Film and Television under Pressure - Essay Example

Film and Television under Pressure Yijia Zhou FTV3007M ID - 13360918 Submitted on 19/12 Word account: 2880 Assignment Instructions: Traditionally liveness has been marked by the bringing of global events to the attention of a nationally situated populace. With the recent growth of mobile phones, blogging, and social networking, notions of liveness are becoming increasingly complicated. How is liveness and our relationship to it changing the current media landscape? Introduction Through constant revising and changing, the media landscape has stepped into a new era in which public participation becomes a primary concern. It is true that participation is becoming increasingly central to the development of the current media landscape. This means that the current media landscape is mostly working towards getting more people to be involved and participate in the interaction. Such interaction between the media and participates can also be defined as the liveness that has been traditionally marked by the bringing of global events to the attention of a nationally situated populace. However, the notions of liveness are becoming more complicated with the development of mobile phones, blogging and social networking (Hirst, 2014, 32). Acknowledging, the purpose to get a critical picture of the changing liveness, this essay will firstly present a general description of the current media landscape. Following this, this essay will critically investigate how liveness is changing the current media landscape. Furthermore, the present essay will continue to examine how our relationship to liveness is changing the current media landscape. Finally, what has been discussed in the present essay will be concluded in the end. Description of current media landscape It is beneficial to get a general knowledge of the current media landscape before investigating how liveness and our relationship to it are changing the current media landscape. First generated by Goldmark, new media refers to the notion that is constantly changing. As a matter of fact, the current media landscape is mainly characterized by new, which can be understood from four fronts. The "new" characteristic can be demonstrated by new notion, a new pattern, new effectiveness, and new value. Specifically, the new notion refers to the reducing of boundaries between traditional media, boundaries between countries, communities, and industries, and boundaries between information providers and receivers. The new pattern refers to the pattern transformation from the point-points pattern of points-points pattern, which enables every individual to have the opportunity to get involved in information broadcasting, and can further enhance public participation (Bagdikian, 2014, 12). For instance, the Bombings in London happened in 2005 was pictured by William, a citizen of London, and the news and pictures became news headlines in a flash. New media is supposed to have the ability to influence individuals visual and auditory reaction within specific time and space, and this is called new effectiveness. With extended public participation, the new value can be understood in the way that new media can of great benefit of social, economic, cultural development. Another major characteristic of the new media is illustrated by diversity. Since the 1990s, an increasing number of new media, from the original news portals to current social networks, to more colorful mobile multimedia terminals, have entered individuals life and changing the forms and manners of information broadcasting and communication. That is to say, a number of new media forms can be identified, complete with mobile phones, blogging and social networking, and so on and so forth (Carvajal, et al, 2012, 638). Although these new media forms remain different, they all make great contributions to the changing of liveness and our relationship to live in the current media landscape. Furthermore, they are also of great importance to the development of the media industry and public participation, which can be demonstrated from two main fronts. In the first place, the current media landscape has provided individuals with more plentiful and convenient broadcasting experiences for participating. In the second place, the current media landscape is authentic and meaningful to the development of the media industry. Furthermore, the new media are also commonly considered to be influential in individuals life. A number of studies have been conducted to investigate the influence of new media on individuals life (Pavlik, 2013, 23). This section will revolve around the influence of new media, especially mobile phones that are increasingly enjoying its popularity among the public because of its various functions. In comparison to traditional communication patterns, the new media are mainly characterized by interactive communication, which is much more efficient and convenient. Interactive communication is the simultaneous exchange of information via a transmission new medium (Verma & Pandey, 2014, 5). That is to say, it is the exchange of standpoints in which participants actively participate. With the constant improvement of new media, a mounting number of choices can be provided for communication. Interactive communication via new media cannot solely enable individuals to communicate within seconds, but benefit them in being familiar with others. Since the influence of new media on individuals interactive communication has been critically discussed, the present essay will continue to examine the impacts brought about by the new media in the mobile terminal. Likewise, the impacts of new media can be demonstrated from both positive and negative perspectives. On the positive side, the majority of the population is tended to search materials and interactively communicate via new media because of their convenience and efficiency. Furthermore, new media possess more extensive information coverage in comparison to traditional communicative approaches (Lievrouw, 2011, 23). It is safe to note that information through new media may become globalized. Besides, various contents are included in new media when compared to traditional media in that not all information can be presented through traditional media. All the above reasons indicate that new media are more competitive than the traditional. On the negative side, new media are sometimes less valid and reliable in that information through traditional media are supposed to be repeatedly revised and modified before publication. In a word, this