Saturday 24 October 2009

Beyond New: Thinking about Media Change.

Beyond New: Thinking about Media Change.

Media has been one of the most integral part since the evolution of human civilization. Media as the medium to communicate the information and message from one to another has always been a primary force in the process of socialization of the human era. The role of Media in every social, political and economical aspect has undermined a huge influence and had accredited a super power in the development of mankind. Media always has been credited to be the ‘Master’ that controls our systems whatever it can be. As being the ‘Voice of Voiceless’ Media has been one of the most powerful tool since and is till today everywhere omnipresent.



Media has seen a drastic development during its formation from the beginning of cave paintings, drawn maps, stone scripting, ancient writings to the digitized computer technology of 21st century where the concept of ‘ Global Village’ is already scripted. Due to this rapid development in the form of Media, the two words ‘New Media’ and ‘Old Media’ has been created for its broad understanding. It has been hard for the scholars to determine the characteristics and place the different forms of Media within it.

 Newspapers, Television, Telephone, Radio etc that has been surviving since its invention and are even becoming stronger day to day, so are they really the old media?

OR

 Computer, Mobile Phones, Internet, Web 2.0 etc those created later, do they really mean the new media?


These questions always strike the mind of everyone because it’s tough to answer it with in a period of time. Regarding the concept of New Media it has been said that the latest developments in media technologies are termed as the ‘New Media’ but it is not always ideal to say because due to the rapid development in digital technology, the media that we used to say ‘New’ will be outdated and turns to ‘Old’ within no time. The growth in digital technology has been so fast and furious and will be more in upcoming days so I feel the ‘ New Media’ never exists permanently and we can define the Old Media in terms of its period of invention but not by its features. It is because Books has been one of the oldest form of Media but till today the power and strength of Books has never been decreased instead it’s production is in high. So, it is here to understand the sense and the way of evaluating the Media in terms of Old and New.

The concept and notion of New Media is totally bound up with the outcome of Internet and the World Wide Web. After the introduction of internet, there has certainly been a profound change in the Media formation and its processes. The ‘Newness’ given by the internet has been a matter of attraction and interest in the human civilization too which causes the formation of the term New Media. Perhaps there can only be a term to distinguish the old and new form of media i.e. the “interactive media”. It refers to the active participation of the user in it. Every New Media is controlled by the user. This distinguishes that in the new media such as mobile phones and computers the user can control its application and use it by their own understandings whereas in the old media like radio and TV, user cannot change its contents as it is already scripted in it.

Within this development of Media in our surroundings we have seen many changes around. The digitization has been as effective in its process as the concept of New Media has come out through it. The another Convergence has been a major changes in the Media industry which have been a topic to be discussed in the recent years. It is because the convergence leads to the extinction of other forms of Media that may results later the imbalance and a one to one monopoly of a particular media. The remediation strategies (Immediacy and Hypermediacy) have also been the major tools in the process of media changes and the establishment of New Media. Its application and its presentation have always make viewer and audience feel the great deal of understanding and has able to claim the attention as pure experience.

References. 
Hasan, Robert and Thomas, Julian. 2006. The New Media Theory Reader, Open University Press:Maidenhead.
http://mitocw.vocw.edu.vn/NR/rdonlyres/F598EB27-0ACB-43ED-8BC4-4B0AB633CE66/0/Course_CMS_image.jpg
http://richardwilsonauthor.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/radio-image.jpg
http://doctor2008.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/newmedia.jpg

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