Abstract

The purpose of this article is to study how the trends of diversion and consumption determined the comic elements of the short plays through the analysis of the comic Mayor within the urban space. I focus on several interludes where commerce and the use of new products and habits are the principal means of making fun of the rural authority figure in the emerging new society of consumers in the 17th century.

Abstract

Infotainment comedy is the branch of infotainment that mixes current affairs content with comedy. “Infotainment” is a relatively new term, first cited by Krüger (1988); as a television trend, academics agree that it must have existed much earlier, with English-language examples such as Saturday Night Live (NBC, 1975) or That was the week that was (BBC, 1962). In Spain, the roots of infotainment lie in Caiga quien caiga (Telecinco, 1996), a precursor to satirical pseudojournalism (García-Avilés, 1999). Nowadays, there are programs that present current affairs with comedy, as in the case of El intermedio (La Sexta, 2006) or Todo es mentira (Cuatro, 2019). Owing to the continuous evolution of formats and their complex definition and classification by academics and professionals, it is worth considering whether audiences also interpret the different programs in different ways depending on their elements, given that they depend on an “intuitive understanding” (Reinemann et al., 2011; Otto et al., 2017) that stems from the habit of repeated consumption. This article presents the results of a reception study contrasting Spanish infotainment comedy professionals and their audiences to assess whether their impressions of these shows are similar or if, on the contrary, their hybrid nature is so changeable that they have come to interpret them in a very different way. The methodology involved ten discussion groups with a total of 87 viewers and 13 interviews with professionals from four programs: El intermedio, Todo es mentira, Ese programa del que usted me habla (La 2, 2019), and La resistencia (Movistar+, 2018). According to the statements collected, the results revealed that audiences and content creators show more points of divergence than concurrences, which means that the messages are interpreted differently from how they were intended.

Abstract

This article analyzes the role of the political «infotainment» prosumer on Internet. In the second half of the XX century, telecracy was the predominant one-way communication model that not only popularized politics but also transformed politics into entertainment or «politainment». The XXI century began with the conviction that the Internet would lead to a bidirectional communication model in which true dialogue between political power and citizens would emerge. This research explores a new field of study: Web 2.0 «politainment» and prosumers’ attitudes and actions within this new communication sphere. The objective of the study is to identify the kind of political content Internet users consume and produce. To achieve this, we made a case study of the political information produced and consumed on YouTube, and in particular of a speech given by Ana Botella, the Mayor of Madrid, before the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in September 2013. The 40 most-watched videos on YouTube during the week of the Mayor’s appearance as well as those viewed in the month that followed have been analyzed, in addition to the 3,000 comments on these videos. The conclusion shows that the prosumption of «politainment» on Internet is characterized by massive consumption of information but passive reaction with regard to production and participation.