So what is new-media?

Why is it important?
Typing ‘new media’ in your Google search gives you around 1.9 bn search results within 0.15 seconds. Typing the same keyword in Wikipedia, in dictionaries, in academic journals, in business plans give you all different kinds of meanings, terms and their relevances. Everyone in the market is talking about new media, the effect of new media, the impact of new-media, etc. But how many of these people actually know and understand what new media is and what is the benefit of using new-media instead of the traditional media, or ever replacing a fraction of your traditional media with our new-media school of thought?
Definition:
Well, ‘new media’ is the term coined to encompass the amalgamation of music, images, videos, words and symbols, etc with the computers and communication technology, mostly used in relevance with Internet and post-2000 era of media usage in our communications.
What is new media?:
With the advent of innovative technologies and their even more innovative usages, new media is growing at a much faster pace than expected. As far as time involved in the growth of new media is concerned, we can relate them, to a couple of related fields: Tim Berners-Lee, for instance, had 10 years of latitude to conceive of the Internet. Researchers from MIT, who were interested in space exploration got undefined amount of time to track signals from Sputnick, and what these people did in their time, changed the face of our today in a positive way – these experiments also led to functionality of our GPS devices.
According to Harvard Magazine(Oct-Nov 2009), “New media is changing the lives of University Students” in more number of ways then we can merely imagine. According to Kathline Carr from Harvard Business Review, to innovate in our media and regular life environments, we need to “create hunch-friendly environments”. Therefore the advent of new media technologies and applications of today leads to many folds innovative applications in our near future. Why? Because it grows on a geometric progression and not just arithmetic progression. New media relates more to on-demand content availability, which also involved interactive participation from the consumer, to make its more dynamic form and evolution cycle.
While a typical mistake from newbie’s to this terminology is, to consider digital consumption such as through a digital radio or HDTV, of a traditional content such as movie or a song to be understood as new media. In reality, this would still hold true for being a traditional media on a new channel. New media would be something like receiving a URL on your mobile phone through an MMS, where you can visit the landing page of the URL and post your comments or be a part of some discussions, would mean actual new media communication. Therefore, it is not just digitization of traditional media into computers and related technologies, but it has more to do with active content, which ever keeps on growing and modifying itself through active participation from the consumer.
Some good examples of new media would be: Websites with active content such as games, puzzles etc which involve active participation; blogs and discussion forums at some corporate websites; computer multimedia and games; softwares involving consumer participation in creation and distribution of content etc.

Read More:

1. Media eating up 50% of your life?
2. TV meets Google.
3. Online communities – The new era?

TV meets the web with Google!

There’s a new interactive experience waiting for you, and your time. Being a constant innovator with web technologies and innovative use of media, Google has done it again this time. Google TV is a new experience altogether, which combines the traditional media platform of television, with speed and power of the internet.

Experts say, that Google is planning to supply QWERTY keyboards, along with the TV, to enable you with searches and browsing. Among many other major media partners, Google is currently working with Sony, Logitech, Intel, and DISH Networkfor co-branding and integrated media tie-ups. The developers are recently being approached, to optimize their apps for Google TV too. Have a look in the video below, for what it has in store for us.