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Jonathon Hutchinson
University of Sydney, Australia
Intermediaries exercising inuence through
algorithms within public service media
Abstract: Media and communication systems have globally shied beyond a mass media
arrangement to promote increased user practices associated with social media. Social
media activities, particularly in the public service media arena, have historically focussed
on the potential of increased citizen participation. A body of work has also emerged to
suggest social media and its associated user-generated content practice is merely tokenistic
participation. However, contemporary innovative public service media (PSM) practice
now engages algorithm culture through social media for user participation, bringing with
it new research questions. Algorithm culture is the design of automated computational
systems that incorporates large data sets based on user behaviour to inform collaborative
cultural production practices. A salient question for policy makers and PSM leaders is how
do they approach algorithm culture to address the remit of PSM in contemporary digital
mediascapes. is chapter provides insights of cultural intermediaries as key co-creative
agents of PSM algorithms and highlights the signicance of inuential social media users
to promote maximalist participation.
Keywords: public service media, algorithmic culture, social media, cultural intermedia-
tion, microinuencer.
Introduction
Referring to the impacts of printing and distribution technologies on the newspa-
per industry, Williams (1989a) describes the signicance of technological changes
for cultural institutions in terms of how technology can, in fact, limit diversity. His
argument is built on the emerging and constraining tight economic pressures of
the failing revenue models from classied advertising, and suggests that because
of advanced printing and distribution technologies, newspapers were forced to
focus their readership towards higher income groups:
e technology which had promised both extension and diversity had, in these circum-
stances, produced a remarkable and specic kind of extension (what came to be called
the ‘mass’ public) and, by comparison with its own earlier stages, an actually reduced
diversity (Williams, 1989b: 213).
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rough growing economic and social pressures, the newspaper industry as a
particular type of cultural institution had fallen victim to its own technological
developments of printing and distribution. In order to overcome these pressures,
newspapers had to cater to a particular wealthier aspect of its audience, thereby
reducing its public reach and limiting its diversity of voice within its content
creation.
Fast forward three decades and our contemporary media environment is mov-
ing closer to what is considered an ‘algorithmic culture,’ which echoes the limit-
ing publicness and cultural aspects of the newspaper industry’s technological
developments. Algorithmic culture is one which sees “the sorting, classifying and
hierarchizing of people, places, objects, and ideas – increasingly to computational
processes” (Striphas, 2015: 395). In the case of media organizations engaging in
algorithmic culture, this usually results in a tailored content experience based
on the user’s past content consumption, or user specic playlists. Striphas (2015)
astutely points out in his work on dening the current approach towards cultural
production and distribution within an algorithmic culture the signicance of the
relationship between information, crowd and algorithm. is relationship be-
tween the key characteristics of an algorithm culture is increasingly prominent in
mass media across networked communication systems, that deliver personalised,
and thereby popular, media experiences to niche markets. is type of content
delivery is most obvious in video on demand television systems such as Netix,
YouTube’s suggested video feature, and iTunes’s ‘For You’ selected music feature.
However, as Striphas (2015) points out, culture, and the media systems that cre-
ate, distribute and perpetuate an algorithmic culture are at risk of limiting public
culture in favour of a mono-cultural reappropriation. Further, if PSM engages in
the automation of content production and procurement, does it risk skewing its
role as a facilitator of relevant public issues within the public sphere?
