'We are in a moment of transition. A moment where the old media system is dying and the new media system is being born.'
These words from Henry Jenkins refer to the emergence of web 2.0 and the major effect that it has had on media moving offline to online. Looking at both sides of the argument, there are positives and negatives of the move for the audience which I will discuss.
One of the internet's most notable critics, Andrew Keen, asks us to transcend the childlike fascination that we have with the baubles of the internet and look further to the dysfunction, inegalitarian, constantly surveilled world that we have been progressively building with digital tools. He cites three fundamental problems that he has with the internet and its progression, challenging the view that the internet is a 'borderless community' where walls of inequality and hierarchies are dismantled and arguing that the networks of power that exist in our lives exist too on the internet.
The first issue that he argues is that the internet is not creating jobs, it's destroying them. He gives the example of WhatsApp, which is a company of 55 people that sold for $19billion. Also, he discusses Kodak which employed 40,000 people and went bankrupt. In Keen's view, the unemployment crisis is 'bound with the digitalisation of the world' and this is a negative effect that the move to online media has had on the audiences.
The gap between the rich and the poor is ever-growing, and this is another problem that Keen highlights with the internet. He claims that the disappearance of the 'middle' is a real problem and that the internet, with its 'winner takes all' approach, is central to this.
Lastly, and perhaps most discomforting, is Keen's fear that we are constantly being spied on. He quotes Mark Zuckerberg in saying that we wants to 'wire the world.' Perhaps adding weight to Keen's worry is the point that the NSA can analyse your communication data if you are so much as 'three hops' from a suspect of a crime. In other words, people who talk to people who talk to people who talk to you. On Facebook, the average number of people who are 'three hops' from us is 1334978.
Another argument against the idea that the move to online media has been entirely positive for the audience is the idea of interactivity versus passivity. Contrary to the social thought in the 1970s and 1980s, active participation has become vital to internet survival and in an effort to be part of something, we are adding to the global economy. As Jodi Dean has written, “our deepest commitments—to inclusion, equality and participation within a public—bind us to practices whereby we submit to global capital”. On every level we are urged to take part and be actively involved in media in order to be part of something. Convergence has enabled websites to need email addresses to sign up, TV shows implore us to write to them and liking restaurants on Facebook and sharing their page is often a kind gesture and a given if the experience was enjoyable. In Keen's view, audiences are trapped in this participation cult, where online media dominates every aspect of our lives.
Instead of being something that unites people, Evgeny Morozov, a writer for Foreign National, argues that it actually drags people apart. There are more attempts to keep foreign nationals off certain Web properties, for example, digital content available to U.K. citizens via the BBC's iPlayer is "increasingly unavailable to Germans". Unfortunately this is not what the creator of the Web wanted, in fact BurnersLee wrote "I want a web that's open, works internationally, works as well as possible and is not nation-based." His aim for the internet perhaps hasn't materialised by he tirelessly works to make online media a positive force in the lives of the audience.
Many people that that is the move to online media has been a positive move for the audiences of media. Anthony Williams and Don Tapscott, in their book Macrowikinomics, stress that we are at a turning point in every industry and we should forge new solutions and initiatives in every aspect of life. Audiences now have the most powerful tool - social media, which is social production which can be used to achieve self organisation. The internet is reinventing TV, music, radio and education. As William Merrin put it, 'the internet is driving every media form to change'. Social change is in the air, Kony 2012 had 100,000000 views in a week and this led to the US government taking action. Marshall McCluhan wrote that the 'world is now a global village' and this certainly rings true with these recent developments. Another example of the internet helping audiences of everyday people to seek justice is the story of Ian Tomlinson. who was struck by a police man and pushed to the ground and he died moments later in London 2005. The story that the police released was that he died of natural causes and there were no marks on his body. Paul Lewis began investigating and used Twitter as a social arena to find out what happened to him. Many people joined together and gave the little bits of information that they had, in 6 days there were 20 witnesses to what actually happened and eventually justice was served.
Julian McDougall would argue that contemporary media, thanks to Web 2.0, has become “more about the people, less about the media”. An audience centred internet is what Berners-Lee and many others strive for. This view is supported by David Gauntlett who coined the term prosumer. He said 1/3 of people see themselves as broadcasters of their own media online. He supported Charles Leadbeater's idea of you are what you share. He talks a lot about distruptive innovation, which is how the internet brings about new things, reinvigorates our culture and challenges the previously done thing. Claudine Beaumont writes that the advent of the internet has made the world go 'photography mad' because of digital photography and easy sharing. This point of view is supported by Clay Shirky who believes that media is more fluid and transferable now. Users are taking pictures on their phones and posting them instantly to the web, resulting in some memorable images, including the first photos of the plane that crashed in the Hudson river. Audiences are creators, everyone has equal opportunity to get involved and this surely is a positive effect of only media.
