Twilight is the time when day converges with night—the perfect metaphor for a world where traditional lines are blurred. In the Twilight Saga, humans, vampires, and Quileute Indian shape-shifters come together and redefine their world. But the Saga also illustrates the power of a different type of convergence that reaches far beyond the inhabitants of Twilight’s setting in Forks, Washington.

The advent of social media has redefined the way people around the globe share, connect, and communicate. In the interactive and participatory world of social media, there are no longer boundaries separating author, audience, and fans, and this convergence unleashed a power that has propelled the Twilight Saga into a cultural phenomenon with a wide-ranging and—despite popular belief—profoundly positive impact.

It’s a Whole New World

The last twenty years of technological innovation and the development of the social web have profoundly changed how we see the world and ourselves. There is an entirely new playing field for how, where, and with whom we can communicate. There are no longer distinct boundaries among technologies—we can post online from cell phones and we can make appointments and watch movies on our computers. We can find people with similar interests anywhere in the world and we can get any information we need on-demand. These changes have altered our expectations about the types of relationships available to us and have opened the floodgates to individual creativity, expression, and connection. The combination of media and social convergence is visible in the new ways that audiences and fans make  …