Networked Computer Media
and the Middle Ground

Davis Foulger
Visiting Associate Professor
Oswego State University

A Poster Presentation at DIAC-02
Shaping the Network Society
May 18, 2002

Extended Abstract

A Medium of Communication is:

A system that enables the creation and consumption of messages

A process that is negotiated by its users

A time, space, and scale machine

Media Taxonomies Describe

Relationships between media ...

• Bretz (1971): 28 Media and 5 characteristics
• Ciampa (1989): At least 43 Media
• Foulger (1992): 52 Media and 12 characteristics
• Hoffman and Novak (1996): 35 Media with 8 characteristics

... based on characteristics of media

• Simon's attributes of the artifact
• McLuhan's
  • "hot" and "cool"
  • "lineality";
  • "eye-oriented" and "ear-oriented"
• Ong's "spare linearity"

The Possibilities Associated with the Medium

• A set of things a medium can do or be used for

A Variety of Media

Propinquitous Interactive Media	Intimacy, Face-to-Face Interaction, Social Dancing, Small Group Interaction, Brainstorming, Family Interaction, Participatory Games and Sports, Classroom discussion
Live Presentational Media	Speeches, Lectures, Town Meetings, Judicial Proceedings, Ritual Ceremonies, Legislative Assemblies, Mobs, Theatrical Performance, Bonfires, Political Rallies, Live Musical Performance, Sporting Events, Puppet Shows
Static Art Media	Cave Paintings, Bas Relief, Oil Paintings, Dioramas, Quilts, Pottery, Sculpture, Architecture, Animatons, Photographs, Filmstrips, Holographic Recordings, Signs, Billboards
Correspondence Media	Letters, Notes, Memos, Telewriting, Telegrams, Telex, Facsimile, Tape Letters, Personal Video, Recorded Telewriting, Electronic Mail
Publishing Media	Books, Daily Newspapers, Magazines, Video Recordings (Videotapes, DVD Video, etc), Weekly Newspapers, Journals, Recordings (Records, CD's, Cassettes), Newsletters, Mechandise Packaging, On-line information, Online databases, Online services, Electronic Publications, MultiMedia Documents (VideoText), Billboards, Direct Mail Advertizing, Microforms
Telephonic Media	Telephone, Teleconferencing, Intercom, C.B. Radio, Ham Radio, Family Radio, Videophone, VideoConferencing, Internet Telephone (CU See Me), Instant Messenger
Dynamic Art Media	Silent Film, Motion Pictures, Film with Subtitles, Talking Animatons, Lightboards
Broadcast Media	Broadcast Television, Cable Television, Satellite TV, Digital TV, Radio, Talk Radio
Interactive Mass Media	Hypermedia, Video Hypermedia, Computer Conferencing (Newsgroups, ListServes), Cooperative Composition, Voice Mail, Electronic Bulletin Boards, Streaming Audio and Video, Voice-into-text concurrent interaction, Virtual Reality, Interactive Television

A Range of Media Characteristics

To be explored in more detail in the forthcoming
Characteristics of Media: the Message Beneath
(Scarecrow Press)

Network Computer Media and the Middle Ground

Are network computer media different than other media in any fundamental way?

Early experience suggested they are:

• A set of "mass interpersonal" media
  • Interactive structures
  • Mass consumption

Media typologies refine this view

• All network computer media operate in a middle ground between traditional media
• Creating a vector of media that manipulate time and scale

MediaSpace (Foulger, 1992)

Implications

Subsequent studies support this observation

• Hoffman and Novak (1996)
• Emerging Results from work comparing a larger number of media on 190 characteristics
  • Network computer media stake out a middle ground
    • in the number of associated roles

There are questions:

• "I don't really believe this conclusion. It suggests to me that the variables used to classify media don't include any dimensions on which the Web is truly different. That is, the key dimensions that differentiate the Web are being left out." (Note from Tom Novak)
• This larger data set offers hope of finding this missing dimension

Building Time Machines

But what we already know makes sense

Network computer media:

• conquer space with distributed communities
• support a wide range of scales
  • from dyadic (Instant Messenger, e-mail)
  • to group (Chatrooms, CSCW environments)
  • to community (LISTs, Groups, Web Sites)
  • to mass (Web Portals, E-Commerce)
• enable the manipulation of time
  • not just synchronous and asynchronous
  • but near-synchronous, delinearized, relinearized, parallel, and supersynchronous

References

Bretz, Rudy. (1971). The Communication Media. Englewood Cliffs, NJ; Educational Technology Publications.

Ciampa, John A. (1989). Communication: The Living End. New York; Philosophical Library.

Foulger, Davis. (1992). Computers and Human Communication. In Pickover, Cliff (Ed). Visions of the Future.

Foulger, Davis. (1992). Building Time Machines: thinking about the future of interpersonal communication. SUNY Oswego Cognitive Science Series. http://www.oswego.edu/~dfoulger/research/timeInMedia2.

Foulger, Davis. (In preparation). Characteristics of Media: the message beneath. Scarecrow Press.

Hoffman, Donna L. and Thomas P. Novak. Marketing in Hypermedia Computer-Mediated Environments: Conceptual Foundations. Journal of Marketing, July 1996.

Novak, Thomas P. (2001) Your 1996 article: Marketing in Hypermedia Computer-Mediated Environments: Conceptual Foundations. Private E-Mail.