The Monopoly of Media

MODES OF PUBLISHING ARTS2090 –

DISTRIBUTION ASSESSMENT

BY: PATRICK HENRY PATACSIL        student number: z3256568

CLASS TIME: THURSDAY 2PM

TUTOR: Michael Clay

COORDINATOR: Dr. Gillian Fuller and Dr. Andrew Murphy

WORD COUNT: 1538

Civilization has been dominated at different stages by various media of communications such as clay, papyrus, parchment, and paper produced first from rags and then from wood. Each medium has its significance for the type of monopoly of knowledge which will be built and which will destroy the conditions suited to creative thought and is displaced by a new medium with its peculiar type of monopoly of knowledge.” (innis, Harold, The Press: A neglected factor in the economic history of the twentieth century. London: Oxford University Press 1949, p. 5).

Do you agree with this statement? Provide examples from the history and current state of publishing to make your argument.

Through the evolution of Civilization, information is dominated by various media of communications such as clay, papyrus, parchment, and paper produced first from rags and then from wood. Each medium has its significance for the type of monopoly of knowledge which was built and which it has destroyed the conditions suited to creative thought and is displaced by a new medium with its peculiar type of monopoly of knowledge. During ancient times, whether it was during ancient Egypt, the history of the Incas, the time of Jesus Christ, they were all based on the idea of ‘Archive Fever’ by Jacques Derrida, the recordings of their history were on mediums such as scrolls, stone carvings, architectural monuments and buildings, so they can remember their culture, their history and to record who was important and in power and the time, and that their culture will be remembered for new generations. The production of information belonged to those who were also powerful, important and wealthy; the monopoly of knowledge was restrained. Information has now evolved to more sophisticated heights, obtaining information and the production of information belongs to everyone on planet Earth. The Distribution of information is abstracted because there is so much info and there’s too much to apprehend, it needs to be moulded into a certain form to create easier use and obtainability (Making the Invisible Visible – Visualization in the Information Age LECTURE, Gillian Fuller. Wk7 19/04/2010, ARTS2090, University of New South Wales), however, aggregation of information is still restrained. The monopoly aggregation of knowledge again was only for those who were important and has certain powers, the visualization of information were based on biased claims of their history and culture to remember only of them and also, it was hidden in temples, sacred ground and only what was allowed to be presented in the Holy Bible, everything else could be a secret hidden by the catholic church, but that is a different story. The evolution of visualization today is shown everywhere in society through advertisements, television and magazines and especially the iPad, a revolution of information obtainability, however, this medium hinders the use of other competitive computer operating systems of information sourcing, destroying the way of obtaining info-alternative sourcing and information distribution is highly controlled. This means the distribution of information will once again be restrained, not only for the ‘important’ and the ‘powerful’, I am arguing that the information will be restrained by the powerful and the important too upon the users, hindering our “compulsive, repetitive, and nostalgic desire for the archive.” Jacques Derrida, this will return us back into the ancient times of when information was only obtained by the wealthy, monitored by the powerful

The purpose of the Archive stated by Steedman, argued in Jon Stokes ‘Archive (2003) ‘Reading Notes: ‘Archive Fever’, Ars Technica, June 27,(http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2003/06/130.ars) is that, “Archive fever is really a kind of desire: the desire to recover moments of inception: to find and possess all sorts of beginnings”… During ancient history, the inscribers portrayed moments of their history from the beginnings of battles, to the birth of a higher being, like Jesus Christ. At the time, language was very simple, words were visualised as drawings or a letter symbolised a literal action made popular  by the ancient Egyptians presenting statements of past ‘beginnings’, “moments of Inception”, that helped to give historians and explorers and importantly, people of today’s society in general, give understanding of that time period.

