Living in the XXI century means being ready to the most drastic changes within the social, economical of financial sphere within the shortest amounts of time.
However, it is important to realize that the change in media also allows for more opportunities for economical, social and cultural development. A fresh look at the changes that media triggers will help define its purpose and possibly define the pattern of future changes that new media will trigger in society.
To embrace the significance of the problem, it is necessary to define such phenomena as change, media, culture and society. While change is a relatively easy concept that presupposes certain progress/regress, i.e., improvements or, on the contrary, deterioration, media is a more complex issue to define.
Typically considered a means to convey certain piece of information, media comes in large varieties, starting from print media, e.g., newspapers and magazines, up to online media, e.g., YouTube channels (visual media) or social networks, such as Facebook.
As for culture, it can be defined as the ways in which the people of a specific nation envision the world around them. Finally, society is a group of people who are related to each other in some aspect (e.g., social, economical, political, or all of the above-mentioned) and form an entity.
With that in mind, the impact of media on society becomes more obvious. A change in media, which practically means establishing a new and more progressive way of delivering certain information from one member of the society to another one, triggers a social change.
Every member of society starts treating information as something extremely accessible and, therefore, tends to consume information in large portions.
Hence, media, culture, society and technology spur each other; as long as there are new technological inventions, there will be new forms of media, which will enhance the consumption of information and, thus, change the society gradually. Thus, the assemblage of culture, society, information and technology is formed.
It is also important to differentiate between technology, technique and technical systems. While technique is a manner in which the technological advances progress, technology is the sum of progressive knowledge concerning certain technical aspects, e.g., machinery, information, etc., and the ability to apply this knowledge to practice. In their turn, technical systems represent the sum of the existing technologies.
No matter how sweet and enthralling the word “progress” might sound, a new step forward brings certain threats closer. For instance, in the present-day world with its technological advances, it can be expected that new forms of media will make people plunge into the joys of virtual reality forgetting about real life.
Supported by a number of theories, such as the ones developed by William Bogard, Bruno Latour and Brian Massumi, the idea of introducing media as a part and parcel of virtual reality is becoming increasingly more popular (Foundations. Thinkers and ideas).
Therefore, it is clear that media is not a monster that shapes the lives of people the way it wants to ruin them later on; on the contrary, the use of media defines the future of business, entertainment, social life and art.
Using new technologies wisely and not allowing them to turn into a thing in itself, people can possibly expect that the recently created media serves peaceful purposes and even offers certain means to correct the flaws of society, e.g., help the people from different corners of the world communicate. When used responsibly, new media opens a whole new world to the humankind.
Works Cited
Foundations. Thinkers and ideas 2013. PDF file. 28 March 2013. Print.