1 ABCT2103 Topic 2 Evolution of New Media

1 ABCT2103 Topic 2 Evolution of New Media

By the end of this topic, you should be able to:

1. Explain the evolution of new media and apply your knowledge effectively;

2. Demonstrate an understanding of the developments of the new technology;

3. Identify the various theories and principles that accompany the new development; and

4. Track the timelines of departure from the conventional into the current state of new media.

INTRODUCTION

This topic shall begin with the introduction of new media technology and how it began its evolution into the current state. New media and the accompanying new technology like the Internet, texting, social media, chat rooms, blogs and Twitter have added a totally new meaning to human communication. With this new ability to instantly communicate from anywhere at all, scholars are beginning to think if new parameters of human communication and existing theories need to be re-looked and re-evaluated. It is also important for you to be

able to have a firm understanding of the theoretical framework that accompany the new regime. In addition, you should be exposed to the state of evolution from the conventional period into the new era of the new media.

New media and the new media technologies have changed the ways we learn, communicate and interact with one another. Its dynamism continues to challenge the existing forms of communication and has elevated the media industry and its audiences to very promising levels of education, edutainment and play and the media industry.

SELF-CHECK 2.1

The evolution of media has changed how we communicate and interact with each other. Discuss and explain those changes.

DEVELOPMENT OF NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGY

The current observation in the development of global media and communication is the increasing use of the internet and development of the interactiveness of the media, especially what has now been termed as the new media. Media scholars have observed an unprecedented nature in the development and innovations in the new technologies for communication, for the delivery of current information and databases, and the levels of interactivity all across the globe.

Scholars have attributed this change to two main factors:

1. A marked increase in activities involving the Internet; and

2. Advances in the field of computer sciences and computer programming.

It is obvious that these advances have elevated all levels of the dynamism of connectivity which combine the field of media technology and the fields of art and media content and virtual cultures, graphic design and skills in programming and computer technologies, and also what is termed as the new media studies or Internet studies.

Therefore, both the content industry and the academic field of media studies, art and design and computer processing are now more integrative, finally emerging into an amalgamation of those disciplines mentioned.

Students and teachers of new media and new media technologies need to master the essential tools from the basic art and crafts to basic design and graphic design to new media technologies, especially web development and the interactive applications.

2.2     CURRENT STATE OF NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGY

ACTIVITY 2.1

The development of new media has offered new applications for us to use.

1. Can you state the new media application that you have used

2. Why do you use that application?

3. What do you get from that usage?

New media technology has caused a shift in the conventional roles of the content creator and the audience. The audiences have become more interactive and they are able to become the developer of content and at the same time are also able to increase accessibility of content. New content developers are now able to disseminate their products in new networks, for example via their social networks or niche audiences.

The new buzzwords of new media technology are:

(a) Convergence;

(b) Integration; and

(c) Globalisation.

The new trends would include cutting-edge media technologies including social media, social networking, mobile media, YouTube and new media advocacy.

Therefore, the hallmark of new media is essentially the way in which technologies interactively engage their users using information and communication technology which focuses on hands on and practical applications of the Web and internet based information and knowledge in digital art and design, visual effects, video and film, and virtual reality are additional tools and act as enablers.

x Digital art and Design

This body of knowledge covers a range of artistic products that utilises digital technology. This process of enhancement transformed the conventional products of drawing, art, sculpture into digital art and virtual reality and art in the internet.

recently?

x Visual Effects

Applications of technologies and practices that help in the creation of

elements with moving images that transplants the viewers into a totally

different domain and reality. Highly featured in the action genres especially

to elevate the senses of cinema lovers.

x Video and Film

Education in the history of conventional to digital video and television and

other media art forms, including digital film and video production.

x Virtual Reality

Virtual reality refers to high-end user- computer applications that create an

image of a world that appears to our sensation in exactly the same way as we

think about the real world. In order to convince our mind that the artificial

world is real, the computer simulates the senses into feeling involved and

engaged in the simulated environment. The whole process engages the

various sensory conduits including smell, audio or touch. As such there is

ultimately a mastery of the various skills including state-of-the-art virtual

technologies and third generation educational and training aspects.

One important development is the advent of Web 2.0 technology. For media

development teachers and professionals as well as students, the challenge is all

the same: how to use Web 2.0 and all its technologies. Successful teaching and

commercial organisations integrate Web 2.0 technologies which ultimately create

a networked environment as manifested in the following:

(a) Blogs;

(b) Wikis;

(c) Social networking services; and

(d) Video-sharing.

