The socialization experience at a silent disco

The infusion of digital devices into everyday life influences the way one seeks information, feedback, and connectedness (Deuze, 2012). Media device use enables connectability anytime, anyplace, and anywhere; therefore creating the potential desire for customized experiences among users. The purpose of this research brief is to understand how media transforms leisure activities by focusing on an emerging event, the silent disco. In a silent disco, participants can customize their experience by choosing what, where, and how they experience the music through the use of wireless headphones. Two research questions were investigated: (a) how do people engage in socialization at silent discos, and (b) in relationship to social interaction, how does the silent disco differ from the music festival experience. Through an interpretive phenomenology approach involving interviews with 25 participants at Amsterdam’s Pitch Festival, this paper discusses the experience through two themes: control of the experience and the individual, collective experience.