section has critically investigated the influence of new media on interactive communication following this, a critical analysis of the merits and demerits of new media is critically demonstrated. In spite of the significance of the current media landscape, both advantages and disadvantages are supposed to be demonstrated critically. On the one hand, the current enables the audience to be easily accessible to various information through a battery of devices and channels, which is more convenient and efficient in comparison to the traditional media. Besides, the current media landscape can get a general knowledge of participating responses and provide feedback accordingly. While, on the other hand, the current media landscape remains unsatisfactory in privacy protection that is extremely central to new media users. Besides, disadvantages of the current media landscape can also be identified in information reliability in that every individual can broadcast the current media. In other words, the information broadcast, sometimes remains unreliable and needs to be repeatedly confirmed (Evans, 2011, 11). Therefore, individuals are supposed to be extremely competent in critical thinking when involved in an information era. In summary, the current media landscape has till now been critically discussed in this section, which is supplied with the four major characteristics, various classifications, current developmental tendency, and merits and demerits of it. Following this, the present essay will explore how liveness is changing the current media landscape. Social media is a phenomenon that has taken the world by storm in the past decade. It is responsible for the way that people have abandoned the old ways of communication and have now taken to social media for most of their communication. One of these is Facebook. Facebook is a social media site that came into existence about ten years ago. Currently, it has billions of users who come from various parts of the world. In as much as people have taken a liking to it, one of the major discussions that have often come about Facebook, just like the many other social media sites, is safety and privacy. Meaning of privacy Privacy on social media can be viewed in various forms. The main one is information privacy. This is in regards to the kind of information that people share on Facebook, and the people it gets to. It is also about what the people who view this information are capable of doing with it. More often than not, since the inception of Facebook, there have been various cases of people who have been led to danger because of the information that they share on their Facebook profiles. For example, there are couples who met on Facebook and decided to go on a blind date. Some of these blind dates have led to distaste after the victim is tricked into showing up to meet at a location that is anything but private. This has led to several warnings being issued when people use social media to meet. It is often recommended that people only agree to meet at public locations, and also bring someone that they trust, in order to increase their safety (Johnston & Wilson, 2012). Emergence of new media There are several methods through which people can get the services that they used to get from television. Most people now use the internet as they see it as the fastest and most accurate source of information. The internet has enabled the world to gain access to a lot of things that previously were not available to them. One of the many areas that have been boosted by the presence of the internet is the collection and dissemination of news. The internet has made news not only easily accessible to many people, but has also enabled the collection process to be faster and more effective. This is because more people have access to it, and thus most media houses have devised methods through which this can be used to make their work more efficient. According to Tewksbury (Hiliard, 2014), the internet has allowed people to be more in control of the kind of new that they receive regarding various issues. Back in the day, people were only dependent the news channels to deliver news to them. This was however not completely reliable because sometimes the news are edited by the media, and some information is left out. These days, any person can avail news to the world, and thus people gain access to the more impartial news since they can get all the details from the internet. Media houses are no longer the only sources of news. This is because the internet has been availed to almost all parts of the world. There are also a lot of gadgets with which people can use to access the internet. As such, sometimes information can reach the public even before the media houses get wind of it. In fact, some media houses arent using social media and other sites as their leads to news items. Vivian & Maurin (32) explain the way in which the internet has been instrumental in the field. According to them, it is because of the presence of the internet that the new provider is not able to give news to their audience while it is still fresh enough to be called mews. As has been stated earlier, there was heavy reliance on media houses to provide the audience with the news. These days, people can get information around even without the media houses. Because the internet has allowed for media to be able to transmit information live, most of those firms now employ people in all parts of the country. These people can work for the company from the comfort of their countries. For example, when there is breaking news at a certain point in a particular country the correspondents in that country are able to show up and cover the event live while they transmit it to the mother station, which is in turn responsible for making sure this is information is also spreading to the rest of their viewership in all parts of the world. The existence of the internet has instilled more discipline among news providers. This is according to the article by Thorsten (45). The author states that media have become more vigilant and accountable because most of their time they have been found to be less serious in their duty. In the past, when people solely depended on the media for information, there was laxity on their part because they knew, after all, that the audience would take what they were told as gospel truth since they also did not have a way of finding out the truth. These days, however, most of the time they find that they have to give all the truth that they have, because they know that if they fail to do this, somebody else is