CommNewMedia

Four Strands of Innovation

1. Computing innovation 2. Computer networking through shared codes to cloud computing 3. Connective software: social media 4. Infrastructure: cable, wifi

Nicholas Carr's perspective on learning and technology ("Is Google Making Us Stupid?")

Google teaches people to just skim whatever they are reading ♣ "swiftly moving stream of particles" o says that are brains are actually being rewired to account for the way technology conveys information to us ♣ author feels his brain is being remapped immersing himself into a book or long article used to be easy now concentration starts to drift o information can go in and out of our brains so quickly o because of google we don't really need to learn anymore, rather we can always just google search ♣ our capacity for the kind of deep reading is weakened o the faster we search the web the more links we click - leading google and other companies more opportunities to collect information on us

Technological Determinism

The belief that technology in any given society defines its nature Technology is considered the driving force of culture in a society Technology is mirroring what is already out there Moral panics associated with new tech dystopian notion that teens are addicted to social media and the utopian idea that tech will solve inequality

McLuhan, "Medium is the Message"

The medium is far more significant than the content itself McLuhan pointed out in the 60s media are not just passive channels of info, they supply thought but also shape the process of thought

Commercial surveillance:

Use of sophisticated technology to send tailored ads: o Get information through: ♣ Registration ♣ Online behavior ♣ Third-party data o Personalization of content, interactivity

why might a company or stakeholder prefer self-regulation?

You can use it as part of your brand More freedom to get away with things ♣ This gives you more authority, more control ♣ Modifying your behavior according to these agreed upon codes Content moderation: April the Giraffe: ♣ Livestream of giraffe's birth removed from Youtube "for containing nudity and sexually explicit content"

Internet Regulation: who does it?

o The claim that the internet is either "regulated" or "unregulated" is an unhelpful binary, not simply because it is outdated...but also because it misses out on the complex nature of governance systems that combine market liberalism, state control and a nod toward consensual decision making o Self-regulation is more desirably - where industry modifies its behavior in respond to a set of agree upon codes

Danah Boyd's perspective on internet and social relationships among teens

o The internet mirrors, magnifies, and makes more visible the good, bad and ugly of everyday life." o It's not the technology itself, it's what we as humans do with it o Internet just mirrors what is already there - can make connections better and worse o Teens go to an event with people and then feel compelled to post about it on social media allows them to participate in networked publics o First it was things like email that connected people then evolved social network sites o Affordances shape the mediated environments ♣ Persistence: durability of online expressions and content ♣ Visibility: potential audience who can bear witness ♣ Spread-ability: the ease with which content can be shared ♣ Search-ability: the ability to find content o Teens focus on publics, while adults focus on being networked

Inventing the Web

o Tim-Berners-Lee inventor of the World Wide Web

Trending, sorting (Gillespie)

o Trending - websites collecting information on people based on what they search for - they can they create recommendations for future searches o Trending algorithms are concerned with the how/ when/ what o Evidence that metrics not only describe popularity but also amplify it o When news sources talk about "what is trending" they are giving the text cultural relevancy

• Monoculture (Scott Timburg)

o "While there is plenty of diversity of opinion, of musical style, of offerings in television and movies - the monoculture is as strong as ever." o Meaning that everyone ultimately watches the same stuff because we all have a sense of wanting to be connected to one another o Cyber-utopians believed the internet would offer a wide range of options every bit of niche culture would find its audience and the idea of the mainstream would wither away o While there is plenty of diversity - monoculture is strong as ever the mainstream, rather than fragmenting, has enforced itself in a big way ♣ Log onto twitter and you will be drawn to sports culture no matter what o We all celebrate the same music and movies during award shows the whole country basically knows whats going on

Inventing the internet (McCracken reading)

o A worldwide system of computer networks to talk to other computers o Crovitz on the urban legend that the government launched the internet o Much of what helped the net change everything was invented at PARC and the building blocks of the net graphical user interface ♣ Began at Arpanet (effort of DARPA in late 1960s under Taylor) o Manjoo speculated Corvitz gave more credit to Xerox because its tech led to the web today Corvitz claims that the web isn't the internet (it isn't) ♣ Tim-Berners-Lee inventor of the World Wide Web o Crovitz points out the government didn't create the internet but rather a group of gifts individuals

Algorithms as neutral

o Algorithms take information from previous searches and then suggest future searches and other things you might like o Set of guidelines that describe how to perform a task o Diakopoulous says they are driven by vast troves of data, are the new power brokers in society, both in the corporate world as well as in the government o Every website you visit is created, at the moment you arrive - that means that it's easy for companies to create a different web page for different people

