Week 10 - The generosity of new media: science technology and innovation

It is evident that there is an ongoing social re-organisation evident within society, due to it's reaction to new media technologies that restructure and assist in creating meaning for innovations that arise over time. Particularly, this can be witnessed in regards to transversality, which I discussed earlier on, although most importantly that it can connect things in unlimited directions because it has no hierarchical order. Rather, transversality moves across potentials to construct meaning and connect different nodes, and through effects the construction of reality. Due to the creation of these new media technologies, we are able to interact with new science and innovations that are steadily being created assist the way in which we interact but also to support for data management, development of infrastructure, resources for curation of data (Pisani 2011) Although how can this new accessibility these innovations change us as a society and the ways in which they can affect the way we organise ourselves?

A crucial part of these new media technologies is creating something which can capture the actual and translates it into the virtual, as it has been changed and adapted to certain mediums and technologies. Although, can we really capture the real and transcend it into something different? Realism tries to capture how the world looks, although by classifying it and labelling it as something, perhaps that already takes away it's meaning and as a result would not remain true to what it really is? It is a difficult process to define, although it is seen that there are increasingly more innovations that are available through new technologies that assist in creating a more efficient and easier to manage world, that would inevitably affect our social organisation within the world.

Most importantly, this is evident in defining media as communication techniques. That is, their role is not only to process and administer information to a variety of different sources and nodes throughout the world, but to be an enabler of content and not just the messenger. They are an application of ideas and knowledge through an infrastructure, a process of invention and adaptation (Murphie 2011) Particularly this is seen in the area of climate change that has been visualised and perfected throughout the years to communicate a more visual message to society, one which has definitely called for a social reorganisation of the priority of climate change within society. This emphasises the power of social media in not only creating an accessible platform for sharing and accessing information, but also it's influential nature in affecting the structure of society through the use of it's technologies.

References

Murphie, A. (2011) Advanced Media Issues Lecture. 9 May.

Pisani, E., Medical science will benefit from the research of crowd, The Guardian. [ONLINE] Available at:http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jan/11/medical-research-data-sharing. [Accessed 9 May 2011].

Week 9 - Social Organisation = Micropolitics, Networks, Designing for and Living in New Communities

What are the ways in which we organise society? There has to be a willingness to be open to new thoughts and ideas in regards to connecting people over a large space. One of these methods has proved extremely popular throughout the years - the use of social networking to remain closely in contact with familliar and unfamilliar faces around the world. We are rapidly becoming a community that is designing and living in new ways through the construction of spaces, more importantly learning to construct our own communities to sustain our networks. Although how is this really achieved and what different ways are there of keeping ourselves connected within a larger organisation?

The introduction of new media, particularly through the use of micropolitics as the creation of techniques for collaboration, involve experimentation and an openness to be experimental (Jellis 2009) This emphasises the idea that social media can be used to change the way that society organises itself and how it can be reworked to lead to a dynamic restructure of the possible oppourtunities that are available to due these new technologies. This is evident, particularly in relation to computer devices and how organisations such as Simpli could restructure searches and bring about alternative answers due to their user generated content.

This move onto online culture has become a way to not only rework society and create more personalised networks amongst ourselves, but also allowing us to reform the idea of what the social is, through how we organise ourselves. Through this innovation, it has lead to a dynamic social organisation, one that emphasises changes to open education and power and authority to the commons, amongst other changes. It has had a significant affect on how informal media and the idea how mixed ways of operating can significantly have an affect on the way data is administered within a community, but also how we organise ourselves around this.

References

Jellis, Thomas. (2009). Disorientation and micropolitics: a response.Available: http://www.spacesofexperimentation.net/montreal/disorientation-and-micropolitics-a-response/. Last accessed 2nd May 2011.

Week 8 - Big Politics

Media technologies have an abundance of uses, and are used to connect us to more accessible ideas while simultaneously exposing us to more information about the world we live in. This exchange of ideas is most noticeable in the areas of media, social and political change as these technologies allow us to exchange data that transform communications and the way we perceive something. The idea fits in with what we previously had discussed about framing; as a framework for how we understand facts and how they are exposed to us through how we perceive things. These media technologies help us to connect to complex relations of power involving politics and how through the media cycle the effects of media on state politics is evident as an influential tool within society.

