1 ABCT2103 TOPIC 7 NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGY AND MASS COMMUNICATION

1 ABCT2103 TOPIC 7 NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGY AND MASS COMMUNICATION.

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

1. Identify the use of new media technology in mass communication;

2. Analyse the benefits of new media technology as a tool of mass communication;

3. Discuss the applications of new media technology that has been used in the mass communication field; and

4. Interpret the global scenario on the usage of new media technology.

INTRODUCTION

Our forms of communication change from time to time with the innovation of technology. According to Biagi (2003), we are now within the Third Information Communication Revolution that started around the 1950s. It began with computer technology and this technology is the main driving force in the majority of changes affecting today’s communication and media.

New media technology is rapidly evolving and has a heavy impact on the media industry and the practices of mass communications. It has been used widely in the mass communication field such as journalism, broadcasting, advertising, and public relations. This technology modifies the form of communication from mass communication to interactive communication.

This is one of the factors that we will discuss in this topic. We will see the adaptation or usage of the new media technology that has become an integral part of media production and distribution. It has also established itself as a communication medium rivalling print and broadcast. Because of the new media characteristics, including convergence and interactivity, it makes any kind of spreading the information easier to the wider audience.

ACTIVITY 7.1

The rapidly changing technology gives us power to control information, especially with the existence of new media technology. The difference between audiences and content providers is blurring. What do you think of this statement?

7.1       THE AUDIENCE OF NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGY.

Mobile phone, CD-ROM, iPod, weblog, IMs, and Internet. These are the examples of products from new media technology. Have you used any of them? Most of us use those technologies in our daily life. New media technology is actually used by everybody. It plays a vital role to some of us and has become part of our fabric of life especially in this digital era. In this day, we have seen and used many convergence technology such as PDA, iPhone, mobile phone with camera, watch with calculator, Internet television, and others. As users, we are the audience of new media technology.

ACTIVITY 7.2

There are many new media products based on mobile communication and Internet technologies. Based on your opinion, discuss the following questions:

1. What are the same features that all these products share?

2. What do you actually want from those products?

3. Can those new products play the same role as mass communication media?

7.1.1 The Characteristics of New Media Audience Generally, new technologies always influence the young generation. This generation is the immediate group that will adapt easily to any new technology. That is why they are always regarded as potential target audience to new technology development, including new media. Basically the new media's audiences are online users who are both computer-savvy and Internet-savvy. They are referred to as Netizens.

Table 7.1: Statistics on Internet Users and Population in Southeast Asia.

Country	Population (2009 - Estimate)	Internet Users (2009)
Brunei Darussalam	388,190	187,900
Philippines	97,976,603	24,000,000
Laos	6,834,345	100,000
Indonesia	249,271,522	25,000,000
Malaysia	25,715,819	16,902,600
Myanmar	48,137,741	40,000
Singapore	4,657,542	3,104,900
Thailand	65,998,436	13,416,000
Vietnam	88,576,758	21,524,417

Source: Internet World Stat

The group consists of teens (12-17) and young adults (18-29) who are heavy users of new media technology especially those that are linked to the Internet and mobile devices such as cell phones. Based on the Pew Internet and American Life report, the teens and the young adults respectively represent 94% of Internet users. They use devices such as desktop or laptop, cell phone, games console, and portable gaming device to go online.

According to Don Tapscott (2008), in his book Growing up Digital, the new media audiences have the following characteristics:

• They want freedom in everything they do, from freedom of choice to freedom of expression.

• They love to customise and personalise.

• They are the new scrutinisers.

• They look for corporate integrity and openness when deciding what to buy and where to work. • They want entertainment and play in their work, education and social life.

• They are the collaboration and relationship generation.

• Has a need for speedăand not just in video games.

• They are the innovators. The new formation of this audience affects the form of traditional media or mass communication. Media and business organisations try to respond to these changes, especially with the influences of the Internet in our daily life.

