"Digital media" : does that cover it ?

A professor at the University of British Columbia argues that the word 'new' has generational contexts and what is new for him might not be new for the 18-year-olds he teaches. He makes a distinction between those who are 'native' to the digital world and those who are 'immigrants'. "Perhaps when the newsrooms are full of digital natives, we will no longer need to use the term 'new media', he says.

Mark Briggs, at Journalism 2.0, explains that the term is not appropriate. He writes about how these tools are only different from traditional forms of publishing and that "Pretty much everything online is 'interactive' and it's not really 'new' anymore."

Digital innovations has enhanced the quality and quantity of the journalism profession just like it has done to other professions. The word 'new' refers to new kinds of tools and applications that journalists use to do their job. They are not, though, doing a different job. Social networking and other media websites that are flooding the internet are also new ways of doing something we have always been doing : communicating. Journalists using newer ways of doing what they do does not change the fact that they are still journalists or that they are still exercising the journalism profession.

One proposal for a new word for all 'hubbub', as Briggs called it, was 'newer media'. A few years from now, we could call it 'newest media'. But what will we do after that?


Sources : journalism20.com, reportr.net