Inequalities in the Gig/On Demand Economy

o Apps/online makes it easier for people to connect with customers proponents argue freedom and flexibility others worry emerging "gig economy" represents a troubling shift where workers face financial instability o Range of providers, casual users who do online tasks in their free time and then the dedicated users who rely on the income they earn from these digital platforms o Those who are gig workers who say it's important come from low-income households/non-white/did not go to college perform physical task motivated by lack of schedule/ job availability o Gig workers can be part time, have flexible schedules

Content Moderation: Who does it? Critiques?

o April the giraffe giving birth online - Michael Baybayan o As social media connect people more than before we now have the "grandma problem" grandparents use services like FB to link with grandkids who are exposed to the internet's dark side o Companies like FB use workers to moderate crude material o Whisper allows people to screen every post in real time other companies moderate only if its been flagged objectionably by its users

• Freemium

o Coined by Fred Wilson basis of the subscription model of media ♣ Can be varying tier of content from free to expensive o The web software and services/some content is free free to the users of the basic version

• Citizen journalism

o Content is available and free 24/7 o Anyone can be a journalist and report anything - record on smartphone and post to places like YouTube o Everyone has an opinion and everyone can get involved in how judicial situations are handled

Key attributes of the internet

o Convergence everyone is on one device now o Interactivity users talk back

Chris Anderson's "Long Tail" hypothesis

o Ultimately everything is free online - we expect not to have to part with money to access digital services ♣ Free redistribution o States we need to turn out attention from the head to the long tail of media markets where millions upon millions of low-volume transactions are now set to be more lucrative than the increasingly unpredictable number of blockbusters ♣ Long tail is efficient and democratic exposes consumers to far more diverse range of content than the traditional media economy ever did • Changes the balance of power inside decision making process in the cultural industries away from hierarchical elites down tot us the new gatekeepers of population/ niche tastes

Humphreys et al.'s arguments about Twitter and "historicizing new media"

o Early diaries = degree of publicness o Narrative style: reflection vs accounting - "mundane and tragic life events are matter of factly reported through writings of historical diarists and micro blogger alike" o This content analysis aims to historicize twitter within a larger historical framework of diaries to better understand twitter and broader communication practice/patterns ♣ Findings suggest that commentary/accounting styles are most popular twitter styles o Diaries and twitter provide a platform for people who might traditionally be excluded from public discourse to have a voice in representing themselves as well as their perceptions of the world around them o Twitter users tweet for themselves but also for others (limited by characters) o Diary users mainly tweet about themselves and their families (limited by size) o Twitter resembles those diaries which were considered social histories for the group - rather than those diaries which only recount the individual's own thoughts and development nor those diaries or ledgers that marked work related tasks only but did not involve any people o Twitter reaches more people than diaries and affords much more interactivity

Three roles for government in regulation

o Enforce standards (content) o Authorize arrangements o Criminalize circumvention (WikiLeaks)

• Gendered differences in self-presentation

o Females: post "cute" pictures, while males post self promotional, references to sexual content and alcohol o Females more concerned about future employers o Differences come from concerns about privacy, harassment, cyber-misogyny o Cultured norms about gender and display "by looking at others' profiles, teens get a sense of what types of presentations are socially appropriate"

Net neutrality

o Freeman: "Regulatory response to the ability of certain providers to restrict or segregate the distribution of content online" o Not simply politicians or programmers, but increasingly, capital that regulates the internet

MTI: "Internet of Dreams" versus reality

o Internet of dreams: o Many thought the internet would change society permanently and irrevocably, inferences derived from the internet's technology o Internet was supposedly engendering a shift from passive consumption to active participation, causing markets to fragment and rendering society more open and egalitarian o Online conversations can be anonymous can get in the way of developing richer interpersonal relationships o Dotcom bubble burst in 2001, reprised mid 2000s, past predictions had been premature o Central to the prophetic tradition is the idea that the internet/digital communication has given birth to the "new economy" ♣ Efficient means of connecting suppliers/producers, helping to compensate for the decline in manufacturing in de-industrializing western societies o Internet levels the playing field between corporate giants and small companies o Internet has changed the interactions between suppliers/producers/consumers ♣ Online retail industry increases o Reality: o Internet's anticipated contribution to the economy was greatly overstated o Did not create a level playing field between small and large enterprises underestimated the advantages of size, larger corporations have more capital gives them a competitive advantage o Amazon became dominant online retailer and Facebook leading social media website o Internet is less subject to state censorship like traditional media o The internet as a component of global understanding

