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ISSN 0214-0039 – © 2014 Communication & Society 27(4), 73-94
73
Transmedia contents created
around Spanish television series
in 2013: typology, analysis,
overview and trends
Abstract
This article analyses the transmedia contents created
around 33 Spanish television series broadcast in 2013 by
national and regional TV networks. The article reviews the
TV series’ official websites, in which the transmedia
contents are made available, and organises the wide variety
of transmedia formats created around the sample of TV
series, based on the different touchpoint categories, which
refer to any content or strategy that allow viewers to engage
with a television brand through other media and platforms.
The results indicate that there is an overwhelming presence
of TV contents that are repackaged or adapted to the new
medium or platform and that there is still a lack of
transmedia expansion through contents that are actually
new, differentiated across media, and narratively relevant.
Keywords
Transmedia storytelling, transmedia contents, transmedia
formats, Spanish TV series, touchpoints, mothership
1. Transmedia and Transmedia Narratives
For Henry Jenkins, Transmedia Storytelling (TS) is a cultural
phenomenon characteristic of the “era of convergence”. In essence,
it consists of the systematic dissemination of important elements of
a fictional narrative through various media, in order to promote a
unified and coordinated entertainment experience across all of
these channels. Ideally, each medium makes an exclusive,
distinctive and valuable contribution to the construction of the
story, i.e., it does not make a mere adaptation, transposition or
intersemiotic translation (Jenkins, 2006, 2007, 2009a, 2009b, 2011;
Scolari, 2009: 589). Each medium provides a text or product that
offers something new, while the whole narrative is enriched and
expanded by those contributions.
Some lists of features have been proposed to characterise TS
(Gomez, 2007; Jenkins, 2009a; Transmedia Manifest, 2011; Scolari,
2013), but they emphasise different aspects. In any case, it is possible
to point out some basic principles: 1) the multiple media and
platforms which disseminate the narrative universe; 2) the need for
each medium or platform to do what it does best in this narrative
universe, expanding it and deepening it without being redundant; 3)
Raúl Rodríguez Ferrándiz
r.rodriguez@ua.es
PhD and Full Professor in
Semiotics of Mass
Communication at the
Department of Communication
and Social Psychology.
University of Alicante. Spain.
Félix Ortiz Gordo
faog@alu.ua.es
Master’s Degree in
Communication and Creative
Industries at the University of
Alicante. Spain.
Virginia Sáez Núñez
virg303@gmail.com
Bachelor's Degree in Advertising
and Public Relations at the
University of Alicante. Spain.
Submitted
April 14, 2014
Approved
June 17, 2014
© 2014
Communication & Society
ISSN 0214-0039
E ISSN 2174-0895
doi:
10.15581/003.27.4.73-94
www.communication-society.com
2014 – Vol. 27(4),
pp. 73-94
How to cite this article:
Rodríguez Ferrándiz, R., Ortiz
Gordo, F. & Sáez Núñez, V. (2014).
Transmedia contents created
around Spanish television series in
2013: typology, analysis, overview
and trends. Communication &
Society 27(4), 73-94.
This study is developed within the
framework of the research project
FEM2012-33411 of the Non-
oriented Basic Research Projects
Sub-Programme, financed by the
Ministry of Economy and
Competitiveness (Spain) and
directed by Dr. Rosario Lacalle
Zalduendo
Rodríguez Ferrándiz, R., Ortiz Gordo, F. & Sáez Núñez, V.
Transmedia contents around Spanish television series in 2013: typology, analysis, overview and trends
ISSN 0214-0039 – © 2014 Communication & Society 27(4), 73-94
74
the calculated balance between stories that are capable of being independent and
satisfactory by themselves in a single medium (to be comprehensible and attractive to casual
audiences) and stories that are fragments of a more comprehensive whole and are capable
of attracting a more involved transmedia audience; 4) the need for a centralised creative
control that sometimes has to be exercised by a single person; and 5) the inevitable
expansion of the universe based on non-canonical stories that are the result of the
unlimited creativity of the user (Rodríguez Ferrándiz, 2014).
As Jenkins (2009a, 2010: 944-45) points out, the phenomenon of transmediality is more
general than TS. In other words, not all transmediality is narrative, although it has the
potential to be so. There are textual and media phenomena that are very similar to TS and
may overlap with them (transmedia branding, transmedia performance and transmedia
activism). However, in order to achieve the status of transmedia storytelling, it is necessary
for the narrative universe to expand, in a coordinated manner, throughout different media
and platforms, to develop further the story and to encourage amateur contributions.
Not all the transmedia products of a TV series are relevant to this narrative expansion.
Some products have a promotional or advertising dimension in the more classic and limited
sense (promos that recap an episode, a plot or a season, in a dramatic way: Gray, 2010).
Others products have a transmedia character, undoubtedly, but are limited to giving access
to the television product, its literalness, from another medium (which favours on-demand
and second-screen consumption, but does not add anything new to the story). Some other
products are adaptations that transpose the story to other media, and often involve
modifications required by the new medium (novelisations, comic books, video games).
This article shows, and this is one of the anticipated conclusions, that the Spanish
Television series broadcast in 2013 reflect considerable transmedia diversity, but also a very
limited transmedia narrative expansion, at least on the part of the media corporation.
