New Electronic Media

The text ‘New Electronic Media’, taken from Mass Communication Theory by Denis McQuail, features in B.Ed. 1^st Year’s General English book (Tribhuvan University). The key takeaways from the text are as follows:

• telematic media = combination of telecommunications and informatics
• visual display unit (television screen) linked to a computer network
• The main features of new media:
  • decentralization = supply and choice are no longer predominantly in the hands of the supplier of communication
  • high capacity = cable or satellite delivery overcomes the former restrictions of cost, distance and capacity
  • interactivity = the receiver can select, answer back, exchange and be linked to other receivers directly
  • flexibility = of form, content, and use
• New telematics media have been offered to the general public in two main forms: one is teletext, and the other is videotext.
• The new media is a hybrid medium. It has bridged differences between media (convergence of technology), and also between public and private definitions of communication activities. The same media can now be used interchangeably for public and private purposes and both for receiving and self-production (for example, the video ‘camcorder’).
• becoming increasingly computerized