Today, however, is no different, it is still the same egotistical portrayal of culture, the only difference is that it is now in popular culture. People record “moments of inceptions” through the ‘commentary bar’ on social network sites, such as ‘Facebook’ and ‘Myspace’. People describe what they did today, how successful they were from a particular moment in their life and even describe moments of grief or happiness through semiotic languages we call ‘emoticons’. It is our way in popular culture to find a sense of ‘attention seeking’, our way of producing information from our history and distribute it to an aggregated abstraction called our ‘friends list’. (Making the Invisible Visible, Visualisation in the Information Age LECTURE, Gillian Fuller. Wk7 19/04/2010, ARTS2090, University of New South Wales). Finding a sense of importance in this world, I would think. Jacque Derrida, also describes in her work ‘Archive Fever: A Freudian Impression’, describes the obtaining of information as “Archival Violence” and the “Freudian Death Drive” stating that, “in order for an archive to exist it must be constructed to live in an external space… it assures the possibility of memorization, or repetition, of reproduction, or of reimpression”, by Jacques Derrida’, November 16, http://julierenszer.blogspot.com/2008/11/archive-fever-freudian-impression-by.html). And to go more in depth, this relates to the Freudian Death drive that is also described by Derrida that, “it is connected to printing of documents of inscriptions with circumcision. It leaves a trace of an incision right on the skin.” This metaphorical statement and “Archival Violence” describes the remembrance of information upon the viewers. These metaphors help to give visualization of the information describing the history which will help that period be remembered and to also help the “desire of information – (re)production and its distribution”, so far information distribution hasn’t changed, however, it’s proliferated, psychoanalytically.

The distribution and aggregation of information during ancient times was definitely limited due to the level of distribution of its mediums, a lot of it was static and heavy through examples of stone carvings and historical monuments, to the sending of scrolls which was only used by powerful figures in ancient government and other important figures as well as the paper-based medium which wasn’t very resistant in many conditions. Today, information is distributed and aggregated through computer networks, television, radio, DVDs and CDs, and magazines that are distributed in mass bulk (Publishing Experiences (Modes and Techniques) LECTURE, Gillian Fuller. Wk3 15/03/2010, ARTS2090, University of New South Wales.).

Information can hardly be destroyed because it is copied to many locations and duplicated over and over again. However, through Today’s new Gadget on the market known as the iPad, it had raised distribution issues that were once raised before during the release of the macbooks and the iPhones. Apple Computers is now the dominant computer product on the market today, taking over the number one spot from Microsoft. Mac computers, but more importantly, the iPad uses a closed circuit platform relying solely on Apple tools and an operating system, it is now impossible to use alternative info sourcing tools in the market (Kirn, Peter (2010) ‘How a great product can be bad news:Apple iPad and the closed Mac’, Create Digital Music, January 26, http://createdigitalmusic.com/2010/01/27/how-a-great-product-can-be-bad-news-apple-ipad-and-the-closed-mavc/).

In the reading by John Naughton ‘The original Big Brother is watching you on Amazon Kindle, July 26, http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/jul/26/amazon-kindle-book-deletions’ The Guardian’, describes “that Apple already has a dangerously dominant position in the consumption of music and mobile software… This means that developers are limited in what they can create for the device when it comes to media”. Does this mean that information aggregation and distribution will be ultimately controlled by Apple Computers? Will this hinder us once again, like how ancient civilization was hindered due to the level of technology? The only difference is that this technology is made to control us, to place us in a closed circuit we have to run with. Only popular culture can define this statement, if the consumer succumbs to Apple computers, the access of information will be limited and controlled, even paid for, ‘look at itunes!’ (i-Publishing- Aggregating- Navigating LECTURE, Gillian Fuller. Wk10,10/05/2010., ARTS2090, University of New South Wales).

The growing popularity of the iPad was due to the eReading mechanism, instead of hard copy books; you can own your very own digital copy of a certain book and read it as a whole through the touch screen. You can easily change the words, highlight certain points and even bring it back to its original state without permanently changing the original, however, distribution of the book is no longer allowed. You can’t lend the digital copy to your friends nor copy it. It can also be deleted by the source you bought it from whenever the source needs to, for example, Amazon.com, an online book store deleted the buyer’s copy of Animal Farm from their location on July 17 2009, it is described as sending them down an incineration chute called “the memory hole”. (Naughton, John (2009) ‘The original Big Brother is watching you on Amazon Kindle’ The Guardian, July 26, http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/jul/26/amazon-kindle-book-deletions).

