www.myspace.com/E4Skins2
Skins is a brand new British teen drama shown on E4, on Thursdays at 10pm, and repeated again on Tuesday evenings, again on E4 and at 10pm. Fans also have the option of watching the programme an hour later on the channel E4+1, or recording it on Telewest to watch whenever they want.
Skins is focused around the lives of a group of teenage friends who live in Bristol. The drama is meant to represent the daily lives of adolescents. The group includes a gay character (Maxxie); an attractive and popular boy (Tony); his girlfriend (Michelle); a drug-taking Muslim (Anwar); a girl with an eating disorder and suicidal tendencies (Cassie); a boy who is desperate to lose his virginity (Sid); an intelligent and privileged girl (Jal) and a party animal in love with his teacher (Chris). Each installment has a self-contained theme, but there are several story arcs that span different episodes. Skins is one of the first programmes at the forefront of the network Channel 4's aim to start showing more British content on its channels. It was shot entirely in High Definition though is currently only being broadcast in Standard Definition.
Upon arriving at the site, we are greeted with the message: “This site contains adult content including strong language, drug references and scenes of a sexual nature. By entering this site you agree that you are above the age of 18.” This promotes the seriousness of the programme, also creating excitement and exclusiveness at entering the site. As the programme is based around a group of 16-17 year olds, it seems a little strange that Channel4 is making such restrictions, as they must know that a younger group of their audience will indeed visit the site. It also links in with the late showing of the show, which is also only on E4 which emphasises its exclusivity.
There are many offerings and fun options on the Skins website that promote interactivity and a modern approach to television.
The Skins website is replacing magazine articles about the programmes, adverts on television which promote the various competitions – instead, whilst watching E4, you are told to visit the website for more details on how to get involved. Gives the programme an ‘underground’ feel and again emphasises the exclusiveness of the programme – you can only find out more if you have access to the internet and know how to navigate around these kinds of websites. The technologies involved are music downloads (see below, this week's download), online videos, online forums and broadband internet.
Skins is aimed at middle class ‘indie’ teenagers who can relate to the issues discussed in the programme, and the secondary target audience is the older generation, who can watch the programme to find out what kind of lifestyle many young people today live.
Skins on the internet is making great use of new media technologies and taking advantage of the recent and hip phenomenon of MySpace. This networking website has been used by the producers and of Skins to create a realistic world, with each of the main characters having their own myspace that includes pictures and personal information, supposedly written by the characters themselves. Skins on the internet aims to involve as big a network as possible, by running underground competitions such as ‘put Skins in your top friends and get invited to the exclusive premier party’. It has brought the franchise of Skins great benefits as it means fans can constantly find out more about the programme and their favourite characters, and even ‘talk’ to them online! The website offers the chance to ‘get involved with Skins Series2.’ Each week, the background for the Skins website is changed to a competition winner who has designed a specific layout (see below, this weeks design).
There is also the chance to view ‘unseen Skins’ which means that online fans can see extra parts to the storyline that they wouldn’t otherwise know about. This again links with the personalisation factor of the website and helps to make the audience feel like they are being let into something special and exclusive.
The competition side of the website plays an extremely large role in the interactivity, which allows fans to help out in the world of Skins. It gives it a more realistic feel and makes it seem closer to home.
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