7.1.2 Audience and New Media Technology

Even with the development of new media technology, old media still play an important role in our popular and professional lives. We still use television to watch our favourite soap opera or drama or news. We still buy books from the bookshops for our leisure as well as for references in our studies. We still listen to the radio when we drive to our workplace. We are the audience to old mass media communication.

Although we use blogs to get news about politics and the elections, but the formal debate will still be a television event. Top-rating television programmes such as Cerekarama and Akademi Fantasia would still manage to create a collective “Malaysian” television audience to generate the much anticipated financial returns for the networks. Online advertisements may be important, but they are generated from the traditional print media system and continue to play a complementary role to the newspapers.

However, the new media technology especially the emerging user-generated media, also known as social media, actually changes the demand for media products especially among the younger media consumer. This generation has seen new media technology being used as a tool for listening, participating, and talking. And based on that, media providers try to offer something that suits their characteristics: • Interaction is the new content: Interactivity is important to the audiences because they are no longer passive audiences, as opposed to the previously dominant processes of creation, distribution, reception or discussion of content by provider.

• Distracted and fascinated: Level of engagement with media increases but at the same time reflects an attitude in which users are easily distracted.

• Can get it for “free”: Media and information products can be obtained at no apparent or extra cost.

Many organisations started paying attention to the new media channel. With these new features, many television programmes that are produced now involve participation from viewers through telephone or SMS voting. We can get news services through online and mobile phones. Games based on films generate more revenue than the films themselves. We have also noticed that the music industry now depends on the transmission of songs via network media such as ring tones for phones. All these are the alterations from the development of new media technology.

Journalism is one of the important fields in mass media communication. It involves the profession or practice of reporting about, photographing, or editing news stories for mass media. It can also refer to investigation and reporting of events, issues, and trends to a broad audience to inform them about a certain topic. Besides covering organisations and institutions such as government and businesses, journalism also covers the cultural aspects of society such as arts and entertainment. With the emergence of new media technology the application of digital (computer) technology to mass communications · affects the field of journalism and the professionalism of the sector. It may sometimes seem as a challenge to this field but they have to somehow adapt to it. People are no longer willing to wait even a single day for a story to break. Besides, journalists must deal with ethical questions regarding fact checking and source corroboration being weighed against the speed of coverage. Journalism has also changed as the Internet presents new and more multi-dimensional ways of telling stories.

7.2.1 Journalism in New Media

Era New media technology is transforming journalism. The Internet has become the journalist’s medium. It embraces all capabilities of the older media and offer new capabilities, including interactivity, on-demand access, user control, and customisation. Thus, by using new media technology or tools available via the Internet, journalists can produce stories using whatever modalities· involving text, images, video, and graphic·and communication features for a particular story. They can also include the engagement of audience by using interactive news story technique as well as hypermedia or links in each story.

In the old media, news are published by the newspaper or covered on the evening television news. The updated story has to be continued the next day. But now, updates can be made continuously. When visiting a website such as The Star 7.2 online, Utusan Malaysia online, or Malaysiakini.com, we always check the updates first or see when the news are posted. If the stories are not recent updates, browsers usually tend to look for the updated story on other sites or blogs.

In this digital age, professionals in journalism use digital tools·such as PDA, smartphone, tablet PC, digital camera·in their preparation to gather news, communicating, editing, and producing the story. The tools become more portable, inexpensive, and powerful and they transform the way journalists do their work. It makes the tasks easier and efficient, for instance to find reliable sources, checking facts, and meeting the deadline. News can be sent from anywhere at anytime. For instance, we obtained updates about the Israeli attack on the Gaza aid flotilla, Mavi Marmara, through many sources with this technology. We also can see the recording of the attack and the feedbacks from viewers via YouTube and personal blogs.

Besides that, the development of software packages·such as “SportWriter”·has the ability to write stories automatically based on electronic data transmitted directly by various news sources. Furthermore, some reporting for sports and financial news can be written using a basic formulae derived from specific data, such as score, stock exchanges, and other data. This may reflect a fundamental shift in the function of journalism in society since this type of applications are reducing the role of journalism as a filter or gatekeeper.