Although, the hierarchy of media changes through the use of different technologies. Borders are broken and unrestricted, rather there is a freer flow of information and a higher degree of accessibility, through increased interactivity. This is visible through online websites that not only provide conclusive news stories but also have a designated area for user comments that are instant and give an oppourtunity for feedback and comments from users. These platforms of communication act as a way of opening up feedback loops for free speech from users, although only in the framework in which they have already set out. This is made possible through the use of tagging posts that are relevant to each other, by keeping content thorough while at the same time keeping posts relatable.

While media technologies allow an abundance of data flowing through different areas around the world and by doing this to keep informed, they can also provide new power to users and voters while maintaining a thorough framework for their content.

Week 7 - Framing versus Transversality - music, journalism and other ecologies of practice

The concept of "I've been framed" has become foundational in how we perceive things and how they come together in our view of the world. Through this framing, both inhibiting qualities of being complex and useful, it highlights the power that media assemblages have in framing our views like never before. Through the use of aggregated content that is available through the internet, it is more likely that certain disciplines such as music and journalism would be thriving as opposed to dying.

Firstly, this is evident through the use of tags as a device from framing through creating a cluster of similar searches, made possible by describing music or texts in short descriptive words that can be easily aggregated. So how can we say that these industries are dying or decreasing wh

en really, we now have more access to actual music and written ontent than ever before? Websites that offer this are available for a multitude of disciplines - particularly last.fm that compares musical tastes with other users to recommend new artists and songs. Although, an online platform that is framing a large amount of written text, audio, visual and photographs is tumblr; which as a blogging website allows all the disciplines to be posted, searched for through tags (and later tracked) as well as reblog off eachother to create a collaboration blogging platform. Websites like this highlight the importance of transversality, in that they transform as they connect things together creating a different interpretation or experience of the event. And through this, we perceive and have a different impression of texts, music, art, etc. Events can only be partially captured, and this highlights the ongoing dynamic formation that is evident in framing; relying on our own interpretations and connections with media to understand these things in a certain way, and highlight what they mean to us.

Image via tumblr.com

It is through these media technologies that we are able to connect and share information from a variety of sources, that is leading to our collaborative nature. Framing in media creates powerful assemblages that provide interactivity between different frameworks and leads to an overall sharing of information from a variety of sources instantenously.

Week 6 - Data and Media - An unrequited love?

There is an undeniable link between data and media. They co-exist and through each other raise ideas about information and the meaning that they try to get across. Although through this, there seems to be an ongoing transfer between natural data and data that is existent within technical systems, that can be comparable to last weeks idea of the World Clock. There is constant relationship evident between things that are natural, with things that are not, and it is dependant on us and our bodies (and through the media that we posses) to adapt to this change or to reject it.

The exchange of data that we receive and send off exemplifies this relationship and how through this media comes between and in a way mediates and changes our perception of how to live in conjunction to these events and processes. Think of how we interpret meteorological data in a daily way. Usually, we arrange ourselves around the day (if it's planned to rain then we leave earlier, if it's hot and sunny we wear something cooler) and in the middle of this experience is the media; informing us of these changes through news reports and channel's dedicated to the weather. The way in which we perceive these events and relationships which differs from one another, although doesn't deny that data and media are a numbers game, depending on the past to see how it will affect the future. We argue about how to interpret the evidence, finding flaws in earlier interpretations. And we keeping changing... know about the past, depends on who we are now (Edwards 2010: 17) Through this we know that data has enabled us to draw these conclusions and re-arrange our lives around the natural but also around figures of data that arrange our lives.

Our media ecologies have certain characteristics that we introduce into our lives, but also that influence us to re-arranging ourselves in a particular order around them; co-existing, in a way. They help to create a notion of a new reality in which we live through and has contributed in making our experience, in which media plays a foundational part in; acting as a relationship between our experience and the world. Data and media complement each other in supporting not only facts but also in that they share the same qualities in how we as humans arrange ourselves and our lives around them.

References

Edwards, P.N. (2010). Introduction. In: A Vast Machine. Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global Warming. Massachusetts:: The MIT Press. p17.

