Daniel Radcliffe Fan Website

www.danradcliffe.co.uk


This is a website made by fans for fans of the young actor Daniel Radcliff, who most famously plays Harry Potter in the films based on J.K. Rowling’s novels. He is currently taking part in the now notorious play EQUUS, written by Peter Shaffer and Directed by Thea Sharrock. The website is replacing fan clubs, which is now vary rare, in which fans of the film/book/actor etc meet up and discuss the latest issues concerning the topic of conversation. In these clubs, members would normally be given ‘packs’ of photographs etc, would normally be quite expensive to run and would require all fans to meet in one designated place, which could possibly be difficult to travel to. Nowadays, these kinds of fan websites are offering all these features and more, with the chance to be able to talk to other fans who quite possibly live on the other side of the world! There are forums, chat rooms, polls, videos and lots more to keep fans entertained, and the best thing is that they can visit the site whenever they want, and it is constantly being updated. It is also relatively cheap to run. The technologies involved with this particular fan website for Daniel Radcliff are broadband internet, online videos, online radio, forums, online shopping and email newsletters.
This image shows a quick summary of details of the young actor available to surfers:


It is not quite clear which social groups are relevant, as Radcliff fans could range between many ages and either gender, but I presume that most fans are young people aged between 11 and 18. this is also relevant to the fact that the fact that the website is high tech and innovative, something which would appeal to the younger generation. However, a feature that stands out as rather different is the option to donate money to Radcliff’s favourite charity, which requires credit card details. As this particular website has already raised £7859, it is clear that there are also many adult Daniel Radcliff fans.



Upon arriving at the site, we are first greeted with a sleek looking homepage, with a list of possible options to explore the site. There firstly upcoming appearances and events, so that fans can know when they can catch a glimpse of their favourite actor.

This is a feature which can be regularly updated on the website to suit the times, and is replacing magazines and newspapers such as TimeOut and The Guide which would normaly detail these kinds of events. Similarly, fans can also be lead to a page which has recent information on current events, latest news and press. This kind of info can quickly be updatied onto an internet website as oppose to writing an article in a newspaper etc, which would have to take into consideration the time taken for publication. Therefore, this website is a good example of the new media technologies that involve instantivity.


Another feature of this website which is extremely common for fan websites is the opportunity to recieve a newletter, which helps to make super fans feel exclusive and special, and links into the theme of personalisation seen on many websites these days.

Fans also have the chance to watch recent videos of Radcliffe:

Probably one of the most astonishing and modern features of the website is the opportunity to listen to WRAD -- Radio Radcliffe!

This enables you to listen to Daniel's radio station through the internet, something which is very rare for this kind of fan website, but could start of an interesting trend!