Henry Jenkins puts forward the theory of participatory culture, where people share media for the love of it, with no motivation for money. He believes that the internet provides a platform for people to get involved in things, often in the way they're most comfortable. An example of this is the Harry Potter Alliance which was formed online to tackle mistreatment and injustice, influenced by the underlying message in the Harry Potter series to recognise evil and fight it. Interest driven networks like this one provide a vehicle for people to mobilise the skills they learnt online and to do good things with them.
He claims that there is no dead media, only dead delivery techniques. An example of this is the Guardian newspaper, with reducing advertising income and falling sales in the print edition it had to migrate to the web and now aims to be 'woven into the fabric of the internet'. Linking to this, Jenkins details the idea of critical utopianism, where we take what we have and work towards the ideal. He claims that the internet gives audiences the opportunity to do this and drives them to do it.
The internet, from its birth in 1989, has developed vastly, especially since the introduction of Web 2.0. It has created a generation of 'digital natives' as Prensky would say; those who have grown up with the internet and expect their media to be free, fast, portable and converged. Many would say this has been detrimental to our society, that the effects are mostly negative and that the 'machine is us/ing us'. This is an idea from Wesch whereby we teach the 'machine' everything we know and it reshapes our lives in every aspect. Keen, Dean and Morozov all are advocates of this view. On the other side though, theorists such as Jenkins and Gauntlett see the move to online media as a positive move for the audience so far. It is seen as an inclusive, innovative and encouraging tool open to everyone at any time. I personally agree with these theorists, that the internet is positive force in our lives. Gillmor wrote that audiences have been changed by the media and while this is certainly true, I believe that it has been in a positive way.
Many people that that is the move to online media has been a positive move for the audiences of media. Anthony Williams and Don Tapscott, in their book Macrowikinomics, stress that we are at a turning point in every industry and we should forge new solutions and initiatives in every aspect of life. Audiences now have the most powerful tool - social media, which is social production which can be used to achieve self organisation. The internet is reinventing TV, music, radio and education. As William Merrin put it, 'the internet is driving every media form to change'. Social change is in the air, Kony 2012 had 100,000000 views in a week and this led to the US government taking action. Marshall McCluhan wrote that the 'world is now a global village' and this certainly rings true with these recent developments. Another example of the internet helping audiences of everyday people to seek justice is the story of Ian Tomlinson. who was struck by a police man and pushed to the ground and he died moments later in London 2005. The story that the police released was that he died of natural causes and there were no marks on his body. Paul Lewis began investigating and used Twitter as a social arena to find out what happened to him. Many people joined together and gave the little bits of information that they had, in 6 days there were 20 witnesses to what actually happened and eventually justice was served.
Julian McDougall would argue that contemporary media, thanks to Web 2.0, has become “more about the people, less about the media”. An audience centred internet is what Berners-Lee and many others strive for. This view is supported by David Gauntlett who coined the term prosumer. He said 1/3 of people see themselves as broadcasters of their own media online. He supported Charles Leadbeater's idea of you are what you share. He talks a lot about distruptive innovation, which is how the internet brings about new things, reinvigorates our culture and challenges the previously done thing. Claudine Beaumont writes that the advent of the internet has made the world go 'photography mad' because of digital photography and easy sharing. This point of view is supported by Clay Shirky who believes that media is more fluid and transferable now. Users are taking pictures on their phones and posting them instantly to the web, resulting in some memorable images, including the first photos of the plane that crashed in the Hudson river. Audiences are creators, everyone has equal opportunity to get involved and this surely is a positive effect of only media.
Henry Jenkins puts forward the theory of participatory culture, where people share media for the love of it, with no motivation for money. He believes that the internet provides a platform for people to get involved in things, often in the way they're most comfortable. An example of this is the Harry Potter Alliance which was formed online to tackle mistreatment and injustice, influenced by the underlying message in the Harry Potter series to recognise evil and fight it. Interest driven networks like this one provide a vehicle for people to mobilise the skills they learnt online and to do good things with them.
He claims that there is no dead media, only dead delivery techniques. An example of this is the Guardian newspaper, with reducing advertising income and falling sales in the print edition it had to migrate to the web and now aims to be 'woven into the fabric of the internet'. Linking to this, Jenkins details the idea of critical utopianism, where we take what we have and work towards the ideal. He claims that the internet gives audiences the opportunity to do this and drives them to do it.
The internet, from its birth in 1989, has developed vastly, especially since the introduction of Web 2.0. It has created a generation of 'digital natives' as Prensky would say; those who have grown up with the internet and expect their media to be free, fast, portable and converged. Many would say this has been detrimental to our society, that the effects are mostly negative and that the 'machine is us/ing us'. This is an idea from Wesch whereby we teach the 'machine' everything we know and it reshapes our lives in every aspect. Keen, Dean and Morozov all are advocates of this view. On the other side though, theorists such as Jenkins and Gauntlett see the move to online media as a positive move for the audience so far. It is seen as an inclusive, innovative and encouraging tool open to everyone at any time. I personally agree with these theorists, that the internet is positive force in our lives. Gillmor wrote that audiences have been changed by the media and while this is certainly true, I believe that it has been in a positive way.
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