New Media, Spring 2006

Assignment 1: A study of a new medium - Application of Janlert's new media model (in groups of 2)

Instruction:

1. Find an exercise partner.
2. Read Janlert (2005) separately. It is not an easy read but don't give up!
3. Meet your partner and try to work out a common understanding of the media concepts presented in the paper.
4. Decide for a new medium to study. Pick one you believe has an interesting tension between medium space and domain space, between producer and consumer, time and place, etc. Or any other property interesting from a new media perspective. For ideas of possible new media to study, here is a list (but do not hesitate to choose something else!):
   • e-mail
   • SMS
   • blogs (web logs)
   • newsgroups
   • mailing lists
   • interactive TV
   • interactive movies
   • web newspapers and journals
   • web-based digital libraries
   • web cameras
   • (cellular) video phones (?)
   • peer-to-peer file sharing
   • the media center home PC
   • e-books
   • search engines
   • web browsers
   • e-democracy / e-government
   • mobile media displays (wearable computers)
   • Grand-Global Grid (?)
   • global B2B, e.g. ebXML
   • “anarchistic dictionaries”, e.g. wikipedia
   • multi-user networked games
   • Virtual Reality
     
5. Write a brief report and publish it on the web in HTML-format. Try to be systematic in your medium analysis and in using the concepts of Janlert. The length should correspond to approximately three A4 pages. E-mail a link to the report to the lecturer.

Deadline

Wednesday April 12 at 23.59.

References

Janlert, L.-E. (2005). A generic medium model for new media. Working paper draft.