going to do it. The bottom line is that whatever that is that they are keeping from the public domain is still going to find its way there. They have hence learned to be more accountable. For instance, in some countries, the government as well as certain powerful politicians had the power to influence the kind of information that is given to the public. They were able to influence the media houses to either withhold certain information or to present it to the audience in a manner that will create a certain intended perspective in the audience. This is hardly possible in the current world because of the existence of many forms of news collectors and disseminators, most of whom are unofficial. Zelizer & Stuart (21) have also proposed that the availability of the internet has made work easier in ensuring that all people can get the news. This is closely treated to the point about the collection of news that is assisted by the inventions of technology. People are no longer dependent on ownership of the main gadgets such as radio and television since these can now be substituted with mobile phones, smartphones, and computers. In fact, even newspapers are now losing their hold in the society because most of them are now available online, making it unnecessary to purchase them from the streets. Most of the newspaper and magazine producers are now even abandoning the paper practice altogether and going online. How is liveness changing within the current media landscape? It is commonly considered that liveness is closely connected to the development of media, and this section will mainly revolve around the critical investigation of how liveness is changing the current media landscape. Before entering into the current media era, it is hard for individuals to access different kinds of information conveniently, and liveness has been traditionally marked by the bringing of global events to the attention of a nationally situated populace. With the recent growth of mobile phones, blogging and social networking, notions of liveness are becoming increasingly complicated in the current media landscape (Hermida, 2012, 814). Liveness can be defined as the interaction between audience and the current media, which means that public participation is majorly central to liveness, and the constant changing of liveness can be interpreted as the changing of public participation in the current media landscape. Nowadays, the current media is playing a significant role in social, political, economic and environmental development. Being involved in the information era, the current media is closely linked to politics. Liveness within the current landscape requires the current media to tackle the political issues openly and transparently. From the perspective of logic, the establishment of democratic politics requires changing liveness, or active public participation (Svensson & Klinger, 2014, 200). In turn, public participation needs the current media as a platform. In the process of public making, the current media make the understanding of government decision-making possible through information that is collected from the public. The current media is of great help in ensuring that the public policy can be made scientifically and reasonably and that the public policy can be enhanced feasibly. The current media remains extremely significant in character-shaping of new citizens, in awareness-stimulating of public participation in the process of government decision-making, and in protecting the fundamental political rights of citizens (Vivian & Maurin, 2012, 98). It is commonly believed that the current media play a significant role in the process of public participation, but such problems as lacking a clear positioning in public participation, and lacking media mobilization can also be located and identified with them. Therefore, the role of the current media in liveness or public participation is supposed to be clearly identified. Furthermore, the changing of liveness within the current landscape can also be identified in environmental development, which can be demonstrated through the increasing concern about environmental problems, individuals awareness of ecological environment and the expectations to participate in environmental policy-making, supervising and protecting. Public participation in environmental policy-making and supervision becomes more convenient and efficient because of the widespread application of the current media (Munster, 2011, 10). Besides, the communication between government and the public becomes more useful than ever before. However, disadvantages also remain in the process of public participation in dealing with environmental problems. Therefore, it becomes a new topic to examine how to direct rational public participation through the current media. In other words, it becomes necessary to investigate how to establish and maintain effective liveness within the current media landscape. Recently, a rapid growth of such new media as mobile phones, blogging, and social networking can be clearly identified. The new media are considered to play an important role in information transferring, culture spreading, and rights supervising. Every individual can broadcast through new media. With the promotion of new media, individuals who do not know each other get together for a particular purpose (Boyd, et al., 2014, 530). Individuals tend to follow the standpoint of the majority, but a few new media sometimes mislead the public, which is harmful to social and environmental development. In recent years, a mass disturbance that is broadcast through such new media like blogging, mobile phones, and networking rises, relating to environmental problems. The reasons for mass disturbance are partially because of the publics lack of knowledge in relation to environmental problems and scientific and rational analysis of information transferred through new media. However, problems are also able to be identified in the governments dealing with new media and directing public participation, and these problems can be critically illustrated from the following fronts. First of all, the environmental information disclosure remains unsystematic. Although the environmental information disclosure has been strengthened recently, it remains unsatisfactory in meeting the needs of the public. Secondly, environmental publicity directing remains unsystematic. Last but not the least, the communication and interaction between different departments remain non ageing (Scolari, 2013, 24). In order to establish and maintain an effective liveness, batteries