Global media, new
technologies and the
digital divide
A project by Alice Vasiloiu
outline
New media technologies have radically changed the way
information is disseminated globally.
The potential of these technologies to spread information beyond
borders and boundaries, to contribute to development and to
shape new social identities
The issues of access continue to hamper the potential of these
technologies to bring about social change globally.
Severe inequalities exist in terms of access and use of new media,
not only between various regions of the world, but also within
‘developed’ countries, where access and use of new media often
amplify existing inequalities in terms of gender and ethnicity.
The Fourth Power
Theories and implementations during many years, have led to the separation
of powers. After the executive, legislative and judicial branches of power -
commonly in recent times and especially in journalistic jargon - media are
however defined as an alleged fourth power.
A difference from the others is often outlined in the fact that the power to
(eventually) influence the public opinion using media is not much controlled,
because media are so "ethereal", and it would be hard to weight them.
Others instead suggest that this would not be a difference, since the control
over official powers is extremely hard to be verified in practice. Often it is not
easy, indeed, to find out who really controls a medium and how much potential
efficacy it effectively could have for such goals. It is then argued that when one
of the three "canonic" Montesquieu's powers gains an additional power on
media, this would be extremely dangerous for the survival of democracy, and
an eventual conflict of interests is contested.
Dissemination of information
Dissemination of information is defined as the distribution of information to the public. It
is usually initiated or sponsored by the government of a country or an agency authorised
for the purpose of dissemination of information by any public sector unit (abbreviated as
PSU).
In simple terms, the term dissemination of information is defined as the process of
making information available to the public. The government must not only regulate the
quality and quantity of information that it can disseminate to the public, but it must also
be systematically disseminated to a select group of people. For example, sensitive
information, such as secrets of the armed forces or the ministry that looks after defence,
must not be divulged to the public.
The dissemination of information is a one-way process. The disseminated information
flows down from the source (an agency of the government) to the target audience (the
public). There may or may not be any feedback from the public.
With the introduction of the new media, information goes two-way, we are part of an
online community that has the ability to change what’s given, into something that might
have a complete different meaning.
what media can do to us
Most of us haven’t seen aliens ever in our
entire life. But if we consult the world wide
web, we might just get ourselves a pretty
concrete and substantive image by the end of
the day, of what one should look like.
We’ve already formed our own ideas after
what old media gave us in the cartoons, films,
books or radio programs, ever since we were
little.
Apparently, it is entirely up to us if we believe
what we see, or not, because nowadays it's
easy to manipulate audio and video and get
really trust-worthy results.
access to information
Each and every year, media becomes more and more accessible to everyone around. One
way or another, we are all somehow able to get information about something that
aroused our interest at a specific moment in time. (e.g. U2)
We can discuss it in various ways and create our own opinions or even generate our own
content about that and publicly spread it among people that share the interest. We can do
that on the well-known web 2.0 platform (blogs, wiki) where there can be more authors
writing on one piece of work and people are able to give feedback and collaborate if they
wish. Of course, trueness and credibility of the content are questionable.
It is indeed very often said that media could be useful (in the point of view of someone
looking for a control over the forming of consensus) in order to discipline the popular
sentiments, by detracting the public from the apocalyptic problems of mankind (e.g.
global warming, ozone hole, radioactive waste, ...), and by the "psychological warfare"
threatening their own public until it accepts foreign or external interventions. But, as said,
this needs to encounter an audience mainly composed by people without sufficient
means to "resist" this intellectual pressure. The lack of a sufficient individual education,
due to a perhaps intentionally provoked low quality of school, is then considered one of
the major reasons for the success of such attempts.
Everybody’s in.
Social media as we know it, is a very generic term that includes different concepts all related to
technology, social interaction and building/providing content such as text, photos or videos.
As you could see in the previous image, it can be about sharing or publishing information, but
also about building a social network. It can be linked to entertainment as well.
According to some people, social networks will replace email (also here), address book, TV
network, search engines, cold calling, and soon our whole social lives.
We are not yet at this point but one thing is sure: its importance is quickly growing and is
becoming not only a new way to communicate between brands/consumers and
consumers/consumers. In fact it’s also setting up interactions with “older” kind of websites such
as blogs, e-business websites, user-created content’s websites… How many blogs have you ever
visited with links to “Digg it” or “share on Facebook” ? What about last photos of Flickr album on
these blogs ? It is also about identification with the spread of openID, with the will to
interconnect different systems but also simplifying it.
But, what is social media about? Social media is about relationships. Social media is about
interactivity. Social media is about word of mouth.
effects
There is a very subtle hierarchy happening in our subconscious.
Regardless your ethnic background, wealth or stature, you’re suddenly
not human enough these days if you aren’t up to date with what the
globalization process has to offer.