2. Spanish television series broadcast in 2013
The first examples of TS analysed by Jenkins (2006) were mainly cinematographic
productions (The Matrix, The Blair Witch Project), being the film or the movie saga the centre
of the universe in transmedia expansion. However, the reflections on the possibilities of
television to become the mothership of a complex transmedia universe (Mittell, 2006, 2010)
were confirmed with very obvious examples like the cases of Lost (Askwith, 2007: 117-149;
Smith, 2009: 70-105; Pearson, 2009; Maguregui, Piscitelli & Scolari, 2010); Doctor Who
(Perryman, 2008); 24 (Scolari, 2009); True Blood (Hardy, 2011; Rodríguez Ferrándiz, 2012) and
Fringe (Álvarez Berciano, 2012; Belsunces, 2012), among others.
Narrative transmediality in Spanish TV series has also been addressed, but almost
never from a general perspective, and instead focused on specific productions, such as
Águila Roja (Costa & Piñeiro, 2012; Guerrero, 2014) and El Barco (Grandío & Bonaut, 2012).
Occasionally, the study of one production has been combined with the study of a transmedia
strategy that was representative of that production (such as El Barco and Twitter, in Deltell,
Claes Osteso, 2013 & Fernández Gómez, 2013; and Pulseras Rojas and Facebook, in Tur-Viñes
& Rodríguez Ferrándiz, 2014). Mayor’s study (2014) of the narrative transmediality of the TV
series produced by the Spanish network Antena 3 addressed the series Compañeros, Los
protegidos, El Barco and Hispania.
The work of Rosario Lacalle for the OBITEL Yearbook is a more ambitious work that
year after year offers a comprehensive overview of the Spanish TV series premiered in both
national and regional networks, taking into account the transmedia reception (the last
published work is Lacalle, Castro & Sánchez, 2014). There is another study that specifically
examines the websites of the Spanish primetime series broadcast in 2011 as a resource of
narrative transmediality (Rodríguez Fidalgo & Gallegos Santos, 2012).
Rodríguez Ferrándiz, R., Ortiz Gordo, F. & Sáez Núñez, V.
Transmedia contents around Spanish television series in 2013: typology, analysis, overview and trends
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Nonetheless, so far the most comprehensive study on truly narrative transmediality in
television has been carried out by Scolari et alia, who analyse the transmedia phenomenon
in 2010-2011 in TV programmes produced in Catalonia (in Catalan or Spanish language),
within the genre of fiction (Las tres mellizas, Serrallonga, Águila Roja, Infidels, 2012a) and
outside of it (the previous productions plus Operación Triunfo, Buenafuente, Polònia, 2012b).
There are also very valuable analyses of the possibilities and challenges of transmedia
expansion via the Internet for Spanish television in the work coordinated by León (2012).
This study focuses on the Spanish TV series broadcast in 2013 by any of the regional and
national DTT networks. The sample is composed of a total of 33 TV productions. The
following table describes the sample of TV series by broadcast network, including its
premiere year and the season aired in 2013.
Table 1. Spanish TV series broadcast in 2013 by networks
La 1
ANTENA 3
TELE 5
TVG
1 Cuéntame (2001-, 14ª)
6 Amar es para siempre
(2013-, 1ª y 2ª)
16 Aída (2005-, 10ª)
25 Padre Casares (2008- 12ª)
2 Gran Reserva (2010-, 3ª)
7 El Barco (2011-2013, 3ª)
17 La que se avecina
(2007-, 6ª y 7ª)
26 Matalobos (2009-13 5ª)
3 Gran Reserva. El origen
(2013)
8 El secreto de Puente Viejo
(2011-, 2ª y 3ª)
18 Frágiles (2012-2013, 2ª)
27 Era Visto (2011-, 5ª y 6ª)
4 Isabel (2012-, 2ª)
9 Fenómenos (2012-13)
19 Familia (2013)
28 Libro de familia
(2005-13, 10ª)
5 Águila Roja (2009-, 5ª)
10 Con el culo al aire (2012-, 2ª)
20 Tierra de lobos (2010- 3ª)
29 Escoba (2013- , 3ª y 4ª)
11 Bandolera (2011-13, 2ª)
21 El don de Alba (2013)
ETB
12 Luna, el misterio de Calenda
(2012-13, 2ª)
TV3
30 Goenkale (1994-, 20ª)
13 Vive cantando (2013-, 1º)
22 La Riera (2010-, 4ª y 5ª)
31 DBH (2012-, 2ª)
14 El tiempo entre costuras
(2013-14)
23 Kubala, Moreno i Manchón
(2012-, 2ª)
CANAL SUR
15 Gran Hotel (2011-13, 3ª)
24 Polseres Vermelles
(2011-, 2ª)
32 Arrayán (2001-13, 13ª)
33 Flaman (2013)
Source: OBITEL
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As we can see, the sample includes productions that are popularly known as “series”,
but can be classified according to their formal and thematic features. For example, the
sample includes series, which are composed of self-contained episodes (Aída, La que se
avecina) as well as serials, which are composed of several inter-episode plots that maintain
the suspense (Gran Reserva; Luna, el misterio de Calenda). The sample also includes weekly
primetime productions (Isabel, Polseres vermelles) as well as daily soap operas (Bandolera,
Amar es para siempre, La riera), dramas and comedies, original TV scripts and TV
adaptations of novels (El tiempo entre costuras and, more loosely, Polseres Vermelles, based on
the book by Albert Espinosa, El mundo amarillo). In terms of length, the sample includes
long-running series and serials (Cuéntame, Aída), series conceived to last one season (El
tiempo entre costuras), and series conceived to last several seasons but cancelled prematurely
after the first season due to low ratings (Familia, El don de Alba, Fenómenos). In other words,
the sample includes TV series that premiered long time ago and may have been conceived
without a transmedia strategy (but may have implemented one later) and series that
premiered recently, at a time when the phenomenon was already more mature (but still had
opportunities of expansion) and invested in transmedia strategies.