In conclusion, I strongly agree that the monopoly of knowledge is aggregated for those who have the power to obtain it. Different types of media of communication do hold a certain monopoly of information that is distributed to a certain aggregation by that certain media. Apple Computers using the example of the iPad has definitely fit this model, it aggregates information as well as controls the limitation of the distribution of information it. If obtaining information would be like this for future generations, will information distribution and aggregation be hindered even more over the years, will our ‘desire of archive fever’ be limited to only this medium due to its world domination? Rupert Murdoch once said “Information is King”, I truly believe this statement!

BIBLIOGRAPHY

STOKES, Jon (2003) ‘Reading Notes: ‘Archive Fever’, Ars Technica, June 27, http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2003/06/130.ars

HOWARD, Sharon (2005) ‘Archive Fever (a dusty digression)’, Early Modern Notes, June 15, http://www.earlymodernweb.org.uk/emn/index.php/archives/2005/06/archive-fever-a-dusty-digression/

Enszer, Julie R. Enszer (personal blog), ‘Archive Fever: A Freudian Impression by Jacques Derrida’, November 16, http://julierenszer.blogspot.com/2008/11/archive-fever-freudian-impression-by.html

Naughton, John (2009) ‘The original Big Brother is watching you on Amazon Kindle’ The Guardian, July 26, http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/jul/26/amazon-kindle-book-deletions

Kirn, Peter (2010) ‘How a great product can be bad news:Apple iPad and the closed Mac’, Create Digital Music, January 26, http://createdigitalmusic.com/2010/01/27/how-a-great-product-can-be-bad-news-apple-ipad-and-the-closed-mavc/

Making the Invisible Visible, Visualisation in the Information Age LECTURE, Gillian Fuller. Wk7 19/04/2010, ARTS2090, University of New South Wales.

i-Publishing- Aggregating- Navigating LECTURE, Gillian Fuller. Wk10,10/05/2010., ARTS2090, University of New South Wales,

Publishing Experiences (Modes and Techniques) LECTURE, Gillian Fuller. Wk3 15/03/2010, ARTS2090, University of New South Wales.

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www.amazon.com

IDENTITIES

It is interesting to note that identity doesnt comprises just an identity but of many identities. You are of many labels that make up who you are such as a heterosexual male account in sydney. That is of many labels on top of this person.  it is impossible to live on this planet without an identity, Its what places us on this planet, our way of existence. whether it is born within sm identity granting institution such as a family, kin-group, nation or ethnic community, gender. there is no way of escaping. everyone has come from a certain community.

my identity consists of many identities, i am a university student, male, filiopino, heterosexual and im in a nuclear family. this determines who i am, and where i am in this world. i could also be names as a nice person, others could name me as a bad person. my identity can be interpreted diffently in society depending on context.

During war of ancient time and wars of today, they all exercise identity affiliations as well as identity oppositions. They identify the difference and then it is exercised with a fight. it is interesting to see that identity will understand the difference of other identities and will understand similarities within other identities.it is stated in the study kit by During, S that “identity politics tends to work by the principles of exclusion.” This is how identities are told apart, this is what identity politics comprises. by looking at the african american nation, they are considered to be opressed by the white society of the United States. they both understand the difference between eachother. In racial terms, the whites in would call the african american people as Nigers, this racial slur means they are dirty balck people. however, african amercian people would call themselves that as well but in different context. only within african american society they call themselves that out of brotherhood. identity meanings and its values are different within different contexts.

Space of Flows – Mobile Media

It is hard to get around the idea that Mobile Media like the cell phone helps to intertwine the virtual space with the physical space. but i think it is the idea of bringing someone distant from you, proxiaml. but mobile media creates a space that cannot be seen through physical space but maybe a representation of physical space on a computer screen called the virtual space. When playing internet games such as World of Warcraft, there is a fantasy world created for users to venture and like a street directory, places located in World of Warcraft only exist specifically in the game. Gibson refers this a cyberspace that is a hybrid cybernetic space, a concensual hallucination of unthinkable complexity.’ all the users more together in the Virtual space in real time to feel the night timing of ‘ proximal’ movement together like how it is in ‘meatspace’ or physical space.