It is at this intersection of automated cultural production and a media system
in the midst of incredible technological advances through personalisation and al-
gorithmic delivery of specic and niche content, that public service media (PSM)
becomes increasingly crucial. If we are indeed at risk of perpetuating elitist culture
through our media system, due to the convenience and speed of an algorithmic
culture, the role of a cultural institution, such as a PSM organization, is crucial in
providing a cultural benchmark, primarily through its Reithian principles. PSM is
ideally located in the media and cultural spheres as an organization that is based
on Reithian principles such as “the application of the principles of universality
of availability, universality of appeal, provision for minorities, education of the
public, distance from vested interests, quality programming standards, program
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maker independence, fostering of the public sphere” (Cunningham, 2013: 62).
e Reithian principles, which are oen contested in contemporary media en-
vironments (Brevini, 2013), once again become increasingly signicant as an
antidote towards an elitist driven and automated culture that is generated by an
algorithmic culture.
is chapter argues that one of PSM’s crucial roles within a digital mediascape is
to maintain its function as a cultural facilitator that engages with cutting edge com-
putational algorithmic culture, while also maintaining its core Reithian principles.
e chapter demonstrates this arrangement through the lens of co-creation, facili-
tated through cultural intermediation, which enables content production through
a étalonnage1 of interactions between professionally trained media producers and
co-creative audiences. Cultural intermediation in this sense refers to the individu-
als that enable co-creation, for example social media producers, and a production
system that includes cultural translation, negotiation and expertise transfer. e
chapter argues that in a digital media ecosystem that seeks to produce and dis-
tribute automated culture, PSM should be engaging in these technologies to avoid
cultural production that ignores the depth, or ‘publicness,’ of culture. At the core
of this argument is the notion that the aordances of social media and its digital
ecosystem provide an opportunity for PSM to showcase its relevance through its
Reithian principles.
Positioning this argument within the inuence economy that is associated with
Multichannel Networks (MCNs) and their cultural intermediaries, this chapter
draws on the Australian context by exploring one of its public service media
organizations, e Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). It highlights
how PSM that engages with social media can collaborate with users, specically
‘super-users,’ to engage broad audiences who both produce and consume culture.
e chapter uses research data from one participatory scripted television comedy
programme, #7DaysLater to highlight how cultural intermediaries operation-
alize collaborative co-creation of cultural products. Finally, the chapter argues
that PSM, under the guise of a distinctive innovation institution (Cunningham,
2013), should be focussing on how cultural intermediaries should be engaging
in a particular role of online facilitation. Cultural intermediaries not only engage
the audience and encourage them to participate in a co-creative environment, but
1 e use of the term étalonnage best describes the process of parlance between producers
and consumers of content within digital media environments. e content production/
consumption model is not straightforward, nor is it one-way: it is oen a contested and
continually negotiated process to ensure all stakeholder groups are satised with outcome
of the process.
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are also responsible for generating new public issues through its strategic use of
social media and the incorporation of cultural intermediaries.
Emerging issues for public service media in a digital
mediascape
Public service media “has been tasked to serve the societal and cultural needs
of each member nation and to promote democracy and participation within the
national geographical boundaries” (Głowacki, 2015: 26). is, of course, is built
upon PSM’s origins of public service broadcasting (PSB) which emerged from the
early British model of the British Broadcasting Company (BBC – which later shis
to the British Broadcasting Corporation). e objective of PSB “was to inform,
educate and entertain with total independence from political power and com-
mercial pressure” (Tremblay, 2016: 194), suggesting its raison d’être is to serve the
public for its educational, cultural and societal needs. e thematic shi from PSB
and towards PSM is taken as “common parlance as services are extended across
‘new’ media platforms and experiments undertaken into new interactive content
forms” (Debrett, 2015: 557). Inherently, the trajectory of PSM is to continue to
provide for the democratic, social and cultural needs of society (Brevini, 2013),
yet extend these services into the digital environment.
European Broadcasting Union (EBU) in its Vision2020 strategy for PSM notes,
Once, PSM were taken for granted; their services were regarded as ‘guaranteed and es-
sential’ components of European societies (EBU, 2014: 5).
