204CR / 346CS (Exploring) Digital Media Technology Some Definitions

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204CR / 346CS(Exploring)Digital Media
TechnologySome Definitions
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Exploring..

• explore verb (explored, exploring) 1 to search or
  travel through (a place) for the purpose of
  discovery. 2 to examine something carefully
  explore every possibility. exploration noun.
  explorative adj.
• ETYMOLOGY 16c from Latin explorare to search
  out.

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• digital adj. (dij"ital)
• 3. (Computers) performing internal logical and
  arithmetic operations by means of digits, usually
  represented as binary numbers. Contrasted to
  analog, wherein variables are represented as
  coninuous physical quantities such as voltages or
  the position of a pointer on a continuous scale
  as, a digital computer.PJC
• Note In digital computers, physical quantities
  in analog form, such as images, sounds,
  distances, voltages, etc., must first be
  converted to an internal digital representation
  before calculations can be performed on them. The
  conversion may be done by the data enterer, by
  approximation, in the case of numerical values,
  or by analog-to-digital conversion in the case of
  light or sound intensities. The latter case uses
  special equipment to convert the physical
  impulses into a digital value, using a
  pre-defined encoding system.PJC
• http//www.answers.com/topic/digital-1

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Media

• media plural noun plural of medium. singular or
  plural noun (usually the media or the mass media)
  the means by which news and information, etc is
  communicated to the public, usually considered to
  be TV, radio and the press collectively.
• medium noun 1 something by or through which an
  effect is produced. 4 art a particular category
  of materials seen as a means of expression, eg
  watercolours, photography or clay 7 computing
  (usually media) any material on which data is
  recorded, eg magnetic disk.

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The Mass Media
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• 20th century mass media
• Designed for large audiences
• Popular rather than elite content
• One-direction of flow Producer to audience
• Trans-community and trans-national
• Impersonal / non-interactive
• Manipulative
• The mass media are considered to have effects
• Impart information
• Influence behaviour
• Influence beliefs and values
• Can you think of an example where a mass media
  story changed public attitudes?

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The mass media

• With the rise of the mass media in the 19th and
  20th centuries direct communication (talking /
  public meetings) is displaced by mediated
  communication (media messages)
• The mass media come to serve (and perhaps create)
  a mass society
• The mass media offer shared meanings, experiences
  and explanations to individuals and groups
  unconnected in any other way
• Mass media are important as channels of
  communication from the few politicians, opinion
  leaders, elites, minorities to the many.
• Media are important to industry/economy as main
  means of influencing sales of goods and services
  through advertising

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Forms of Mass Media

• Can you think of some forms of mass media?

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What is New Media?
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New Media

• Digital media produced anywhere by anyone
  accessible to anyone anywhere
• Todays mass media users become tomorrows media
  producers
• Not 500 Channels 500,000,000 multimedia Web
  Sites

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Oxford English Dictionary

•  I. Simple uses.
•     1. With sing. and pl. concord new means of
  mass communication considered collectively spec.
  electronic means such as the Internet, CD-ROMs,
  etc. Also the profession of working in such a
  field of mass communication.
• 1984 Japan Econ. Jrnl. (Nexis) 26 June 31 Now we
  are on the threshold of history's fourth
  technological reform era. Electronics, new media,
  new materials, biotechnology, etc. 1992 Wall St.
  Jrnl. 4 Nov. A16/3 In his campaign, Mr. Perot
  vowed he would take the new media to new heights
  if he were elected president. What he had in mind
  was an electronic town hall. 2000 Times 7 Aug.
  II. 5/2 A self-respecting BYT sc. Bland Young
  Thing will only have a job that did not exist 50
  years ago new media, management consultancy,
  advertising.., headhunting.
• II. Compounds.
•     2. General attrib.
• 1972 N.Y. Times 5 Dec. 94/3 There has been a
  great deal of talk, but very little practical
  exploration, of how the new media technologies
  can be used to benefit the arts. 1987 Los
  Angeles Times (Nexis) 13 Dec. 4 That will allow
  crucial contributions..coming from the new-media
  electronics and video to enter the mainstream and
  no longer be marginal. 1996 Sci. Amer. July 21/1
  Not all new-media enthusiasts eschew TV
  altogether.
• --http//oed.com

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Wikipedia

• New media usually refers to a group of relatively
  recent mass media based on new information
  technology. It is based on computing technology
  and not reducible to communication in a
  traditional sense. Most frequently the label
  would be understood to include the Internet and
  World Wide Web, video games and interactive
  media, CD-ROM and other forms of multimedia
  popular from the 1990s on. The phrase came to
  prominence in the 1990s, and is often used by
  technology writers like those at Wired magazine
  and by scholars in media studies.
• --http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_media
• Question to consider Which source would you lean
  toward citing, and why? Or would you use both?

