Lecture Week2. Interactivity.

As media interactivity increases, the question is raised of how the audience will react to interactive websites. In my personal opinion, I prefer to read printed information than to read things online or on a screen, although the content is no different. The ‘produser’ is still reading the same information, with the same message and then having an opinion on it, yet if read online, is making their comments in a forum rather than speaking their opinions. The audience can take on active roles and ‘blur the boundaries of production and consumption’, by replying on discussion boards and commenting on newspaper articles etc. This makes it easier to voice your own opinions on an article or information and explore other views or information on a similar subject.
Although there is a great difference between reading a magazine article interactively and reading a normal magazine, the idea of non-linear order, and choosing what part of an article to read, is no different to skimming over pages which you have no interest on. The ‘produser’ has the ability to choose what they read, rather than reading what the mass media present to them. I understand that media interactivity helps the 'produser' to find out information quickly and easily, yet I still prefer not to read information on-screen.

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Week 2, Topic 1, A

'Upgrade culture' is the concept that media as a whole is constantly changing, improving and becoming more developed. The latest software is constantly adjusting and new media becomes old in a matter of weeks. It reinforces the ideology that the newer and more developed something is, the better it is. It can also be said that because these developments move so fast, the old versions of these things rapidly become obsolete. It can therefore be argued that the sheer speed of companies upgrading their software is solely to make consumers spend more money; with the idea that older technology may not be compatible with newly developed software and therefore is a necessity. Does this upgrading and updating always make the programmes better?However, this may be a pessimistic view developing from consumer culture – it may be more optimistic to adopt the view that companies are only developing the new programmes and software in the interests of the users, which is why they are constantly updating and upgrading their products.

Week 2, Topic 1, D

As opposed to analogue data, digital data is in many cases easier to manipulate, and the end result can be reproduced indefinitely without any loss of quality. Bolter and Grusin calls the process of divorcing digital media from earlier media as "remediation," and they note that earlier media have also refashioned one another: photography remediated painting, film remediated stage production and photography, and television remediated film, vaudeville, and radio. In their opinion there is not a clean break between digital and analogue media but they are trying to separate themselves from eachother. There is obviously some relationship between the two, it can be said that digital is just upgrading of analogue. For example email is the same concept as sending a letter yet it is quicker, cheaper and more convenient for both the sender and receiver. Another point to consider is transferring media from analogue to digital and vice versa. This can be seen, for example, in printing digital photographs, turning digital media into analogue, or copying music from a cassette to a CD. It is evident that analogue and digital media will never be completely separate, as Boltin and Grusin claim, especially when it is clear that digital would not exist without it developing almost exclusively from analogue media.

Goebbel's Radio Speech

At the time when Goebbels was writing this, the radio was the most effective and convenient way of reaching the masses. The Nazis believed in the power of the spoken word, and therefore, in their eyes, it is a very effective and influential form of communication. Goebbels claims, “It is no exaggeration to say that the German revolution, at least in the form it took, would have been impossible without the airplane and the radio” I also think this is true, the more significant something is in influencing the masses, the more responsibility it has to the future of the nation. This is not so applicable to society today. His idea about letting the government control what is put across the radio, and using it as a form of propaganda is not as relevant today as it was in the 1930’s as there are more radio channels so people can choose what they listen to, and forms of communication such as the Internet enable people to access more information than they used to.

http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/goeb56.htm

Forms of Communication on the Internet

The Internet is an easy, convenient and fast way to not only communicate with new people but to also keep in touch and find old friends. It is a way of finding people with the same interests as you across the world and discuss things you're interested in. This is not only entertaining and enjoyable for people using chat rooms and social networking sites such as face book, but also educational about people from different countries and backgrounds. Most of the information is accessible to anyone in the world providing, of course, they have Internet access. Emails, documents, videos and pictures can be sent across thousands of miles in a matter of seconds, making it easy and efficient to communicate.

Personally, I use email and social networking sites to communicate with my friends, and I use email to contact tutors. I use social networking sites as they are a quick and easy way to contact people informally. I use emails to contact tutors because documents can be attached and again, they are quick and convenient to use. Both of these communication forms allow the audience to be in simple and continual contact with people. I also use websites to find out information for educational purposes and also for entertainment purposes in my free time. I use websites as they are a simple and fast way of finding out information, and are usually more up-to-date than books.

I hate January.

Hello EVERYONE.

I Hate January.

Look how the blog handles paragraphs!