{"title":"The informational “cosplay journey” of Star Wars cosplayers in the context of a Facebook group","authors":"Emily Vardell, Paul Thomas, Ting Wang","doi":"10.47989/ir283199","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Introduction. Research on personal information practices has increased in recent decades. Building on this current of thought, the present study explores information practices in the context of serious leisure, looking specifically at the Rey Cosplay Community Facebook group, an online community of Star Wars cosplayers. The work discusses how these fans seek, organize, and share relevant information during the process of making costumes. Method. This study used participant observation and semi-structured interviews to investigate information behaviours, including information seeking, organization, use, and sharing, of seventeen members in the Rey Cosplay Community with a purposive sampling strategy. Analysis. The researchers transcribed and jointly coded the collected data with an open coding scheme to identify themes that emerged from the data. Results. The cosplayers used a myriad of tools to seek, organize, and share information about costume making. Participants identified that their information practices had evolved over time, and they shared sophisticated strategies for sharing work-in-progress photos and updates as well as methods for organizing information for later use. Conclusion. There are a variety of information practices used when making a costume. Participants often seek and acquire relevant information on online platforms and use a combination of traditional physical tools and modern electronic tools to organize information. They also display a rich culture of sharing information when responding to other fans’ information needs. The overall structure that these information practices take can be neatly articulated as a sort of informational “cosplay journey”.","PeriodicalId":47431,"journal":{"name":"Information Research-An International Electronic Journal","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7000,"publicationDate":"2023-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Information Research-An International Electronic Journal","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.47989/ir283199","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"INFORMATION SCIENCE & LIBRARY SCIENCE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Introduction. Research on personal information practices has increased in recent decades. Building on this current of thought, the present study explores information practices in the context of serious leisure, looking specifically at the Rey Cosplay Community Facebook group, an online community of Star Wars cosplayers. The work discusses how these fans seek, organize, and share relevant information during the process of making costumes. Method. This study used participant observation and semi-structured interviews to investigate information behaviours, including information seeking, organization, use, and sharing, of seventeen members in the Rey Cosplay Community with a purposive sampling strategy. Analysis. The researchers transcribed and jointly coded the collected data with an open coding scheme to identify themes that emerged from the data. Results. The cosplayers used a myriad of tools to seek, organize, and share information about costume making. Participants identified that their information practices had evolved over time, and they shared sophisticated strategies for sharing work-in-progress photos and updates as well as methods for organizing information for later use. Conclusion. There are a variety of information practices used when making a costume. Participants often seek and acquire relevant information on online platforms and use a combination of traditional physical tools and modern electronic tools to organize information. They also display a rich culture of sharing information when responding to other fans’ information needs. The overall structure that these information practices take can be neatly articulated as a sort of informational “cosplay journey”.
介绍。近几十年来,对个人信息实践的研究有所增加。基于这一思路,本研究探讨了严肃休闲背景下的信息实践,特别关注Rey Cosplay Community Facebook群组,这是一个星球大战角色扮演者的在线社区。作品探讨了这些粉丝在制作服装的过程中如何寻找、组织和分享相关信息。方法。本研究采用参与式观察法和半结构化访谈法,对17名雷伊Cosplay社区成员的信息寻求、信息组织、信息使用和信息分享行为进行了有目的的抽样调查。分析。研究人员对收集到的数据进行转录,并用开放的编码方案进行编码,以确定从数据中出现的主题。结果。角色扮演者使用无数的工具来寻找、组织和分享关于服装制作的信息。参与者发现,他们的信息实践随着时间的推移而发展,他们分享了分享正在进行的照片和更新的复杂策略,以及组织信息供以后使用的方法。结论。在制作服装时,有各种各样的信息实践。参与者经常在网络平台上寻找和获取相关信息,并结合使用传统的物理工具和现代电子工具来组织信息。在回应其他粉丝的信息需求时,他们也表现出了丰富的信息共享文化。这些信息实践的整体结构可以被清晰地表达为一种信息“角色扮演之旅”。
期刊介绍:
Information Research, is an open access, international, peer-reviewed, scholarly journal, dedicated to making accessible the results of research across a wide range of information-related disciplines. It is published by the University of Borås, Sweden, with the financial support of an NOP-HS Scientific Journal Grant. It is edited by Professor T.D. Wilson, and is hosted, and given technical support, by Lund University Libraries, Sweden.