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New Media

Sentient – able to perceive or feel things.

Artificial Intelligence – the theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks normally requiring human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between languages.

To start off with, prioritise the notion of CHANGE & TRANSFORMATION as a way of thinking about NEW MEDIA which can be linked to the key ideas of a media syllabus. For example,

  1. the transformation of social interaction (audiences);
  2. the transformation of individual identity (audiences and representation);
  3. the transformation of institutional structures (industry); and the changes in textual content and structure (language).
  4. The transformation of audience consumption
  • Speed
  • Access
  • Retrieval
  • Storage
  • Time
  • Space

Alex Krotoski: The Virtual Revolution

she looks at the pioneering work of Vannevar Bush – ‘As we may Think‘ (1945) that describes a memory machine that would make knowledge (and thereby understanding?) more accessible.

TOPICNOTE / COMMENT
The Printing Press (Gutenburg) in the Medieval period mid 1400’sthe impact of new technology
Impact of new technology in South Korea as a result of promoting greater digital interaction (speed, connectivity, spread etc)mental health
internet addiction? Choices made?
‘A world without consequences’
‘Senses over meaning’
On-line / digital connection statsAccording to recent social media data, the number of people using social media worldwide is 4.59 billion—which equates to about 57 percent of the total global population.

Reports estimate that the number of global smartphone users will continue to increase and hit 6.8 billion by 2023.

In 2023, the number of smartphone users in the world today is 6.92 Billion, which translates to 86.41% of the world’s population owning a smartphone (Source)

8.39 hours is the average daily use for screens, ages 13-24.

Facebook is still the leading social media. 2.93 billion users.

16 million new members on Netflix during the pandemic.
Theodore VailThe Network effect
Norbert Weiner Loop TheoryLoop Theory – predictive behaviour
But is behaviour shaped and altered through networking and digital communications (pushing / pulling
)

Issues around privacy and individual psychology (mental health / wellbeing) and the environment

Virtual worlds / virtual identities (hypperreality, simulation, implosion – Jean Baudrillard)

(Judith Butler ‘gender performance / David Gauntlett, Anthony Giddens etc ‘fluid & multiple identities’

The
Robin Dunbar – The Dunbar NumberThe Dunbar number suggests that connectivity for individuals, communities or groups is typically 5 o 6, with an upper limit of 150.
So who benefits from greater connectivity?
 Companies, organisations, institutions – ‘small elites dominate’ (Andrew Kean)
Clay ShirkyAmerican writer, consultant and teacher on the social and economic effects of Internet technologies and journalism.

Argued audience behaviour has progressed from the passive consumption of media texts to a much more interactive experience with the products and each other. Source (Media Studies Website)

Clay Shirky shows how Facebook, Twitter and TXTs help citizens in repressive regimes to report on real news, bypassing censors (however briefly). The end of top-down control of news is changing the nature of politics.
Vannavar Bushassociative not linear thinking
the demise of long form reading

So changing rules for logic, rationality, truth, understanding, knowledge.

Baudrillard implosion (a culture imploding in on itself rather than expanding and developing?)
Tim BernersLeethe inventor / creator of the World Wide Web – developed and given to everybody for free?!! Why? What did he hope it would achieve? Is he satisfied or disappointed with how it has developed and made an impact on society?

Berners-Lee understood that the Web needed to be unfettered by patents, fees, royalties, or any other controls in order to thrive
Marshall McLuhanThe Global Village – ‘a sophisticated interactive culture’
The impact on political and economic decision making
Conclusions, suggestions, reflections and predictions

B.F Skinner:  American psychologist, behaviorist, author, inventor, and social philosopher.

  • The theory of B.F. Skinner is based upon the idea that learning is a function of change in overt behavior. Changes in behavior are the result of an individual’s response to events (stimuli) that occur in the environment

New Media

POTENTIAL QUESTIONS

Media products are shaped by the economic and political contexts in which they are created.
To what extent does an analysis of your online, social and participatory Close Study Products (The Voice and Teen Vogue) support this view?
[25 marks]

Media effects theories argue that the media has the power to shape the audience’s thoughts and behaviour.
How valid do you find the claims made by effects theories? You should refer to two of the Close Study Products (Tomb Raider Anniversary, Metroid: Prime 2 Echoes, Sims Freeplay) in your answer.
[25 marks]

The target audiences for video games change because of the historical and economic contexts in which they are produced.
To what extent does an analysis of the Close Study Products Tomb Raider: Anniversary and The Sims FreePlay support this statement?
[25 marks]