The series format may lend itself more or less to transmedia dissemination and, within
the range of possibilities, to some formats more than others. Moreover, each network has its
own way of managing the expansion of its narrative through other means (on Antena 3,
García Mirón, 2012; Mayor, 2014). The objective is, therefore, to produce a very recent
overview of the Spanish television series landscape and their more or less narrative
transmediality.
3. Objectives and method
The analysis of the narrative universes of the previously described sample of TV series aims:
1) To establish a full list of the different transmedia contents and formats created
around the TV series, which are in this case the mothership, i.e. the content of reference
that contains the core narrative. This list will allow us to establish the most common
contents and formats in the national TV production of 2013.
2) To organise these formats within the main “touchpoint” categories (Askwith,
2007), i.e. the points of contact between the viewer and the transmedia universe. This
typology also based on the narrative “novelty” of the transmedia product with respect to
the core TV text, and users’ degree of interaction with the plot or the TV company.
3) To identify the formats that contribute to the transmedia expansion of the
narrative universe of the TV series, detecting the most narratively transmedia
productions, and taking into account whether this transmediality is due more to the
activities of the TV series’ corporative strategies or the productive activity of fans.
4) To assess the transmedia dimension of the Spanish fiction television series of
2013, and to detect future trends.
In order to analyse the transmedia products of the Spanish TV series broadcast in 2013,
we distinguished between the official “corporate” productions and user generated contents
(hence UGC), in order to show the specificities of each case.
3.1. Method to analyse official products
To analyse the official productions we combined two strategies. An inductive strategy,
which involved the identification and collection of the variety of formats used in the
transmedia expansion of the TV narratives, and a deductive strategy, which involved the
classification of these transmedia expansion formats according to academic classifications
developed by other researchers (Askwith, 2007), based on the inductive analysis of the
Rodríguez Ferrándiz, R., Ortiz Gordo, F. & Sáez Núñez, V.
Transmedia contents around Spanish television series in 2013: typology, analysis, overview and trends
ISSN 0214-0039 – © 2014 Communication & Society 27(4), 73-94
77
transmedia narratives of American TV series. Both strategies were combined: the inductive
classification that was based on the Spanish examples (which provided a great variety of
formats, many of which were given both old and innovative, and sometimes wrong, names
by the TV companies) was reorganised according to the academic classification developed
Askwith (which is more concise and based on consistent criteria). Both classifications
turned out to be perfectly compatible: the deductive typology provides general types, within
which we distributed the specific formats.
The first step to identify corporate official material was to review the websites of the TV
networks in question and, in particular, the TV series’ websites located within their
respective networks’ websites. We reviewed the different sections of these websites and
selected representative examples for each identified format. These platforms provide much
of the promotional material of the series and, therefore, this review allowed us to make a
catalogue of contents that very closely reflects the total number of promotional activities
generated around the series.
After extracting the relevant information contained in the different websites of the
series, we continued the search in three of the main online video platforms: YouTube,
Dailymotion and Vimeo. This choice is based on the Top 20 list of online videos in Spain
according to unique viewers1. The highest position in the list is occupied by YouTube, which
is owned by Google since 2006. Dailymotion and Vimeo occupy the 13th and 14th positions on
the list, but were selected for the study over other video platforms in higher top positions
(like VEVO) because the both platforms offer a greater amount of videos related to the topic
of our research.
We visited the previously mentioned online video platforms and checked whether the
television networks had their own channels in these platforms. We reviewed the videos
available in the identified channels and selected those that were different from the ones
already identified in the official websites previously examined.
The following step was to input the relevant keywords in the search engines of the
websites to track the material uploaded by users not related to the TV companies. Here it is
important to note that we tried to identify the origin of the videos, to make sure we only
selected non-official materials. To this end, we examined some of the characteristics of
corporate videos (duration of the video, editing, sound, characters, integration of corporate
elements like logo bugs and banners), the descriptive information of the videos, and the
information included in the comments section.
After completing the search in the video platforms, we searched for other types of
corporate products on the web (with the Google search engine) and checked the presence of
the TV series on social networks (Facebook and Twitter).
Once the examples were collected, we classified them according to their features and
the descriptions found in the different corporate websites. The result was a total of 50
different, mostly corporate or official, formats, which contained elements of the TV series
that were not included in the content originally broadcast by the networks:
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1 Source: http://blog.hollybyte.com/2013/02/los-datos-del-video-online-enero-2/captura-de-pantalla-2013-02-05-
a-las-14-23-51/
Rodríguez Ferrándiz, R., Ortiz Gordo, F. & Sáez Núñez, V.