The new media technology also affects the news industry. Competition becomes tighter. News providers are no longer just the traditional newspapers, magazines, or broadcasters. The World Wide Web becomes an option for low cost global forum for anyone with a message. Corporate, non profit organisations and government institutions whose voices were formerly filtered by gatekeepers can now freely send their message or opinion through various channels of information to the media such as online forums, blogs, newsgroups, YouTube, iPod, etc.

In addition, the new technology also transforms the relationship among and between news organisations, journalists, and their public, including audiences, competitors, advertisers, and sources. Traditional news providers generally serve a well-defined geographic community. Local newspapers, local magazines, and local broadcasters usually have their own markets to serve. For instance Sinar Harian Edisi Johor and Harian Metro provide news to Johorian and Kuala Lumpur communities respectively. National news providers serve a single country, although some are extended to the regional markets.

Now, online news continue to serve local communities but at the same time it also serves amlarger and geographically diverse community. This includes the local audience but may also include larger audiences who live across the local or even national boundaries. Everybody can access news and updates easily via the Internet nowadays. Through online news websites such as Wired, Salon.com CNN online, Kompas, and others, we can access news from other countries at anytime we want.

7.2.2 The Emerging Citizen Journalism.

Because new media technologies are now easy to use, everybody can become content providers, including the audience. Thus, people without a journalism background may also act as “journalists” and write news using various new media technology or application. With the elements of open or personal publishing, collaborative editing, and distributed content which are now possible with new media, we now have a new type of journalism called “citizen journalism”.

ACTIVITY 7.3

Anybody can become a citizen journalist by using new media technology and post their stories on any news site, online forum, or weblog. But what do you think of their stories? Can we accept their stories as news? How about their credibility as a professional journalist? Does the citizen journalist discredit the profession? Discuss.

“Citizen journalism” is a concept that refers to members of the public playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analysing and disseminating news and information. According to Mark Glaser (2007), in MediaShift: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizen_Journalism - cite_noteglaser2006-4

The idea behind citizen journalism is that people without professional journalism training can use the tools of modern technology and the global distribution of the Internet to create, augment or fact-check media on their own or in collaboration with others. For example, you might write about a city council meeting on your blog or in an online forum. Or you could fact-check a newspaper article from the mainstream media and point out factual errors or bias on your blog. Or you might snap a digital photo of a newsworthy event happening in your town and post it online. Or you might videotape a similar event and post it on a site such as YouTube. (Mark Glaser, 2007).

With the rise of the World Wide Web in the 1990s, anyone could set up a personal home page to share their thoughts with the world. For instance, at Anybody can become a citizen journalist by using new media technology and post their stories on any news site, online forum, or weblog. But what do you think of their stories?

Can we accept their stories as news? How about their credibility as a professional journalist?

Does the citizen journalist discredit the profession? Discuss

ACTIVITY 7.3

Indymedia, anyone can share photos, text and video with other activists and the world. By early 2000, journalism „by the people" began to flourish, enabled in part by emerging Internet and networking technologies, such as weblogs, chat rooms, message boards, wikis, and mobile computing. Besides that, media for citizen journalism can be classified as follows: 1. Audience participation (such as user comments attached to news stories, personal blogs, photos or video footage captured from personal mobile camera, or local news written by residents of a community).

2. Independent news and information websites.

3. Full-fledged participatory news sites.

4. Collaborative and contributory media sites.

5. Other kinds of "thin media." (mailing lists, email newsletters).

6. Personal broadcasting sites (video broadcast sites such as KenRadio).

This term gained attention after 9/11 where many ordinary people became onthe-spot witnesses to the attacks and their stories and images became a major part of the story. In Malaysia, we can read many weblogs written and watch videos posted in YouTube by ordinary people and the popular topics always involve politics especially since the general election of 2008.

NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGY AND ADVERTISING

Advertising expenditure is one of the most important revenue components of the mass media business and an essential economic indicator because it contributes significantly to the economic growth. Based on MCMC, Free-To-Air (FTA) TV adex in Malaysia is worth RM1.2 billion as of October 2006 and an annualised RM1.4 billion for 2006, while ASTRO's pay-TV services have annualised adex of RM119.4 million. For the first quarter of 2010, adex in Malaysia grew 21 per cent to RM2.2 billion.

Table 7.2: Malaysia’s Advertising Expenditure Compared To Other Countries.

Audience advertising has become part of our lives since a long time ago. We are familiar with the advertisements when we watch our favourite programmes. We often listen to ads on the radio while we drive. We also see many ads when we read newspapers and magazines. Radio, television, newspapers, and magazines are the main advertisement media used by advertisers to send their messages about products or services. With this media, we do not have any choice other than accepting all the advertisements broadcasted to us.

The growth of new media such as the Internet, multimedia products, and interactive television, has provided advertisers with new communication channels to send messages to their target audience. They have to use this new media technology as one of the advertisement mediums to reach new media audiences. The new media audience, especially the younger generation, are different from audiences in old media. They are more active and like to have control. This group spend their time online longer than the older generation use the old media such as television, radio or newspapers.

7.3.1 Internet Advertising

Advertising has blossomed with new media technology. It fills the pages of search engines and portal websites. The Internet has started to compete with old media for a share of some major advertiser’s marketing budget. According to Carat Media Service (M) Sdn Bhd, the Malaysian adex for Internet and television recorded the highest year-on-year growth of 31 per cent each, while free-to-air television share of the advertising pie went up a significant three points to 36 per cent for the first quarter of 2010.

Since the Internet acts as a place for connectivity, information, entertainment, and buying and selling goods, advertisers rapidly migrate to the Internet as one of the marketing strategies. The Internet has both features of print and electronic media because it can convey messages electronically and it is able to display moving or static images. Furthermore, the Internet can reach a global audience and the interactive nature of Internet makes it a great medium to send any message and get feedback or response easily from the audience.

Internet advertising·or online advertising·is a form of promotion that uses the Internet and the web to deliver marketing messages to attract customers. The various types are as follows:

Table 7.3: Types of Online Advertising.

Search engine results pages (SERP)	The listing of web pages returned by a search engine in response to a keyword query. It may contain advertisements. This is how commercial search engines fund their operations. Sometimes these advertisements are displayed on the right hand side of the page as small classified style ads.
Banner ads	A form of advertising on web. It entails embedding an advertisement into a web page. The advertisement is constructed from an image, JavaScript program or multimedia object employing technologies such as Java, Shockwave or Flash. This banner usually consist animation, sound, or video to maximize presence.
E-mail advertisement	A form of direct marketing which uses e-mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. Can be divided into two: 1. Advertisements whereby recipient has asked to receive emails such as notification of publication of the news,books from certain publishers. 2. Unsolicited mass e-mail advertisement, or spam.
Pop-up ads	A form of online advertising on the web intended to attract web traffics or capture e-mail addresses. Pop-ups are generally new web browser windows to display advertisemen.
Social networks advertising	A form of online advertising that focuses on social networking sites likes Facebook, MySpace, Tagged, and Friendster.
Interstitial ads	It refers to web advertisements that are displayed before or after an expected content page. This type of ads are often to display advertisement or confirm the user's age.
Online classified advertising	Like most forms of printed media, the classified ad has found its way to the Internet. Internet classified ads tend to be longer and more readily searchable. Craigslist.org was one of the first online classified sites, and has grown to become the largest classified source, bringing in over 14 million unique visitors a month according to comScore Media Metrix.
Mobile ads	An SMS text or multimedia message sent to a cell phone.

With so many types of online advertising, sometimes those ads annoy the audiences. This is due to some websites using large numbers of advertisements, including flashing banners that distract the Internet user, and some have misleading images. Many ads try to shift users to using the advertisers' website by clicking on the ads displays on the website. But, as new media audience, many of such advertisements can just be ignored because we can control which ads we want to see and which we do not want.

