Now you find audiences are very, very specific. You don't want them to forget about you. There are very few programs now that become a communal experience. We share those experiences so infrequently, they take on greater significance. The guys, who watch more television that the girls, do gravitate toward comedy, sports and the farcical violence of wrestling.
Girls prefer sexual intrigue and emotional conundrums.
But the old days didn't reflect the diversity of the culture. A lot of groups simply weren't represented at all. Teenagers experience movies and television far differently from the way their parents did. When his son was 6, Professor Jenkins showed him the movie on video. They may not be watching the same programs, but they still strongly connect to what other kids are watching, and making it part of their identity through T-shirts, fan fiction and creating Web sites or talking to each other on the Web.