Transmedia contents around Spanish television series in 2013: typology, analysis, overview and trends
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78
Table 2. Transmedia formats in Spanish TV series
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Source: Authors’ own creation.
After the searching for examples and formats was completed, and in order to
reorganise this great variety of formats, we classified the Spanish TV series according to a
research-based transmedia product classification system developed in the USA. This
typology of transmedia products, which in our view is more comprehensive when the
mothership is the medium of television and, in particular, TV series, was developed by Ivan
Askwith in a thesis co-supervised by Henry Jenkins and presented to obtain a Master of
Science in Comparative Media Studies at MIT (2007: 51-99).
The advantage of this typology is that it leaves in the background classification criteria
that are perhaps too obvious, such as the material platforms of the transmedia content. This
typology neither takes into account very fragile and somewhat little relevant distinctions:
like whether the product under analysis is formally labelled as “content” or “promotion”, or
whether it is free or not. The main criterion is the new information or content that these
products provide to the mothership around which they orbit, and therefore uses a criterion
related to the “additive comprehension” that Jenkins considers as a fundamental
characteristic of TS, in opposition to the well-known adaptations and transpositions (2009a,
2009b, Rodríguez Ferrándiz, 2014: 20-21).
Askwith uses the term “touchpoints” to refer to “any content, activity, or strategic
offering that allows the media consumer to engage with a television ‘brand’ in any manner
other than watching the core program content through real-time or time-shifted (DVR)
viewing” (2007: 53). The creation of the touchpoints and the typologies to analyse them was
prompted by the agents interested in measuring audiences and selling these measurements
to advertisers. However, Askwith has highlighted the inconsistencies of the criteria used by
media professionals: they do not pay attention to truly narrative considerations (the novelty
of the new product in relation to what is already known of the story) nor the “expansive
‘unauthorized’ activities of fans”, which are not measured or evaluated.
Askwith speaks of an increasingly clear and comprehensive “expanded television text”,
which allows consumers to access the contents of the television narrative in ways that
largely exceed the viewing on the TV screen, at the time scheduled by the network and
according to the broadcast rhythm decided by programmers. Excluding the core television
Rodríguez Ferrándiz, R., Ortiz Gordo, F. & Sáez Núñez, V.
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ISSN 0214-0039 – © 2014 Communication & Society 27(4), 73-94
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text (which we can call “product 0”), Askwith identifies seven different categories of
products related to these TV texts, ranging from those products that show a quasi-identity
to the TV series those linked in a more flexible way: more additive, more creative, less
subject to the norm, more participatory.
1) Expanded access. Refers to the formats that transform the flowing TV product into a
physical published product (DVD) or combine both types of products, resulting in such
formats as streaming video, video on demand, iTunes video, etc. All of this is undoubtedly
linked to new devices and screens in which the TV programme can be watched (desktop
computers, laptops, mobile phones, tablets). In general, these products offer the full
television broadcast product, without alterations2.
2) Repackaged content. Refers to everything that “manipulates, re-organises, excerpts,
replicates, reuses, repurposes or adapts a show’s core content (i.e. the original televised
episodes), thus generating new content through variations of pre-existing content” (57). In
general, such products do not provide new information, but interconnect and systematise
the available information. And this is in order to guide the casual, not loyal, viewer and
revive the interest of the fan, by affording them the pleasure of recognition. Examples of
repackaged content are episode or season guides, characters bios and recaps, which are
usually available on the official websites of the series.
Although Askwith does not point it out, this category could perfectly include all the
classic promotional formats of television series. There is entire a paratextual apparatus that
surrounds the television text for promotional purposes (Gray, 2010). This category would fit
contents temporarily detached from the episode itself, such as promos, which advance more
or less defined products (promos of the episode, the season or the entire series that will be
broadcast) and are disseminated on television and on the Internet. Moreover, the category
would also fit paratexts attached to the episode: the teasers or cold openings that advance
the content of the episode we are about to watch, or compile excerpts of what has been
shown to ensure continuity (“previously on” is announced at the start of many American
series), or conclude the episode with previews of the next episode. They are usually
powerful pieces and montages of audiovisual materials extracted from the recording, or
taken ex profeso during the broadcast. They do not provide new narrative elements, but
remind or anticipate plots and tell the viewer what they can expect.
While guides and character bios tend to be written texts with an anaphoric function
(refer to what has already been seen or known, summarise it, and never anticipate content),
promos and previews are audiovisual formats with a cataphoric function (announce the
things that are about to come). A third, relatively novel, type of content is the second screen
(tablet, mobile phones) applications, which become active and show content during the
television broadcast of the episode. Based on the previous, in order to sort out the variety of
repackaged content it is useful, in our view, to take into account the temporal dimension:
before, during and after the broadcast of the corresponding television mothership.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
2 Although the DVD format is available since the 1980s, it was in 2000 when a television series was published for the
first time on DVD (the first season of the X-files, FOX). With regards to the Internet, it was in 2005 when an
agreement between Apple and ABC allowed people to access certain ABC programmes online the day after their
broadcast. In the USA the access can be free (the streaming video contained advertising) or paid-for (downloads
through Apple’s iTunes Video Store, Microsoft’s XBOX Live, and Amazon’s Unbox). In Spain, Antena 3 was a pioneer
already in 2007, offering the episodes of El Internado through its website. In 2008 Antena 3 offered previews of Los
hombres de Paco on its website. With regards to access to TV content from mobile devices, Antena 3 also acted
before the other networks, by making live programs available on mobile devices in 2008, as well as television
channels exclusively available for mobile devices and second screen applications in 2012 (García Mirón, 2012;
Fernández Gómez, 2013).
