Taylor Swift: Audience and Industries blog tasks

 Background and audience wider reading

Read this Guardian feature on stan accounts and fandom. Answer the following questions:

1) What examples of fandom and celebrities are provided in the article?

Lady Gaga’s Little Monsters, Beyoncé’s Bey Hive, Taylor Swift’s Swifties, and Nicki Minaj’s Barbs.

2) Why did Taylor Swift run into trouble with her fanbase? 

When the presale for Taylor Swift’s tour turned into a battle royale for fans locked out of Ticketmaster’s system, frazzled Swifties voiced their disappointment. Ticketmaster and Swift quickly apologized, with the singer calling the process “excruciating”. Ticketmaster ended up testifying in Congress in a hearing about consolidation in the ticketing industry.

3) Do stan accounts reflect Clay Shirky's ideas regarding the 'end of audience'? How? 

Yes because social media allows fans to create, share and organise content themselves, rather than simply consuming media produced by the music industry.

Read this Conversation feature on the economics of Taylor Swift fandom. Answer the following questions: 

1) What do Taylor Swift fans spend their money on? 

Taylor Swift fans are known for spending significant amounts of money on albums, merchandise and concert tickets.

2) How does Swift build the connection with her fans? Give examples from the article.

Swift shares a particularly intense connection with her fans. Fans frequently engage in parasocial relationships with their celebrity objects of fandom, where they feel as if they honestly “know” the celebrity. She also has a history of sending fans surprise gifts in the mail, ranging from handwritten letters of support to gift boxes full of things she says “remind her” of the fan in question.

3) What have Swifties done to try and get Taylor Swift's attention online? 

The belief among fans (which has never been confirmed) is that being noticed on social media puts you a step closer to meeting Swift in person – something many of the participants in my research into her fandom described as the ultimate motivation behind their engagement.

4) Why is fandom described as a 'hierarchy'? 

For Swift fans, these hierarchies are heavily tied to practices of consumption, including the purchasing of concert tickets.

5) What does the article suggest is Swift's 'business model'? 

Swift’s business model is largely built on fan desire to meet her. How do you meet her? You prove you are the biggest fan – and you’ve made the sacrifices (and spent the money) to show it.

Taylor Swift: audience questions and theories

Work through the following questions to apply media debates and theories to the Taylor Swift CSP. You may want to go back to your previous blogpost or your A3 annotated booklet for examples. 

1) Is Taylor Swift's website and social media constructed to appeal to a particular gender or audience?

No, I think it is made for all genders as she has a wide fan-base constructed of a diverse community and different genders etc and even though she promotes femininity a lot, she is still welcoming to both male and female audiences.

2) What opportunities are there for audience interaction in Taylor Swift's online presence and how controlled are these? 

They can build personal relationships with her by reading the letter on her website she left for them to read and also they can comment and like her posts online and follow her on her social media platforms as well as shopping for her music and albums on her website.

3) How does Taylor Swift's online presence reflect Clay Shirky’s ‘End of Audience’ theories? 

Her online presence allows her fans to interact with her and this could show the encouragement of readings other than her preferred reading in this situation, which shows the audience being more in control rather than just perceiving what the media hands to them.

4) What effects might Taylor Swift's online presence have on audiences? Is it designed to influence the audience’s views on social or political issues or is this largely a vehicle to promote Swift's work? 

I think it is mostly to promote her music and her brand identity through the layout and colour scheme and all the website conventions she uses, but she does post on social media her political views sometimes, e.g supporting Kamala Harris and so this has an influence on the voting and perception of her fan-base on those political matters.

5) Applying Hall’s Reception theory, what might be a preferred and oppositional reading of Taylor Swift's online presence? 

The preferred reading may be to position Taylor as an authentic artist but the oppositional could be that the website is just a promotive tool following capitalistic structures as the first option in the navigation menu is shop (profit seeking).

Industries

How social media companies make money

Read this analysis of how social media companies make money and answer the following questions: 

1) How many users do the major social media sites boast?

In December 2025, Meta had 3.58 million daily active people worldwide.

2) What is the main way social media sites make money? 

This isn’t a unique observation, but it’s a crucial one: If you’re not paying for the product, the product is you. The real transaction here isn’t you receiving enjoyment in the form of a free temporary distraction created by a media company at great expense. That media company is renting your eyeballs to its advertisers.

3) What does ARPU stand for and why is it important for social media companies? 

Average revenue per person- important to estimate how much profit they may be able to secure.

4) Why has Meta spent huge money acquiring other brands like Instagram and WhatsApp? 

When Meta acquired WhatsApp for (for $19 billion), that company had over 450 million monthly active users, and it was believed to be on the path to a billion. To Meta management, this meant more users to sell as a unit to companies looking to advertise their products or services. Every acquisition Meta has transacted since, such as Instagram for $1 billion, has been conducted with the same goal in mind.

5) What other methods do social media sites have to generate income e.g. Twitter Blue? 

Mark Zuckerberg initiated a new corporate strategy at Meta to eventually dominate what has come to be known as the "Metaverse." His goal was to create the means for people to spend most of their time in virtual worlds. As of 2026, and after spending $80 billion on it, Zuckerberg's strategy has been unsuccessful.

Regulation of social media

Read this BBC News article on a report recommending social media regulation. Answer the following questions:

1) What suggestions does the report make? Pick out three you think are particularly interesting. 

-A new report has put forward a tranche of ideas that its authors say could end the "informational chaos that poses a vital threat to democracies".

-One of its suggestions is that social networks should be required to release details of their algorithms and core functions to trusted researchers, in order for the technology to be vetted.

-It also suggests adding "friction" to online sharing, to prevent the rampant spread of disinformation.

2) Who is Christopher Wylie? 

The report was published by the Forum for Information and Democracy, external, which was established to make non-binding recommendations to 38 countries. They include Australia, Canada, France, Germany, India, South Korea and the UK. Among those contributing to the report were Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Christopher Wylie.

3) What does Wylie say about the debate between media regulation and free speech? 

In most Western democracies, you do have the freedom of speech. But freedom of speech is not an entitlement to reach. You are free to say what you want, within the confines of hate speech, libel law and so on. But you are not entitled to have your voice artificially amplified by technology.

4) What is ‘disinformation’ and do you agree that there are things that are objectively true or false? 

This is when there are some objectively disprovable things and I think that is depends mostly on the circumstances if they are true or false but if it's scientifically proven then it should be true.

5) Why does Wylie compare Facebook to an oil company? 

Because an oil company would say: "We do not profit from pollution." Pollution is a by-product - and a harmful by-product. Regardless of whether Facebook profits from hate or not, it is a harmful by-product of the current design and there are social harms that come from this business model.

6) What does it suggest a consequence of regulating the big social networks might be? 

If you have a platform that has the unique selling point of "we will allow you to promote hate speech, we will allow you to deceive and manipulate people", I do not think that business model should be allowed in its current form.

7) What has Instagram been criticised for?

Instagram algorithms comment on health and beauty which can cause audiences to feel the need to go on diets etc as it may make them feel insecure.

8) Can we apply any of these criticisms or suggestions to Taylor Swift? For example, should Taylor Swift have to explicitly make clear when she is being paid to promote a company or cause? 

I think her stating the truth would be beneficial as it would prove to her audiences that she is an authentic artist and maybe can allow the building of stronger connections with fans but also it may make her come across as power hungry and following capitalism due to promotions, but at the same time it could be argued that that's just part of her job.