Netvertising: Content-Based Subgeneric Variations in a Digital Genre

We have endeavored to define a new emerging digital genre in the world of Internet : netvertising. We present an analysis divided into two stages. An initial survey of 20 randomly selected netads reveals that texts in this genre are formed by very brief sentences and noun phrases, the systematic use of imperative and simple present tenses, second person personal pronouns, a higher use of punctuation marks, a combination of different types of images with various texts, and the use of diverse HT linkers. A second survey, however, unfolds a significant series of subgeneric variations depending on the contents of the netad. These content-based variations seem to be directly related to the product advertised. We have carried out a linguistic study of a complementary corpus of 50 first page target ads, linked to those banner ads appearing while browsing through a good number of Internet servers (Infoseek, Webcrawler, AOL, and so on). 1. A dynamic conception of genre There is new tendency in linguistics to re-define genre adding to the concept not just form or structure, but also content, situation, context and objectives or communicative purposes. Several authors [19, 2, 5, 1] support this new view as a better description of the term. Content, situation, context and the purpose of a text become as central to the new conception of genre as form, and if one of them is modified, this, in turn, implies a modification of the genre as a whole. Bhatia [3] underscores the importance of genre integrity. The fact is that situations, contexts and objectives vary according to the natural evolution of the discourse communities in which genres are realized. Therefore, genres change and evolve since they are not static but dynamic instances subject to transformation. We believe that the appearance of Internet is creating a set of new generic forms of which we are yet to see which ones will prevail and which ones will simply be a flash in the pan. For instance, will html language become another necessary skill for professionals in such fields as 1060-3425/98 $10.0 advertising? Or will html and web pages create a new profession altogether? Among the new emerging genres in Internet, publicity—in its various forms—represents one of the leading discursive manifestations of this process of continuous generic change which is now taking place in this international computing agora. The significance of advertising in relation to sociolinguistic analysis has already been addressed regarding its more traditional forms of television, newspaper, magazine and other advertising media [12]. This study has been focused on the sociodiscursive analysis of target ads (linked to banner ads)—the most extended form of netvertising—as a representative genre of the new trend of textual manifestations which are to be encountered in the ever growing world of Internet. 2. Internet genres: constant evolution According to the definition of genre, there must be a group of features that define a certain kind of discourse to consider it as a separate genre. Internet is a new means of communication which has become popular only in recent years. Much of what can be found in it is not systematized yet. This new means of communication has lead to new genres, such as the web page, or huge multimedia catalogues, but also to the application of existing ones, such as advertising or research articles. There are several features that all these genres have in common, among which we would like to highlight a few ones. First of all, we can say that over 90% of the information you can find in Internet is in English, but many Internet users are non-native speakers—or even exclusively writers—of English, who do not use this language in their daily life, which means they are suffering continuous interferences from their different tongues creating a special type of interlanguage. Additionally, there is the special metalanguage that this new means of communication is producing, with expressions such as the following: to link (relate different parts of a document by means of hypertext), cookie (some kind of file that stores information), communicon (= communication + icon; combination of letters and