Research streams for "gender and internet"

o Is the internet gendered? earlier content was targeted towards men o Gender differences in online behavior (including linguistic) o Gendered online communities o Mobilizing for social and political causes o Performing gender in online contexts o Gender disparities in tech/ design o "Why Women Rule the Internet" especially when it comes to social and shopping, women rule the internet ♣ companies leveraging girl power o girls dominate visually orientated social media platforms (Instagram, Snapchat) o boys are more likely to play videogames o different ways you can look at this ♣ women as internet creators and technology ♣ language differences ♣ social structure differences

Media convergence

o Is the merging of mass media communication outlets - print, television, radio, the internet along with portable and interactive technologies through various digital media platforms

Government versus governance (MTI)

o It's important to have a limited relation between the government and the internet, to focus the public's imagination on a better solution, not government regulation or even industry self-regulation ♣ An environment where consumers themselves can exercise their power/control their own info o Governance is a flexible form of organization - it is a more expansive/fluid concept than government

Features of mass media versus "new media"

o Mass media audience is much larger o New media: Cappy video, traits that distinguish the two o Audience from one to many, one to one ♣ Can you customize the message? YouTube you can customize ♣ On a public platform (newspaper) you can't customize o Convergence merging of media technologies on a simple platform, made possible by digital code (iPhones are everything - camera, music, TV) o Interactivity consumers/users participate in the conversation ♣ Restaurant goers can post on Yelp

• Catfishing (Gentile - Romantic Deceit)

o Pretending to be someone you are not o Wire Love explains that our romantic expectations can give us false hope and unrealistic anticipations o People can meet online or use online chatting as a way to stay in touch with long distance lovers and friends

"Second Screen"

o Refers to how people aren't just watching shows anymore, they are constantly checking social media at the same time o Successful advertising would target social media during shows people are watching so they can get the consumers by all angles

Remediation and remix

o Remediation: no medium today, and certainly no single media event, seems to do its cultural work in isolation from other media, any more than it works in isolation from other social and economic forces ♣ What is new about new media comes from the particular ways in which they refashion older media and the ways in which older media refashion themselves to answer the challenges of new media o Remix: small portions of one song are extracted and used in a new derivative work the remix should be seen as a transformative work of creativity that forms part of the fabric of our wider cultural environment

Funding internet content: subscriptions, advertising, etc

o Sites invoke image-making: cultivate good feeling/ offline sales (can't buy coca cola online) o Selling products/ services: amazing, target o Selling subscriptions: content sites attempt to build audiences by attracting them to site o Selling advertisements: google, YouTube

Influence of counter-culture on internet's development

o Values of openness and togetherness for humanity o"The hippy strand of the counter culture helped to turn the computer into a playground. During the 1990s, a cult was created around text based adventure games in which participants could take on assumed identities...freed from the visual markers of age, gender, ethnicity, class, and disability." Stewart Brand - tech god oindependent, decentralized, diverse, open to innovation omarketing/advertising are responsive to shifting tide in public behavior look at trends/ styles from counter culture and want to rein them in to consolidate

• Role of the internet in sex education/sexual subcultures (Doring)

o While individual actors and the larger social environment shape internet sexuality - they are also impact by it o Positive or negative consequences may result depending on how the internet is used in various social contexts for activities of a sexual nature o Sex education institutions, companies, groups, and individuals use the internet to obtain and provide information about sexuality as well as to promote changes in attitudes and behaviors ♣ Benefits: availability, anonymity ♣ Risks: misinformation, unscientific or uncorroborated evidence o Sexual subcultures for marginalized sexual communities, "the emancipation and empowerment brought on by the internet is typically welcomed." ♣ By providing and easily accessible platform for the establishment of contacts between individuals of similar creeds and sexual orientations, the internet can ameliorate social isolation, facilitate social networking o Internet can ameliorate social isolation, facilitate social networking, strengthen self-acceptance and self identity, help communicate practical information, and encourage political activism ♣ You can find people like you on specific sites (transgender posting on YouTube)

Hip Consumer Capitalism

wear t-shirts to work - you don't need to wear a suit part of this digital capitalism is the idea that it was suddenly cool to make money, express individuality and avoid state control pushing against state or gov't control

o To what extent are the authors you read technological determinists?

♣ Curran**: neither society or technology solely determines the nature of the internet's impact; issue is rather which of these influencers is more important and how do they interact with one another? • We have control over the direction in which technology is going in our lives • social constructivist view - it's our role as human agents that affects how tech impacts our lives • not as much faith in technology as faith in us; social constructivism; we as individuals have agency and it's not the technology itself but it's what we do with it and our role as humans • Society exerts, in general, a greater influence on the internet than the other way around. That is why many of the prophecies about the impact of the internet...have not been fulfilled ♣ Boyd: there's a complicated relationship between technology and society! ♣ Carr: YES • Cognitive rewiring: our brains are actually being rewired to account for the way technology conveys information to us