ACTIVITY 7.4

As a new media user, what do you think about online or Internet advertising? Is this new form of advertising a good tactic to send messages and attract userÊs attention? What are the advantages and disadvantages compared to traditional advertising in mass media?

7.4       NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGY AND PUBLIC RELATIONS

New media technology has created a more open, transparent and interactive society. Media organisations and their audience can now check each other’s activities and motives. And obviously, public relations (PR) have to keep pace with this technology development in every sector in their PR tactic which generally involves mediated communication, interpersonal communication, and social activities. PR involves practices of managing communication between organisation and its public. It concerns several discipline including media relations, corporate communication, financial PR, consumer PR, crisis PR, industry relations, and government relations. Generally, PR is used to build connection with employees, customers, investors, or general public

7.4.1 Media Communication Technology and PR PR involves internal and external communication. In internal communication, serving and informing the members is usually done by using internal media such as follows:

1. Association publication ă magazines or bulletin.

2. Business and professional magazine advertising and publicity.

3. Direct mail messages.

4. Community public relations plans for members companies or employees.

5. Personal contact by PR staff representatives.

In the practice of PR, the PR practitioners usually use press releases and media kits for external communication in spreading information to gain public awareness or generate positive press on behalf of the organisation. The press also has been used as the medium for PR practitioners to seek publicity and press coverage for their clients. The other widely used print media are brochures, newsletters, and annual reports.

The Internet now allows data sharing and communication in large quantities. Even those who are not computer literate do not have problems accessing and sharing information on the Internet. Although the Internet is not a requirement or an essential utility, more and more people approach the Internet. There is no doubt that traditional media still exists and is required as information outlets. However, with the Internet people do not have problems to get constantly updated information. In fact, the comfort factor in its usage is also increasing.

The traditional method of PR still remains as the central daily duties to what PR practitioners do. However, as the Internet grows, it has now become one of the important tools in PR.

The existence of e-mail, IMs, web pages, cell phone and other Internet-based communication technologies had changed the way PR practitioners, individuals, and organizations communicate with each other. The technology also changes the way how people get information about anything around them. This has affected the methods used in PR to create and maintain relationship with the public.

The ability to influence the public depends on the credibility of a message and reputation of the organisation. Therefore, media is not an option to PR practitioners, but a necessity. It is important for them to control the flow of information and manage the relationship with the public. Thus, the use of media and communication technology as PR methods or tactics is very important to reach their public and gain their feedbacks. And new media technology has brought about a paradigm shift in the way PR communication works. It has transformed communication from a monologue into a dialogue with the audiences.

7.4.2 The Use of Social Media as PR Tool

With the advancement of technology from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0, new media is changing and evolving into a new form of social media which is further strengthened with a combination of three main elements, namely technology, conversation, and sharing information. Web 2.0 refers to second generation web development and it is often associated with social media applications. With this social media, audiences of new media are now able to present themselves and their interest in the social platform and be able to engage with others.

Social media can be defined as the integrated activities in technology and social interaction. This new media technology differs from traditional media because the media industry or audience may be directly involved by either making additions, comments, and even editing an item. In addition, the media is also relatively inexpensive and is a tool that can be accessed by anyone. This media is constantly changing over time, and is therefore available in various forms or applications, including weblogs, wikis, social networking, photo and video sharing, and others.

Apart from newspapers, television, and radio, social media is now being used in PR. It has changed traditional PR into something interesting and challenging. PR through social media can be executed by using various kinds of application. The choice depends on the particular need of PR and its objectives.

(a) Podcast

Podcasts can be a great PR and marketing tool because it is cheap to produce. It allows clients to promote their products, technology, services and methodology directly to their customers as well as the media and the blogosphere. A podcast could be part of a tradeshow PR campaign where the client introduces a new technology or wants to be part of the latest trade show buzz. A series of podcasts on one particular issue can also support a companyÊs sales campaign and its issues management.

