Convergence and Fragmentation: Media Technology and the Information Society - Brossura

Brossura

ISBN 10: 1841501824 ISBN 13: 9781841501826

Casa editrice: Intellect L & D E F A E, 2008

Riassunto

The European media landscape is changing so quickly that critics and scholars can barely keep pace with new developments. On the cusp of the latest media innovations, Convergence and Fragmentation brings together specialists from the humanities and social sciences in fifteen countries to analyze the technological, economic, and political trends sweeping Europe. The diverse group of contributors also assesses the effectiveness of models used to explain the changing media environment in this authoritative collection.

 

 

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Informazioni sull?autore

Peter Ludes is professor of mass communication at the International University Bremen, Germany. He is the author of Introduction to Media Studies.

 

 

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Convergence and Fragmentation

Media Technology and the Information Society

By Peter Ludes

Intellect Ltd

Copyright © 2008 Intellect Ltd
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-84150-182-6

Contents

Foreword, 
Introduction: Unity in Diversity Peter Ludes, 
Section 1 Culture and Technology, 
Global and European Information Society Maria Heller, 
ePolicies in Europe: A Human-Centric and Culturally Biased Approach Ursula Maier-Rabler, 
Section 2 Techno-pleasure, 
The Cultural Value of Games: Computer Games and Cultural Policy in Europe Rune Klevjer, 
Learning and Entertainment in Museums: A Case Study Ed Tan, Cristina Chisalita, Bas Raijmakers and Katri Oinonen, 
Section 3 ICT and Learning, 
For a Communications Approach to the Use of ICT in Education Bernard Miège, 
E-learning – A Knowledge Theoretical Approach Lars Qvortrup, 
'Virtual' and 'Flexible' University Learning Knut Lundby & Päivi Hovi-Wasastjerna, 
Section 4 Power, Technology and Policies, 
Media Governance: Valuable Instrument of Risk Discourse for Media Ownership Concentration Werner A. Meier, 
Telecom Liberalization: Distributive Challenges and National Differences Tanja Storsul, 
Public Service Television's Mission in France: An Analysis of Media-Policy Instruments – Including the Use of the Internet as a New Distribution Channel Marcel Machill, 
About the Contributors, 
Index, 

CHAPTER 1

Global and European Information Society

Maria Heller

Convergence, divergence, diversity and fragmentation

The general tendency of globalization has created considerable convergence in the domain of European, as well as global economic and social development, information and communication structures, media and cultural consumption. It has also caused growing public concern about the economic, social and ecological drawbacks of globalization. The rapidly developing ICT and media industries have largely contributed to the development of globalization. In the spread of new ICTs there are overall tendencies of convergence: similar ICT devices are used everywhere, with converging functions. Similar information and entertainment tendencies characterize global media, similar contents are available and access to them is facilitated through various devices, ICT networks are globally interconnected and foster all kinds of communication and information-transfer whether public or private, short or long distance. ICTs also make it possible to reach the same entertainment or information contents through different devices and, in the same way, they make it possible to reach interlocutors of all types through various communication channels provided by various ICTs. In this sense, we can witness that ICT developments create a great deal of convergence on the global scale and contribute easy access to communicational and cultural diversity.

But ICT developments do not only back convergence on the global scale: diverging tendencies are also numerous. One should differentiate between divergence and diversity in this respect: divergence meaning development in different or opposing directions or at different paces, and diversity involving variety, a scale of different uses, more choice among possibilities, devices and activities.

The term divergence covers several phenomena: One of the most often cited problems is the deepening digital divide, the info-communicational gap between layers of the same society with different economic and cultural backgrounds, between age groups and sexes, etc. The digital divide, however, can also be defined on a global scale: between different societies and regions of the world having different economic status and different cultural and communicational characteristics. Both types of digital divide constitute a threat to global communication and world integrity.

Another phenomenon of divergence is the so-called fragmentation of the public. Today, there are strong signs showing that the formerly unified public sphere (Keane 1995) has been split up: differently sized public spheres have made their appearance beside former national public sphere(s), which used to be represented or thought of as being uniform and unique (the very place where public affairs, public concerns are discussed by unrestricted publics). Different publics use different ICTs and different media and the former unified (national) publics have been fragmented into social groups having different ICT activities, different centres of interest, and having no common space for the elaboration of common causes and meanings.