Be it the latest TV series (Family Guy, House MD, Gossip Girl, Two and
a Half Men, How I met your mother, LOST, the 4400, Grey’s Anatomy,
etc.), the the latest iPhone or iPod, being familiar with the most
popular music hits or wearing a very popular brand of shoes while we
also own a blog and a social network profile filled with ‘friends’ from all
over the world.
Things that we use or do, define us as individuals. But what do we do
when the market is saturated? How do we make a difference?
Case study 0.1 - contextualizing the uses of
‘new’ and ‘old’ media in everyday life:
Two eight year old boys play their favorite
multimedia adventure game on the family PC.
When they discover an Internet site where the
same game can be played interactively with
unknown others, this occasions great
excitement in the household. The boys choose
their fantasy personae and try diverse
strategies to play the game, both co-operative
and competitive, simultaneously ‘talking’ on-
line (i.e. writing) to the other participants. But
when restricted in their access to the Internet,
for reasons of cost, the game spins off into
‘real life’. Now the boys, together with their
younger sisters, choose a character, don their
battles and play ‘the game all over the house,
going downstairs to Hell, The Volcanoes and
the Labyrinth, and upstairs to The Town,
‘improving’ the game in the process. The new
game is called, confusingly for adult
observers, ‘playing the Internet.’’ (1998:436)
Mass dispersion
is progress indeed and that is only because everything that information is about right now
is, as T. Feldman also stated, “increasingly manipulable, networkable, dense, compressible
and impartial.” Sadly, on the other hand, it is also dispersion. From this point of view,
geographical, ethnical, demographical characteristics of each one of us became irrelevant.
No matter whom we are what we do or what our beliefs are, due to what the new media
has to offer, we can have everything incorporated in just one really intelligent gadget that
we can hold in our hands.
The whole idea of ‘quality time together’ is fading away. In the past, letters were
personalized hand-written ways of expressing thoughts and sending them to our dearest
ones. Now we have the convenient e-mail that does not require movement to the post
office, stamps or various official paperwork and arrangements. In the past, dinnertime
used to only be about eating and telling others how each of us spent the day. Now,
technological distractions are involved in the story as well. “A good way of getting a sense
of what analogue information and digital information are is to imagine ‘analogue’ as an
expression of our experience of the real world while ‘digital’ expresses a world belonging
exclusively to computers.” (Tony Feldman, (1997:1), Introduction to Digital Media,
Routledge.)
growing apart
Questions to ask yourself
Consider, for example, the array of messages within media content
that you will encounter today about gender roles.
Do these messages challenge or perpetuate what are currently viewed as
the ‘appropriate’ gender roles in your specific social setting or cultural
context?
What do these messages tell you about masculinity and femininity?
What sorts of assumptions are inherent in these media messages about
being a ‘man’ or a ‘woman’ in the early twenty-first century?
What sorts of normative assumptions are made about sexuality?
Is universal heterosexuality assumed?
What sorts of discourses predominate about ideal body shapes and weight?
Within the mainstream print and broadcast media, how are these
messages articulated at a symbolic level?
Do you think that they alter in any way the understanding you have about
the social world in terms of gender divisions and gender-based inequality?
The Digital Divide
Media can shape and assert ideas. Can brainwash and change mentalities. Ability to change
human behavior and emotions.
Financial potential?
The term “digital divide” has quickly become so popular as an instant sound bite that it has
entered everyday speech as shorthand for any and every disparity within the online community.
In this study the concept of the digital divide is understood as a multidimensional phenomenon
encompassing three distinct aspects.
The global divide refers to the divergence of Internet access between industrialized and
developing societies. The social divide concerns the gap between information rich and poor in
each nation.
Finally within the online community, the democratic divide signifies the difference between those
who do, and do not, use the panoply of digital resources to engage, mobilize and participate in
public life.
Many have speculated that the freewheeling, individualistic , and somewhat irreverent spirit that
appears to be characteristic of the World Wide Web, captured by many of the quirkier dot.com
ads and Webzines, may help shape a distinctive cyber-culture, as well as altering ascribed social
identities such as those of gender and race.
Gender discrimination and ethnic
discrimination
Gender discrimination in media
Racial discrimination
Personal experience? Really?
Stereotypes or authenticity?
Too much subjectivity?
Culture! Not cyber-culture!
Global media: Mulan or Kung Fu panda spreading ideas
about local (Chinese) culture
What to do?
Many industry leaders in the corporate sector have expressed
concern that too many people are being left behind in the
Information Age, and multiple nonprofit organizations and
foundations have highlighted this problem. Governments in
Finland, Germany, Canada, and Sweden have all announced
programs to address access inequalities, often blending
private and public resources.
Ex: the British government has established a network of city
learning centers, introduced a scheme to distribute
reconditioned computers to homes in poor neighborhoods
and develop a national grid linking all public libraries to the
Internet.