Students should have a solid and balanced background in design and technology

and content development and continue to learn the latest technology and

interactive applications.

ACTIVITY 2.2

Web 2.0 is a newer version of web that is previously called Web 1.0.

1. What is the difference between Web 2.0 technology and Web 1.0?

2. Web 2.0 technology is considered as new media and offers more

interactivity. Explain this.

Therefore, the final outcome is a balanced grounding in design and technology and

an ability to execute their own problem-solving. On the creative side, students are

versatile in producing high technology products such as online games and rich

media web appliances, including motion graphics and visual effects.

It is remarkable that the new media is distinct in the way in which the technologies

interactively engage their users. So much so, the significance of new media or

digital media is that it functions not just as a product but it is also a process.

State-of the art information and communication technology emphasises hands-

on and practical applications of the Web and internet-based information and

databases, e-commerce applications and group communication system.

Another development that one associates with new media technologies is

networking with the capacity of carrying large volumes of data using for

example, a broadband cable or ISDN (Integrated Switched Digital network).

Hence, new media and the accompanying technological processes have impacted

strongly on the social as well as the technological processes itself. These

relationships have resulted in digitisation and convergence, interactivity and

networks and networking.

THEORETICAL APPROACHES TO

2.3     UNDERSTANDING NEW MEDIA

ACTIVITY 2.3

The Internet is always associated with the term „information society‰.

Why?

The 1980s witnessed the rapid development in international communications due

to the expansion of direct satellite broadcasting. This period was followed by the

introduction of the Internet in the 1990s which further contracted the shrinking

notion of the world.

Daniel Bell, in his book The Coming of Post Industrial Society (1973), wrote about

the move from an industrial state to a post-industrial which was accompanied by

a society that was dominated by information and information led industries.

Analysts welcomed the idea of the arrival of the „information age‰. Ito (1985)

from Japan was the first person to have used the term „information society‰.

However, the idea of the „economics of information‰ had already been actively

discussed in America. Machlup, in his book The Production and Distribution of

Knowledge in the United States (1962), had already discussed information in the

economic sense.

Alvin Toffler also raised the same hypothesis of the information society. He

refers to it as the third wave, which came after the agricultural and industrial

eras of human civilisation (1980). Scholars see the third wave as the time for

interconnectedness, evolving into a universal interconnected network of audio,

video and electronic text communication.

Scholars then began to think that perhaps the new context might need new

discussions to evaluate the new media. Perhaps new media theories would bring

forth new visionary scholarly works. Theories would easily provide the context

of the assessment of the new environment, allowing space for analysis, critique

and application.

Terry Flew (2004) mentions about how to research the InternetÊs overall social

significance beginning from the „first generation‰ Internet studies found in the

works of Rheingold(1991), Turkle (1995), and Poster(1995) which highlighted the

radical and transformative significance of the Internet to society. New media will

continue to be revolutionary and more new inventions will be generated in the

future. These new technologies do not change human needs and desires

drastically, therefore there is no absolute need to change or invent new theories.

The old and existing theories are not necessarily obsolete. Research has shown

that theories such as agenda setting, uses and gratifications, cultivation, and

diffusion of innovations remained high in the selection lists of media researchers.

ACTIVITY 2.4

Many theories can be used to explain the emergence and the use of new

media. Explain these following theories and relate it to the new media:

1. Diffusion of innovation.

2. Uses and Gratification.

3. Agenda-setting.

Thus, theoretical frameworks from the more traditional communication science

paradigm to the new alternative paradigm of interpretive and critical views in

the study of media are still applicable, such as the following:

x Technological determinism;

x Cultural studies;

x Agenda-setting; and

x Cultivation theory.

2.3.1 Technological Determinism

This approach was developed by Marshall McLuhan (1964), the Canadian media

scholar (1911-1980). It is basically an alternative paradigm that began to be

popular in the 1960s. He started writing about the role of pop culture in society

and of course he became iconic for his usage of the term „the global village‰ and

„the medium is the message‰. He provided a frame of belief that technological

development influences and determines social and cultural change. McLuhan

also adapted the theory of the biases of communication by Innis (2009), which he

adapted into his theory about how media technologies are able to impact

patterns of human thinking and how humankind relate to the new technologies.

