Media Studies – New Media

Today we continued our Introduction to Media Studies module by looking at new media and the technology it uses.

Old Media is things like newspapers, magazines, print based-publishing, film, television, radio, photography, advertising, etc.

New Media is:

 “a movement away from traditionally based old media styles of products and consumer consumption, towards a post-modern approach of bricolage (a mix) to produce newer meanings for the producer/consumer/end user”

This New Media moves away from Modernism to Postmodernism. There was a key debate from the 1970s where regimes and thinking of the past are abandoned, and new ways of examining and investigating theories are put forward.

New Media has intensified processes of globalisation (a theory we looked at earlier in the module).  In terms of media, this means that boundaries of state are dissolved in terms of trade, corporate organisations, customs and cultures, and identities and beliefs.

In the Western World there is a move away from an industrial age to one of information.

Some characteristics of defining New Media:

• Digital
• Compressed/Small
• Editable
• Fast
• Interactive
• Networked
• Virtual
• Simulated
• Hypertextual (outside the box)

Types of New Media

• Internet
• Mobile Phones
• Games Consoles
• iPod/MP3 Players
• DVD
• Digital Cinema (revamped old media)
• Digital Radio
• CD’S
• New Media Art

We then took out mobiles and laptops and played around with them discussing the endless possibilities we could achieve with the technology we had on us. I took a photo on my phone and uploaded to Facebook.

Case Study: Blair Witch Project

We went onto the Blair Witch Project Site and discussed how originally when the film came out it went viral on the internet that this film was real. It was an advertising campaign to get people excited but it was ground-breaking and the first time this was done and was really effective at gaining interest in the film.

Of course, the film isn’t real, but it was popular through the uses of new media.

 

Official Website: http://www.blairwitch.com/

New Media cannot function without Old Media as a reference point. It uses theories of interconnectivity with other forms of communication and takes a bricolage effect – a mix – to bring new meanings to media. It is aimed at individual consumption over mass audience and is more interactive – we choose what we want to investigate with more ease of use.

New Media – groundbreaking!