Johanna Blakley: Social media and the end of gender

Summary

Johanna Blakley, in her TED Talk, explores the revolutionary impact that social media is having on traditional gender norms and demographics. She argues that social media platforms enable individuals to transcend societal stereotypes and labels based on gender. By focusing on personal interests rather than demographics, social media is dismantling outdated assumptions. Women, in particular, are pioneering this shift, dominating social media usage globally. As a result, media companies must adapt by focusing more on taste communities rather than rigid demographic categories. This paradigm shift holds the potential to create a more diverse and inclusive media landscape, free from clichéd gender stereotypes, paving the way for a media environment driven by shared values and interests.

Highlights

• Social media is helping dismantle old-school demographic stereotypes! 🌟
• Women are leading the charge in the social media revolution. 🙋‍♀️
• Shared interests, not age or gender, are the new way to connect. 🤝
• Media companies must adapt to a focus on taste communities. 🎯
• Exploring entertainment preferences helps understand global cultures. 🌍

Key Takeaways

• Social media challenges traditional gender demographics and norms, allowing individuals to redefine themselves beyond societal stereotypes.
• Women globally outnumber men in social media usage, influencing old media industries to focus on interests rather than demographics.
• The shift from demographics to taste communities creates a potential for a more diverse and inclusive media landscape.

Overview

In a captivating TED Talk, Johanna Blakley explores how social media is transforming the way society views gender and demographics. She posits that online platforms are enabling people to break away from traditional labels and stereotypes that have long been perpetuated by the media industry. As social media allows for nuanced self-expression, individuals can connect based on shared interests rather than being boxed into arbitrary demographic categories.

Blakley highlights a surprising trend: women across the globe are dominating the social media space. This influence suggests that the future of media could be shaped significantly by feminine perspectives, potentially disrupting conventional gender roles within media and entertainment industries. This doesn't necessarily predict a complete transformation to feminist media but indicates a shift towards varied representations and more inclusive storytelling.

Ultimately, Blakley envisions a future where media are driven by the passions and interests of individuals, rather than their age or gender. By understanding what we enjoy through taste communities, we gain insights into human behavior and cultural trends, offering a richer, stereotype-free reflection of society. This transformation promises not only more personalized content but a more empathetic understanding of diverse audiences worldwide.