Castell raises the idea as the ‘space of flows’, a flow of communication that define a network. By playing ‘WOW’ on the internet, i realised that i am reacting with other people around the world. it is sad to say that people feel like WOW is real to them like how the physical space is real. People take this game seriously and if i defeat a highly ranked player, they throw an immediate tantrum, but it is representated in words shown on my screen typed by the other player saying offensive language and threats to me saying that he could hurt me in the physical space. A lot can be interpreted in the ‘Space of Flows’ and the idea of the virtual space imbuing the physical simply from a set of codes, colours and pixels that create image to represent ‘space’. It’s frightening to say that the virtual space can really affect our physical self in the real world.

Domestication

When training an animal such as a dog, we try to keep it outside and not within the home to help it understand its place in the family. the owner would also train it to urinate or deficate at a certain location outside. when it was time to come inside the home it would be disciplined to keep the house clean, it will habitually go outside at that certain  spot to do it. thats what i think about with the concept of Domestication. Like an animal, we human beings are taught how to use the media and integrate it into our social lives. for example, the television is commonly used at night after work for entertainment or informational awareness purposes. Silverstone describes how we place value on a certain media object to give it a symbolic entity that keeps us attached to the media object. like the phone, it has articulated to resonate the home to keep in contact with your loved ones. by losing that disconnection with that symbolic object makes the human being ambivalent to the world around him or her, losing that structure in his or her lifestyle. that is why i use a dog as an example, if the dog isnt trained, it would most likely go out of control urinating and deficating all over the place.

In conclusion, Domestication is the structure of a humans everyday existence to socially integrate themselves with society and the world around them. that repetitive use of objects such as the television, phone, radio or the press keeps the human being aware of the world, sadly creates a phenomenological discourse of putting the human on a virtual leash.( Scannel)

Media Rituals

The media such as the television, radio and the press has turned into society’s obsession to stay socially connected with the world. it helps to gain awareness of our world( Durkheim). The media in our daily lives has shaped our routines and everyday existence on this planet. Couldry mentions the understanding of Religion by showing ritualised values in Aborigianl beliefs. The people would look at totems and tell stories of sacred animals. this brought the people together as a tribe. A social network following the same beliefs, like the media, it portrays other values like favourite shows or important news. Society is integrated through the immediate coverage of the television, radio or the press. Coming together to practice the same values and being aware of what is going on in the world.

It shows that today, media cannot be escaped. it will be like social suicide to disconnect yourself from the media, you are forgetting the values of society and not keeping up with today’s issues on this planet. how would you know if a meteor is about to hit Earth? i think if you’re disconnected, you will be the very last to find out. the curious minds of human beings has led to humans ritualising the use of the television, radio and the press. Television for example is always used at the time when people arrive home from work to watch the news.

in conclusion, Media rituals and the phenomena of social integration and the awareness of the world it creates, inevitably cannot be avoided. Media is the central component to our everyday lives. its everyday use had established values and beliefs of what is out there in our society.

WEEK 9 SEMIOTICS

Semiotics is the use of signs that “evoke” a certain message to the audience. There is the “signifier” and the “signified”. The “signified” is the “physical sign” being signified. The signs are then interpreted by the audience however, interpretation vaired across age, race, religion, gender and class.

Meaning in media text is collaborated in many different forms, such as language. Linguistics is a strong tool in portraying signs and meaning. the naked eye can show the “simple truth” but the trained eye can pick up certain meanings in language towards a candidate running for office portrayed in the media pn political news which always portrays a ‘for’ or ‘against’ use of language on a candidate.

Another way to show meaning is through image. the use of a photograph can ‘speak a thousand words’ but it necessarily doesnt portray the truth. Today, images can be digitally altered by computers and its programs which can destroy its validity which can give an image its bias stance. Anexample of this is Singapores NKF scam where they generated images of Kidney patients receiving medical aid from the company, but what they were really doing is stealing millions of sollars in donations.

the use of visual imagery and linguistics always show an intention of meaning and with the use of both can construct perception to what the producer wants them to understand. These semiotics can be used in a positive or a negative way. Positive news such as magazines, current affairs of global disaster and Negative “Transitivity” (Clark, Kate 1992) where blame is not shown on the criminal from news.

In conclusion, the use of semiotics of language and imagery is to portray meaning. it can be founds in advertisements, television, newspapers, magazeines and even on your mobile sms.

