To connect, to create, to share creativity or
thought, to discuss, to collaborate, to form groups or to combine with others
in mutual interests or passions. If you can’t see the point of any of those
things, you will not see the point of Facebook.’
(www.guardian.co.uk)
What opportunities and/or disadvantages do new and digital media have
for audiences?
New and digital
techniques has created more opportunities to audiences as they can now connect,
create media texts, share thoughts and creativity, collaborate and discuss, and
form groups with people that have mutual interests and passions. Although all
these things seem positive there are disadvantages such as less privacy, less
censorship, danger of the growth of bad groups and several or things that will
be mentioned later in this essay.
An example of how people
can share ideas is Youtube. People can produce media texts expressing their
ideas and values. This gives people the opportunity to share ideas and
highlight problems with society. An example of this is Kony 2012. This was an
online campaign that was put online to spread awareness of, and helps catch a
man guilty of war crimes; it raised thousands of pounds and helped keep some
military advisers in Africa to help local militaries catch this man. This is an
example of possible benefits to society of new and digital media.
Another area were new and
digital media has benefited society is with the ability to discuss topics in
the public eye. On most the news channels there is areas for people to leave
comments, opinions and feelings about the article. This allows the public to
discuss and share the feelings about the topic and take action is necessary.
This can be done on separate website not only news websites. This is one of the
ways the student protests were set up; lots of people were unhappy about the
increase in tuition fees and shared their feeling online. A protest was then
setup on these sites. This shows that new and digital media has allowed people
to with similar to discuss and then meet to take action about things they are
not happy with in society. This is something that would have been very
difficult and long to do in the past.
Another benefit of new
and digital technology is it helps the police and authority prevent and reduce
crime. This is because is people talk about illegal activities online it can be
seen by police; the police can then go to the places and stop the people from
committing crimes and arrest any people guilty of committing crime. Also the
police can use and video or image in court to prove someone is guilty of the
crime; this was something used a lot after the London riots to imprison people
who participated in the riots and broke the law.
There are also
disadvantages of people with similar ideas being able to connect; this is that
it is likely groups of people who may abuse this power and may meet up and
commit acts of crime. An example of this is the London riots. Many people used
social networking sites and other websites and platforms to communicate and
arrange to meet and cause mayhem. This allowed these people to meet up in large
groups and cause destruction and loot. This ended up costing the government
millions of pounds and is an example of a disadvantage of new and digital
media.
Another disadvantage to audiences is they can be
exposed to incorrect information. This could be put presented in a way to make
audiences ideas and values to change. By doing this people and businesses can
make audiences do things and think things that they wouldn’t have done before. This
is because audiences are used to consuming texts and content from large trust
worthy sources and because of this don’t often question idea shown to them and
often just believe them; this can be harmful to society if a large percentage
of the population believe take on board these ideas that are not necessarily
true.
In conclusion new and digital media has provided many opportunities
for people as well as having several disadvantages to audiences, this means
people must be responsible when using new technology and not abuse the power it
gives them and regulation should be in place to stop people from abusing opportunities
they get from new and digital media.