In this statement, at least in the western European context, PSM has always been
understood as an essential component of the national, societal and cultural fabric
of a nation. However, PSM has also been the target of much public criticism in
recent times, especially in how it maintains its relevance in an over-saturated and
digital media landscape. Barnett (2015) reminds us that PSM is increasingly under
attack because of conservative governments, introspective and disorganised le
political parties, hostile media environments, and substantially reduced funding
arrangements. Tremblay (2016: 192) also observes the mounting pressure by gov-
ernments on PSM in its “systematic reduction” in the eld of media and commu-
nication, which he notes as a “gradual and calculated suocation of public service
media.” At the same time, most PSM institutions are subject to Public Value Tests,
or in the case of Germany the Drei-Stufen-Test, as a somewhat ambitious attempt
to ensure PSM operations are indeed in line with that of its nation’s citizens. Col-
lectively, these issues demonstrate how PSM is under re as an institution in an
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oine environment, which is the caveat for the mounting pressure for PSM to
tentatively progress into the digital environment.
e public debates surrounding the relevance of PSM in the online or digital
spaces have focused on a few important areas. Seemingly, PSM in digital media-
scapes has been supported through arguments that note it should provide new
multiplatform services beyond television and radio (Steemers, 2016), it is a tool
for online citizenship and civic engagement (Debrett, 2015), or even as a locale for
‘distinctive’ media system innovation (Cunningham, 2015). ese arguments build
upon the recent scholarly contributions that bolster the value of PSM beyond the
market failure argument (Edelvold, Lowe and Lund, 2014), debunk the so-called
‘digital argument’ (Donders and Bulck, 2014), or as a facilitator of user co-creation
(Hutchinson, 2013). None of these arguments have entirely bolstered the relevance
of PSM in the online environment, which is best demonstrated through regional
re-thinking of the PSM strategy. Indeed the EBU are calling for action to make
PSM indispensable (EBU, 2014) with an emphasis towards digital media. e UK
government are suggesting digital media reform to its Charter, especially through
universality, given that its current version is set to expire in late 2016 (DCMS, 2015).
While in the Australian context, the ABC has its focus clearly on the production and
distribution of digital content as it further develops its catch-up service, iView, to
be more of a ‘digital rst’ over terrestrial broadcast model (ABC, 2014; Gow, 2015).
e strategic and policy emphasis on digital technologies, coupled with the
advent of incredibly sophisticated digital media technologies, especially social me-
dia, suggests digital PSM becomes increasingly signicant as an apparatus for user,
citizen and public engagement and participation. Although with participation as
a key area of interest for PSM scholars, some have noted the marginalization of
participation of users within PSM products and services. Głowacki and Jackson
(2014) observed that increased participation with PSM through digital technolo-
gies is moot, highlighting that websites are oen ‘bolt-on’ extras for marketing
purposes and not core platforms utilized for content production and distribution.
Jakubowicz (2014: 229) notes the decline of user-generated content (UGC) in
PSM, suggesting that the use of UGC “seems to remain in most cases [as] mar-
ginal forms, either designed to obtain input (…) that professional journalists use
in producing their programmes, under their exclusive control, or web pages (…)
serving as a display case for UGC.” In this light, increased participation within
PSM has, in many cases, been used as a symbolic process to align the remit of
PSM with digital citizen engagement. In this body of literature there is a point
of departure to explore the shiing digital media landscape surrounding PSM,
specically the impact of algorithmic culture.
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While many of these scholars mount compelling arguments for both the rel-
evance of PSM, and how PSM audience participation through digital technolo-
gies has gone out of style, I argue that none have addressed the emerging issues
surrounding the impact of algorithms. Algorithms are increasingly obvious in
how media industries are distributing content, but they are also impacting on
how content is being shaped and produced for subsequent audiences. A com-
mon example of this type of behaviour is best seen in publications like Buzzfeed
or Vice Magazine, which collect data on the consumption habits of their media
publications as a means to inform how future content is produced. is is not
a new strategy in media production, but when conducted on the scale as seen
through social media consumption, the potential for impact on the public sphere
is potentially enormous. As a key media production house, PSM must be aware of
how they too operate in the algorithmic space and their consequential impact on
public issues. Burgess and Matamoros (2016: 79) note the signicance of social
media and public issues:
Social media play a prominent role in mediating issues of public concern, not only provid-
ing the stage on which public debates play out, but also shaping their topics and dynamics.
erefore, if algorithms shape how public issues emerge, and public issues impact
on how future debates are shaped and discussed, PSM becomes a crucial agency
to be actively participating and shaping cultural production through social media
with its citizens.
