What is Media? Broadly speaking, media describes any channel of communication. The most important innovations in communication technology since writing, for the development of modern society, has been the emergence of mass media and a gradual shift from interpersonal to mass communication as the basis of societal control. It is not been engineered, of course but evolve through the complex interaction of individuals and institutions and the arrangement of their control (James R. Beniger) A short history of media • Around 45,500 years ago, some human ancestors painted on the walls of a cave in Sulawesi. • Cave painting in France and Spain have been dated to a couple of thousand years later. • Experts don’t know exactly what purpose the artwork had, but some suggest they might be the first examples of communication. • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwAYtBxn7E A short history of media • The so called 'mass media' had to wait for the creation of new technologies. Movable type and paper were first invented in China around 100 BCE. • The oldest known extant book printed from movable type was created in Korea in the 14th century. 1,500 after China, Johannes Gutenberg built the first printing press. • The printing press allows books to be mass produced where before each one had to be hand written. A short history of media • In early 17th century, the first newspapers appeared – with limited readership • By early 1800s, newspapers such as The Times of London were developing large readerships. • High speed rotary printing press produced large volumes and development of railways made for wide distribution. A short history of media • In the 1800s, arrival of photography changed the media scene. The first photographic technologies were produced during the 1830s and 40s. The invention of photography would revolutionise culture and communication in the West forever. For the first time, images of ‘real’ life could be captured for posterity and sent around the world. Portraits of royalty and other celebrities (far more accurate than paintings) allowed members of the public to feel they were viewing these people ‘in the flesh’. The dead could be remembered, the fleeting could be fixed. • By late 19th century, new technology allowed newspapers to print photographs. First Images by Fox Talbot (1834) Constant evolution • The printing press was the big innovation in communications until the telegraph was developed. Printing remained the key format for mass messages for years afterward, but the telegraph allowed instant communication over vast distances for the first time in human history. Telegraph usage faded as radio became easy to use and popularized; as radio was being developed, the telephone quickly became the fastest way to communicate person-to-person; after television was perfected and content for it was well developed, it became the dominant form of mass-communication technology; the internet came next, and newspapers, radio, telephones, and television are being rolled into this far-reaching information medium. A short history of media • Samuel Morse invented morse code in 1835. Messages could be sent over long distances almost immedietly. Before, the fastest speed at which information could travel was about 55 km/h. • In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone making instant 2-way voice communication possible. A short history of media • In 1895, the Lumiére brothers gave the first public demonstration of moving pictures. • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nj0vEO4Q6s • The first screening took place in Paris, at the Society for the Development of the National Industry, in front of an audience of 200 people. • Some of the audience were frightened. Development of the radio • During the 1860s: Scottish physicist, James Clerk Maxwell predicted the existence of radio waves; and in 1886, German physicist, Heinrich Rudholph Hertz demonstrated that rapid variations of electric current could be projected into space in the form of radio waves similar to those of light and heat. • In 1866: Mahlon Loomis, an American dentist, successfully demonstrated "wireless telegraphy." Loomis was able to make a meter connected to one kite cause another one to move, marking the first known instance of wireless aerial communication. • Guglielmo Marconi: an Italian inventor, proved the feasibility of radio communication. He sent and received his first radio signal in Italy in 1895. By 1899 he flashed the first wireless signal across the English Channel and two years later received the letter "S", telegraphed from England to Newfoundland. This was the first successful transatlantic radiotelegraph message in 1902. A short history of media: Marconi • In 1901, Guglielmo Marconi raised a radio antenna attached to a kite on Signal Hill, St. John's, Newfoundland. He received a radio signal from Cornwall, England, 3,400km away. Instant communication without wires was now possible. • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pocg1N3LWA • 5 years later, Canadian inventor Reginald Fessenden transmitted speech across the Atlantic ocean. A short history of media: Radio • In 1920, radio station KDKA in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania went on