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3) Ancillary or expanded content3. Refers to all types of content that provide information
or materials that are not and will not found in the broadcast TV series and, thus, increase
the knowledge of the audience about the fictional narrative. Askwith differentiates between
“textual extensions” (3.1), “relevant information” (3.2) and “extra-textual information” (3.3).
The first category involves the expansion of the universe of the story and is divided into
“narrative extensions” (3.1.1) and “diegetic extensions” (3.1.2). The first subcategory refers to
new stories, delivered as such in the typical formats of commercial narratives and labelled
as such. Without leaving the medium of television, they can be sequels, prequels or spin-off
of the original series, i.e. strictly speaking they are not transmedia but intra-media contents
(Harvey, 2012: 65). However, the textual extensions can be substantiated in other media and
platforms of expression, such as novels, comics, and more recent formulas, such as
webisodes, online miniseries or web series, and video games. This category is, therefore, the
one that fits much of the products typically considered in the study of TN.
Askwith warns us that, in the past, that commercial exploitation of television franchises
neglected creative aspects, in a way that there was no control over the narrative of those
cultural products, which were often the responsibility of authors or screenwriters not
involved in the original series. Now these narrative extensions are more subject to control,
and are conceived as a decisive added value for viewer’s engagement with the franchise.
For its part, the second subcategory (“diegetic extensions”, 3.1.2) is composed by
artefacts that furnish and make the narrative consistent (newspapers, photo albums, e-
mails, websites or weblogs of the fictional characters, institutions and events of the
narrative), but are not limited to the narrative and but somehow overflow it. And this way
they are inserted as objects in the real world, as if they were crossing that threshold and
materialising as part of our experience and our everyday practices.
Ancillary or expanded content also includes relevant information (3.2) that underpins
the fictional universe with details that make up a sort of encyclopaedic knowledge within
the fiction genre: from data about the protocols of forensic medicine in the police
procedural subgenre (C.S.I. and Bones, for example) to information about rare diseases, their
symptoms and treatments in medical dramas (like House), and even information about alien
races, their culture and customs in science fiction series (Star Trek). Finally, this type of
content also includes extra-textual information (3.3), which may be professional character
(data on the production team, short behind-the-scenes videos and podcasts by
screenwriters, directors and producers; details about the film locations or the casting of
actors, event ratings reports), or about the celebrities involved in the series.
4) Branded products. These are objects related to the series, not because they have been
extracted from the fictional universe (see “diegetic extensions” [3.1.2]), but because they
carry and show very clearly the brand of the television show: merchandising of the series
with the logo printed on 4. Sometimes these promotional items are free (computer
screensavers and wallpapers, mobile ringtones, etc.) and sometimes are up for sale (posters,
key chains, t-shirts with images or memorable phrases, etc.). Some of these objects would
fall into the category of collectible items: character-based toys, replicas of ships or
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
3 The term “ancillary content”, which has been coined by Askwith, seems to be too restrictive, because it seems to
suggest an absolute subordination to the TV mothership despite the fact that the best examples of transmedia
storytelling indicate that a characteristic feature of this phenomenon is precisely the expansion of the narrative
universe through new contents that may work autonomously. In other words, the narrative expansion of a TV
series through a comic book, a novel or a videogame undoubtedly provoke an inter-textual reference to the original
TV series but also could and should work as independent and satisfactory narratives by themselves. For this reason,
we have decided to rename this touchpoint proposed by Askwith as “expanded content”.
4 For a rigorous classification of merchandising based on a television series, see C. Johnson (2007), who
distinguishes between diegetic merchandising, pseudo-diegetic merchandising and extra-diegetic merchandising
(pp. 15-16).
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scenarios characteristic of the series, cards with the characters and their information. These
television branded products play several roles: they serve as memorabilia of the series and
as portals to access the fictional universe, and publicly indicate the affiliation of the holder
to that narrative universe.
5) Related activities. There are touchpoints that require the consumer to adopt an active,
participatory role, and not only a somewhat static, one-way, and private consumption.
Askwith speaks of four possibilities: themed activities (5.1), for example, themed games and
puzzles. Unlike the touchpoint 4 (branded products), which are more inert, narratively
speaking (such as screen savers, key chains, t-shirts or ringtones for mobile phones), these
activities allow and even demand user interaction.
