Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book covers a variety of issues for contemporary audience research; reconceptualizing and retheorizing 'audience'; the nature, constitution, and characteristics of digital audience data; tools for analyzing data; and digital methodologies for audience research. It addresses the drift toward Big Data within contemporary audience research and its underlying reliance on a host of assumptions not only about quantitative, data-driven research approaches, but also their acceptance of the paradigm of 'users' generated by the major social media platforms. The book engages with the apparently new development of the location-based augmented reality (AR) game Pokemon GO via a broader thinking of what mobile means in relation to digital media audiences. It examines a host of assumptions underlying concerns over the use of the internet as a radicalizing tool for Islamic fundamentalist groups.