Algorithmic culture and public service media
Before exploring algorithmic culture and its impact on PSM, it is crucial to un-
derstand what algorithms are, how they shape communication in digital media
environments, and how PSM can engage cultural intermediaries and algorithms
in this space. Gillespie notes two signicant characteristics of computational al-
gorithms. First an algorithm is “merely the steps for aggregating those assigned
values eciently, or delivering the results rapidly, or identifying the strongest
relationships according to some operationalized notion of ‘strong’” (Gillespie,
2014, np.). Second, he notes that algorithms “are “trained” on a corpus of known
data” which builds on certied data either by “designers or past user practices.” In
the digital media production environment, users and audiences see these strong
and trained approaches play out in the simplest of interfaces that present them
with a selection of content: usually programmed by producers based on an in-
formed corpus of data of past user practices. For example, algorithms are at play
on the Netix platform that presents a selection of ‘popular’ television content as
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a ‘suggestion for you’. is type of practice is increasingly common across digital
media properties of both commercial and non-commercial media organizations.
In the Australian context of the ABC, this is most obvious through the ABC Radio
mobile phone application and the ‘Your View’ section of the catch-up television
smart phone application, iView. ese examples indicate that algorithms are very
much at play in the production of PSM content. However, the more interesting
area to explore in this form of PSM content is how public culture is being pro-
duced around, by and through algorithms.
Williams (1989b) notes that culture is specic to each society based on nd-
ing common meanings and direction. Culture is very much present within a
networked society, which Castells notes is the connection of “major social, tech-
nological, economic, and cultural transformations (…) to give rise to a new form
of society, the network society” (Castells, 2007: xvii). What Castells so astutely
highlights is the emergence of a new culture that is based around the multimodal,
horizontal communication network: a cultural transformation that aligns our on-
line world with our oine. So, in a new society that is encountering global cultural
transformations and is diused between on and oine existences, the ability to
nd common meanings and directions becomes increasingly dicult. An op-
portunity exists within this space for PSM to contribute to a global conversation
across the network society by sharing and translating a national society’s common
meaning and direction among other nation states engaging with PSM. However,
if algorithms are at play within our PSM’s content procurement and production
processes, does PSM stand to risk skewing the development of public issues and
how those issues are further shaped and discussed within the public sphere?
is concern of skewing public issues is at the heart of an algorithmic culture.
Striphas (2015: 395) carefully warns on algorithmic culture:
ooading of cultural work onto computers, databases and other types of digital technolo-
gies has prompted a reshuing of some of the words most closely associated with culture,
giving rise to new senses of the term that may be experientially available but have yet to
be well named, documented or recorded.
So, while culture within a network society is generated at a rapid rate, from a
diverse group of individuals within multicultural backgrounds, attempting to
make this data sortable and storeable (Andrejevic, 2007) for simple retrievability
is entirely problematic. If we adhere to Striphas’ warning, new and potentially
incorrect meanings, issues and debates could emerge as seemingly signicant to
the participation and democratization within the public sphere. Further, these
sorts of activities and approaches towards the production of public issues through
algorithms could echo the limitation in access to information previously argued
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as the ‘lter bubble’ (Pariser, 2011), which suggests “culture is being reimagined as
more of a sedentary locus than a trajectory of human development” (Hallinan and
Striphas, 2014: 6). While PSM engage in algorithmic culture within the network
society, they may indeed be at risk of disseminating inaccurate or insignicant
information, or omitting the information entirely. Regardless of PSM’s remit to
engage in digital media technologies and to continually improve user interaction
and engagement, algorithmic culture is potentially problematic.