of measures are supposed to be taken in directing public participation through new media. First of all, environmental protection departments are supposed to improve environmental information disclosure and be supervised by the public. New adjustments are supposed to be done to fit the constant changing of new media. Secondly, great importance is supposed to be attached to the comments published through new media. Last but not the least, accelerate the establishment of new media and increase the awareness of individuals in public participation (Wittneben, 2014, 1440). This section has, till now, provided a critical investigation of how liveness is changing the current media landscape. Generally speaking, liveness has been traditionally marked by the bringing of global events to the attention of a nationally situated populace. With the recent growth of mobile phones, blogging and social networking, notions of liveness are becoming increasingly complicated in the current media landscape. How is our relationship to liveness changing within the current media landscape? Since how liveness is changing the current media landscape has been illustrated above, this section will critically investigate the question of how our relationship to liveness is changing the current media landscape. In general, the question can be answered from two fronts. In the first place, our relationship to liveness is becoming increasingly extensive within the current media landscape. In the second place, our relationship to liveness is becoming increasingly deep within the current media landscape. Traditionally, the likeness has been marked by the bringing of global events to the attention of a nationally situated populace. However, it is extremely difficult for every individual to access global events during that time, and the likeness is relatively weak. With the development of new media, individuals are provided with more choices to access various information and news. From the perspective of objectivity, the public can acquire different kinds of information through such new media like mobile phones, blogging and networking, and so on and so forth. Meanwhile, they become increasingly aware of the significance of public participation. Thus, a mounting number of individuals are objectively and subjectively involved in public participation. As a matter of fact, a number of new media forms can be identified, and it is the constant development of new media enables various information to be easily accessible to the public (Scolari, 2013, 23). Besides, the development of new media enables interactive communication to be possible. Thus, the public can comment and put forward suggestions based on their standpoints, and the government or other departments can also present feedback to participate in responses. It is also true in micro-learning that centers on small learning units and tasks in a short period. In general, micro-learning is defined as micro-perspectives in the context of education. In recent decades, it is usually adopted in e-learning and other relevant domains. Nowadays, with the constant improvement and extensive use of new media, micro-learning is also able to be processed through such new media blogging. A variety of microlearning forms can be identified, such as reflective, constructive learning, and so on and so forth. Micro-learning has been proved effective by a number of researchers and educators (Boyd, et al., 2014, 520). For instance, those who are fond of cultural communication can search the information through relevant channels, and those who are interested in English learning can also find what they want through new media. All these discussed above have proved that our relationship to liveness within the current media landscape is becoming increasingly convenient and efficient. Besides, interactive communication is considered a major changing with the development of new media, and it refers to a modern term that centers on effective interaction. Take the example of WeChat, a type of new media, which is able to be work on mobile phones; people can interactively communicate with their friends, classmates, and so on and so forth (Vivian & Maurin, 2012, 45). In comparison to traditional communication forms, such as letters decades ago, WeChat is of great convenience and significance in helping people contact one another. The interactive communication form through new media can not only help people communicate within seconds, but also benefit them in knowing better about their friends through looking through what they share in friends group, a beneficial function where people can share their personal experiences, or something they like (Pavlik, 2013, 33). Till now, this section has demonstrated how our relationship to liveness is changing the current media landscape from both the breadth and depth of public participation. It is safe to say that our relationship to liveness is becoming more complicated within the current media landscape. Conclusion Aiming to investigate how liveness and our relationship to it, is changing the current media landscape, the present essay has firstly presented a critical discussion of the current media landscape, where the four major characteristics of the current media landscape, complete with new notion, new pattern, new effectiveness and new value, various new media forms and the advantages and disadvantages of new media have been critically examined. Following this, the present essay has revolved around the question of how liveness is changing the current media landscape. This section demonstrates in detail that liveness has been traditionally marked by the bringing of global events to the attention of a nationally situated populace. Whereas, with the recent growth of mobile phones, blogging and social networking, notions of liveness are becoming increasingly complicated in the current media landscape. Finally, the present section has moved on to the question of how our relationship to liveness is changing the current media landscape from both the breadth and depth of public participation. It is safe to say that our relationship to liveness is becoming more complicated within the current media landscape. References Hirst, M., Harrison, J., & Mazepa, P. (2014). Communication and new media: From broadcast to narrowcast. Oxford University Press. Bagdikian, B. H. (2014). The new media monopoly: A completely revised and updated edition with seven new chapters. Beacon Press. Carvajal, M., Garcia-Aviles, J. A., & Gonzalez, J. L. (2012). 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