Media producers must respond to changing social and cultural contexts to maintain audiences. To what extent does an analysis of the online close study products do the voice and teen vogue support this view [25 marks]

New Media

To start off with I would like to prioritise the notion of CHANGE & TRANSFORMATION as a way of thinking about NEW MEDIA which can be linked to the key ideas of a media syllabus. For example,

  1. the transformation of social interaction (audiences);
  2. the transformation of individual identity (audiences and representation);
  3. the transformation of institutional structures (industry); and the changes in textual content and structure (language).
  4. The transformation of audience consumption

In summary, this could be described as the changing nature of symbolic interaction and a lot of the work on this blog is essentially discussing this concept.

Dan Gillmor is a useful theorist to look at, you can read his book We Media by clicking on this link – provides an overview of how new media technologies have had an impact on relationship between citizens and government / institutional power.

New technology and media developments:

  • Speed
  • Knowledge
  • Time
  • Space/communication
  • Understanding
  • Access
  • Participation
  • Reality
  • Privacy
  • Choice
  • Interactivity
  • Storage
  • Retrieval

Suggested Essay Structure?

Remember to focus on key issues around new media – privacy, knowledge, understanding, education, friendship, behaviour, thoughts, attitudes, beliefs, politics, economics, employment, war, conflict, food, the environment, space, science (essentially social change)

  1. Overview: New media always creates change (printing press, telegram etc)
  2. Q: so how has recent technology changed (society, individuals, organisations, ideas, beliefs etc etc)
  3. CSP 1 – show knowledge of CSP
  4. characteristics of new media (in reference to CSP 1)
  5. theoretical / conceptual analysis of new media (loop theory, network theory, Dunbar number, McLuhan, Krotoski)
  6. Critically thinking about new media (Baudrillard, McLuhan, Krotoski, B. F. Skinner, Zuboff, Lanier – are all essentially critical of new media technologies. But Gauntlett, Shirky, Jenkins are all very positive about new media technologies)
  7. CSP 2 – show knowledge
  8. Draw parallels and conclusions
  9. Suggest future pathways / developments

Revision

CSPS

The Close Study Products (CSPs) will address the requirement that students engage with products
which:
• possess cultural, social and historical significance
• reflect and illuminate the theoretical framework underlying the study of media together with
the theoretical perspectives associated with them
• illustrate a full range of media products in terms of perceived quality, form and structure
• provide rich and challenging opportunities for interpretation and in-depth critical analysis,
enabling students to develop a detailed understanding of how the media communicate
meanings and how audiences respond
• cover different historical periods and different global settings
• be intended for different audiences
• demonstrate emerging, future developments of the media
• cover examples of media students would not normally engage with
• at least one media product produced before 1970
• at least one media product produced for a non-English speaking audience
• at least one media product produced outside the commercial mainstream
• at least one media product targeting, or produced by, a minority group.

notes

3.4.1.1 Semiotics
Semiotics:

• Sign
• Signifier
• Signified
• Dominant signifier
• Icon
• Index
AQA A-level Media Studies 7572. A-level exams June 2019 onwards. Version 1.2 24 January 2019
Visit aqa.org.uk/7572 for the most up-to-date specifcation, resources, support and administration 11
• Code
• Symbol
• Anchorage
• Ideology
• Paradigm
• Syntagm.
Barthes’ ideas and theories on semiotics:
• Signification
• Denotation
• Connotation
• Myth.
3.4.1.2 Narratology
Narratology:
• Narrative Codes
• Narration
• Diegesis
• Quest narrative
• ‘Character types’
• Causality
• Plot
• Masterplot.
Todorov’s ideas and theories on narratology:
• Narrative structure
• Equilibrium
• Disruption
• New equilibrium.
3.4.1.3 Genre theory as summarised by Neale
• Conventions and rules
• Sub-genre
• Hybridity
• Genres of order and integration
• ‘Genre as cultural category’.
3.4.1.4 Structuralism
Lévi-Strauss’ ideas and theories on structuralism:
• Binary oppositions
• Mytheme
• Cultural codes
• Ideological reading
• Deconstruction.
12 Visit aqa.org.uk/7572 for the most up-to-date specifcation, resources, support and administration
3.4.1.5 Postmodernism
Postmodernism:
• Pastiche
• Bricolage
• Intertextuality
• Implosion.
Baudrillard’s ideas and theories on postmodernism:
• Simulacra
• Simulation
• Hyperreality.