Chapters

• 00:00 - 00:30: Social Media and the End of Gender The chapter titled 'Social Media and the End of Gender' presents a provocative thesis that social media is fueling the dissolution of traditional gender roles and identities. The argument begins by acknowledging the initially surprising nature of this claim. Through the exploration of social media applications and their influence, the chapter suggests that these platforms are potentially dismantling conventional gender norms by providing spaces for diverse and fluid expressions of gender identity. It delves into examples of how social media enables individuals to transcend traditional binaries and find communities that embrace a spectrum of gender experiences. The chapter likely explores both the positive impacts, such as increased visibility and support for non-binary and transgender individuals, and any negative consequences or criticisms that arise from this shift. Overall, the chapter offers a nuanced view of how digital spaces are reshaping societal understandings of gender.
• 00:30 - 01:00: Dismantling Stereotypes In the chapter titled 'Dismantling Stereotypes,' the discussion centers on how social media can play a crucial role in breaking down societal stereotypes, particularly those related to gender. It argues that the prevalent media often presents a distorted view of gender roles, but social media has the potential to challenge and change these outdated perceptions.
• 01:00 - 01:30: The Role of Demographics in Media The chapter explores how media companies utilize rigid demographic segmentation methods to understand their audiences. Despite these traditional and restrictive labeling techniques, these companies assume predictability in individuals' tastes based on their demographic categories.
• 02:00 - 02:30: Psychographics vs. Demographics The chapter titled 'Psychographics vs. Demographics' discusses how popular culture in mass media is heavily influenced by demographic presumptions, particularly focusing on age demographics like the 18 to 49 group. This age group has significantly shaped mass media programming in the United States since the 1960s, a period during which baby boomers were part of this demographic. Although baby boomers have since aged out, powerful ratings companies like Nielsen continue to prioritize this age group in measuring audience ratings.
• 03:00 - 03:30: Social Media's Impact on Demographics The chapter discusses the disregard of television viewers over the age of 54 in media metrics, as if they do not exist. It mentions the TV show "Mad Men," where a character engages in psychographics, a method from the 1960s for creating psychological profiles of consumers. Despite its introduction, psychographics hasn't significantly impacted the media industry, which still heavily relies on basic demographic data.
• 04:30 - 05:00: Aggregation by Interests The chapter delves into research conducted at the Norman Lear Center at USC over the past several years, focusing on the influence of demographics on media and entertainment. Recently, the research shifted to examining social media's impact, revealing that despite the new medium, participants on social media continue to align with traditional demographic categories utilized by media companies and advertisers.
• 05:00 - 05:30: Women Leading the Social Media Revolution The chapter focuses on how online networking tools have blurred traditional demographic boundaries, enabling individuals to redefine themselves freely and connect with others based on specific interests. It highlights the diminished role of media companies in facilitating these connections and emphasizes the empowerment users have in managing their identities online, including aspects like age.
• 05:30 - 06:00: The Cultural Impact of Women Leading Social Media The chapter discusses how traditional media companies are observing online communities, recognizing them as the future mass audience but struggling to understand and engage with them. Their challenge lies in relying on demographics, like age, gender, and income, to which they have limited access despite monitoring digital activities. Their understanding is limited to educated guesses, highlighting a gap in adapting to the evolving digital landscape dominated by influential women in social media.
• 06:00 - 07:00: Women Redefining Genre Categories The chapter "Women Redefining Genre Categories" discusses the evolving nature of how personal interests and tastes are being monitored and respected. The conversation highlights that online aggregations are shifting focus from traditional demographic categories like age, gender, and income to more personalized metrics based on individual online behavior and preferences. This shift suggests a redefinition of cultural and genre categorizations, influenced by the digital monitoring of personal tastes, which is perceived as both invasive yet potentially beneficial. The emphasis is on how this respect for individual taste could redefine traditional genre boundaries, potentially influenced by women's critical role in shaping new cultural narratives.
• 07:00 - 08:00: Understanding Entertainment Choices The chapter discusses the concept of how people aggregate based on shared interests and values, rather than demographic categories. It emphasizes that knowing someone's interests, such as a preference for a TV show like 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer,' can be more telling than demographic information like age. The chapter also highlights the surprising discovery that women are playing a significant role in driving the social media revolution.
• 08:00 - 09:00: The Importance of Entertainment in Life The chapter titled 'The Importance of Entertainment in Life' focuses on the influence and dominance of women in the social media space. Worldwide statistics indicate that women outnumber men in every age category when it comes to using social networking technologies. Women also spend more time on these sites, significantly affecting traditional media. The chapter raises the question about the impact of this shift towards social media dominance.
• 09:00 - 09:30: Envisioning a Media Without Stereotypes The chapter delves into the impact of social media on traditional media, specifically focusing on the growing influence of women on social media platforms. It raises questions about whether this shift could lead to a transformation in global media representation, with a potential increase in female characters across various media forms like cartoons, games, and TV shows. The discussion extends to the possibility of major films embracing themes traditionally associated with female audiences.