Observing what is going on in the differently sized fora created by the new ICTs, we can conclude that, instead of doing away with the public sphere, various new public spheres have appeared and topics of public concern are widely discussed by diverse publics in various new public spaces (Internet fora, discussion groups, chat rooms, even e-mail and SMS). The problem of this new diversity of the public spheres is whether all layers of society have access to them and are willing and capable of participating. The question can reasonably be raised whether new ICTs predominantly facilitate the entertainment function or the information-seeking and democratic function of the new media based on new possibilities of interactivity. Do users/citizens/individuals become more dominated and passive by the entertaining function of the new devices or do they become more active and partaking in growing democratic participatory discussions?

Main modifications in the different domains of social life in societies of different levels of development

The rapid development of ICTs, the restructuring of the public sphere, and the introduction of the Information Society or knowledge society inevitably entail radical modifications in different domains of life.

The power structure of individual societies is undergoing important changes. In fact, political, economic and symbolic powers depend more and more on control over knowledge, and the access to and use of new ICTs strongly influence the new knowledge hierarchy in society. This can hasten major macro-structural changes in different societies. The gap between information-haves and information-have-nots or users and non-users is gradually widening, the often-mentioned digital divide does not seem to disappear, and it reinforces the inequality relations inside individual societies.

Similar modifications in the inequality relations are under way on the global scale, i.e. among different societies: thus recreating and reinforcing asymmetrical relations according to centre and periphery, innovative and traditional societies. The digital divide is deepening between societies participating in or left out of the digital revolution. Whole regions are cut off from the mainstream development or, in other places, certain deprived (or information-deprived) social layers are left out while local bourgeoisie or the national elite manage to strengthen their position and cope with the global development. The dichotomy between democratization of communications and digital divide on the global scale is stronger than ever.

New ICTs and the changes they introduce in the structure of the economy and of the workforce are about to cause radical changes in the relationship between work and leisure, and will also modify the relationship between workplace and home. A great number of activities can be done from anywhere because of online or mobile accessibility. These changes, in turn, will continue to alter the structure of towns, creating new patterns of urbanism, new types of settlements with broadband facilities and dense nets of 'communications' of all sorts, like telecommunication nets and highway nets.

Telework and mobile communication devices contribute to the appearance of different forms of work and radically modify people's timetables and schedules. It is clear that these changes will and already do affect people's lifestyles in the sense that the role of 'place' decreases as the communicative situations are stretched out beyond time and space constraints. This at the same time increases the need for prompt but quickly perishable information in particular situations, in particular places.

Digitalization and, hence, easy accessibility of all kinds of communication contents and cultural products through diverse new ICTs with quickly decreasing technological constraints, introduce radical changes in the access and acquisition of cultural products. All cultural productions become accessible through the same media and digital handling makes it possible to create an infinite variety of relationships among different cultural products (Hypertext). This qualitative change brings about the intertextuality of culture, changing at the same time not only accessibility but also the patterns of acquisition of cultural products. Linearity of most cultural products is replaced by a new complex structure, where acquisition is not directed by the same strict rules as before. Meanwhile we can observe that the earlier 'road' metaphor in cultural reception is by now replaced by the metaphor of 'maze', or 'labyrinth', where the user progresses in his/her own pace and directions according to his/her individual decisions and needs.

With digital accessibility, cultural products also become more vulnerable, more open to alteration or misappropriation. Texts, films, pictures, music, etc. are no longer finished products, their rewriting has become technologically affordable and facilitated: they can best be characterized by time co-ordinates. Thus, the notion of 'document' also has to be redefined because all documents can easily be modified without noticeable traces. While this development involves considerable danger for copyright and autonomy of creative action, it also has socially positive outcomes. Digital technology not only increases the quality of cultural production but also enormously enhances productivity and interactivity and thus may lead to a renaissance of individual productive activity in contrast to the 'age of consumption'.

New forms of cultural acquisition should enhance important modifications in the education system. It is already clear that the meaning and content of 'literacy' is about to change to incorporate 'digital literacy'. Although most countries' school system has difficulties in coping with the radical changes, the necessary knowledge and the skills to get along in the digitalized world has already greatly increased. Research, as well as everyday experience, shows that young generations quickly get used to new technologies and this emphasizes the need for new forms of learning for all generations and the importance of lifelong learning in a quickly changing world.

Scientific communication has also been modified by the new ICTs. Interaction among scientists has become much more frequent, to such an extent that in the case of some innovations even the origin of the scientific thought is untraceable.

The obsolescence factor of the new devices is very rapid, since the continuous innovation process has made people's needs change very quickly. The appearance of the ever-newer appliances recreates consumers' needs, while consumers trapped in the innovation competition feel the former devices to be trashy. New devices go through quick downwards infiltration in society, spreading from the upper classes to different forms of mass uses (either as status symbols or quickly spreading leisure devices).

