CRD701: History and Theory of Communication Technology

Manovich (2001) begins his dissection of new media by establishing their relationship to the computer. ?The computer media revolution affects all stages of communication, including acquisition, manipulation, storage, and distribution; it also affects all types of media ? texts, still images, moving images, sound, and spatial constructions,? he writes (p. 19). However, what is it about the computer?s relationship to media that makes them ?new?? Manovich identifies five principles that qualify new media: numerical representation, modularity, automation, variability and cultural transcoding. He dispels common myths surrounding new media, such as they are analog media converted to digital formats and interact with their users.

Listing media developments from the 1950s and 1960s, including color television, the cassette and videotape recorder, Enzensberger (1970) asserts these new media increasingly form connections with other new and existing media, ?clearly coming together to form a universal system? (p. 261). Despite media?s growing ability to involve the masses in the social and political process, Enzensberger argues they actually serve to prevent large-scale communication. Indeed, television and film allow for ?no reciprocal action between transmitter and receiver; technically speaking, it reduces feedback to the lowest point compatible with the system? (p. 262). He believes media serve to manipulate their audiences, by definition, because all raw material is edited for presentation on the page or screen. The only way to combat the manipulation is for everyone to become a manipulator.

In a response to Enzensberger, Baudrillard (2003) dispels the idea that placing media production tools in the hands of the masses will make an impact, ?as if owning a TV set or a camera inaugurated a new possibility of relationship and exchange. Strictly speaking, such cases are no more significant than the possession of a refrigerator or a toaster? (p. 281). He calls for an understanding of communication beyond the model of sender-receiver. Without this change, he argues, ?All vague impulses to democratize content, subvert it, restore the ?transparency of the code;? control the information process, contrive a reversibility of circuits, or take power over media are hopeless? (p. 282).

Uricchio (2003), like Bolter below, addresses the separation between media theory and practice. He offers the example of film studies, ?initially defined its interests almost in opposition to commercial production, focusing instead upon the medium?s history, its aesthetic markers, and the development of a set of academic disciplinary terms and practices? (p. 27). Using his definition of media as cultural practices, Uricchio believes historical analysis of media needs to expand beyond medium-specific study.

According to Bolter (2003), in disciplines like computer science and graphic design, theory affirms practice and practice justifies theory. ?The point is that film critics were and still are examining a mass medium to which they will not in general make a practical contribution,? he writes. ?The same has been true for the critics of radio and television and to some extent even the mass print genres of magazines, newspapers, and trade fiction. Cultural critics of media ? often assume that the audience, including themselves, will not have access to the means of production? (p. 22). Recognizing the relationship between media theorist and media producer would serve to enhance new media studies. Ultimately, as he concludes his article, ?This new media critic that we are imagining wants to make something, but what she wants to make will lead her viewers or readers to reevaluate their formal and cultural assumptions? (p. 30).

Returning to Manovich, I felt his principles of automation and variability gave me the greatest understanding of what constitutes new media. Music services like Pandora and last.fm determine playlists based on a listener?s favorite artists. Similarly, amazon.com continually suggests new books, movies and music based on previous purchases. The close link between automation and variability allow for this extreme personalization of new media. Manovich also makes the important distinction that what may appear to be interactive features are actually automation and variability algorithms at work.

In the introduction to Enzensberger?s article, the book?s editor Noah Wardrip-Fruin notes it is impossible to read the 1970 piece in present day ?without an eerie sense of familiarity and disjoint? (p. 260). One such moment for me is Enzensberger?s description of the Xerox electrostatic copying machine, which allowed its customers to rent the equipment but not purchase it. This draws the eerie similarity to propriety software such as Microsoft Windows, iTunes and the Adobe Creative Suite. Users may license (or ?rent?) the software, but not purchase it. The result is a multitude of restrictions, most notably the prohibition of any reverse engineering.

Baudrillard rejects Enzensberger?s idea that every person should become a media producer, or ?manipulator.? He argues such a revolution would result in ?a kind of personalized amateurism, the equivalent of Sunday tinkering on the periphery of the system? (p. 286). Rather than the underground press Enzensberger envisions, the rise in media consumer-as-producer only leaves personal Web sites full of cat pictures and YouTube videos showing people hit in the head with blunt objects.

I spend a considerable amount of time viewing academic job postings, and reading Uricchio and Bolter?s comments on the difference between media theory and practice reminds me of the difference between hiring norms for speech communication (theory) and media production in academia. Right now High Point University has vacancies for five faculty positions in its School of Communication. The speech/organizational communication professor posting requires a PhD, while candidates with only masters degrees are welcome to apply for positions in new media, media production, journalism, and public relations/advertising. This is just one vivid example of how those involved in theory need higher academic qualifications than those ?only? involved in practice.