WEEK 8 EXTENDED AUDIENCE

Couldry has found different theoretical explorations of understanding the ‘Extended Audience’. Through ‘audience research,’ he has found conceptualised audiences through the use of media, and to understand how and why an audience tends to evolve over time. Couldry determines these findings through existing audiences of today through his theories and also by understanding Abercrombie and Longhurst’s three categorization of audiences, through the classification of the “simple audience” growing into a “mass audience” which later evolves into the “diffused audience.” (Reader, p187).

Couldry describes the audience as a “diffused audience” due to the fact that media use is “everywhere”, “not just audiences.” (reader, p187). through my understanding, media use for me is at home with the computer and my television, and my use of the iphone on the train or anywhere else. And as i dont realize it, the “diffused audience” also appears on streets, train stations, pubs and clubs where media can be accessed such as the television showing news and current affairs or maybe Big Brother or ‘So you think you can dance’ allowing people to vote and make a change.

Couldry then recognises the immediate participation of the audience to “perform”, through “audience-hood” (Reader, p185) through the mundane use of media in everyday life has become an “intrusion of media in everyday life.”(reader, p186), therefore, becoming “ritualised” (Couldry 2003, p2) into a lifestyle making people “performers”.

i dont realise it, but i do have an urge to ‘perform’ through the media. when i am on facebook, my firend sends me a comment asking me “how are you?” this is read by almost everyone if they are frIends with us. i have to then reply back.

Rizzo, Teresa, Programming your own Channel: An Archaeology of the playlist, 2007. WEEK 7

To me, the articles of network societies is very difficult to comprehend due to the fact that networks are governed by ‘nodes’ thaeations of the playlistst create social networks that distribute the ‘space of flows’, via micro electronics. Through the reading Teresa Rizzo’s article focuses on the creation of the Ipod and its ‘mobile’ creations of the playlists anywhere and anytime globally. as well as Foxtel IQ and Youtube empowers the individual where temporality of informational flow is constant with the broadcaster and access with the user is dominant.

 

i have foxtel IQ at home, i feel that it empowers me to view anything i want without looking at the scheduled time. i have that direct connection, with the broadcaster. i ‘organise’ and ‘customise’what there is to watch so that it can suit my ‘temporal arrangement’ especially when i come home after university the programs i want to watch which i missed during university, i can watch straight after i get back home. Lury defines this as the ‘spatial mode of viewing’. however, this weeks reading is very comprehensive and is still mind-boggling for me, so please bare with me.

the beauty of Youtube is that unlike television which is running through a scheduled time, Youtube can allow you to be the ‘producer, scheduler and user’, where you can watch anything you want at any time. from my experience, i watch Youtube for the funny skitz people upload while im at university taking a break from study. i myself have uploaded videos of my dance performances with my dance crew called Gigabeatz for everyone to see, this creates a multi-way of flow. this is a notion of creating ‘democratisation’ of media texts based upon the personal comments people place upon videos helps mt to select what is worth watching.

Week 4 Space: The Doubling of Space

From Cauldry and McCarthy. Media Space: Place, Scab 2nd Culture in a Media Age. Routledge, 2004, 21-37

Paddy Scannel describes the ‘Doubling of Space’ through the simultaniety of the public event and the time of transmission the broadcast is recieved by by the public through electronic media. The creation of the ‘double reality’ makes the pyblic feel like they are ‘being-there’ without physicallybeing there at the actual event. (Scannel 1996:76. No matter what the numbers of the peoples locality, their immediate space is given the opportunity of the ‘possibilities of being’ which is to be at two places at once. However, broadcasting gives the audience an opportunity to experience a ‘live’ event of a different location through the electronic media. Electronic media can make events give that sense of ‘closeness’, no matter what location near or far. Electronic media also makes the experience feel ‘close’ or ‘within range’ removing the sense of ‘farness’. (ibid.:167)

the media shows representations of the world through television’s imagery and the broadcast of radio. it influenced our world giving the audience a taste of what is out there. the imagery also can and will affect our way of thinking. the information articulates our ‘being’. Turnock describes a family watching the funeral of Princess Diana. The father has his own business, but out of respect for Princess Diana he shut the store for the day. They then watched the funeral on BBC1 on television. “We stayed at homes in our breakfast room drinking tea and crying. it did not feel right to go out on such a sad day.” (Turnock 2000:99). It is interesting that these people expressed forms of sadness and they dont even personally know Princess Diana.

