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When I think of how new media is approached, I think of how others perceive it. Several theorists have given their own perspective on how media is seen to them, but out of all of them, two stand out to me: the feminist approach and Media archaeology.

From the feminist perspective, Judy Wajcman, a sociologist known for her work in feminist technoscience, particularly in her book “Technofeminism”. She focused on one thing: the relationship between gender and technology. She argued that technology was not neutral but was shaped by gender relations. This brought a question to mind: " How does the media portray women that it has caused great impacts in terms of gender roles and placements in organizations?"

The use of technology (New media) has forged a fixed mindset about women. it has made women look fragile, thus disempowering women from taking up bigger roles in organizations, creating a boundary that prevents women from taking up bigger positions in their workplaces.

Then, there is media archaeology. It focused on attempting to understand the new media by ensuring critical examination of the past by focusing on the relationship between the old and the new. This resides with me because for me understanding how new media can be i focus on the past. It reminds me of my A-level program where I took up History, the first year was focused on the British industrial revolution focusing on how past inventions lead to the development of the new technology we use today. This has helped me to understand the gravity with which media is described as new because for every digital device that is used today there has always been an old form of media that created it.

Citation:

Flew, T., & Smith, R. (2021). New media: An introduction (4th Canadian Ed). Oxford University Press.

Wajcman, J. (2004). Technofeminism. https://monoskop.org/images/a/ae/Wajcman_Judy_TechnoFeminism_2004.pdf

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The history of new media goes back to the very beginning before phones were created. It goes back to a time when sending information had come with a lot of issues when it came to how the message was delivered.

It all started with the telegraph; this solved the major issue of how information was delivered to people. But as technology evolved , especially with the printing press that allowed access of information to all, people finally understood the use of technology and focused on one major thing, “How can electricity be used to send a message?” and the solution was morse code, this was a mix of dots and dashes that represented letters and numbers which was used to pass a message to those that could read the code. But that was not the only thing the telegraph was useful for.

For every aspect of industrial evolution, it was one idea or invention that led to another but in this case the telegraph opened doors for globalisation.

The telegraph built the pathway for phone, camera and anything that had a similar system built into it. But Harold Innis (1951) made a distinction between time binding and space binding media and how it impacted culture and community. He made it known that time binding media focused more on  how messages where hard to deliver because they were either monuments or stone tablets which had great durability this made it difficult for information to be passed across in the past before the telegraph  while the space binding focused on the use of paper like the printing press and telegraph that allowed information to be passed easier but it could be easily destroyed especially the telegraph because there was a time when the telegraph was in such a high demand that it was becoming extremely slow and difficult for people to send messages across.

But over time it evolved causing a need for smart phones like Apple iPhone that allowed people to send messages from across the world and also allowed them to take pictures which is explained by the term  digital convergence where old media and new media come together to create a new form of technology  that performs the same activities.

Citation:

Flew, T., & Smith, R. (2021). New media: An introduction (4th Canadian Ed). Oxford University Press.

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The differences in how media has been portrayed over time and how it has been used shows how society has evolved over the years. The media has evolved from focusing on breaking news and politics to becoming an entity that has established itself into every aspect of our lives. It is used almost every day, to listen to music, the creation of academic papers and even the weekly announcements that we receive at the University of Calgary about due dates for courses or deadlines for payments. But the way the media is used to its fullest has to do with who has greater knowledge about the use of the media.

One of the major differences in the transition from "old" to "new" media is the digital divide. The current generation "Gen-Z" is seen to have more digitally intelligent compared to the millennials and generation X. According to research done by the Digital Future Society, "the media often portrays Gen Z as being socially progressive and engaged in social and

political causes (Carnegie, 2022) ...This sparks several questions on how digital technologies are shaping this generational cohort’s attitudes and beliefs.".