In the case of experiential activities (5.2), users are asked to play a role related to the
fictional story (video games, role-playing games), of which a particular incident that
occurred in an episode or series of episodes is recreated. More rare -but more interesting in
the real of TN- is when new narrative plots are created based on what is already known or
assumed, but are novel because they have not been previously presented in the TV show (in
this sense, these activities are similar to the textual extensions (3.1.1)). Users can generally
play four different roles: 1) as themselves, or original characters of their own design, whose
features can be selected from a menu of configuration options (as in the Desperate
Housewives videogame, in which the player assumes the role of a new housewife who moves
onto Wisteria Lane; 2) as recognisable characters from the TV series (as in the 24 videogame
and the 2003 Buffy The Vampire Slayer: Chaos Bleeds videogame); 3) as a new token character
(a new detective in the CSI game, or an emergency doctor in ER); and 4) as an unspecified
agent that navigates the fictional universe as a visitor rather than a character.
We also have productive activities (5.3), which put the viewer, either individually or
groups, in the position of content creators, which ranges from participating in the writing of
the Wikipedia page or other specific wikis to participating in the programme’s websites and
online fan communities, and in even more complex and elaborate ways of generating
content (with editing tools) with varying degrees of originality with respect to the raw
material.
Finally, there are challenge activities (5.4), which allow players demonstrate their
competencies, skills and knowledge in relation to the show by overcoming challenges:
quizzes about the show, for example (Askwith, 2007: 51-99).
6) Social interaction. Increasingly, TV broadcasters try to exploit the mobilisation of fan
communities on the Internet. In the opinion of Askwith, this occurs in several ways. First by
favouring a horizontal connection (6.1) between viewers across purpose-created platforms in
which the show is discussed, praised or criticised, and possible interpretations and
emotional responses are shared. It is an activity that Genette (1989) would call metatextual,
but is not signed by professional critics, but by ordinary spectators. There is an interesting
dialectic between the interaction channels provided by the television brand (websites of the
show, official profiles in social networks such as Facebook, Myspace or YouTube) and the
platforms that are created by and for the fans and are not related at all with the corporation
that produces the show. The first group of channels tend to be more general and regulated,
while the latter are designed by the fans, are more hardcore, and give more independence
and freedom to express opinions (Rodríguez Ferrándiz, 2012: 75-76; Tur-Vines and
Rodríguez Ferrándiz, 2014).
Second, by favouring a vertical connection (6.2) between the show’s viewers and
celebrities. Here it is important to note that the term celebrities no longer applies only to
the actors and actresses that are part of the show, but also to the production team, which
relatively recently have been given a very remarkable recognition as authors: writers,
producers, directors (Abrams, Sorkin, Chase, Kelley, Simon Ball...).
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And third, by favouring a vertizontal connection (6.3), which halfway between the
previous types of relationships, and consists of the interaction with the show’s characters.
This category is linked with the diegetic extensions (3.1.2) and experiential activities (5.2), but
provides the opportunity of interaction with the characters: for example, the ARG and blogs,
where viewers often have the possibility of (supposedly) interact with the characters, behind
which there are, obviously, screenwriters familiar with the dramatic roles they assume.
7) Interactivity. In this final category, Askwith points out that there are several types of
interactivity with a TV show, for example: “mechanical interaction” which is characteristic
of remote control use and channel selection, and “content activation”, which is what video
game players do when selecting an action that provokes reactions that have been pre-
designed the video game’s programmer. Askwith is interested here in the so-called “content
interaction” subcategory (and not only with “content activation”) and divides it into
“acknowledged contributions” and “influential interactions”.
The first type of interactivity occurs in those touchpoints that foresee and provide a
structured, planned occasion for users to contribute and see this contribution
acknowledged and even rewarded (surveys, SMS messages or tweets that are displayed on
the screen, gifts or prices). This can happen during the broadcast of the programme, and
through other platforms associated to it, such as the series’ website or its profile on the
social networks. However, this contribution, although recognised, lacks the ability to alter
or influence the direction of the events that take place in the programme or its conclusion.
Instead, “influential interactions” can determine the course of the story and they take
the form of interactive endings (which means that creators have to write and shoot several
endings, knowing that not all of them will be broadcast), the winners of reality talent shows
like American Idol, and any creative fan work that has an effect on the narrative (in the
upcoming scriptwriting, dialogues, the setting, props, etc.).
3.2. Method to analyse the activity of fans
The method used to obtain the UGC is very similar to that used to identify the official
content, but it is worth noting some differences. The first step was to search for examples of
the different formats of UGC, starting with the video format. Two peculiar features of the
UGC realm, in comparison to the official content, made more difficult the task of collecting
examples of the former: the absence of a unifying and and coordinating content platform
(like the corporate websites of the series) and the multiplicity of potential creators. The
difficulty produced by the second feature of UGC was alleviated by the unifying power of
YouTube, as the other two online video platforms hardly had any remarkable activity of
users.
The selection of videos paid greater attention to those proposing more than the simple
fragment of a certain episode and involved a more creative participation from users. An
outstanding example of this is a video found on YouTube about Cuéntame cómo pasó. The
video in question is titled “Jugárselo a lo Alcántara” (“Playing Alcántara style”) and is about a
card game in which the protagonist of the series, Antonio Alcántara, puts the deed of his
house as a guarantee to receive a 250,000 pesetas loan. However, the user modified the
scene so that the outcome of the game was different from the original narrative, being
another character, Don Pablo, the one who leaves Antonio Alcántara without money. This
type of video deserves greater attention because it involves a series of tasks and more active
participation from the user (reinterpretation of the scene, review of material, selection and
editing), in contrast to the simple amateur jump cuts, assembly of trailers or recaps.
