REVISION: Terminology and Definitions

THE HYPODERMIC NEEDLE MODEL.
from 1920's- suggests audience's passively absorb information without processing or challenging it. Still quoted today in debates such as the arguement as to whether violent games provoke violent behaviour.

TWO-STEP FLOW
from 1940's- new version as hypodermic needle model too clumsy. Suggests that the media is filtered through "opinion leaders" who communicate it to their less active associates. These less active people will then receive information from their "opinion leaders" and directly from the media and mediate it. This creates a two-step flow.

USES AND GRATIFICATIONS
In 1948, Lasswell suggested audiences used the media for:
-Surveillance
-Correlation
-Entertainment
-Cultural transmission.

Blulmer and Katz, 1974, extended it:
-Diversion- escape from everyday problems/routine
-Personal Relationships- soap operas and family life: emotional interaction etc
-Personal Identity- reflection in texts, own self relation to values/information/texts
-Surveillance- information for living e.g. weather, news.

GLOBAL VILLAGE
This is the thoery that the world is, metaphorically, much smaller than it used to be as an individual can talk to another person within seconds, even if they are the other side of the planet. Just as you would be able to in a village.

CONVERGENCE
The combining of the communications, electronics and computer industries. Also, the co-operation of various media companies with each other in order to take advantage (economically) of the newest technology.

DIGITISATION
conversion of analog information into digital information

SOCIAL NETWORKING
a social network is a network of people, for example:
You-your brother-your brother's friend-your brother's friend's girlfriend-your brother's friend's girlfriend's auntie.
you may not know everyone in the chain but you are still connected by your relationships to the other people. You may not even know the connection exists. Social Networking sites allow you to see connections that would be hidden in the "real" world as people add each other as friends on these sites and so allow their connections to be seen by others. it is said that everyone in the world is connected by six people, e.g. you know someone, who knows someone, who knows someone, who knows someone, who knows someone, who knows the Queen (or anyone else in the world.)

TECHNOLOGICAL DETERMINISM
the view that the effects of any new technology on work and employment are simply defined (ie determined in a fixed way) by the inherent capabilities and functions of the technology itself. This is invariably criticized for ignoring factors in the context of work and the role of human agents.