Future belongs to media weddings

Nowadays media is a tool which inevitably exists among us and the world. The expanding world of media in the future will connect to the web of information. Probably everybody could agree with the idea that media as a myth – a challenge for today. Paul Klee’s painting “Angelus Novus” was used as the interpretation of W. Banjamin who saw history as progress. What does it mean? It means that all forms of media are engaged and will be used together. 

 

Media fragmentation in the 40’s started with considerably more radio, newspapers, magazines, cinema, theatre and posters. It’s now common knowledge that in the 60’s (the nation’s first televised debates: Kennedy vs Nixon) television took an exclusive role in user generated media. During these years society began to get more news from the television than the newspaper. However, over the years it’s begun to take on a less important role due to the fact that new types of media such as smartphone, HDTV, Blue Ray, iTunes, Podcasting, Blogging and Youtube started to appear. Does it mean that TV can be replaced by the Internet? It means that the two are engaged together. We can say that a conceptual and digital age consists of phases of communication (orality, manuscripts, print, electronic) and convergence. Nowadays the digital age has mobile phones with cameras, watches with calculators, iPhones, radio with Internet, print design with web design and so on. The convergence of these media forms affects not just communication, but our behavior as well. 

Television as a tool for mass communication

13 days more and Lithuania will celebrate the first translated program in Lithuanian television history. It was on the 27^th of April (1957). Quite late when compared with other European countries (the first experimental direct broadcasts were in 1929 in the United Kingdom and Germany). However, today Lithuania may still justifiably be called a country of TV lovers. People are used to watching TV in order to get news and to be entertained. This medium between society and news or entertainment has a big influence on even our daily routines - people are now even used to co-ordinating their daily plans in order to see a certain TV program. Also it has altered our world through mass communication by presuming it manipulated and still manipulates our thinking and behavior. 

“Television is a medium which permits millions of people to listen to the same joke at the same time and yet remain lonesome” (T.S. Elliot).

Technology attracts not only the attention, but it indirectly leads society along the way it wants to. The best example to base this idea may be a documentary film called “Czech Dream” (2004), directed by young Czech directors Vít Klusák and Filip Remunda. The film is about a mass communication experiment where a new supermarket called “Czech Dream” is advertised, but transpires to be a hoax. The aim of this experiment was to demonstrate how strongly media affects society. Nearly 3000 thousand came to see a fake supermarket.

However, even in this example television was not the only media for mass communications. Nowadays media is in a process of convergence. 

Losses of TV viewers recognized the importance of technology

There are more and more TV viewing options. En excellent example is Apple’s iTunes which people like because it is easy to use. However TV still has strong content and this is what people need. TV content, formally a one-directional visual communication, has today evolved into a two-way communication and plays an important role in the digital area. TV has the potential to grow further, but not singly. It is developing with a convergence of other media. TV interactivity is growing via social networks (Twitter, Facebook, ect.) because people like to share what kind of television programs they are watching. TV as an information tool will spread even more, the only question is: what will it be called? This is the result of convergence. It is likely, that the mobile devices role will increase significantly in television viewing. The usual television screens will be replaced by tablet (iPad) screens. Direct television broadcasting will be monitored both: on television screens and through mobile phones. From that point of view people will be able to get more information and share it with others etc.

Over the past 5-10 years, television has changed into something previously unrecognizable. In February of this year Lithuanian National Radio and Television (LRT) followed in the footsteps of Britain’s BBC – becoming a single facility incorporating connected television, radio and an Internet portal, for their audience suggested content-related programs designated for smart devices, created their own video-sharing portal in “Youtube”, started to use a supercomputer, work with students and create an interactive television. Now they have a redesigned site where radio and television is on the Internet. According to research data, about 70% of portal visitors are going directly to this mediatheque. LRT actively enforce their cross-promotion – in each of three LRT channels they are advertising each other. Although one hour of HD video comes in at about 20-25 GB, it is still possible to prepare ten times smaller files because LRT is using supercomputer. 

The increasing consolidation of information increase the need for media research in order to explore innovative ways of interacting with consumer needs and habits in a digital space. By using special programs it’s now even possible to determine exactly in which media channel users watched a video or listened to music. One of the ways is “Virtual Meter,” a tool which helps to observe and calculate the audience of electronic media. Media audience measurement is very important and is a significant tool for media development which affects a convergence a lot. It supplies a list of conceivable assumptions concerning how to reach their goals of media convergence and not to lose media audience interests. According to Lithuanian Market and Media Research Company TNS LT data, in 2012 the average Lithuanian watched 3 hours and 36 minutes of Television each day. This metric grows annually, indicating Lithuanians still prefer television. But it doesn’t mean that the Internet usage has a low level. According to Lithuanian Information Society Development Committee under the Ministry of Transport and Communications (ISDC), the usage of the Internet is growing each year as well. Comparing the last two years, the percentage of Internet usage from 2011 to 2012 grew by 7 points. In recent years, the growth of these indicators has lead to the increasingly elderly population becoming interested in information technologies and their possibilities. Right now 70% of Lithuanians are using the Internet. However, the ranking shows that Lithuanians still prefer to use computer more instead of the Internet. Each percentage of the Internet usage is approximately 2% less than the usage of computers. In general, the usage of the Internet in Lithuania is quite behind the average of the general European usage.  

As a result the Internet has changed the television despite the fact that all values of the content became less loyalty. The biggest advantage here is the increasing amount of consumers. Furthermore, you will not require a TV to watch TV and that is why television doesn’t have a capital letter whereas the Internet does.