(b) Social Networking As more contacts are added to social network and we are able to see those contacts, we just might find some very useful personalities. Some might be reporters or analysts, others might be future prospects. We might also be introduced to graphic designers or photographers who are good contacts to have in our line of business. Sometimes we can experiment by pitching a story through a social networking site such as Facebook or LinkedIn. This can be done directly (through your network) or through another contact. Social networking will help PR practitioners keep in touch with past and future clients who do not communicate frequently.

(c) RSS (Really Simple Syndication) Major wire services such as PRWeb, PR Newswire and Business Wire offer RSS-enabled press releases. They will automatically offer a form of client’s press release as part of an RSS feed. With RSS, we also can subscribe to news feeds that cover topics of interest to clients. With RSS, we can monitor any online source ă from the online editions of major newspapers and magazines to a number of blogs that are relevant to your clients. It will help us to figure out the most talked about issues and who are commenting on what topics.

(d) Weblogs Weblogs can help clients promote their products and services, and participate in dialogues related to their products and services as well as convey the image of a pioneer and leader and sustain contact with important user groups and other blogs. Besides that, blogs can be a good place to create and maintain relationships with bloggers who are important to the clients and with those who drive conversations in the PR industry. Discussion can be done via comments and it can be knowledgeable and informative to PR specialists and clients.

(e) Social Bookmarking Social bookmarking sites have become an increasingly popular way to locate, classify, rank and share Internet resources through the practice of tagging. Currently, the most popular social bookmarking site is del.icio.us, which allows us to tag any web content that we find and share it with other del.icio.us users - and even pitch journalists.

7.6       NEW TECHNOLOGY AND BROADCAST.

The new media technologies keep developing into new forms including digitalisation, convergence, and broadband. These developments have an impact on the whole mass communication field, including broadcasting. With new media technology, most broadcasting networks are now connected by air. Broader frequency has been used for FM radio and television.

7.5.1 Cable and Satellite Technology.

In the beginning, the broadcasting sector used centralised networks, in the form of transmitters to send sound, images, and text to reach the audiences. However, this has limitations. Since then we have seen the development of the technology of coaxial cable and fibreglass cable which managed to solve the problem.

Nowadays, digitalisation has expanded the services of television and radio channels especially with the use of satellite and small dish antennas. Subscription and pay television has been introduced to us. For instance ASTRO, Malaysia's sole satellite television operator owned by MEASAT Broadcast Network Systems, offers many programmes to subscribers.

The development of video, cable and satellite technology offers more options to us as the audience as well as to content providers. With this technology, more content can be offered for our selection. Not only are we able to just receive all programmes that are offered, but we can select the best programmes that we want.

ACTIVITY 7.5

Nowadays, we have a choice to watch or listen to our favourite program online. There are many websites providing online content and we can access it anytime, anywhere. For instance we can find our favourite programmes via YouTube or we can even watch any Japanese or Korean drama via Mysoju. What do you think about this phenomenon?

7.5.2 Broadcasting and the Internet.

The introduction of Internet broadband has enabled broadcasters to provide streaming videos which have a greater demand among the new media audience. Furthermore, the convergence element in this new media technology can be made available through any transmission medium such as mobile telephone, mp3, and computer. This has dismantled the distinction between the telecommunications, computer, and broadcasting sectors.

This is seen as a challenge to the public broadcaster who concentrated on television and radio services that were allocated by the state to provide service to the people. The changing landscape in broadcasting creates a new competitive environment. In Malaysia, we see the rush in all the channels to go online in order to reach wider audiences.

