User Perspectives on Media Convergence: Results from Quantitative and Qualitative Studies
This chapter investigates the user perspective on new media, and especially on how the convergence between television and mobile technologies is experienced in highly connected societies. It relies on three user studies aiming at exploring current and fut
- PDF / 514,828 Bytes
- 32 Pages / 439.37 x 666.142 pts Page_size
- 13 Downloads / 206 Views
1
What We Talk About When We Talk About Convergence
Convergence is an ambiguous and hard-to-define concept because it can refer to many different ideas and processes. “It is used differently, both with regard to what is converging (networks, terminals, social practices, etc), and with what happens when something converges (merging, new complexities, etc)” (Storsul & Stuedahl, 2007, p. 13). In academic and industrial publications, authors have used the term to describe any phenomena related to the development of digital media. Most however acknowledge that convergence occurs across media organizations (institutional convergence), across consumers (cultural convergence), and across platforms (technological convergence), in a carefully regulated environment (regulatory convergence). Studying the blurring of mass and interpersonal communication, Lu¨ders argues that converging forms of communication rely on three processes: interaction, participation, and social integration (Lu¨ders, 2007). Firstly, interaction offers symmetrical communication channels, which typically contrasts with the asymmetrical communication process of mass media (to which new media is opposed). The bi-directional dialogue resulting from interactions should however not be over acclaimed or promoted as superior to mass media’s monologue, which is expected to keep a significant role in future media consumption. Secondly, audience participation in new media differs from that of mass media as it is unformatted and unedited. Despite the issues raised by the integration of unedited material into their in-house created content, user generated content has become vital to media corporations who encourage audiences to voice their opinion and share stories and multimedia creations. Finally, social integration refers to the ritual functions of mediated communication, which Lu¨ders considers reflecting a desire to situate oneself in relation to others. Overall, if “the opposite ends A. Fleury (*) Aalborg University – Section for Multimedia and Signal Processing, Niels Jernes Vej 12, 9220, Aalborg, Denmark e-mail: [email protected] # Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2016 A. Lugmayr, C. Dal Zotto (eds.), Media Convergence Handbook - Vol. 2, Media Business and Innovation, DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-54487-3_11
193
194
A. Fleury
of the interpersonal and mass-mediated communication axis are still easily distinguishable” (Lu¨ders, 2007, p. 195)—placing phone calls versus reading newspapers, an increasing grey area exists within which the boundaries between mass and interpersonal communication have become somehow irrelevant. According to Jenkins, convergence is more than the tendency of various types of media to be available for consumption on a single device thanks to technological evolution. Instead, convergence occurs on five levels: technological, economic, social, cultural, and global (Jenkins, 2001). He argues against the early vision of convergence, describing the phenomenon as the advent of an “u¨bercomputer”, a singular device managing all acces
Data Loading...
