'Bringing you the meaning and the knowledge behind the music': fan production and the control of meaning on genius.com

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Morgan, Henry. 2020. 'Bringing you the meaning and the knowledge behind the music': fan production and the control of meaning on genius.com. Riffs, 4(2), 4. ISSN 2513-8537 [Article]

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Official URL: https://riffsjournal.org/2020/12/18/bringing-you-t...

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This article examines the hierarchies and meaning-making culture of the website genius.com, on which users transcribe and annotate lyrics of popular songs. The site is analysed in the context of a transformation from its initial web 2.0 form prioritising 'bottom-up' audience consensus and crowdsourced meaning-making to one in which musicians and labels assert direct 'top-down' control of disseminated musical meaning, especially via the Genius YouTube channel. It is argued that this is emblematic of the broader processes of platformisation that defined online culture during the 2010s, functioning as a reassertion of authorial (and corporate) control of music culture and meaning making online following the upheaval of the peer-to-peer revolution and associated digital audience practices. The article is based upon an extensive digital ethnography of the site and interviews with key community members, and is itself presented as an annotated text, in line with Riffs Journal's preference for experimental writing formats.

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Article