Despite the potential issue of incorrect or insucient information, PSM engag-
ing with algorithmic culture can also address the recent concerns of universality
(DCMS, 2015). For example, users who are interested in particular issues surround-
ing specic content, may be unaware of how that interest could translate to other
areas such as political activism or civic participation. Using an algorithm to highlight
additional content for users is a particularly useful and strategic method that PSM
organizations could engage to increase citizen awareness of contemporary issues
within the public sphere. e problem with generating public interest through algo-
rithms however, is designing, developing and implementing the correct algorithm
that will include citizens, and avoids perpetuating additional levels of ‘othering.’ As
Gillespie highlighted earlier, algorithms are developed on a corpus of known data
based on past user experiences. rough the generation of data that is based on past
user experience PSM are presented with a unique opportunity to build upon their
Reithian principles through algorithmic culture. It is possible to generate targeted,
authentic and appropriate information through social media practices, which will
enable PSM to reengage as key cultural institutions that co-create, archive, publish
and distribute core cultural texts that describe our society, for all our society.
However, while focussing attention on the role of PSM in information collec-
tion and generation within a social media environment, it is crucial to rethink
the relationship of PSM and convergence culture to reposition the PSM approach
from being user-centric entirely, and more towards a user-focused model. While
much of the earlier convergence culture research demonstrated the signicance
and impact of co-creation with PSM (see for example Flew et al., 2008; Wilson,
Hutchinson and Shea, 2010), there has been a broad pushback that rejects the
audience as co-creators altogether. As media organizations moved away from pro-
prietary social media platforms in favour of well-established social media spaces,
for example Facebook and Twitter, the focus on the audience has shied away
from them as co-creators (user-centric), and more towards an actively listening
audience (user-focused). However, recent scholarship demonstrates that the audi-
ence are located somewhere in between these two dichotomies. is is especially
the case with the increase of younger audiences interacting with PSM (Van Dijck
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and Poell, 2015). However, Vanhaeght and Donders (2016: 303) note that young
people’s participation in PSM is ultimately trumped by the media professional,
prompting them to ask, “If youth perspectives were of so little value to the produc-
tion process, why enable participation in the rst place?” is timely observation
is accurate about user-participation with media organizations broadly: they are
interested in audience inclusion, yet are still developing an appropriate model.
What these two academic sources inadvertently expose within PSM and media
organizations broadly is that they fail to identify the signicance of ‘inuence’ of
these highly active social media users. It is especially important to analyze this in
the algorithmic environment: incorporating young people’s perspective as a form
of past user experience to develop suitable PSM content algorithms. ese users
can be referred to as PSM cultural intermediaries.
Public service media, cultural intermediaries and inuence
Carpentier (2009) has problematized participation which is particularly useful for
PSM. rough an approach of minimalist and maximalist participation, Carpen-
tier (2009: 409) describes how participation can be aligned within societal elds.
In the minimalist model, participation “is conned to the process of representa-
tion” to suggest those who are represented are the only individuals participating.
Maximalist participation is a “balanced combination of representation and par-
ticipation”, which has a suciently signicant impact on decision-making that is
genuinely representative of an entire population. In the PSM algorithmic culture
arrangement described in this paper, maximalist participation is signicant for
cultural decision-making that incorporates the perspectives of all citizens. e
problem PSM face in attempting to incorporate maximalist participation through
algorithms is how to engage citizens in the discussion, which cultural perspec-
tives to include, and how to provide a democratic and participatory environment.
is location of cultural calibration is an ideal space for cultural intermediaries to
operate within to assist in knowledge, cultural and expertise transfer.