With the new media technology, especially with the Internet, broadcast products are not only watched on television. Television and radio programming are available on the Web through the use of technologies such as Real Audio and Video and QuickTime. This facility is fully utilised by all media. For instance, Media Prima uses a website for each of their television channels to manage relationship marketing with new media audiences. Through it, people can watch any episode of local drama that they want or that they had missed at any time. Through websites such as TV3, the public can watch drama series or any episode of the drama that was shown like Saka, Manjalara, Spa Q, Kaber Hero Kaber Zero, Kalbar, Pontianak, or Anak. They can also watch dramas that had been aired recently on television via that website such as Keliwon, Segalagalanya Kuteruma, Bionik, Mr Mom, and Kala Hati.

With this new technology, we can also watch dramas online for free through the Malaysia entertainment and lifestyle portal, gua.com.my (GUA), which was officially launched on 11 September 2007. On 23 October, 2007, GUA launched Kerana Karina, the first Malaysian online drama. This series of 20 4-minutes episodes was a new achievement in the country and was recorded in the Malaysia Book of Records.

In Korea, in order to clinch the leading position in the new media environment, Korean Broadcasting System (KBS) participated in new media broadcasting. They launched Internet news online in 1994 and offered various broadband services such as video on demand. KBS also provided mobile Internet services, distributing various mobile content such as interactive data broadcasting and mobile news services.

With new media technology, broadcast content can easily transform and transfer from one form to another. It can be recorded and kept in tapes, VCDs or DVDs. It can also be uploaded to the Internet and distributed or shared with everyone. Thus, nowadays we can find any programme easily without limitation of time like we have with television or the radio.

THOUGHTS ON THE FUTURE OF NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGY

New media technology will keep developing and changing. Its use is not an option, but a must, especially in production and distribution of media content and mass communication.

Today’s trend shows that collaborative network is taking place whenever we see social media such as social networking sites and weblogs. It has been used for both personal networking and for collaborative work on the Internet.

This media is easier to use, and it is cheaper and has multimedia capability. This tends to make it the preferred channel for citizen reporting, for the publishing of individually or collaboratively produced content. Mobile devices such as cell phones will be the main device of the new media technology and it will become more direct and personal to the users.

Furthermore, new media technology will no longer refer to technology only. It is no longer the realm of those that know computer programming and those that know how to use the hardware the best. It will be more about culture. This is because new media audiences are more likely to use this media when expressing themselves and sharing their thoughts.

Media practitioners should listen to those that create and lead culture. That can be anyone including artists, academicians, those in government, in politics and in the civic sector. The environment is for everyone and everybody can participate. It is a culture of inclusion. Thus, it will create more understanding if people engage in it rightly, but it can also create misunderstanding in some cases.

ACTIVITY 7.6

What do you think about the future of new media technology?

What new development will we have?

Will this technology eliminate all the old media or is it a complement to old media?

• New media technology plays a vital role to some of us and has become part of our lives.

• The Internet has become the journalist’s medium. Through new media technology, journalists can now produce stories using whatever modalities involving text, images, video, and graphic for a particular story.

• New media such as Internet, multimedia products, and interactive television has provided advertisers with new communication channels to send messages to the target audience.

• Internet advertising, is a form of promotion that uses the Internet and the web to deliver marketing messages to attract customers.

• The existence of e-mail, IMs, web pages, cell phone and other Internet-based communication technologies have changed the way PR practitioners, individuals, and organisations communicate with each other.

• Digitalisation has expanded the services of television and radio channels especially with the use of satellite and small dish antennas.

• The development of video, cable and satellite technology offers more options to us as the audience as well as to content providers. Advertising Broadcast Journalism Mass Communication Public Relations Social Media

1. What kind of new media technology has been used in journalism nowadays?

2. There are many types of Internet advertising. State all the types that you can.

3. How is new media technology used in broadcasting?

4. Give an example of how this new media technology have been used in public relations:

(a) Podcasts;

(b) Blogs;

(c) RSS; and

(d) Social networking.

1. New media technology has been used widely as a tool in mass communication, including in journalism. Explain how this technology affects the journalists.

2. Discuss the use of the Internet in broadcasting.

3. The use of media in PR is not an option but a must. Discuss.

4. Explain the differences between traditional advertising and Internet advertising.