So I’ll provide some background that might make answering the questions easier to answer. Skip it if you want, up to you. If you need me to clarify anything I’ll do my best to check back now and then.
Murray argues that we shouldn’t focus on the worth of various media, but more so on the consumer’s ability to use the medium, in conjunction with one’s own imagination, to create meaning. He essentially suggests that this ability evolves along with the medium. To illustrate this point, he uses film as an example. When the medium first emerged, it was used essentially as a lens through which to view a play, an older, universally-accepted medium. But when artists would use cut-scenes and the like to create an experience not previously possible with the performance of the play, film came into its own as a medium. He argues that this shows us a medium becomes successful when we fully utilize it’s “intrinsic properties.”
He then uses that early idea of the “film-play” as an analogy to our current idea of a web page. That is, we’re essentially using new media simply as another way to view older mediums (web page as a page in a book, youtube as a movie theater, etc.). Using this analogy, Murray argues that new media has yet to develop to it’s full potential.
One of Getelman’s assertions essentially expands upon that idea. In discussing the turning point at which a new medium becomes “successful,” she describes the concept of “structural amnesia.” She asserts that with any medium comes a certain set of norms and constraints, intrinsic to the medium and/or resulting from how society responds to and utilizes the medium. Using Murray’s observations, perhaps the constraint existing with new media in it’s current state is that we mostly use it simply as a lens through which to view what are essentially old mediums. One might argue that this constraint has thus far prevented new media from fully facilitating “structural amnesia,” and thus developing to it’s full potential.
With all this in mind, I’ll list two possible viewpoints.
Pick the viewpoint you agree with more, and answer the questions listed beneath it.
Viewpoint 1: New media’s “intrinsic properties” are not yet being utilized; that is, it’s full potential has not yet been realized.
- What needs to evolve in order for new media to utilize it’s “intrinsic properties:” society, the medium/technology, or both?
- Could this be achieved with current technology, or does a more integrated, immersive and/or interactive media technology need to emerge first?
*OR*
Viewpoint 2: New media and/or our society has already reached it’s full potential; it’s “intrinsic properties” are already being utilized.
- Explain why you feel this way, and illustrate your point with examples.