I believe that due to the fact that the world has become more digitally evolved that this has created a wider division between the older and younger generation because when I view how media was portrayed in the past it was through newspapers which shaped their beliefs through what they were made to read but when compared to new media with the creation of TikTok and Instagram has shaped the beliefs and attitudes of Gen-Z because it is based on not only what is read and what they watch. This digital divide shows how exactly how the media is perceived because as someone who is considered a Gen Z, what i watch on social media has shaped my beliefs on topics both culturally and politically especially as someone who makes maximum use of social media. Especially, with the current generation who are unapologetic about what they stand for , an example is the Black Lives Matter protest of 2020, where members of “Gen Z”  walked on the streets of America and social media to make known what exactly they stood for in matters of politics and the spread of awareness of what was believed to be of great importance to them.

In summary,  the representation of media in society is based on how members of each generation make use of it when compared to the past especially among the younger generation who tend to make more use of apps like Spotify and Instagram compared to members of the older generation who may have downloaded the app but do not make extreme use of the app.

Citations:

Davis, D.-M. (2020, June 10). The action generation: How gen Z really feels about race, equality, and its role in the historic George Floyd protests, based on a survey of 39,000 Young Americans. Business Insider. https://www.businessinsider.com/how-gen-z-feels-about-george-floyd-protests-2020-6

Flew, T., & Smith, R. (2021). New media: An introduction (4th Canadian Ed). Oxford University Press.

Gen Z and Digital Inclusion: Moving beyond digital natives ... (2024, August). https://digitalfuturesociety.com/app/uploads/2024/08/DFS_GENERACION_Z_ENG_FINAL.pdf

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week 5- AI, Large Language Models and Coded Bias

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week 5- AI, Large Language Models and Coded Bias

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When we think about what we view on the internet, we normally can't tell the difference between what is true and what isn't, or between what is fake and what is real.

The increased use of AI has made it difficult for us to distinguish between reality and our imagination.

The documentary I watched in class titled "Coded bias" focuses on how the increased use of AI has caused bias towards people.

Joy Buolamwini speaks on how the code that has been created my white men like Alan Turing who consider themselves as the founding fathers of AI. But it brings up one question to me,” why create an intelligence based on your own beliefs that isn’t 100% accurate?”. AI was created with the expectation that it would be accurate with the mindset that it made work and information easier to grasp.

Joy pointed out that AI can’t tell easily notice the facial features of those in the black community compared with that of those that are white because its algorithm has been programmed to notice the features of white individuals because that was the base of their program.

This explains why people say “don’t trust what AI tells u all the time”. This is because it is not always accurate and can be manipulated. This is done through micro recipe which means telling the computer what to do or giving the computer data and it analyzes it on its own.

In summary, AI is a broad concept in my perspective because there are still aspects of it that hasn’t been looked on so easily and analyzed.

Citation:

Flew, T., & Smith, R. (2021). New media: An introduction (4th Canadian Ed). Oxford University Press.

Kantayya, Shalini, et al. Coded Bias. 7th Empire Media, 2021.

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 AI, Large Language Models and Coded Bias

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week 6- Internet Law, Policy and Governance 

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week 6- Internet Law, Policy and Governance 

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When I think of internet laws, I think of how these laws are followed and how people choose to disobey them and get away with it unpunished. Breaking the law is seen as a serious offense, but in terms of the internet, numerous issues have been raised.

The textbook makes known to us the three main issues of dealing with the internet: the challenges of networked information, the fact that the internet is global, and, most importantly, the fact that internet laws do not exist.

In terms of the challenges, I can't ignore that the internet is faster than the legal system, which makes me question why so many rules have been made for it when it's rules take a lot of time to be updated this explains why people can get away with a lot of crimes on the internet like harassment and scamming because the laws that are meant to be put in place to keep us safe aren't there.

We live in a global world where the laws regarding different things aren't the same. So, the fact that the internet is global explains why the laws and legal systems in different countries are completely different from each other, because we are citizens of different countries that follow different sets of rules.

In conclusion, in the world we live in, the laws put in place aren't always updated due to time, and the fact that some of these laws are so outdated that they can't be followed unless the government takes their time to go through them and update them.

citation:

Flew, T., & Smith, R. (2021). New media: An introduction (4th Canadian Ed). Oxford University Press.