Cultural intermediaries were rst mentioned by Bourdieu (1984) to describe
the taste agents located between high and low cultural goods. He notes they are
especially well equipped to translate the nuances of cultural texts to groups of
individuals from dierent cultural backgrounds, that is, diering social-economic
demographics. Since then the term has been aligned with individuals who are
cultural market agents (Negus, 2002), contemporary taste agents that incorporate
market knowledge (Maguire and Matthews, 2014) and authoritative co-creative
taste agents who eciently operate within media organizations for collaborative
cultural production (Hutchinson, 2016). I have also previously argued the role of
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the cultural intermediary aligns with the operation of PSM through governance
(Hutchinson, 2013), participatory culture and co-creation (Hutchinson, 2015),
and locative and archival processes (Hutchinson, 2016). In this chapter, I develop
this understanding of the cultural intermediary in the context of algorithmic
culture, through the lens of the latest iteration of cultural intermediaries: micro-
inuencers (Abidin, 2015). To do so, I will explore the role of microinuencers
through the emerging phenomenon of Multichannel Networks.
Multichannel Networks (MCNs) are the intermediary agencies that exist be-
tween brands and social media inuencers, or microinuencers. For example,
the UK based Gleam Futures are talent agents operating in an inuential “social
talent” economy with “individuals who have built considerable audience & in-
uence on social media channels” (GleamFutures, 2016). is agency’s role is to
manage those popular social media producers who have amassed large amounts
of followers, and to support them to inuence their followers with commercial
products. While this model is moot for PSM because of the commercial applica-
tion, the framework remains signicant in order to think through how inuence is
becoming its own economy within social media. Furthermore, emerging cultural
intermediaries operating as microinuencers act as conduits between social media
users and organizations.
In the context of PSM, microinuencers are useful in two capacities. First,
they are essential distribution platforms that promote content through their large
follower audiences. As a content distributor, they not only distribute ocial PSM
content, they are also responsible for disseminating specic and unique public
issues that are absolutely relevant to the public sphere. In this capacity, microin-
uencers are key agents to facilitate public democratic and participatory conver-
sation across social media channels. Second, microinuencers also transfer the
issues amongst the users, typically younger audiences in this environment, back
into the PSM organization. is type of iterative feedback loop aorded through
social media technologies enables producers to create cultural goods that align
with Carpentier’s maximalist participation model that display “professional qual-
ity and social relevance” (Carpentier, 2009: 408). In this communication model,
socially relevant information, in the form of co-created content, is transferred
from the PSM through cultural intermediaries to their audiences, and then back
again from the users to the PSM organization.
Further to the maximalist participation argument, this is crucial for develop-
ing a suitable and appropriate algorithmic culture. As organizations build content
production and distribution strategies around an algorithm culture, incorporating
this type of existing user experience is crucial for the design, development and
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implementation of such technologies. is not only produces data on how audi-
ences are accessing content and the content they are consuming, it also invites
users for their input on socially relevant and public issues. Public service media
organizations are digitally calibrating with their citizens by incorporating user
input made possible by the cultural intermediary.
e following section draws on research that clearly demonstrates how cultural
intermediaries operate within PSM across social media channels as information
and user experience conduits. is research also demonstrates the key concepts
highlighted in the previous two sections that demonstrates how PSM operates
within the contemporary digital mediascape, and how cultural intermediaries are
centrally located for both ‘communication ins’ and ‘communication outs.’
#7DaysLater, participatory media and public service media
e Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is one of Australia’s public ser-
vice broadcasters, along with the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS), that rely
on government funding to operate. Unlike other countries with PSM, the ABC
operates in a unique environment, where two broadcasting provisions enable
market based programming to operate alongside non-commercial programming.
Australia, therefore, has two broadcasting licences, one commercial and one non-
commercial. A dual licencing system also means the ABC is entirely reliant on
the government to fund its operation. Although the ABC does have a commercial
arm including retail, selling archival content for reuse, and the sale of produc-
tions to outside distribution retailers, the majority of its funding is provided by
the Australian government.
