An audience is an individual or collective group of people who read or consume any media text has be consider one thing and that is does it have any audience.
Mass: often termed 'broadcast audience' those who consume mainstream or popular texts such as soaps or sitcoms media communication that targets a very large group of people
Niche: much smaller but very influential. A niche audience is a small, select group of people with a very unique intrest.
Why are audiences important?
Audiences are important as they are the people who bring in the money when they go to the cinema to go see a film creating profit for the film makers. The mass media is becoming more competitive than ever as there more and more people to attract with many different ways. They do this to stay profitable.
Katz and Blumler
Proposed form their research into audience behaviour that audiences use media text for a variety of reasons.
Information: - finding out about events, satisfying curiosity gaining a sense of security through knowledge
Personal identity - reinforcement for personal value, finding models of behaviour, insight into ones self
Integration and Social interaction - Insight into circumstances of others social empathy, identifying with others and gaining a sense of belonging, interaction, enabling one to connect with family, friends and society, E.g soap operas & Sitcoms
Impact of new technology on audience
Old media (TV, Print, Radio) which used to have high audience numbers must now work harder to maintain audience number.
New technology has made it harder to define an audience it is shown as being outdated and now that an audience are now fragmented. E.g television.
Demographic- The audience
- age
- race
- gender
- class/status
- nationality
- intrests
- beliefs
- hobbies
http://www.thinkbox.tv/- looking at this link shows how media audiences are divided into categories
Group A: lawyers
doctors
scientists
well paid professionals
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