Media is an essential tool for people, that allows them to connect themselves to the rest of the world as well as being a form of entertainment. Many forms of media exist such as television, radio, the newspaper and the Internet. The television allows users to watch recorded and live video whether it being the news or their favorite show. The radio allows users to listen to audio and the newspaper paper functions as a set of text and still images for users to read. However, while each of these have their own set function to communicate media to the world, the Internet is the medium that can take all of these different functions and put them together (Adams & Clark).
The Internet has five defining characteristics that allows it to be the only media that includes video, audio, text and still images at the same time. The Internet is hyper-textual, interactive, digital, packet based and multi-mediated. These 5 characteristics makes the Internet unique and the most popular communication medium (Adams & Clark).
One of the most important characteristics of the Internet is the fact that it is hyper-textual. Hyper-textual comes from the creation of the hypertext markup language. This language was developed by Tim Berners-Lee in 1990 and allowed for easy navigation throughout the Internet. To further explain, hypertexuality is the underlined words in an article or story on the Internet that are actually links that bring you to another page when they are clicked on. These links usually bring you to a page that further explains something within the article or story. Hypertexuality is a unique characteristic and helps the Internet separate itself from the other media available(Adams & Clark).
The multivocality that is brought to the Internet by the html language leads into the next defining characteristic of the Internet. Interactivity is truly what gives you a different experience than watching television or listening to the radio. The hypertextuality of the Internet allows you to control where you go. Unlike other media you have a choice on what you want to watch, listen to or read. With there being hundreds of millions of websites to choose from on the Internet it makes your options endless. The interactivity of the Internet also gives you the option of communication with other people. Many programs are built for this person to person interaction on the Internet such as instant messaging and email. Even if you are in the mood to be a social butterfly, chat rooms and forums are also available for your use. Computer programs developed for the Internet also allow you to receive information such as weather and other topics you are interested in. All of these options of communication and entertainment available should alone make the Internet different than any other media (Adams & Clark).
With other media, the reliability is not always there. The Internet is packet based which allows it to separate itself in terms of reliability from other forms of media. Packet switching is when a data file is cut up into pieces called packets. These packets are labeled with their origin, place in the file and their final destination. The thing that makes packet switching such a useful characteristic of the Internet is that if one packet can't make it to its destination it is resent again and re-routed another way to reach its destination successfully (Packet switching definition, 2005). The packet switching process was developed because of the possibility of a nuclear attack during the cold war. This means that if there was an attack people outside of the attack zone could communicate to people on the other side. If you tried to send a radio wave or television signal through the attack zone they would be broken up. The fact that packet switching is so versatile, makes the Internet the most reliable medium (Adams & Clark).
Digitalization is another paramount characteristic of the Internet. Without being able to make files digital the packet switching process wouldn't work and the Internet wouldn't be where it is today. The digitalization of a file is when the file is put into binary code which is a bunch of ones and zeros. The computer then can take the codes (stands of 1's and 0's) and decode the file which would then show up as the original file on a monitor. This is a huge advantage over carrying around physical files. For example imagine carrying around 2 gigabytes of music. That could be up to 20 cd's you would have to carry around compared to a 2 gigabyte flash drive. Being able to compress data such as music is one of the most useful features of digitalization. Another option would being able to store your physical data as digital data online on servers for easy access from other places that provide the Internet(Adams & Clark).
As I mentioned before, the Internet is the only communication medium that can present a user with still images, video, audio and text at the same time. The ability to show a user this all at the same time makes the internet multimediated source. Television and books are also multimediated but not in such a way as the Internet is. This characteristic makes the Internet not boring. If you get bored with reading an article you can click on a video that gives you a brief summary of it. It's also possible to look at a picture and get a general idea if you want to read it or not. These multimedia options give so many different ways in absorbing information depending on your mood and make it fun while your doing it (Adams & Clark).
The Internet is full of advantages that make using it more simple, entertaining and worth your time over any other media. It allows you to do anything from communicating with one another to easily obtaining information that is personalized to your liking. The five characteristics that I mentioned without a doubt define the Internet and make it possible to be the communication powerhouse it is today.
Bibliography
1. Adams, & Clark, C. What is it? characteristics of the medium.
2. The linux information project.(2005). Packet switching definition.
Retrieved September 7, 2008 from
http://www.linfo.org/packet_switching.html
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