Recently, ABC Television commissioned a group of popular YouTube produc-
ers, or microinuencers, to produce a series of scripted comedy television under
the programme title, #7DaysLater. #7DaysLater was a series of seven, six-minute
programmes with a unique and entirely experimental production methodology.
Its production methodology was ambitious in “(…) taking comedy to the scary
arena of interactive storytelling where the audience gets to write the brief via
social media for each weekly episode that will air just seven days later on ABC2”
(ABC, 2013). e typical production methodology began on Monday morning
with a Google Hangout to source broad ideas from the participating audience.
e following phase was to take those curated ideas to the popular Morning Show
on the national youth radio network, Triple J, to source additional audience input
on plot ideas, characters, or script writing. e production would be scripted
by Tuesday with shooting on Wednesday and ursday. Postproduction was on
Friday through to Sunday, with the episode going to air the following Monday
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evening. During the production process, the audience was invited to continue
to contribute via multiple social media channels, including Facebook, Twitter,
Instagram and YouTube. e season produced seven programmes that were rea-
sonably well accepted in television viewership, however, the programme yielded
enormous interaction across social media channels.
I have previously described the data collection process and methodology for
this research project (see Hutchinson, 2015), and this will not be discussed in this
book chapter. Instead, this work will explore the cultural intermediaries as they
emerged in the Twitter conversation around the @7DaysLater Twitter username.
Figure 1 below demonstrates how the Twitter conversation was mapped. rough
a series of social network analysis (SNA) algorithms, the more signicant nodes
are located near the centre of the graph, while the larger nodes indicate more
connected nodes. In other words, the more signicant nodes that are communi-
cating with large networks are the larger, centrally located nodes. If these nodes
are topics, they are popular conversations among the networks. However if they
are users, they represent the microinuencers described above.
Figure 1: e entire Twitter conversation associated with the @7DaysLater Twitter handle
Source: Originally published in Hutchinson (2015).
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Table 1 represents the zoomed in version of the conversation and highlights the
concentration of the more signicant nodes in the centre of the network graph.
In this table we see the top 10 users within the @7DaysLater conversation.
Table 1: Top 10 Twitter users associated with the @7DaysLater conversation
Users
1. @7DaysLaterTV
2. @Daley_Pearson
3. @HarrisoneFan
4. @MWhalan
5. @henry_and_aaron
6. @bajopants
7. @ABC2
8. @WASHINGTONx
9. @JordanRasko
10. @tomandalex
Source: Originally published in Hutchinson (2015).
If the @7DaysLater handle is extracted because it will be the most signicant
connection between all of the programme’s conversations, along with the leading
fan users of @HarrisoneFan and @MWhalan, because they are super user fans
of the show, we are le with seven microinuencers. Each one of these Twitter
microinuencers are associated with the production of the programme and each
user brings with them a large group of existing audience members. For example,
@henry_and_aaron are a comedy duo that align with the description of YouTube
producers with high inuence capital because of their social talent expertise. eir
Twitter account notes them as “an Australian comedy duo who create various on-
line videos and viral content” (Inglis and McCann, 2016), and their YouTube page
has approximately 10,500 followers. eir videos consistently attract large viewing
numbers, ranging from around 2,000 views to their top video with just under
20million views. ese two YouTube content producers align with the descrip-
tion of the microinuencer highlighted above. During the lming of #7DaysLater,
they were brought in as guest stars, and this was also integrated into their own
personal social media platforms. Many of the top Twitter users in Table 1 were
also utilized in this capacity, which is a grounded example of Castell’s network
society being operationalized within PSM. In other words, the producers of the
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programme were engaging in the networks of the networks during the lming
of the programme.