For example, when we trace our early relation with the media we have to

actually track since the beginning of human organisation and communication,

from the age of tribalism.

Tapscott, (1998) noted that media technology continues to be revolutionary and

more new innovations will be invented in the future. In fact, new media made its

presence felt since 1948, and during that time too, people were already talking

about the impact of television, FM radio and the fax machine, Therefore, we are

reminded that studies on new media need to recognise the old patterns of

communication behaviour which perhaps do not change after all regardless of

the new technology. We need to be mindful of the new contexts of human

communication and human behaviour. For sure the new contexts have shifted

the focus on face-to-face communication to what is now known as computer

mediated communication (CMC).

Other researchers such as Lievrouw (2009) think that new media and the new

technologies have sort of created a grey area between interpersonal

communication and media communication. Previously, communication theories

would emphasise an in-depth study of the effect of the two-step flow as an

attempt to look into the interpersonal interaction in the centre of media influence

and persuasion. However, with the new media there seems to be a shift from just

the media channels to communication interaction in the new context of

networked connections and systems.

It can be seen that much of the discussion on new media theory seems to illustrate

the fact that it is still a continuation from the traditional environment and

professional practice of conventional media with all its contemporary phenomena

and everyday applications. Thus, new media concerns should develop critical

insights about the new phenomenon especially in its relation to the role of the

media consumer, behaviour of the audience and the producers of media.

MILESTONES IN MEDIA TECHNOLOGY

2.4

To understand the changes in the history of human communication and its role

in society, McLuhan tracked the development of communication technology over

the course of human civilisation. McLuhan referred to the earliest form of human

organisation as the era of the tribal age, the print paradigm, and the electronic

paradigm.

x The Tribal Age: Oral Culture

The story of humankind began with senses associated with the sense of

hearing and the sense of smell; touch and taste were more fully developed.

Communication during the tribal paradigm was dominated by oral tradition.

Forms of articulation were derived from experiences within the culture and

thus this era reflected the tribal view.

x The Print Paradigm

The early period was replaced by the beginning of the modern era which took

place about 600 years ago. The accompanying technology was the printing

press, which unlike the previous oral culture, provided records of human

communication and these records were formatted and structured. This period

was also linked to human literacy and introduced the period of

Enlightenment and modernity.

x The Electronic Age : Electronic Media

The twentieth century heralded the electronic age and the introduction and

subsequent spread of the television and its central position in society. Society

is dominated by the new tool of communication which further extended

human capacities. The media extended the senses with the ability to see and

hear things from a great distance which later created McLuhanÊs „Global

village‰.

The new media began to debut in the United States in the 1960s when the

Defence Department began formulating an alternative communication system in

case America comes under foreign attack. The ARPAnet project began as a

connection between the military, the defence contractors and scientists that were

based in their laboratories in the universities. This was the landmark that

revolutionised the information and communication technologies.

x New media technology has caused a shift in the conventional roles of the

content creator and the audience.

x Successful teaching and commercial organisations integrate Web 2.0

technologies which ultimately create a networked environment.

x Daniel Bell in his book The Coming of Post Industrial Society (1973) wrote

about the move from an industrial state to a post-industrial which was

accompanied by a society that was dominated by information and

information led industries.

x Tapscott, (1998) noted that media technology continues to be revolutionary

and more new innovations will be invented in the future.

x Other researchers such as Lievrouw (2009) think that new media and the new

technologies have sort of created a grey area between interpersonal

communication and media communication.

Electronic age

Interactiveness

Globalisation

Print Paradigm

Technological determinism

Tribal Age

Web 2.0

1. Media scholars have observed an unprecedented nature in the development and innovations in the new technologies for communication. State two main factors that bring those changes.

2. Explain the impact of new media technology in these fields:

(a) Virtual reality.

(b) Digital art and design.

(c) Visual effect.

(d) Video and film.

3. What is technological determinism?

1. The new media technology has been connected to a few buzzwords such as the following:

(a) Convergence;

(b) Globalisation; and

(c) Integration.

Explain each of those terms and its relationship with new media technology.

2. "New media and the new technologies have sort of created a grey area between interpersonal communication and media communication". Discuss that statement.

3. According to McLuhan, there are three phases in the history of human ommunication. Discuss each of that age or phases.