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204CR / 346CS (Exploring) Digital Media Technology Some Definitions…. Exploring….
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204CR / 346CS(Exploring)Digital Media TechnologySome Definitions…
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.
dig·i·tal adj. (dĭj"ĭ*tal) • 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
Media • media plural noun:plural ofmedium. singular or plural noun (usuallythe 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. 4art a particular category of materials seen as a means of expression, eg watercolours, photography or clay 7computing (usuallymedia) any material on which data is recorded, eg magnetic disk.
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?
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
Forms of Mass Media Can you think of some forms of mass media?
New Media • Digital media produced anywhere by anyone accessible to anyone anywhere • Today’s mass media users become tomorrow’s media producers • Not 500 Channels — 500,000,000 multimedia Web Sites
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. 1984Japan 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. 1992Wall 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’. 2000Times 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. [1972N.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.] 1987Los 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. 1996Sci. Amer. July 21/1 Not all new-media enthusiasts eschew TV altogether. --http://oed.com Oxford English Dictionary:
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?
Forms of New Media Can you think of some forms of new media?
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)
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?
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
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
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?
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 People’s needs Subcultural Bottom-up (ish) Audience autonomy
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 Murdoch’s 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
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'.
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 2002…the 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
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
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)