Significance of New Media in Contemporary Society Flashcards
cultural optimist view - how many TV channels do media audiences have a choice of?
500
UK
2013
cultural optimist view - consumers more informed
access information/reviews about anything
user-generated sites enable ordinary people rather than professionals to make online reports & learn from fellow consumers
cultural optimist view - more user participation
172 million active websites in 2015
interactive sites give consumers more opportunities to participate in using/producing media content
cultural optimist view - greater democracy
ordinary people have more power to make positive contributions to build democratic societies
greater opportunities to report, criticise & comment
cultural optimist view - greater democracy; campaigning websites
enable protest groups to reach worldwide audience rapidly
wikileaks, coalition of resistance, facebook groups
cultural optimist view - greater democracy; social movements
use new media to spread their ideas, build support & coordinate protests
cultural optimist view - greater democracy; culture of questioning
holding to account elite hierarchies for their actions
sheffield united football club; forced to withdraw an offer to convicted rapist ched evans due to social media campaigns and online petitions
cultural optimist view - greater democracy; mainstream media
difficult for mainstream media to ignore stories they might have dropped in the past
video shot on phone by protestor at london demonstration showed it was police brutality that killed Ian Tomlinson which the police tried to cover up
cultural optimist view - greater democracy; new media
become a tool to fight against oppressive and corrupt regimes
arab spring 2011; series of uprisings against oppressive regimes in arab countries, images from phones showing violent acts of repression & torture were loaded to social media was used to coordinate/publicise protests
kony 2012; exposed the situation of children in uganda was viewed 100 million in first week
cultural optimist view - more access to information; social media sites
enable information from a range of sources to be brought to the attention of people who have missed them
cultural optimist view - more access to information; health
people able to gain information about their health conditions, check symptoms online or check risks of medication (NHS choices)
gives patients more information rather than solely dependent on doctors
cultural optimist view - global village
new media allowed users from around the world to connect with each other, making the world one village
cultural optimist view - global village; new media promotes
cultural diversity
reduces national barriers
blurs boundaries between local and global
brings different people together
greater understating between different cultures
cultural optimist view - postmodernist
new media contributes to social diversity as globalised culture allow people to shape their identities and make lifestyle choices
opened new channels for communication and enhanced social networks
cultural optimist view - social life and interaction enhanced
people can stay in touch meet anonymously construct alternatie identities express themselves re-restablish lost contact create online communities bring people together from all over the world
cultural optimist view - ofcom; visitors
facebook has 36million unique visitors per month in the UK
cultural pessimist view - problems of validity of information
difficult to know source of messages in new media, hard to validate information
no jornalista, TV crew to verify whether images are real
factual public information is disguised advertising for products
material recycled without checking the information/sources
cultural pessimist view - problems of validity; kony criticisms
oversimplified issue
deflected attention away from cruelty of ugandan army
never mentioned kony left 6 years ago
focused too much on views of white western people
ignores views of local black people
cultural pessimist view - cultural/media imperialism
new media has imposed western (american) cultural values on non-western cultures
undermines local cultures and cultural independence
cultural pessimist view - threat to democracy; sovereigns of cyberspace
power of giant multinational corporations (amazon, apple, google), control internet access, channels, social networking, technology
they hold the power over us that once was held by governments
part of political system, though never elected/accountable to public - power without responsibility
as the internet becomes popular = power of the commercial companies providing the services increases
cultural pessimist view - threat to democracy; examples of sovereigns of cyberspace effect
amazon & finance companies starved WikiLeaks of funds by blocking online donation without any justification
google can make a website invisible by blocking it in its search engine
shows their power in constraining free expression
cultural pessimist view - threat to democracy; censorship and control
undemocratic repressive regimes (china, iran) control new media use
internet face government censorship & surveillance
majority of websites carry mainstream material, online comments within the dominant ideology
majority of news online comes from establish newspapers
cultural pessimist view - threat to democracy; websites criticising the status quo
under-resourced
don’t attract adverts
marginalised
cultural pessimist view - threat to democracy; examples of censorship and control
majority of china’s social network censor messages that cause political problems
british government propose laws to monitor content of emails & social network
cultural pessimist view - threat to democracy; what affects new media than old media
issues of control/ownership
social construction of news
agenda-setting
cultural pessimist view - lack of regulation
undesirable things can thrive unchecked by national bodies (ofcom)
ISIS use new media to advertise globally & spread its messages to recruit
cyber-bulling, pornography, the dark web
cultural pessimist view - commercialisation
new media is about making money for companies producing technology, internet connections, provide websites/services, those that advertise
internet advertising is bigger business than traditional media advertising
social network sites is a way of target adverts at people who give information about themselves rather than connecting people
cultural pessimist view - commercial surveillance
storing information about consumer preferences
cookies; bombard people with adverts based on their browsing habits/purchases
cultural pessimist view - no real increase in consumer choice
digital divide means many people unable to access consumer choices
digital media doesn’t bring to people attention stories they didn’t know they wanted to be informed about only what they want to read/look
people rely on their news from recommendations from like-minded friends/contacts on social media so not exposed to broad range of news agenda
dumbing down & tabloidisation of popular culture to attract large audiences
celebrity culture replaced serious programmes, infotainment replaced serious news
cultural pessimist view - increased surveillance
new media operate to increase social control
america; teacher lost her job over Facebook picture of her with wine/beer
north yorkshire police posted images of graffiti on social media to ask local residents to help catch culprit
metropolitan police used facial-recognition app to identify people in 2011 london riots
used to monitor/control social protestors to condemn non-conformist behaviour
mobile signals locate users enabling agencies to find out where people are
cultural pessimist view - undermining of human relationships & communities
increase in social isolation as people have lost the ability to communicate in real world
spend less time talking with family/friends, more time in the virtual world
will be loss of social capital
