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| title | chunk | source | category | tags | date_saved | instance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New media | 4/9 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_media | reference | science, encyclopedia | 2026-05-05T07:11:44.549298+00:00 | kb-cron |
== Globalization == The rise of new media and the Internet has increased communication among people all over the world. It has enabled individuals to express themselves through blogs, websites, videos, pictures, and other forms of user-generated media. Terry Flew stated that as new technologies develop, the world becomes more globalized. Globalization is more than the development of activities throughout the world, globalization allows the world to be connected no matter the distance from user to user and Frances Cairncross expresses this great development as the "death of distance". New media has established the importance of making friendships through digital social places more prominent than in physical places. Globalization is generally stated as "more than expansion of activities beyond the boundaries of particular nation states". New media "radically break the connection between physical place and social place, making physical location much less significant for our social relationships". However, the changes in the new media environment create a series of tensions in the concept of "public sphere". According to Ingrid Volkmer, "public sphere" is defined as a process through which public communication becomes restructured and partly disembedded from national political and cultural institutions. This trend of the globalized public sphere is not only as a geographical expansion form a nation to worldwide, but also changes the relationship between the public, the media and state. "Virtual communities" are being established online and transcend geographical boundaries, eliminating social restrictions. Howard Rheingold describes these globalized societies as self-defined networks, which resemble what we do in real life. "People in virtual communities use words on screens to exchange pleasantries and argue, engage in intellectual discourse, conduct commerce, make plans, brainstorm, gossip, feud, fall in love, create a little high art and a lot of idle talk". For Sherry Turkle "making the computer into a second self, finding a soul in the machine, can substitute for human relationships". New media has the ability to connect like-minded others worldwide. While this perspective suggests that the technology drives – and therefore is a determining factor – in the process of globalization, arguments involving technological determinism are generally frowned upon by mainstream media studies. Instead academics focus on the multiplicity of processes by which technology is funded, researched and produced, forming a feedback loop when the technologies are used and often transformed by their users, which then feeds into the process of guiding their future development. While commentators such as Manuel Castells espouse a "soft determinism" whereby they contend that "Technology does not determine society. Nor does society script the course of technological change, since many factors, including individual inventiveness and entrepreneurialism, intervene in the process of scientific discovery, technical innovation and social applications, so the final outcome depends on a complex pattern of interaction. Indeed the dilemma of technological determinism is probably a false problem, since technology is society and society cannot be understood without its technological tools". This, however, is still distinct from stating that societal changes are instigated by technological development, which recalls the theses of Marshall McLuhan. Manovich and Castells have argued that whereas mass media "corresponded to the logic of industrial mass society, which values conformity over individuality," new media follows the logic of the postindustrial or globalized society whereby "every citizen can construct her own custom lifestyle and select her ideology from a large number of choices. Rather than pushing the same objects to a mass audience, marketing now tries to target each individual separately". The evolution of virtual communities highlighted many aspects of the real world. Tom Boellstorff's studies of Second Life discuss a term known as "griefing." In Second Life griefing means to consciously upset another user during their experience of the game. Other users also posed situations of their avatar being raped and sexually harassed. In the real world, these same types of actions are carried out. Virtual communities are a clear demonstration of new media through means of new technological developments. Anthropologist Daniel Miller and sociologist Don Slater discussed online Trinidad culture on online networks through the use of ethnographic studies. The study argues that internet culture does exist and this version of new media cannot eliminate people's relations to their geographic area or national identity. The focus on Trini culture specifically demonstrated the importance of what Trini values and beliefs existed within the page while also representing their identities on the web.
== New media uses ==