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Forms of New Media

• Can you think of some forms of new media?

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Examples of New Media

• News Feeds
• Blogs
• Voice over Internet Protocol
• Podcasts / Shoutcasts
• PDAs, handhelds, phones with wireless internet
  access
• Webcams
• Tivo / Video on demand
• Community portals (e.g. Myspace, Friendster,
  YouTube)

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what about?

• Cassette tapes
• Record players
• Tape recorders
• Telegram
• Telephone
• Digital cameras
• Cable television
• Diaries
• Independent film
• Pirate radio
• Are these examples of new media?

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Blogs
Is blogging the most revolutionary breakthrough
in communications since Gutenberg, or the worst
case of overhype since cold fusion? Actually it
is both. By making it easier for anyone to
publish his or her thoughts to the world,
blogging has ruptured the media landscape, giving
millions of ordinary citizens a chance to write
about their own lives and obsessions and to talk
back to power. Yet traditional journalism
remains crucial for informing us in an accurate,
comprehensive, and neutral manner. --Kennedy,
D, The Blogging Revolution
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Community portals and personal websites
Public display of private lives The internet
has simultaneously heralded a new age of
voyeurism, narcissism and exhibitionism, all
within its various forms. Surveillance has also
exited the world of internet webcams to become
the organizing narrative of reality television
around the world. Via the internet, the
everydayness of personal and intimate images that
are perpetually accessible has transformed the
cultural discourse of what is public and what is
private, who is the performer and who is the
audience. -- Marshall, David, New Media
Cultures
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For Discussion

• Do new technologies change how we access
  information?
• The type of information upon which we rely?
• How we communicate with each other?
• Does new media limit or expand our personal
  freedom?

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Mass media Vs New Media
PASSIVE Atomised, asocial Effects on
audiences Predictable Meanings given Societal
needs National Top-down Audience control
ACTIVE Individualised, social Media impact is
variable Unpredictable Meanings
constructed Peoples needs Subcultural Bottom-up
(ish) Audience autonomy
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Who owns new media?
It is often easy to assess the current array of
media as just extrapolations of what has already
developed political economic analysis rightly
points to the continued and increasing
concentration of media ownership. Five
recording companies, themselves part of larger
conglomerates, control the production of popular
music. Rupert Murdochs News Corporation
continues to expand its influence through the
acquisition of satellite services, satellite
channels and an array of cable-delivered
television super stations beamed to all
continents on the planet. The Internet, for
all its diversity, has still seen the emergence
of the same large corporations as the most
popular websites. Indeed, whenever there is any
successful web-based start-up company, it is
usually the major media players who are the key
investors. A consortium of major entertainment
corporations, as we have seen, supported Tivo.
Blockbuster films are clearly a strategy that is
connected to maintaining an industrial hegemony
for the leading film studios and production
companies. --Burnett, Robert and Marshall,
David P., Web Theory
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Technology..

• Technology noun (technologies) 1 the practical
  use of scientific knowledge in industry and
  everyday life. 2 practical sciences as a group. 3
  the technical skills and achievements of a
  particular time in history, of civilization or a
  group of people. technological adj.
  technologically adverb. technologist noun someone
  skilled in technology and its applications.
• ETYMOLOGY 17c from Greek technologia systematic
  treatment, from techne 'art' or 'skill'.

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So will new media destroy mass media?

• Video rental stores will disappear within 10
  years
• Nicholas Negroponte, Being Digital, 1995
• In 2005, Blockbuster had 720 stores in the UK
  alone
• By 2002the television sets now sitting in homes
  across the world will have been jettisoned
• Sir Christopher Bland (Chairman of the BBC), The
  World in 1998, published by The Economist
  magazine, 1997

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Key assumptions made about technological progress

• New developments will be accepted by the public
• And these will be accepted by large numbers of
  people
• They will be used for the purposes for which they
  were designed
• Technological change will produce essentially
  inescapable social, cognitive and behavioural
  change in the users

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Learning from old technology

• The telephone did not radically alter American
  ways of life rather, Americans used it to more
  vigorously pursue their characteristic ways of
  life.
• Fischer (1992)

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Interactive TV Are Users Different?