The Presumed Prosumers: An observational study of the eSports experience

Abstract

The contribution of this article concerns the fact that consumers of the eSports experience can be regarded as prosumers. This conclusion is based on an observational study carried out at Intel Extreme Masters in Katowice. Consumers of the eSports experience take on the role of prosumers as they contribute with resources such as time, money, skills and efforts, as well as engagement and creativity, which creates value not only for themselves, but adds to the entire experience. It was noticed during the observations that the contribution of resources varied between individuals, which stress the importance of allowing prosumers to participate on their own terms. We conclude that the motivations of prosumers are similar to the motivations of the consumers of the eSports experience. However, not all consumers of eSports are prosumers. Marketing actors within eSports cannot force the consumers to take on the role of prosumers, but they can however encourage them to collaborate by providing the consumers with opportunities to contribute with their resources in co-creational efforts such as collaborative marketing.