Week 5 - Reality- actual, potential and virtual

The nature of mixed realities arises from the relationship that we as individuals and collectives have between our experiences and reality. Through this, media that is used to extend memories while also preserving them through archives highlights the 'medium' role that media technologies have in being in the middle of everything people do. The use of these technologies and their affects to reality refer to individuals as technical animals (Murphie 2011: 29 Mar) through the exploitation and intervening nature of these technologies in restructuring the reality of our lives by prolonging them through the use of the virtual.

A significant emphasis is placed on the idea of the network as an inescapable social event and as a concept - calls for a substantial reworking of the concept of ecology (Murphie 2004: 88) Here, the mixing of ecologies is evident as a process of restructuring networks that through all our interconnectedness assist in constructing a new reality through media technologies. Think particularly about online multi player role playing games such as World of Warcraft that create a virtual environment for individuals by transforming the nature of reality as a device that connects players worldwide that frames their experience through an online platform of connection. Media technologies intervene in our realities but getting in the middle of how we choose to connect with things in the world. Similarly this is evident in the mobile phone that interjects and makes us a part of different networks while transforming our experience.

The way in which an individual or collective constructs different realities is made possible through the use of media technologies. These technologies; through their different functions, produce possibilities for realities to take place that affect habit, perception and memory through their intervening nature. They offer a variety of different sensations to how peoples experiences can be affected by the use of these technologies that through media bring together our different realities and how they can be transformed from our perceptions over time.

References

Murphie, A. (2011) Advanced Media Issues Lecture. 28 March.

Murphie, A. (2004) 'The World's Clock: The Network Society and Experimental ecologies', Topia: Canadian Journal of Cultural Studies, 11, Spring

Week 4 - Global Mnemotechnics: Globalising Memory, Thinking and Action

Memory is an external part of our bodies, it is outside of us and so are the technologies used to store them. In order to sustain and protect our own memories, we use technologies to store and archive our personal experiences so they can be easily accessed and never forgotten. Although does increased dependence on these technologies actually make the individual lose more knowledge than we put into the equipment? What is certain is that as individuals and as collectives we all have a certain sphere, environment also know as umwelts, where we inhabit memories and habits that are an extension of us and our extended mind (Murphie 2011: 21 Mar) Although coming from different backgrounds and perceptions of the world, our umwelts can cross through shared experiences and create a commonality between one person and another.

Memory and the media have a special relationship that fuses experiences and cognitive technologies to influence events as they shift through time (Stiegler 2006) These technologies allow us to access stored memories as well as maintain them through time, preserving them for the future. From the past, in which we draw to propel us from the present into the future and our engagements with the world allows the individual to influence their future experiences (Murphie 2011: 21 Mar) From this, memory acts as not only a link from past > present > to future, but reinforces the ambiguous nature of human memory and how media can preserve this for each individual.

Most importantly, we place particular significance on hypomnesis (the extended memory which is technical) and anamnesis (the recalling of natural memory) The former is used to help deficiencies in human memory where media and technologies are used to extend it. Despite this, Stiegler places importance on mnemotechnologies as a cognitive technology serving memory (Murphie 2011: 21 Mar) It is the self conscious remixing and synthesising of our technologies to generate different results. Although there are some arguments that state more knowledge is being lost due to the use of cognitive technologies on human memory, there is no denying that media technologies transform memory and experience for every individual.

References

Murphie, A. (2011) Advanced Media Issues Lecture. 21 March.

Stiegler, B. (2006). Anamnesis and Hypomnesis. Available: http://arsindustrialis.org/anamnesis-and-hypomnesis. Last accessed 21st Mar 2011.

Week 3 - Media Ecologies, Social Ecologies, Other Ecologies

A significant part of contemporary cultural life is how interlinked and overlapped things are with each other. But exactly how do these processes and events come together, especially in regards to media? Through time and technological change such as the industrialisation of the world beginning in the 1800's, processes have been combined together to not only create a better and more efficient way of living but also to signify that huge ideas in the shift of the world through time can impact greatly on social and cultural changes. A good example of this is the introduction of the camera in the late 1800's and how it evolved and changed the way people not only were photographed but also how it was used to further the development of these new technologies. It allowed people to interact with them and familliarise themselves as opposed to being scared of new technological flows of development.

