THE NEW MEDIA REVOLUTION IS ONLY A REVOLUTION IN NAME

From the industrial revolution, to the American Revolution, to the French Revolution, to the Haitian Revolution in the Caribbean, revolutions - drastic and far-reaching changes in ways of thinking and behaving - have transformed the lives of men. In times past, people thought that revolutions always involved violence and some blatantly obvious political reform, but the materialization of new media has proven that a revolution of a more silent and less obvious nature is possible, and occurring even at this very moment. So what is this new media that everyone is talking about anyway? For the purposes of this essay, let us consider it to be the emerging digital/electronic communication forms, particularly the internet and the World Wide Web. Considering these definitions, the “new media revolution”, therefore, refers in general to the widespread social changes which have occurred as a result of the emergence of digital and electronic forms of communication, especially the internet and World Wide Web.

The question has been raised: is this revolution only a revolution in name? Are the changes that new media have provoked merely exaggerated and overstated? Or are they real and dynamic, tangible reforms that will forever modify society’s information sending and receiving capacity? I strongly believe that the case is the latter.

New media have opened up the portals of the air waves and have released dynamic, life –altering energy which has radically transformed the way we send and receive information and caused many other significant social changes as well.

If ever there was an embodiment of the term “mass empowerment”, the new media definitely demonstrates it. In an internet article entitled, “The Individual is the Epicentre of the New Media Revolution” (De Rossi, 2004), we are told that the individual – the ordinary man – is empowered through the use of mew media, and is the one who will benefit most from this technology. The article also explains that this “new frontier” (para.18) the independence of a person will not be compromised by their attachment to any organisation. As a result, there will be freer and fairer flow of information in society that speaks more precisely to certain issue. This will also lead to heightened awareness of current events and action accordingly.

No longer is the control of information flow limited to a few large media conglomerates. We do not need to rely only on mainstream media for what often turns out to be a prejudiced or biased view of world events. New media have allowed anyone and everyone a fair chance to tell their side of the story. Pod casting, defined by Wikipedia (Podcasting, 2005) as “a method of publishing files to the Internet, allowing users to subscribe to a feed and receive new files automatically by subscription, usually at no cost”, along with web logging, more commonly known as “blogging” and defined by Wikipedia as “a web-based publication consisting primarily of periodic articles” (Blog, 2005) now allow the ordinary man to post his story online – to make his voice heard.

There was also a time when, if you missed the seven o’clock news on television or radio, you would have to wait until early morning news the following day to be updated on what was going on. This period exists no more. With new media has come greater flexibility of times. People can now access news at any time they like. With new technology like TiVo, people no longer need to conform to the times dictated by media houses, they decide when and what information they access. And then there is the fact that the internet never sleeps – no matter the hour, one can log on to the web and have “the world at their finger tips”.

The time that it takes to access information has also been totally revised. With just one click of a button, and in a few seconds, an individual can have access to worlds of information. This speed allows people to be aware of issues in their societies even faster than before, therefore, they will also be able to react more quickly.

New media have also caused widespread social change. Governments can no longer just do as they like without facing any consequences. New media allow the public to perform its role of government-policing even more efficiently and effectively. On this note, Philip E. Agre (1998), notes that new media encourages even more democratic participation among the people. It reinforces the exercise of their rights to freedom of speech.

But then, one has to wonder if this greater access to information has not also led to laziness on the part of the wider public. Instead of taking full advantage of the privileges-turned-rights that they now have, it seems to me that they have become lackadaisical in their desire for and pursuit of information.

And then there is also the issue of credibility. With this new media, anyone can post their thoughts – this means that sick, demented psychopaths can create websites of full of lies and inaccuracies if they wish with no restrictions. Who determines or checks the reliability of the information that is now so freely transported and easily accessed? This places more pressure on the reader to be critical and active. They have to police the information they receive and get collaboration on these issues for themselves.

But whatever the shortcomings, one thing is for sure – new media has inspired a revolution that is taking the world by force. Shhhh!!! Can you hear it?

That is the sound……………. of a revolution!

References

Agre, P. E. (1998). Designing Genres for New Media: Social, Economic, and Political
Contexts. Retrieved November 29, 2005 from http://polaris.gseis.ucla.edu/
pagre/genre.html

Blog. (2005). Retrieved November 29, 2005 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Weblogging

De Rossi, L. C. (Ed.). (2004, April 26). The Individual is the Epicentre of the New Media
Revolution. Retrieved November 29, 2005 from http://www.masternewmedia.org/
2004/04/26/the_individual_is_the_epicenter.htm

Podcasting. (2005). Retrieved November 29, 2005 from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podcast