Johanna Blakley: Social media and the end of gender Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 I'm going to make an argument today that may seem a little bit crazy: social media and the end of gender. Let me connect the dots. I'm going to argue today that the social media applications
• 00:30 - 01:00 that we all know and love, or love to hate, are actually going to help free us from some of the absurd assumptions that we have as a society about gender. I think that social media is actually going to help us dismantle some of the silly and demeaning stereotypes that we see in media and advertising about gender. If you hadn't noticed, our media climate generally provides a very distorted mirror of our lives and of our gender,
• 01:00 - 01:30 and I think that's going to change. Now most media companies -- television, radio, publishing, games, you name it -- they use very rigid segmentation methods in order to understand their audiences. It's old-school demographics. They come up with these very restrictive labels to define us. Now the crazy thing is that media companies believe that if you fall within a certain demographic category then you are predictable in certain ways -- you have certain taste,
• 01:30 - 02:00 that you like certain things. And so the bizarre result of this is that most of our popular culture is actually based on these presumptions about our demographics. Age demographics: the 18 to 49 demo has had a huge impact on all mass media programming in this country since the 1960s, when the baby boomers were still young. Now they've aged out of that demographic, but it's still the case that powerful ratings companies like Nielson
• 02:00 - 02:30 don't even take into account viewers of television shows over age 54. In our media environment, it's as if they don't even exist. Now, if you watch "Mad Men," like I do -- it's a popular TV show in the States -- Dr. Faye Miller does something called psychographics, which first came about in the 1960s, where you create these complex psychological profiles of consumers. But psychographics really haven't had a huge impact on the media business. It's really just been basic demographics.
• 02:30 - 03:00 So I'm at the Norman Lear Center at USC, and we've done a lot of research over the last seven, eight years on demographics and how they affect media and entertainment in this country and abroad. And in the last three years, we've been looking specifically at social media to see what has changed, and we've discovered some very interesting things. All the people who participate in social media networks belong to the same old demographic categories that media companies and advertisers
• 03:00 - 03:30 have used in order to understand them. But those categories mean even less now than they did before, because with online networking tools, it's much easier for us to escape some of our demographic boxes. We're able to connect with people quite freely and to redefine ourselves online. And we can lie about our age online, too, pretty easily. We can also connect with people based on our very specific interests. We don't need a media company to help do this for us.
• 03:30 - 04:00 So the traditional media companies, of course, are paying very close attention to these online communities. They know this is the mass audience of the future; they need to figure it out. But they're having a hard time doing it because they're still trying to use demographics in order to understand them, because that's how ad rates are still determined. When they're monitoring your clickstream -- and you know they are -- they have a really hard time figuring out your age, your gender and your income. They can make some educated guesses.
• 04:00 - 04:30 But they get a lot more information about what you do online, what you like, what interests you. That's easier for them to find out than who you are. And even though that's still sort of creepy, there is an upside to having your taste monitored. Suddenly our taste is being respected in a way that it hasn't been before. It had been presumed before. So when you look online at the way people aggregate, they don't aggregate around age, gender and income.
• 04:30 - 05:00 They aggregate around the things they love, the things that they like, and if you think about it, shared interests and values are a far more powerful aggregator of human beings than demographic categories. I'd much rather know whether you like "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" rather than how old you are. That would tell me something more substantial about you. Now there's something else that we've discovered about social media that's actually quite surprising. It turns out that women are really driving the social media revolution.
• 05:00 - 05:30 If you look at the statistics -- these are worldwide statistics -- in every single age category, women actually outnumber men in their use of social networking technologies. And then if you look at the amount of time that they spend on these sites, they truly dominate the social media space, which is a space that's having a huge impact on old media. The question is: what sort of impact
• 05:30 - 06:00 is this going to have on our culture, and what's it going to mean for women? If the case is that social media is dominating old media and women are dominating social media, then does that mean that women are going to take over global media? Are we suddenly going to see a lot more female characters in cartoons and in games and on TV shows? Will the next big-budget blockbuster movies actually be chick flicks?
• 06:00 - 06:30 Could this be possible, that suddenly our media landscape will become a feminist landscape? Well, I actually don't think that's going to be the case. I think that media companies are going to hire a lot more women, because they realize this is important for their business, and I think that women are also going to continue to dominate the social media sphere. But I think women are actually going to be -- ironically enough -- responsible for driving a stake through the heart of cheesy genre categories
• 06:30 - 07:00 like the "chick flick" and all these other genre categories that presume that certain demographic groups like certain things -- that Hispanics like certain things, that young people like certain things. This is far too simplistic. The future entertainment media that we're going to see is going to be very data-driven, and it's going to be based on the information that we ascertain from taste communities online, where women are really driving the action.
• 07:00 - 07:30 So you may be asking, well why is it important that I know what entertains people? Why should I know this? Of course, old media companies and advertisers need to know this. But my argument is that, if you want to understand the global village, it's probably a good idea that you figure out what they're passionate about, what amuses them, what they choose to do in their free time. This is a very important thing to know about people. I've spent most of my professional life researching media and entertainment
• 07:30 - 08:00 and its impact on people's lives. And I do it not just because it's fun -- though actually, it is really fun -- but also because our research has shown over and over again that entertainment and play have a huge impact on people's lives -- for instance, on their political beliefs and on their health. And so, if you have any interest in understanding the world, looking at how people amuse themselves is a really good way to start. So imagine a media atmosphere
• 08:00 - 08:30 that isn't dominated by lame stereotypes about gender and other demographic characteristics. Can you even imagine what that looks like? I can't wait to find out what it looks like. Thank you so much. (Applause)