Caring time in a hybrid digital media system: The tragically hip, public broadcasting, and networked media events

Abstract

Background This article tackles the concern that meaningful collective experiences of large-scale media events are no longer possible because contemporary hybrid digital media systems disrupt the temporal coordinating function, or formatting, traditionally performed by broadcast media. Analysis Drawing from media events literature, this article puts forward a conception of caring time to show that while the means for sharing the temporality of media events have changed, these events also remain a telling site for collective experience. The authors detail an empirical case study to support their argument. Conclusion and implications Careful analysis of the Tragically Hip’s Man Machine Poem event shows how the CBC used social media to manage temporal proxemics for the concert in a way that called national publics into being.