the air to report results of that year's presidential election. • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdfrC7zz8Nc • 8 years later, pictures were added to sound. • However, widespread installation of TV sets did not happen until the late 1940s. The Television • Television viewing is typically seen as a pleasurable and effortless activity, requiring much less cognitive activity than, say, reading. • The First Electronic Television was Invented in 1927 • The world’s first electronic television was created by a 21 year old inventor named Philo Taylor Farnsworth. That inventor lived in a house without electricity until he was age 14. Starting in high school, he began to think of a system that could capture moving images, transform those images into code, then move those images along radio waves to different devices. • Farnsworth was miles ahead of any mechanical television system invented to-date. Farnsworth’s system captured moving images using a beam of electrons (basically, a primitive camera). • The first image ever transmitted by television was a simple line. Later, Farnsworth would famously transmit a dollar sign using his television after a prospective investor asked “When are we going to see some dollars in this thing, Farnsworth?” • Between 1926 and 1931, mechanical television inventors continued to tweak and test their creations. However, they were all doomed to be obsolete in comparison to modern electrical televisions: by 1934, all TVs had been converted into the electronic system A short history of internet media • In 1965, two computers communicated with each other in a lab at MIT. The technology broke a message down into individual packages which were then reassembled at the receiving computer. • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKPEVNlmaUg • With many refinements, this became the ARPANET, and it was adopted as a communication system by the U.S military in 1969. This Photo by Unknown author is licensed under CC BY-SA. Development of the internet • In 1974, ARPANET was adapted for use commercially. • In 1990, Tim BernersLee developed HTML, a technology that allows people to navigate the internet. • The following year, WWW went into action and by 1993, there were 600 websites and 2 million computers connected to the internet. This Photo by Unknown author is licensed under CC BY-SA-NC. Search engines and browsers • In 1998, Google search engine was born. • In 2004, Facebook went online and the whole social networking phenomenon began. • There are now more than 1 billion websites with about 140,000 new ones created daily. • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUrDI6OkJfU Types of media: Print media The term print media is used to describe the traditional print-based media including newspapers, magazines, books, comics, etc. Digital era has brought us desktop publishing softwares, print-ondemand publication services and electronic book readers. Types of media: Television Where it was once the case that programs had to be watched at the time they were broadcasted, this is no longer the case. Digital era has brought us satellite TV, pay-per-view and on-demand streaming services. Types of media: Movies (Films) Oldest form of motion picture technology. Originally movies could only be consumed at a neighbourhood theater. Digital era has brought us satellite services featuring HD content, distributed on DVD and Blu-Ray disks and on-demand streaming services. Types of media: Video games Available since 1980s, video games have only grown in popularity. Modern era games features an immersive experience, networked gameplay, shared universe and gesture-based interactions. Types of media: Music The advent of sound recording at the end of the 19th century ushered in the era of analog recordings, first on vinyl records and later on audio tape in the form of 8tracks and later, cassettes. CDs begin the widespread use of digital format for music, followed by MP3s which allows music sharing and streaming via the internet. Digital media Any media device which can be read by a machine (computer) is called digital media. What makes the difference between digital media devices and the classical, physical is the fact that digital media is created, modified and distributed on digital electronic devices. Digital media The impact of digital media brought about a technological revolution. The internet, personal computing, and digital media gave us a chance to handle information on a level which we could only dream about with traditional information storage devices like books. Digital media created a whole new world in the fields of journalism, entertainment, education, publishing and commerce. It brought about new challenges concerning copyrights and intellectual propetry. Research areas in digital media technology Technical Humanities Compression-decompression algorithms Cyber security Image processing Digital signal processing Software development Artificial intelligence Social and cultural studies Policies Ethics Digital marketing Digital heritage and culture Public relations Why do we like media? An Essay • https://buffer.com/resources/psychology-of-socialmedia/#:~:text=Dopamine%20causes%20us%20to%20seek,resist%20 than%20cigarettes%20and%20alcohol.
