無聲的參與？ Twitch 遊戲實況「潛水者」參與行為之初探

閱聽人如何參與媒介活動？過去在閱聽人研究中，觀眾透過主動詮釋、解讀的方式參與媒介內容，而在Jenkins的「參與文化」概念中，個體的展演性被強調，迷成為主要的討論重點，隨後「參與文化」的討論逐漸從「個人表現」（individual expression）轉往「社群參與」（community involvement），在社群的集體參與中，參與者的分工觀點被強調，集體是一個網絡化、組織化的參與結構。本研究以Twitch遊戲實況為研究田野，整理出五種遊戲實況中常見參與類型，其中包含潛水者，以及選擇性參與社群活動的浮潛者（spammer），而為了「看見」潛水者與浮潛者，本研究以「混合研究方法」（mixed methods）作為主要的操作手段，理解遊戲實況中的觀眾參與聊天室的行為模式與動機；文獻上，則以「參與文化」（participatory culture）、「機緣」（affordances）、「洗頻、刷頻」，（spam），以及「潛水者」（lurker）等相關理論或田野現象作為主要概念架構，理解在平台的技術條件中，潛水者的多樣參與行為如何延伸既有關於「潛水者」與「社群參與」的討論。研究結果發現，潛水者除了以不發言作為界定其身分的標準外，本研究認為「於意義中潛水」也是另一種重新指認潛水者的方式，此於「洗頻、刷頻」時浮出水面的參與行為使得個人特殊性逐漸消失，使得浮潛者在個人參與層次呈現出「不參與」的姿態；此外，「搭便車」的觀點在潛水者跨平台的行動中也受到挑戰，並同時也印證了參與文化所強調的跨平台匯流的參與行動。而對於完全不（在平台內、外）發言的潛水者來說，無聲的參與突顯出他們以舊媒介的參與模式做為新媒介的使用方式，也就是將直播、實況當作電視進行收看，此參與行為使實況成為一種電視文類，也使過去對「觀眾」此強調與媒介內容直接接觸的概念轉往「觀」「眾」此強調觀看其他觀眾參與行動的意義轉向。

關鍵字

Twitch遊戲實況；參與文化；洗頻；機緣；混合研究方法；浮潛者；潛水者

並列摘要

How does audience engage in media activities? From audience study, we know audience can reform the meaning of the texts through his/her own social experience, and in the concept of “participatory culture” which was proposed by Henry Jenkins, audience participation means not only “individual expression” but “community involvement” which puts more emphasis on collective intelligence or collaborative problem-solving. In this sense, community stands for the organized structure of participation, everyone matters. In line with that, Twitch live streaming platform as participatory culture encounters some individual actions or participations that cannot be integrated into the whole culture. Those participants include “lurker” and “spammer”. The study takes “mixed methods” to find out the reason why they want to engage into the community in this way, and how those participations extend the concept of lurker. The study results find out “lurking in the meaning” can be another way to identify lurkers, and those who choose to join the community during “spam” amplify the collective participation while decreasing their individuality, making their participations barely visible. Furthermore, the concept of “free rider” along with lurkers cannot refer to them anymore when we consider the participation of cross-platform, this also confirm the theory of participatory culture which lights up the importance of platform convergence and audience mobility. As for the one who never leaves any messages neither in nor out of the Twitch.tv, the reason why they keep silent participation is they view live streaming as television. In other words, they use the old way (as viewers not active participants) to consume new media, which recontextualizes video game live streaming as a television genre, and those who participate into video game live streaming community will be part of this genre as well. To sum up, lurkers are not only the viewer of media content, but the viewer of whole participatory culture.