NEW MEDIA/DIGITAL CULTURE

 WHAT IS DIGITAL CULTURE?

A digital culture is a concept that describes how technology and the internet are
shaping the way that we interact as humans.
It’s the way that we behave, think and communicate within society.

- Digital Cultures include: the web; social media; online identities; mobile media;
social networks; computer games; virtual communities; theories of technology
and culture; digital research; and media arts.

 WHEN DIGITAL CULTURE STARTED?

In the mid-1990s, a confluence of factors;

1) exponentially increasing microchip processing power,
2) the diffusion of personal computing,
3) the conception of the World Wide Web …

EXAMPLES OF DIGITAL PLATFORMS

• Social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
• Knowledge platforms like StackOverflow, Quora, and Yahoo! Answers.
• Media sharing platforms like YouTube, Spotify, and Vimeo.
• Service-oriented platforms like Uber, Airbnb, and GrubHub.

 VIDEOGAMES

Video games have become ubiquitous in modern culture. Understanding them as a

medium allows a fuller understanding of their implications in the realms of
entertainment, information, and communication.
Studying their history reveals new perspectives on the ways video games have affected
mainstream culture/media
Nowadays we take classic movies or video games and showing them to young people
to record their reactions for YouTube.

The 1970s saw the rise of video games as a cultural phenomenon. However, the
precursors to modern video games were created as early as the 1950s.
The first video game console for the home began selling in 1972.
The birth of the home computer market in the 1970s paralleled the emergence of
video game consoles.
Nintendo, a Japanese card and novelty producer that had begun to produce electronic
games in the 1970s, was responsible for arcade games such as Donkey Kong in the
early 1980s.
Its first home console, developed in 1984 for sale in Japan, tried to succeed where
Atari had failed.
The game Super Mario Brothers, released with the system, was also a landmark in
video game development. Its designer, Shigeru Miyamoto, tried to mimic the
experiences of childhood adventures, creating a fantasy world not based on previous
models of science fiction or other literary genres

Super Mario Brothers also gave Nintendo an iconic character who has been used in
numerous other games, television shows, and even a movie.The development of this
type of character and fantasy world became the norm for video game makers.
As companies focused on new marketing strategies, wider audiences were targeted,
and video games’ influence on culture began to be felt.

ONLINE GAMING GAINS POPULARITY

The current state of the home console market still involves the three major companies
of the past 10 years: Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft.

Game culture:
Gaming culture is the set of customs, traditions, symbols and norms that have
emerged around the share experience of video games.
Gaming culture also features a large number of subcultures centered around factors
such as genre, locations, interest and skill level.

Game values:
- Identity: Sense of camaraderie with others gamers.
- Social: Video games are a form of social interaction that provide diverse
environment to engage other people both physical and virtual .
- Languaje: Vocabulary that emerges within the players know as leetspeak. Ex: gg
as Good Game.
- Etiquette: Rules of politeness associated with a game or situation. Ex: in some
games is Good etiquette to leave a game with gg when it is clear the other
player has won. In other cases can be bm, or bad manners, to leave a game
before is over
- Traditions: LAN parties. A Local area network (LAN) party is a gathering of
people with computers or compatible game consoles, where a local area
network (LAN) connection is established between the devices using a router or
switch, primarily for the purpose of playing multiplayer video games together.
- Stories: Games are often wrapped in rich narratives that represents a literary
tradition of histories. These stories are another type of shared experience
among gammers.
- Media: Video channels, music videos, films ..fashion, art …

The effects of Video Games on Other Types of Media

Video games during the 1970s and ’80s were often derivatives of other forms of
media. E.T., Star Wars, and a number of other games took their cues from movies,
television shows, and books.
This began to change in the 1980s with the development of cartoons based on video
games, and in the 1990s and 2000s with live-action feature films based on video
games.

 TELEVISION

Television programs based on video games were an early phenomenon. Pac-

Man, Pole Position, and Q*bert were among the animated programs that aired in the
early 1980s. In the 1990s, Pokémon, originally a game developed for the Nintendo
Game Boy, was turned into a television series, a card game, several movies, and even a
musical

 FILM

The rise in film adaptations of video games accompanies the increased age of video
game users. In 1995, Mortal Kombat, a live-action movie based on the video game,
grossed over $70 million at the box office, placing it 22nd in the rankings for that year.
- Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001) , starred by Angelina Jolie
- Tomb Raider (2018), starred by Alicia Vikand

Films based on video games are an increasingly common sight at the box office, such as
producer Jerry Bruckheimer’s Prince of Persia, or the recent sequel to Tron, based on
the idea of a virtual gaming arena.

