A Consumer Revolution

Week six's lecture focused mainly, on how the lines dividing consumer and producer of media, such as videos, have become inextricably blurred nowadays. This is thanks to the new media sharing options out there. The major being the Internet. It is really needless to say that the incredible popularity of the Internet as a media and information source has a lot do with 'you' and 'I', the consumer. According to our lecturer, Josh Nicholas, in the past consumers have been "passive receivers" of content. Meaning, that they were only able to watch media but not affect its process. But thanks to what we can achieve with our humble computer, phone or other portable devices, this is changing significantly.

The Internet, has become increasingly popular as a form of media. Especially among the youth of society. In my opinion for two notable reasons. Firstly it allows the consumer to access a significant amount of differing types of content at one convenient source. Secondly, it allows for a high level of content control. This is most likely the reason why there has been a decline in revenue of other media,such as television and newspapers.

Like our lecturer mentioned, problems do of course arise when we use small portable devices such as our mobiles or personal media players to access content, due to the fact that often the file sizes are too big and the screens too small. Though, these types of devices are useful when assessing the news or the smaller 'episodic' videos on YouTube. Mobile phones are also frequently used today for people to write on their own or others 'blogs'. At the pleasure of their own convenience and privacy.

Not only can the consumer now choose what they want to watch by accessing the Internet, via their computer or a portable device such as their phone, they are also increasingly able to become the producer. There are many ways in which we the consumers are affecting the process of content. Thanks to various programs such as Windows Movie Maker and sites like YouTube, even the most meagre or inexperienced consumer, can try their hand at movie making. According to Josh many of the first movies produced by consumers for consumers on the Internet, were so called 'fan edits', or spin offs of particular films, series or paraphernalia, which In turn were guaranteed viewage by consumers who were also fans. The trouble the consumer faces nowadays, is sorting through a lot of rubbish available on the Internet and on sites like YouTube. A task which can be rather annoying if you are net surfing on you phone. But I suppose one man's trash is another man's treasure.

Those who in the past were just mere consumers of news available on television, are now able to often contribute in a multitude of ways. For example, the consumer can now produce videos, which can be used on television news reports. This was the case during a catastrophe, such as September eleven, where some of the content displayed on the news was sourced by those who were in the past, just consumers. Problems can arise when using a mobile phone to create a video, though. Notably, the picture and sound quality are rather poor, even on the best of phones. Budding camera men and women, can also upload their news related videos on various news sites. There is unfortunately, no real guarantee that the video depicted actually related to the news issue at all. Rather it could actually be a sadistic student with too much time on their hands, who thought they would mess with a few avid news watchers.

New media, such as portable entertainment devices, mobiles and the Internet in general, has revolutionised not only the way in which content is accessed but who creates the content. This was a step that was extremely necessary in a democratic society. Content by the people, for the people.