What’s not said loudly, is said
subliminally.
Sexual references, iluminati symbols, satanism
Sex sells
Subliminal messages in children’s cartoons
Drug References in Alice in Wonderland
Case study 0.2 - Subliminal Messages
It is suggested that the personalities of the dwarf characters in
Disney's animated film version of Snow White and the Seven
Dwarfs represent the 7 stages of cocaine addiction.
Walt Disney didn’t make up Snow White himself, the film was
obviously based on the fairy tale by the Grimm brothers. Disney
was just the one responsible for creating names and distinctive
personalities for each of the seven dwarfs.
Their names correspond (we do not know whether or not it is
intentionally) – to the symptoms of various stages of cocaine
addiction: changes in sleep/wake patterns (sleepy), mood swings
(happy, grumpy), alteration of personality (dopey, bashful), and
allergies (sneezy).
Fig. 1.0: The Seven Dwarfs - Sleepy, Bashful, Doc, Dopey, Happy, Sneezy, Grumpy
media influence
The media play a central role in defining societies as traditional, modern or
postmodern. Modern and postmodern societies continue to be marked by
inequalities in terms of class, ethnicity and gender The mass media’s role in
reproducing there inequalities may be seen on two main fronts. We can view
the question of the mass media and inequality in terms of access to the mass
media and we can and should ask questions about the extent to which the mass
media either challenge or reproduce social inequality in their representation of
the social world.
The much favored illusion of the global community or ‘global village’ , used
repeatedly by the media industry itself, needs to be balanced with a more
realistic perspective that recognizes that not all social groups or societies have
equal access to media technology or the increasing amount of media content
being made available for purchase or consumption.
At a micro level the mass media act as agents of socialization, constitute a
powerful source of social meaning, and occupy a significant amount of people’s
leisure time.
Regional Access to Internet, Television,
Cellular Phones and Radio (per 1000 people)
EarthTrends 2009, Regional totals calculated (1) using latest available national data from the International
Telecommunications Union
Mini-Survey
“In China, new media exists into every city family. We have cable TV, PC games, e-products for the mobile
phone (such as e-newspaper, podcast). However, in the rural area, few people can access these new
media. They highly depend on the traditional media, such as the radio or newspaper. Usually, one or two
big families share one small TV and only receive little programs. There are not many TV programs made
for farmers, for instance. What’s more, women have no right of higher education in some poor areas.
Therefore, there is nothing to focus on their living situation and they have no media programme that is
specially designated for them. Therefore, in China, I think the new media just belongs to the rich and
middle class people, it’s not for everyone.” Jing Zhang, Media & PR Student, Newcastle University
“I would say that there's no inequality in the use of new media in Belgium, if you are talking about
Internet, social networks etc. Most universities, schools, provide free access to computers, and almost
everyone has internet at home. The only problem comes probably from the price - very expensive for
Internet in Belgium. Which means some very poor people can't afford it. Finally, most of the time, only
young people (less than 30%) use computers, Internet or Social networks. I don't think there are
amplified inequalities just because everyone can access it at school!” Etienne Froment, Media student,
Newcastle University
Back in Romania we have it almost everywhere and it’s not even that expensive anymore.
But because we all have access to it one way or another, some people just educate
themselves only based on new media products. That leads to a very weak understanding of
many concepts of various domains. Personally, I refuse to get too much in touch with
what’s selling everywhere nowadays, because I think it is able to brainwash and I am OK
with sticking to my own ideas about everything. Call me limited but I don’t trust TV shows
or random podcasts and videos that run on YouTube, that might just come up with
information that probably isn’t true, just to get attention from the audience and gain a big
rating which later gives their profit. It’s all a matter of interests, and mine is to have access
to what’s real and true.” Irina Mateescu, Media student at the University of Bucharest
“Actually in china, a developing country, inequalities regarding access of new media reflect
a noticeable gap between urban and rural areas, especially in some isolated small villages.
But as a high speed of economical development, a portion of poor places have been
equipped with the basic new media condition such as mobile phones and networking
which shortened inequality. For the use of new media, the same situation, the more
chances has individual to access to new media, the more familiar with and influent
surrounding people. New media has various forms and contents in relation to almost every
topic. Gender discrimination tends to decline. Due to censorship and propaganda filters,
few aspects could be solved indeed.” Ting Wang – Media & PR student – Newcastle University
Bibliography
Eoin Devereux, ‘Understanding the media’, 2007 (p.14-18)
Pippa Norris, ‘Digital Divide’ , 2004 (p.26)
Lisa Nakamura, ‘Digitizing Race’, 2007 (p.70)
Internet sources:
Wikipedia
Earth Trends World Resources Institute
Blurt it
YouTube