After searching for UGC in YouTube, we searched on the web for another types of
formats. We input keywords in Google’s search engine, and paid attention to social
networks (Facebook and Twitter), fanfiction activity, blogs, wikis and any innovative
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formats. A preliminary analysis of the UGC shows that the dispersion of formats is even
greater in the case of corporate productions: users add original creations to the replicas of
the classic formats coined by the industry, and the new creations in turn get notoriety and
are replicated. In order to avoid oversizing the table of formats, we included the creations of
fans in Askwith’s productive activities (5.3) generic category, being aware that these
creations could very well be distributed in other categories if we look more to their semiotic
and textual nature and less to their origin.
Table 3. Touchpoints and transmedia formats by TV network and series,
with links and percentages with respect to the total sample
FORMAT'/'
DEVICE!
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Transmedia contents around Spanish television series in 2013: typology, analysis, overview and trends
ISSN 0214-0039 – © 2014 Communication & Society 27(4), 73-94
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Rodríguez Ferrándiz, R., Ortiz Gordo, F. & Sáez Núñez, V.
Transmedia contents around Spanish television series in 2013: typology, analysis, overview and trends
ISSN 0214-0039 – © 2014 Communication & Society 27(4), 73-94
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Transmedia contents around Spanish television series in 2013: typology, analysis, overview and trends
ISSN 0214-0039 – © 2014 Communication & Society 27(4), 73-94
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Rodríguez Ferrándiz, R., Ortiz Gordo, F. & Sáez Núñez, V.
Transmedia contents around Spanish television series in 2013: typology, analysis, overview and trends
ISSN 0214-0039 – © 2014 Communication & Society 27(4), 73-94
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Source: Authors’ own creation based on own research and data from Askwith (2007).!
!
4. Results
Table 3 shows the integration of the transmedia formats seen in table 1 with Askwith’s seven
major touchpoints. This table shows: 1) general touchpoint and specific format within it; 2)
list of series in which that format is present or offered, by network; 3) brief description of
the format; 4) a selection of examples with their corresponding links; and 5) percentage of
presence in series with respect to the total sample.
It should be noted that the general touchpoints and specific formats use very
differentiated classification criteria, so sometimes some formats appear in more than one
touchpoint. A paradigmatic case is that of books: the same material platform may contain: 1)
repackaged content, as it is the case of novelisations. For example, the books No estamos solos
and Una de fantasmas (Jordi Solé, Planeta, 2013) which narrate the second season of El barco;
2) Ancillary or expanded content in the form of narrative textual extensions, as in the case of
prequels, sequels or interstitial or parallel stories. For example, the book La viña vieja
(Temas de Hoy, 2011), written by one of the writers of the TV series Gran Reserva, Eligio R.
Montero, is a prequel that takes place ten years before the story that is narrated in the TV
series, while Águila Roja. La profecía de Lucrecia (Espasa, 2010) introduces the past of some
of the characters from the TV series Águila Roja; and 3) extra-textual information, as in the
case of Cuéntame: ficción y realidad, which is an illustrated book written by Sol Alonso and
Teresa Peyri (RBA, 2013) about the production of the series, but more entertaining and
complex than chapters and characters guide.
Similarly, video games can incorporate expanded narrative content, but at the same time
are undoubtedly experiential and competitive activities of first order. Moreover, the online
activity of fans (included as mentioned in the productive activities [5.3] category), could in
fact be classified more precisely within some of the other categories: expanded access, as it
facilitates it through cooperative peer-to-peer exchanges; ancillary or expanded content, in
any of the formats available to users, either narrative, diegetic (fanvids, fanfiction, parodies)
and extra-diegetic (wikis, reviews or critical commentary); repackaged content (like home-
made trailers or recaps, collection of scenes by character or theme); and even physical
products, which can include the series’ characteristic elements, parodies or cartoons.
5. Conclusions
The data obtained about the presence and frequency of the different formats and their
distribution within the broad content categories, according to their relationship to the core
text and the modalities of user access and interaction, allow us to draw the following
conclusions:
1) Expanded access shows that the DVD format –which is not even available for half of
the sample of TV series- is being abandoned in favour of resources to allow access to
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Rodríguez Ferrándiz, R., Ortiz Gordo, F. & Sáez Núñez, V.
Transmedia contents around Spanish television series in 2013: typology, analysis, overview and trends
ISSN 0214-0039 – © 2014 Communication & Society 27(4), 73-94
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episodes in other screens (computer or mobile: 100% of the TV series are available in both
cases). However, and this is something on which we agree with other studies (Videla and
Costa, 2012: 108), the web seems to be still subsidiary of television contents, and mobile
phones of the web: there is usually no clear strategy to differentiate the contents and
promote the nomadism of fans between different platforms, but an extensive and intensive
exploitation of the same or similar contents in all of them.
