Angelie New Media Technologies 08

Linky

This is a website which promotes ITV's children's channel: CITV.

The dark red and purple homepage is quite packed, with lots of links and images all over it.



At the top of the main section of the homepage, there is a banner featuring scrolling text and pictures of 'Horrid Henry' characters. These messages have been sent in by audience members, and if you hover your cursor over the banner you are also given the option to send in your own message and choose which 'Horrid Henry' character you would like to be shown with that message. On the left side of the home page, there is a poll where visitors can choose their favourite 'Captain Mack' character. This poll, and the 'Horrid Henry' message banner, are both good examples of interactivity.

When you first go onto the homepage, an advert for CITV automatically starts playing in a small Flash Video Player on the page. TV listings and channel information are also displayed on the home page. All of these are used to specifically promote the channel itself.

The CITV website is split into 7 sections:

1. Home
2. Watch It
   The 'Watch It' section consists of:
   ~ CITV TV Show Directory - this section provides links to CITV webpages for all of CITV's TV shows. Within those show pages, a small description of the show is given, along with a link to the show's external website. When you click on those links, the external site is opened in a CITV frameset, which means that the set of links from the CITV website are also displayed on the external websites. This helps to promote their institution as broadcasters.
   ~ What's On - this section provides links to the CITV listings for the next 7 days.
   ~ Competition Winners - this sections provides a list of all the winners for recent CITV competitions
3. Create It
   This section of the website encourages visitors to send in any artwork they've done so that CITV can exhibit it, and provides an address and e-mail address where they can send their work. Also in this section, is a display of artwork that viewers have sent in.
4. Say It
   This section of the site enables visitors to send their friends CITV TV show e-cards, send in their favourite jokes, and e-mail the CITV web manager.
5. Get It
   In this section, audience members can download CITV wallpapers for their computers.
6. Play It
   This section provides links to many CITV show related games for the audience to play.
7. WHAM!
   The 'Wham' section of the CITV website is dedicated to entertainment news, reviews, and interviews. In this section, there are lots of links to interviews with various TV and movie personalities as well as children's authors.

Since the target audience of CITV and the website is children (most likely between the ages of about 5 and 12), simple language is used throughout the website, and lots of images are used on all of the pages. The website provides the audience with lots of opportunities to participate and contribute, which makes them feel very involved in the website. This level of participation is much higher than on the CITV channel itself, so it offers the audience an enhanced experience. Due to this enhanced experience, audience members may feel more inclined to stay loyal to this website and channel.

This website is mainly used by the institution to market the channel. On all of the pages, there is a small red box at the side of the page, advertising the channel and telling visitors that they can watch the CITV channel every day from 6 a.m. By giving the audience lots of opportunities to contribute to the website, it can seem as if the broadcasting institution places a lot of importance on the contribution and opinions of their audience members.

Key concepts:

1. Interactivity
   The website offers countless opportunities for audience members to get involved by sending in artwork, jokes, playing games etc.
2. Non-linear
   The audience can choose whichever way and order they want to navigate around the website.
3. Immediacy
   The audience can log on to the website and access the content instantly and whenever they want.