Flew What’s New About New Media

I think where Flew was going with this article is that new media and the technology surrounding it is constantly improving and changing with different forms and distributions and storage. For example instead of buying a CD or a DVD, people can now download this media on a file in there computer or purchase it off of a program like Netflix.

He also claims that new media and its broad options doesn’t answer the question of why do we need these new increasing media in the first place when we were originally content with past results? Going further into the document Flew mentions that companies are starting to merge and work together forming alliances as the rise of new media technology increases. Everyone wants their hands in the pot of gold and the only way to maintain and keep your business at its peak is to involve yourself with other large corporations. In the 80’s and 90’s the telecommunications businesses starting doing just this, and went from public monopolies to a “complex range of value-added network services” as Flex said.

Citation:

Flew, Terry. New Media: An Introduction. South Melbourne, Vic.: Oxford UP, 2005. Print.

Flew New Media Culture

In Flew’s description of New Media Culture, he explains that for new media to move forward from old it must have the perspectives of different ideas, values and most importantly, cultures. He states that to properly explain what cultural technology is, he must break it down into three separate definitions,

“Understanding technologies not simply as physical objects, tools, and artefacts, but also in terms of the content they produce and distribute, and the systems of knowledge and social meaning that accompany their use and development.”(Flew, New Media:An Introduction page 21)

He also refers to McLuhan explaining how he would stress on the cultural impact on media. McLuhan believed cultural content was naturally planted within the technology and that it influences “how” we think not just “what” we think.

Different Cultures

Replying to Classmates

Going through my classmates posts on their Word Press’ was very enlightening and informative. Explaining copywriting and elaborating on the impact of new media in our modern world and how we still are using old media to benefit the newer material. My classmates were very good at finding great examples to clarify their post. They broke down every paper we read and every video we watched to a point that anyone can completely understand the points being made by the authors.

The pages I replied on are here:

http://jcher021.students.digitalodu.com/?p=47#comments

http://mquer005.students.digitalodu.com/?p=24#comments

http://vsimo001.students.digitalodu.com/?p=69#comments

http://mblac018.students.digitalodu.com/?p=47#comment-13
(It seems I posted two seperate replies because I couldn’t locate the first one)

http://rschn009.students.digitalodu.com/?p=29#comments

Manovich

Manovich goes into great lengths to define media and new media and make sure readers understand that although they are intertwined they are far from similar. As you go in further he explains that modern media is now that main objective of our community and although it  has taken over the old media it still needs it to further grow. For example, the German engineer named Konrad Zuse who created the first working digital computer in his parents living room with the use of a movie film tape to control the programs. This shows how old media makes contributes to the building and creation of new media. He also elaborated on another form of new media which is called Automation. One of the most popular and “low-level” automations (as he would call it) was Photoshop.

Adobe Photoshop

Photoshop allows you to fix and edit photos that you’ve taken and turn it into something creatively different like an old photo or a painting by Van Gogh or another famous artist. This is another way the old media has been enhanced by newer media.

 

Citations:

Manovich, Lev. The Language of New Media. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2002. Print.

Copyright, Fair Use, and Creative Commons

After watching all the videos on copyright, fair use, and creative commons I learned many things about copyright laws and what you can and cannot do. The laws are enforced so that people can have access to these creative ideas without actually taking the ideas for themselves and giving credit to the people who produced the ideas. Thats where the fair use policy comes into play; this limits what the public can copy from the author and his work. The author can establish how limited he wants his work to be copied, from not being copied at all to allowing the public to openly use it. Creative commons helps organize these rules and laws into a method that helps people use and share work without worrying about copyright laws being broken.

One example of recognizing copyright laws that I go through all the time is bibliographies in all of my papers. I always give credit to the works of many people who were involved with the creation of my papers and essays. Without their ideas and creativity I would have nothing to write about or discuss. Its important to recognize those that help keep your work afloat. Another example would be how my friend downloads music illegally through different media sharing programs. It is illegal because he is taking the ideas and work of an author without paying for it. This is becoming an even larger issue now than ever due to the vast growing media that refuses to slow down.

Bolter

This article by Bolter explains that our culture is aimed towards perfecting everything and in doing so using remediation. Remediation takes old media and multiplying it, in doing so this helps create newer media in the process. Mediation has been around for a very long time but has just been recreated or upgraded since then, according to Bolter. Remediation is, in a sense, gives an ongoing creative spark for new ideas for media in the future.

Old iPhone Original

New iPhone 5

He starts off by bringing up the movie Strange Days, a futuristic movie which characters use a machine called “the wire” to experience a “continuous, first-person-view shot” (Introduction: The Double Logic of Remediation page 4) as stated by Bolter. The movie led to an explanation of how our culture wants to reproduce the same media at the same time delete it so we can move in a positive and constructive direction. This also means, sometimes when companies or businesses introduce a new media technology it could just be the same thing with re-modifications or refashioned differently instead of inventing a whole brand new software or database. But Bolter explains that these add-ins are just as important as the actual technology itself like for example the Internet or the World Wide Web. This media was basically data files and texts but over the years the upgrades have led to marketing, advertising, scholarships, personal expression, business, etc.

 

Citations:

Introduction. The Double Logic of Remediation. N.p.: MIT, n.d. Print.

Jenkins

In this paper, Jenkins has clarified on how this world is now grounded by technology. Explaining that people during at this time rely the internet and media more than we realize. Media has been evolving into a larger scale different from how it was before. It has been separated into two different definitions; old media and new media. Old media can be defined as anything before the new media of the internet existed, as in newspapers, cable televisions, telephones, books, radios. New media has a broader means of communication through the limitless world of the internet.

Jenkins also explains that children are exposed to popular culture at such a young age which allows them to attain these skills that most adults are still learning. Jenkins goes into further detail about this by explaining The Participation Gap, which is “the unequal access to the opportunities, experiences, skills, and knowledge that will prepare youth for full participation in the world of tomorrow.”(Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century page 3) Although there are positive benefits to children adapting to new media at an early age, there can be misguided judgement from this new culture. Napster Generation” is the name given to youth have capitalized on Appropriation, “the ability to meaningfully sample and remix media content.” (Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century page 32) In doing so, they are stealing money from music companies and artists everywhere all because they are influenced by the new technological culture of their time.

 

Citations:

Jenkins, Henry. Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2009. Print.

 

First in class assignment

Neb Zewdie

Digital Writing

 

 

I feel like the video touched on a lot of subjects within Digital Writing. It explains through the music and visuals like t-shirts and acting out different uses of the technology and writing. Explaining that we are the “now” generation and within this generation we become more advanced in technology which directly influences how we write. We are not just writing for ourselves and the people around us anymore, but now we are writing for the whole world to see when we post things on forums, blogs, and websites.

 

I believe Digital Writing is an important part of today’s society. The fact that its digital helps connect people globally, and brings together a world that has been separated up until now. Digital writing is the main subject of many different medias within technology. It is within our daily lives and constantly growing to a point where now it is a necessity.