How the Internet Facilitates the Activity within a Consumer Culture : - A Study of the Online Vinyl Record Network

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this thesis is to describe and analyze how the online vinyl record network functions from both a consumer and retailer perspective, in order to gain an understanding of how the Internet facilitates the activity within a consumer culture. The vinyl record industry is experiencing a revival, with an upswing in sales and media attention and a significant increase in the amount of online trading. This inductive study contains data from qualitative interviews with ten vinyl record consumers and four vinyl record retailers, as well as observations of three relevant online forums. The study shows that the online vinyl record network is an e-tribe built upon a number of genre-specific member groups where the Internet facilitates consumption by informing, inspiring, and allowing network members to interact.  Among the respondents, consumers with sufficient resources in their offline network rely to a lesser extent on their online network for interaction. The study further indicates that retailers have little influence on the network, compelling them to adapt the information and structure of their marketing activities to the preferences of the individual consumer groups. In all, the online vinyl record network does contribute to the recent growth of the vinyl record industry.