It is also crucial to realise that almost always the introduction of one technology becomes the stepping stone for an improvement of it in the future and also the mixing of media ecologies, all of which are combined to improve our ways of life. Photographer Etienne Jules Marley used film, a camera and a film projector to catch unstable movement in photos, and highlights the overlapping of media forms due to the proliferation of media through space and time (Murphie 2011: 14 Mar) They are all part of media ecologies, and how they affect media change in cultural contexts , highlighting the evolution of these processes and practices. Also how the overlapping of ecologies constructs a new influential technologies.

In some respect, it seems as though media ecologies possess some characteristics of being technologically deterministic in that their introduction in society causes so much change that it affects and changes routine for society, people and culture. These affects are traced back thousands of years, to ancient Egypt where hieroglyphics were used to reinforce memory and became a benchmark for the evolution into the Phoenician alphabet in conveying monotheistic ideas as a part of the information revolution (Levinsen 1997: 3) This media ecology highlighted the power of memory and the conveyance of ideas to affect literary change and show how media communications are connected to highlight the importance of technological change and convergeancy and how through time causes significant changes to society.

References

Levinson, Paul (1997). 'The First Digital Medium' in Soft Edge ; a natural history and future of the information revolution. London: Routledge. 3-5.

Murphie, A. (2011) Advanced Media Issues Lecture. 14 March

Week 2 - Foundations, Thinkers, Ideas

The effects of media on cultural and social change were a main focus in the topics for this week and how they have since developed. It gave an insight into the nature of change and how everything is constantly changing, particularly the way that we communicate and share things through media.

Media itself was referred to as anything in the middle of anything else (Murphie 2011: 7 Mar) and how the medium is at the centre of culture and technology, influencing society and how order changes due to technological innovation. This idea was particularly important with the introduction of technological determinism, an agent of social change whereby a successful technological innovation creates a new type of society (Murphie 2003: 12) This is an interesting point that shows how influential technologies are in restructuring society and culture deeming them helpless to technological change, or is it the society's decision to incorporate or abandon this new technology. Although it is evident that both technologies and society both influence each other, ultimately they alter our patterns of perception and contribute to the global village (Murphie 2003: 14) they both hold a strong power in the advancing of new technologies that are made to suit the needs of society, as technology is thought to be a technique which has anything to do with our bodies becoming an embodied form of media (Murphie, 2011: 7 Mar)

Despite the strong connection that media, society and culture and technology have in influencing each other, it is difficult to define which aspect holds more power over the other. It is evident that the introduction of technologies is masterminded by society to suit or solve certain needs or problems, they might not always be accepted, and other technological changes might flourish more than others. Although technology can be altered and suited to meet the needs of different societies and socially shaping itself to mould to different societies and cultures, there is no denying that it holds considerable significance within a collective and an individual.

References

Murphie, A. (2011) Advanced Media Issues Lecture. 7 March

Murphie, A. Potts, J. (2003). Theoretical Frameworks in Culture and Technology. London: Palgrave Macmillan. p12,14.

Week 1 - What is a Media Event?

This week marked the beginning of the course and an introduction into what we would be consuming ourself with over the next twelve weeks.

Firstly a large focus was put on 'media events' and their significance within this course but also about their nature. A media event's main characteristics revolve around change; that is sudden and and quite obvious which happens accidentally and spontaneously, and how the media always has to adapt to this change throughout time. Events differ and aren't viewed as static objects, they are ever changing and discussed about as being never ending forms that are part of a larger complex web within society.

As well as change, a media event also affects a change in media usage and cultural change. It would alter the way that media coverage attracts mass media organisations, particularly the element of immediacy when dealing with spontaneity; the "breaking news story" exemplifies this as a crucial event within the viewers lives on television and even disrupting normal segments with live news that alters the way information is shared with the public.

A significant portion of media events fall into the category of weird global media events. This is defined as the singular eruptions that delve into regular media events, which are sudden and come without any warning. The most obvious example of this would be September 11, and the news coverage that broke through routined segmenting but also kept replaying the plane hitting through the Twin Towers because people in the media were unable to share any detailed news with society; instead it caused confusion since the news broke out of our conventional events within society. It became something in everyday life and through these weird global media events, they highlight the importance they have on the media, cultural and social effects due to these events being inflicted upon society.

While media is rapidly changing as the years go by, it has a large impact on how news in distributed to society and affects the nature of reality at how we as individuals and within a greater society relate to data and information and how this is represented to us through the ever changing media systems. These changes affect the present and future of established industries while highlighting the imperative nature of media and communications within a greater society.