 57 Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 57 Generative narrative and machine learning ......................................................................... 57 Hypertext .............................................................................................................................. 61 Transmedia storytelling......................................................................................................... 62 Social media and news broadcasting .................................................................................... 66 Social media and entertainment broadcasting ..................................................................... 68 Social media as a platform for narratives