2) TV networks still concentrate their efforts on repackaged content, especially the
classic advertising formats (promos and derivatives: sneak peeks), with percentages close to
100% of the sample. To a lesser extent, there are new formats, which disguise their
advertising nature because they are more retrospective (best moments, recaps) than
prospective. Social networks, as large repositories of the contents about the TV series,
deletes in fact the difference between retrospective that prospective contents and keeps
indefinitely the promotional products along with the new products that serve as reminders.
A novelty in this area are the second screens (Antena 3 with Gran Hotel, for instance),
but not because they offer different repackaged contents. The particularity is that they force
the viewing of the episode on TV, because they interact in simultaneity and closely
coordinated with the contents of the conventional broadcast. In general, they do not provide
anything new. They are somewhat conservative strategies: they promote the loyalty of the
spectator not so much with the universe of the series (understood in transmedia terms) but
with its television broadcast. This aims to ensure advertising impacts of various types.
Second screen users are induced to pay attention to the advertisements presented in the
commercial breaks of the TV broadcast to discover clues that allow them to interact with
their second screen and win prizes or identify brands included in the series. In turn, the TV
network and its media group, as advertisers of their own services and products, use that
second screen profusely to promote their programmes and the products associated with
their programmes.
3) Ancillary or expanded content, and in particular the textual narrative extensions (3.1.1),
have minimal presence (in an average of 5% of the sample, i.e., in less than two series out of
33, for the 14 different formats). TVE and Antena 3 stand out for their bet on these contents,
and to a lesser extent, TV3. This fact is relevant because this is the category where we can
most undeniable speak of authentic transmedia narratives in the sense given by Jenkins, if
we stick to the corporate, official production: exclusive sequences, webisodes, webseries,
videoblogs, books, comics, video games, all of which make narrative contributions that
expand or deepen (Mittell, 2009) the original narrative universe. The production of these
innovative contents requires an investment in talent and money that the networks do not
seem to be willing to assume, and in any case respond to strategies that seem to be
implemented in the heat of the success instead of being planned from the very conception of
the narrative universe.
The presence of textual diegetic extensions (3.1.2) is minimal. Only a fictional website of
La riera restaurant represents a fictional institution as if it were from the real world,
without mentioning TV3. Restaurants from the Maresme region, where this series is set, sell
the cakes that are shown on the series. There are no more forms of reverse product
placement, i.e., of fictional products and brands becoming real products for sale on the
market.
4) The presence of not truly narrative extensions reaches slightly higher percentages:
relevant information (historical data, when the series lends itself to this: 12%) and clearly
extra-diegetic information. In this category, the most classic formats (making of,
bloopers/outtakes, cast and crew interviews, filming news, cast bios) appear in more than
50% of the series, in average.
5) Branded products move ostensibly from material to digital products, which are shared
or sold online, but even among these products there is an almost total lack of diegetic
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products, as we have seen in the previous section. All these products declare their
membership to the fictional universe, i.e., they are overtly promotional extra-diegetic
merchandising (Johnson).
6) Related activities, either thematic, experiential or competitive, are in an embryonic
state (5% on average). In contrast the productive activities reach an extraordinary level (85%
on average), but they are autonomous initiatives of fans (UGC), not encouraged nor
rewarded in some way by the TV networks. There is a remarkable dysfunction between the
participatory and creative initiatives of fans and the almost absolute lack of effort from TV
networks to take advantage of the current of interest in the narrative universe to enhance
viewers’ engagement.
7) Social interaction, as expected, descends as we move from horizontal to vertical and
to diagonal interactions. The presence of the latter type is minimal, in El Barco, which is a
remarkable example of the integration of the TV, the website and the social network
Twitter. The overwhelming dominance of horizontal types of interaction, which merely
duplicate the information posted on TV networks’ websites in the social network, seems to
respond only to the mere urgency to be present on the web: the 2011 study shows that the
three mainstream networks (TVE, Antena 3, T5) have zero interest in responding to their
Facebook and Twitter followers, even if they are hundreds of thousands of followers (García
Mirón, 2012: 70-74)5.
8) Interactivity is growing in terms of recognised contributions, but is almost negligible,
very casual, in terms of influential interactions. This latter category would require a detailed
study that we cannot carry out here: it refers to the exciting possibility of making the
official, corporate production to adopt some of the contributions of fans to the expansion of
the narrative, in a very interesting feedback.
In short, all the TV series analyzed are typical of a post-network era in which television
show acts as a mothership with orbiting transmedia satellites. These satellites operate as
nodes that divert attention from one another and the mothership. However, the centripetal
force exerted by that ship grips in many cases the possibility of autonomous content,
inhibits the differentiation through platforms in orbit with unique narrative material and
thwart the expansion (not to mention deepening) in the narrative itself and the appropriate
management of the engagement with transmedia audiences. Rather it strengthens the link
with other productions of the network and its media group, with the actors as brands rather
than the characters, beyond the fictional world of the series: more transmedia branding
than transmedia storytelling, in a word.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
5 In October 2011, Telecinco’s Facebook page had 414,983 followers and a weekly average of 99 posts, but zero
responses to users’ doubts and questions. Antena 3’s Facebook page had 3,221,658 followers and an average of 84
posts and one response per week. The Facebook page of La 1 TVE had 78,043 followers, and an average of 30 posts
and two responses per week. The Twitter accounts of the TV networks show disappointingly similar figures (García
Mirón, 2012: 72-73).
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