interestingly, electronic media makes the audience feel this way through the emotive ‘construction of celebrity.’ This is a reflection upon how ‘familiarity’ and ‘estrangement’ are mapped by electronic media changing situational geography. (Shaun Moores 2004:25). Giddens (1999:11-12) commented on how popular Nelson Mandela is as a ‘Global Celebrity.’ Surprisingly, his face is more familiar than the face of your next door neighbour. such as Princess Diana, she is ‘known’ to be a humanitarian in poor countries, as an audience we see her ‘Represent’ herself frequently through media appearances which is her ‘Performance of Ordinariness’. (Cauldry 2001:231) This is why the audiences feels so emotional of her death, because we are emotively influenced by her representation of her image by the broadcast making the audience feel the ‘ordinariness’of her like the publics ‘ordinariness’. This is the pluralization of social relationships between the audience and celebrity. Also, the pluralization of time  ’being’ at two places at once without being at the actual event.

In conclusion electronic media through broadcast media creates this ‘doubling of space’ by observing the representation of an actual event on television of a different location and the immediate space that the viewer is located. television, or even the internt through ‘Mudding’ and mobile media makes the sharing of people experience eachothers ‘virtual co-presence’ (Schegloff 2002:287), making the experience ‘proximate’ and close no matter what location.

DAILINESS

DAILINESS
The concept of Dailiness to me isn’t an easy concept to grasp because of its philosophical theories and how Scannell would describe it. However, I know Dailiness involves ‘Time’, through this time which is our time as “being” we understand “what” matters which is the involvements of “being-for-the-sake-of-what” which “concerns” us in the world, ‘our world’, which is our community and society, to be immersed in our “being and time” to gain our awareness of the world.
Scannell describes the term ‘Dasein’ is “best understood as human life in all its manifestations – past, present, and future. It is something that each and every one of us possesses.” The term Dasein is human being and being is in each case mine.” in this case our manifestations of the past, present and future is radio and television. Heideggar described media to be ‘ready-to-hand’ and its ‘availability’, it is easier for us to be aware of our time. To structure ourselves through out our day from morning to night, these objects are considered our ‘everyday objects’ which are ‘self-disclosing’; to be widely open and truthful to the public called ‘publicness’.
Scannell describes Dailiness as “what it is to provide a daily service.” a service that provides a product ‘everyday’, a ‘routinization of the production’… in such a way that it is there for anyone on their doorstep each morning.” like television and radio, “a daily service that fills each day, that runs through the day, that appears as a continuous, uninterrupted, never-ending flow – through all the hours of the day, today, tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. (Scannell pg 149)
Media determines our sense of time, by highlighting certain programmes spaced out throughout the day which gives the audience the effect of ‘temporal arrangement’. for example, “the ‘today news’ brings ‘news’ of what happened yesterday, what happened while I was asleep, what happened yesterday, what happened ‘now’ and what is going to happen today on ‘this day’ in particular.” which is our ‘concern’. Also, through ‘Zoning’ gives programmes an idea of placing certain programs at particular times for example shows appropriate for ‘children times’ for each morning or shows during ‘adult times’ which is late at night.
And finally, the interesting concept of ‘Soap Operas’ use the real world and its real time of the ‘now’ factor to co-exist with fiction. It is these two parallels that play with our sense of existence. as an audience we are enthralled by it, which will then stimulate the ‘Gossip-function’ which will give us our sense of talk and understanding of that time that was viewed, that time of the past that we are aware of and to compare that time with the present and to look forward to what’s in store in the future. That is our care-structure of concern which can be applied to anything daily in any mediated technologies. Scannell argues, “This effect of a fictional world that exists in parallel with the actual world is the most powerful and distinctive feature of this kind of story and is the basis of the cumulative pleasure it offers to its listeners or viewers.”
Therefore, Dailiness offers our sense of Being and Time in our world. Through radio and television media, gives a temporal arrangement of the days through its programming and its ‘daily service’ ‘zoning’ in through the morning of breakfast, tea-time, to adult time night television or radio.

From Scannell, P. Radio and Television and Modern Life. B