 MUSIC

Video games have been accompanied by music ever since the days of the arcade.
Video game music was originally limited to computer beeps turned into theme songs.
The design of the Nintendo 64, Sega Saturn, and Sony PlayStation made it possible to
use sampled audio on new games, meaning songs played on physical instruments
could be recorded and used on video games. Beginning with the music of the Final
Fantasy series, scored by famed composer Nobuo Uematsu, video game music took on
film score quality, complete with full orchestral and vocal tracks.
Composing music for video games has turned into a profitable means of employment
for many musicians.
Schools such as Berklee College of Music, Yale, and New York University have
programs that focus on composing music for video games. The students are taught
many of the same principles that are involved in film scoring.
While video games may not be accepted by everyone as a form of art, there is no
doubt that they contribute greatly to artistic media such as music and film.
Blurring the Boundaries Between Video Games, Information, Entertainment, and
Communication

Social media outlets such as Facebook have also used video games to expand their
communication platforms. FarmVille, a game in which players plant, harvest, and sell
crops and expand their farm plots with the profits, is integrated with Facebook so that
all users can connect with their real-life friends in the game. The game adds another
aspect of communication—one centered on competition, strategy, and the aesthetics
of game-play—to the Facebook platform.
In 2010, FarmVille had 80 million users, an unprecedented number of people playing a
single game. Other games for Facebook include Lexulous (formerly Scrabulous), a game
that mimicked the board game Scrabble closely enough that it had to be changed,
and Pet Society, a game that allows users to raise virtual animals as pets.

 CONTROVERSIAL ISSUES

Video game violence has been an issue since the 1976 game Death Race. The potential
of video games to simulate murder created a new issue in entertainment media.
A great number of news stories link video games with violent crimes. Studies have
found a correlation between aggressive behavior and video games, but critics claim
that these studies do not prove that video games cause violent acts.
Video game addiction is associated more with online games, although many instances
of single-player obsessions exist as well.
Sexism and gender issues are hot topics in the video game industry, as female gamers
and developers often struggle for equal footing. Controversy has arisen over character
stereotypes; however, modern games are beginning to break through conventional
barriers of gender.

 THE FUTURE MEDIA

Life has changed dramatically over the past decade, and a major reason for this is the
progression of media technology.
Traditional Media encompasses all the means of communication that existed before
the Internet and new media technology, including printed materials (books,
magazines, and newspapers), broadcast communications (TV and radio), film, and
music. New Media, on the other hand, includes electronic video games and
entertainment, and the Internet and social media.
New media has three major advantages over traditional media: First, it is immediate,
enabling consumers to find out the latest news, weather report, or stock prices at the
touch of a button.
Digital music can be downloaded instantly, movies can be ordered via cable or satellite
on-demand services, and books can be read on e-readers.
In an increasingly fast-paced world, there is little need to wait for anything … but ….

The second advantage is cost. Most online content is free, from blogs and social
networking sites to news and entertainment sources. Whether readers are willing to
pay for content once they are used to receiving it for free is something that the The
New York Times set to find out in 2011, when it introduces a metered fee model for its
online paper.
Finally, new media is able to reach the most remote parts of the globe.
But …

Modern media delivery has numerous advantages, including the speed at which
content is delivered, the widespread reach of the Internet, and the low cost—most
online content is free.
But …

Online media delivery enables a wide range of voices and perspectives to be heard via
blogs and social networking sites. These sites are also changing the way knowledge is
consumed: from a one-way system (for example, through passively reading newspaper
articles) to a dynamic process that involves an entire online community.
But …

The Internet also has economic disadvantages; it widens the digital divide between
those who have access to the technology and those who do not (usually older people,
people of lower economic means or educational status, or people in developing
countries with poor infrastructure) …

Tech giants: FAMGA (Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, Google and Amazon), FANG
(Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, Google), or GAFA (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple) ….
They are different from their predecessors in two significant ways: They are U.S.
multinationals rather than being rooted in the countries in which they operate, and
they are largely unconstrained by commitments to protect the public interest.

 NEW TRENDS IN MEDIA

1. TikTok’s continued takeover

2. Livestream’s power to connect with consumers
3. Mainstream virtual reality
4. Augmented reality is everywhere
5. Audio chat
6. Video content
7. Instagram stories for strategic marketing

As a result of rapid change in the digital age, careers in media are constantly shifting,
and many people who work in the industry face an uncertain future:
• Interface designer
• Cloud computing engineer
• Integrated digital media specialist
• Game developer: Art director, Programmer, Sound designer, Producer, Game
tester, Animator …
• Mobile application developer
• Media consultant