As the web insinuates itself into our daily lives, we are participating in an transition that will utterly change our notion of media, along with the media types and institutions they've created over the last 600 years. VOX, the latest offering from pioneering blog software company Six Apart, makes this process visible and public, but it has been going on for several years.
Modern "media" began with the invention of printing in the 15th century, and was extended to become a mass medium in the 19th century as improvements in transportation created the possibility of communicating with large audiences in short periods of time. The "periodical" was print publishing on a schedule plus mailing as the delivery technology; the blockbuster book was publishing plus modern marketing, backed by warehouses, trucks, and an organized distribution system.
When radio was commercialized in the 1920s, audio communication became instant and regional, defined by the range of the transmitter. As radio stations joined into networks, national communication became possible, both via "bicycled" recordings and real-time interconnections.
Television arrived in the 1950's when the radio networks were mature, and extended the network/local affiliate model, eventually replacing radio's former dominance over mass entertainment. The drive for bandwidth was on; VHF begat UHF and channels multiplied. Cable solved both the fringe reception problem and the bandwidth problem because broadcasting used very limited electromagnetic spectrum and could only support a small number of simultaneous signals.
Cable allowed new channels to bloom, but was itself limited to tens, then a few hundred channels. However it did begin a process of "leveling" other media types, when cable services began to carry local radio stations and background music services during the 1980s along with television channels.
The arrival of the Internet marks a quantum leap in both bandwidth and the leveling process. Here is a medium with effectively unlimited aggregate bandwidth, thus the well known ability to support all kinds of niche audience subject matter: The Long Tail.
A dozen years into the Internet era, The only limitations left are the speed of broadband connections, and the ability to hit users in motion with wireless services. Both are the subject of intensive development and will be eliminated in time.
More important, the Internet levels ALL previous types of media: text, pictures, graphics, animation, audio of all kinds, and now video. So great has been our focus on the old organizing centers of media that print, audio and video still remain largely separate online — a result of differing skill sets, craft traditions, unions, rights regimes and audience habits.
Nevertheless, we now have an emerging paradigm which still lacks an elegant one-word name. The closest would be "web multimedia." This paradigm is now emerging on blogs. At 50 million and counting, blogs are the first web mass medium that allows individual creators to engage audiences online with a common multimedia format.
The original blogging "platforms" were built around print, but have rapidly expanded to include other media types. First images, then audio and video can now be embedded in blog posts. The latest blogging platforms like the recently launched VOX by Six Apart, will only accelerate this transition.
VOX integrates writing, photos, audio, videos, and books, with social networks of individuals and groups, plus the ability to split access into public and private. VOX encourages individuals to quote, include and juxtapose media they find online. By including simple tools to do this, it radically levels all component media types and reflects the diverse media experiences we enjoy online. As a creature of the network, it effortlessly integrates media from Amazon, YouTube, flickr, iStockphoto, photobucket, and iFilm — for openers.
So too, a new class of omnitalented multimedia creators are emerging. Equally at home with writing, photography, audio, video, web design and publishing, they embody the native competencies of the new order, which uses the entire web as a platform.
Print reverts to writing; radio to audio; television and film to video. Web multimedia is the New Gravity, pulling old media types into its orbit. What will be the Citizen Kane of this medium?
:: SH
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