Competition+Artifacts+Part+II

Another branch of Competition-type shows are rooted in "dating" and "playoff" types of competitions. Contestants are seeking to win money, or affection, and sometimes both. Below are five examples of these types of shows. Like other competition shows, contestants are usually housed together in some fashion, and the interaction between them takes up the programming between the competitive elements. These five artifacts show the different range in programming options, ranging from Paradise Hotel where the the only true requirement is to be ruthless and sexy, to Tool Academy, a show where the goal is to turn socially and emotionally unacceptable boyfriends into proper gentlemen. Alternatively, there is Treasure Hunters, a reality TV billed for smart people who like adventure, history, and puzzle solving. (Though, its to be noted that all contestants are young, fit and good looking.) The following artifacts show the audience range of the show. Gone are the days of the nuclear family sitting in the living room, glued to the television. In the mobile society of the early 21st century, viewers from all over the world communicate with eachother to discuss their favorite characters, plots and developments, even going so far as to break the law to do so.

**1. Paradise Hotel**


“Hook up or go home” is the mantra of the show. Sex, lies and deceit are the ways to the prize. The show aired in 2003 with Fox, and then in 2008 with Fox Reality TV. As the show progresses, contestants are to find “roommates”, and the person left over must leave. That person is periodically replaced with a new contestant. The first show was hosted by Amanda Byram and the winners of the first season were Charla Pihlstrom and Keith Cuda. They won $250,000, but had to decide whether to split it with their partners. Keith decided to split it while Charla chose to keep the money for herself. It was filmed in Villa Arabesque in Acapulco, Mexico. While the show gained a modest following here in the US, mostly related to advertising dollars, it has a huge following in Denmark, and as of 2011, is in it's seventh season. The second season is available on Hulu for streaming, showing a new venture into programming, at http://www.hulu.com/paradise-hotel-2

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This is a clip of the opening scenes of Paradise Hotel. The subtitles have been added by users, creating an unauthorized upload. While extremely popular, it creates copyright issues for the producers, something that is very indicative of this generation of media access. It is hosted by Youtube, popular video site that allows users to upload and store video, providing that it stays within the allotted time, file size, decency regulations and does not violate copyright. In this particular case, the user did violate copyright, but due to the size of the site, not every video, every time, gets caught.

**2. Treasure Hunters**


Billed as “Reality TV for smart people”, this show makes it very plain that just getting there first does not help win the prize unless you can actually solve the puzzle. In the beginning, there were 10 teams of three, which were successively narrowed down as they could not figure out the clues. Similar to Amazing Race, which does bank on that ability to get there first, Treasure Hunters provide contestants with multimedia platforms to work through the clues that take them across the United States and Europe. Laird Macintosh was the host, and Team Genius won the more than $3 million in “treasure”. The show still has an active site on NBC.com as of April 2011, which is interesting considering that the show debuted June 18, 2006. Both of the below artifacts reflect user-generated contact. One is a blog site, chosen for it's length of activity, and an episode summary site from RealityBites.

and Episode summaries and blogs are both popular means for fans to keep up with shows that they may not have time, desire or means to watch all the way through. These types of sites allow people to discuss the shows, interact with eachother and as production companies do monitor the popular sites, it allows the companies to see what fans are really saying and thinking about their product

**3. FOX's Boot Camp**


This show aired for one season in 2001. Its short life was due mostly to a lawsuit by Mark Burnett, who claimed that it was too similar to his own show, //Survivor//. The premise takes sixteen contestants, none of whom are military, and put them through “boot camp”, styled after the Marine Corps. All drill instructors were former or currently enlisted Marines. Using elimination and immunity, much the same way as “Survivor” did, contestants completed the obstacles and training. When there were only two remaining, the competition turned to “The Gauntlet”, mimicked after the Crucible, the pinnacle of Marine Corps Bootcamp. The final winner, Jen Whitlow, won $500,000 and the runner up, Ryan Wolf won $100,000.Fox does not currently maintain a site for this, perhaps as part of the lawsuit settlement.



Reality TV was a new thing in 2001, and though the Marine Corps and being "stranded" on remote islands are very different premises, Mark Burnett saw enough of his own show, "Survivor" in "Boot Camp" and sued FOX for infringement. This is the episode list for the single season that the show aired.

**4. Tool Academy**


This is a very different marketing perspective than some of the previous shows. VH-1, the producing company, has most of the episodes online. This rather defeats the purpose of unauthorized user content being uploaded, something that many of the other shows had issues with. There is definitely a different level of marketing control to some of the others, where the blogs, recap sites, and other social media outlets were easily found. Content can be found here: http://www.vh1.com/shows/tool_academy/season_1/series.jhtml

This artifact shows the titles and air dates of all of Season 1, as well as shows the variety of options created by VH-1, to meet the needs of fans of the show. This approach is very show-centered, inviting fan interaction.

**5. Pirate Master**


This show has a really interesting history. It was produced by Mark Burnett, of Survivor fame, with the premise of 16 "pirates" aboard the //Picton Castle//, hunting for a "lost treasure". It debuted May 31, 2007 in the US, Canada, Australia, and Asia, with high international expectations.. The format is similar to the other shows, with teams of people working to both stay in the game and win prizes. But with the other shows, once you win a prize, you generally keep it. Not so with Pirate Master, "Once you win a prize, you have to lie, cheat and steal to keep it." It is also different than other shows in that not only the final winner has the opportunity to take home money. All of the contestants, barring the winner, took home between $200 and $80,000. By July, the ratings were so low that the show moved to an online-only format. In an interesting turn of events, the show went on to win an Emmy award for it's theme music. Those shows can be found here: http://www.cbs.com/primetime/pirate_master/ Ben Fagan was the final winner, netting over $617,000.

A lot of money and effort went into producing the show, with a focus in internal marketing. CBS kept their message boards, their videos and other marketing in-house on their own site. While the concept is very similar to VH-1's marketing aspect, but with a different approach. Rather than bury the interaction a few site layers down, CBS put it all on the first page of the site, in an effort to generate user conversation and interest in the show itself.