It is no wonder that all these social changes greatly influence and modify people's behaviours towards communications. The new devices make it possible for people to cope with increasing life speed. This involves changing lifestyles, new relations to space and time, redefinition of public and private affairs, spaces and times. Mobile devices procure more personal or individual freedom, where the individual is less confined by place. Easy accessibility through new ICTs makes modification of previous agreements easily readjustable: indeed, the use of e-mail, mobile communication and SMS has been reported to deal frequently with quick modifications in predefined work or leisure programmes. It follows from this phenomenon that many communications events become situation-dependent: their relevance is restricted to a particular space and time constellation, to a particular communication situation.

With the accelerated lifestyle, news consumption has greatly increased. This is clearly proven by statistics, which show that important layers of the society follow news through diverse media: newspapers, radio, TV, WAP, Internet, etc.

Because ICTs bring about changes in the structure of work-type with the spreading of telework or distance work and learning, it is clear that households and family relationships also change. Not only does child control become easy and frequent through ICTs but public and private places and times, as well as relationships, get modified through continuous accessibility. People try to delimit private or public space or time for communication with subtle methods (e.g. different musical rings, etc.); they also often feel the need to define the space and time co-ordinates of a particular communication on a mobile phone.

The new lifestyle does not modify people's predilections for travel as it was thought, especially because conditions for travelling have become far easier than before while the need for face-to-face communication seems to have been preserved.

Researchers even discuss the use of ICTs as a social problem of addiction, where the very possession of the digital devices decreases the individual's feeling of insecurity and reinforces his/her impression of being part of a community and constitutes a factor for identity construction. The possession and use of ICTs also gives way to specific forms of self-expression.

All the aforementioned modifications of social and work structure, of time and space relations, of people's needs and behaviours lead to new communicative relationships among people. If we consider that human relationships constitute a specific form of social capital (Bourdieu 1970, 1979), it is no wonder that ICTs play an important role in the accumulation and the management of this capital. The more ICTs are available for the individual the more he/she is free to choose the most adequate form to reach a partner according to their relationship, the topic of communication, the situation, etc. (In the choice of ICTs there might be considerations about the accessibility of the person, of the public or private character of the topic and the relationship, the degree of intimacy, the urgency of reply, the degree of facility of immediate or remote communication, etc.)

It can be observed as a consequence of the growing needs of communications that, both in strong ties and in weak ties, communications have become more frequent and higher in density. People find it easier to maintain communicative ties with remote persons: dying relationships have revived via the Internet, and many new relationships have been established between people who would not have met or started discussions had it not been through new ICTs. The growing communication activity through ICTs has changed both horizontal and vertical relations inside individual societies but has also opened up the borderlines among different societies. People engage in a great number of different communicative acts through various channels made available by ICTs. In this manner, individuals have built up large international networks of relations of both strong and weak ties and these large networks are often combined together into meta-networks through worldwide e-mail chains.

The exponentially growing number of communicative acts testifies to the increased needs for communication and human relations of contemporary humans. The former tendency of passivization of the public (period of the mass media) (Noam 1996) has been overturned. Although important social groups are still passive consumers of mass cultural products, an increasing tendency of interactivity and a certain return to public discussion, to participation in social discourse can be observed due to ICT facilities.

The ever-innovative developments of ICTs generate, however, some global problems. People are more and more concerned by the increased capacity of registration of the new technologies. Individual user's activities, likes and dislikes can easily be traced back and people feel their privacy is put in danger. Although the registration capacity can be useful, when it facilitates e-commerce and m-commerce, creating forms of easy purchase of products and services, the liability of the identifiable registered user seems to create an urgent need for new regulations defending user privacy, data protection or copyrights.

New ICTs also raise some technological problems. There is a constant competition among different industrial fields about how to incorporate more and more functions in the same devices. This creates a peculiar convergence among multifunctional objects that used to be clearly separate. The outcome of the competition will be defined by biological constraints: buttons cannot be too small compared to our fingertips, etc. This problem has, however, been partially overcome in the use of new PDAs or handwritten digital tablets. In a certain sense, biological evolution has been replaced by technological evolution: new ICTs improve our senses. Fortunately, the user might still choose the tendency of divergence and use the most convenient device for his/her goals and situation.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Convergence and Fragmentation by Peter Ludes. Copyright © 2008 Intellect Ltd. Excerpted by permission of Intellect Ltd.
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Dettagli dell'edizione

• Editore: Intellect L & D E F A E
• Data di pubblicazione: 2008
• Lingua: Inglese
• ISBN 10: 1841501824
• ISBN 13: 9781841501826
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Numero di pagine: 256
• Redattore: Ludes Peter
• Contatto del produttore: non disponibile
• Persona responsabile: non disponibile