#7DaysLater is an exceptional example of how the cultural intermediary is
being utilized as a genuine maximalist participatory agent. From Figure 1, it is
clear to see how several key Twitter users that are associated with the conversa-
tion are distributing both content, along with conversational triggers. Although
this is occurring within a scripted comedy television project, this is an incredibly
important framework that highlights how PSM should be engaging in the digital
media landscape. Beyond distributing content to larger networks of social media
users, these cultural intermediaries are also translating signicant talking points
from the fans of the show back into the production of the programme. is was
best demonstrated through one of the key Twitter users Nick Boshier, who was
also heavily involved in the production of #7DaysLater. Boshier is also responsible
for another very successful Australian comedy duo, e Bondi Hipsters, whose
unique comedy style was also very prominent in the programme. rough Bosh-
ier’s involvement, his social talent was obvious in the content production as he
was acting as a taste agent who would translate cutting edge cultural tastes into
ABC institutionalized television comedy.
Each of the microinuencers associated with #7DaysLater demonstrate high
social talent, which, as described before, aligns with inuence as a social media
currency. With high inuence capital, microinuencers are able to embody the
cultural intermediary role of taste translator to translate cultural taste between
PSM organizations and vast groups of social media users. Although the example
given above is based in scripted comedy television, the framework #7DaysLater
developed is exemplary on how contemporary PSM can engage citizens within
the digital mediascape. In this role, PSM cultural intermediaries are best placed
to understand how culture is functioning within society (listening), while also
distributing key public issues (talking). ey assist in developing maximalist par-
ticipatory models, while also introducing existing user patterns to help develop
PSM algorithmic culture.
Conclusions
is chapter has highlighted the contemporary digital media landscape in which
PSM operates. rough the combination of social media, an inuence economy,
and cultural intermediaries, there is a new cultural calibration model occurring
between cutting edge cultural activities and cultural institutions, such as PSM.
is enables the PSM organization to understand what cultural practices are
relevant beyond their existing programming, while also presenting them with
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Intermediaries exercising inuence through algorithms 131
an opportunity to disseminate the public issues that should be discussed within
the public sphere. Combining this approach with contemporary digital media
processes, PSM has begun engaging with the emergent algorithmic culture that
sees the personalized cultural products delivered to individual consumers, while
also providing an avenue for users to provide their input into the institution. e
danger that has emerged with this automated process is the potential of either
operating with incorrect information, or omitting socially relevant information
altogether. is chapter has argued that the inclusion of cultural intermediaries
as key cultural, knowledge and technology agents enables the correct design,
development and implementation of an appropriate and socially relevant algo-
rithmic culture.
Further to this argument, PSM operating with algorithmic culture to enable
maximalist participation through professional and socially relevant content is an
example of Cunningham’s (2013) distinctive innovation model. e #7DaysLater
case study clearly demonstrates how this model is working to satisfy both the
audience and the media organization, and is an exemplar of how other media
organizations could be operating in this space. e cultural intermediation model
coupled with an algorithm culture could easily transfer from the PSM sector to
the broader digital media sector seamlessly, bolstering the signicance of PSM
within the contemporary media environment. While in the PSM model, the goal
is to engage users within a maximalist participation sense, within the commercial
broadcasting sector, this cultural intermediation algorithm model could be reap-
propriated to enable these organizations to engage in content production that is
authentically market driven.
e cultural intermediation algorithm culture that has emerged from PSM
is an outcome that is crucial to its legislated remit in order to engage its citizens
across digital media technologies to promote increased participation and citizen
democracy. is is typical of the sort of innovation that we have come to expect
from PSM, and following Cunningham’s call for this innovation to be recognized
as a distinctive role for PSM, the algorithmic participation model is a crucial func-
tion that is to be highlighted for media policy makers. For policy makers and PSM
leaders alike, a cultural intermediation algorithm model is demonstrable of how
PSM remains relevant within a network society, and places them at the fore of
innovative practices. Most importantly, it demonstrates that it is possible for PSM
to engage with its citizens across new and emerging communication technologies
and ensure it maintains authenticity, value and publicness.
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