Nollywood on the Internet: A preliminary analysis of an online Nigerian video-film audience

The prolificacy of the Nigerian video-film industry, tagged Nollywood, has attracted wide attention and won the acclaim of a large cross-border audience. The success of the video-films is largely attributed to their nature as popular art, created by the people for the people. Popular art is noted for its openness to novelty, and the accessibility of the video technology has had an important role to play in the development of this industry. This same openness to technology can be applied to the audience of popular art, which, given its greater involvement in the performance, holds a key position in the promotion of such culture. The development of new information and communication technologies, especially the Internet, has led to an increased participation of audiences in general. This has brought about new considerations in terms of audience research. This article takes a preliminary look at the online presence of the Nigerian video-film audience with the goal of determining whether the Internet has brought about any changes in this popular art audience. It concludes that the use of the Internet has not changed the characteristics of the popular art audience, but has enhanced them, giving this audience a greater visibility.