New Media

The term new media is up for discussion in the introduction. What is the difference between old and new media? What makes media old? Society does. When new technology is developed, then many forms of media are overridden and obsolete. Think how prevalent social media is now as a form of news for so many people. This is new media and the old media was television, radio and newspapers for news. The interesting thing about new media is that we can watch TV shows on the internet, we can listen to the radio on the internet, and we can read the newspaper on the internet. So the old medias are still there, they are just in a different format.

The concepts that were introduced gave depth to the idea of new media: Network, Information and Interface. A network is “an infrastructure that connects computers to each other and to range of external devices, and thereby enables users to communication and exchange information” (Gane & Beer, 2008). So the computers are connected in order to allow more users access to information. When we refer to “the network of networks” it is internationally connecting devices to allow for people across the world to communicate and have access to information. So information is the next concept. Information is the communication of ideas from a source, through a transmitter and channel. The ideas are being transmitted from the source and they travel through the channel to reach their intended destination. So for an example a blog post is written by a person, they are the source. The information is being transmitted through digital writing and the channel in the blog platform. The information can travel to others through the channel. Interface is boundary in which two aspects of a computer technology transmit information. This can be seen in tablets with how the user can communicate to the tablet what they want it to for them. The interface is that medium between the user and the function of the tablet.

Network

Information

Interface

Hacker Pedagogy

I found this to be very interesting and I agreed with a lot of the arguments regarding the pedagogy style. I think it is an effective method of teaching. I especially like the explanation on page 7, “…instead of promoting a contrasting pedagogy of skills and drill to teach a given technology…we ask students understand both their use and learning of a given technology within the context of the course and their own experiences” (Romberger & Rodrigo 2013). That just really resonated with me and it stuck out as a great point. I think this is so true for a lot of fields even outside of this. I notice a lot more of the “drilling” focus and not so much of the understanding the application aspect to learning. I think that is much more effective and complex.